Cultural Frameworks of Cities: An Analysis of Requirements and Challenges of Sustainability of Cultural Landscapes in Compiling Cultural Maps

A cultural landscape, as the common product of intentional interventions of man in nature, is considered one of the multifaceted assets in cultural maps. In urban studies, compiling a cultural map requires checking the sustainability of cultural landscapes; therefore, the problem of current research is to analyze the requirements and challenges of the sustainability of cultural landscapes in the compilation of the cultural map of city of Kashan. The research method was combined and conducted in two qualitative phases with a phenomenological and quantitative approach using a survey method. The sample research in the first phase included 15 experts selected in a purposeful way; the data collection tool included a semi-structured, in-depth interview; Colaizzi’s method was used to analyze the data and to measure the validity of the research data through the agreement coefficient and two coders. In the second phase, the statistical sample included 150 experts of tourism cultural heritage, urban section, and architecture and urban design section from Kashan who were selected through a Non-probability sampling. The tool of data collection was a researcher-made questionnaire taken from the first phase; face and content validity of which had been confirmed, and the reliability of which had been estimated at 0.7 with Cronbach alpha. Confirmatory factor analysis was used for the analysis of the data. The results showed that the requirements and challenges of sustainability of cultural landscapes included 5 categories: a technical and infrastructural one, the category of care and safety, management category, a socio-cultural one, and a natural one with 43 components. The results of the quantitative part showed that the factors of natural, infrastructural, cultural, and social elements have the highest coefficients respectively. According to experts’ average opinions, the cultural and social dimensions as well as the category of care and safety, respectively, have the higher priority in the sustainability of cultural landscapes in cultural maps.