Relationship between Environmental Qualities and Continuation of Urban Life in Public Realm

Complex situations of today’s life have led to the complexity of urban issues and changed meanings of many urban places. Public realms are transformed to ways for connections between private spaces. A significant emphasis on speed، technology and time encourages men to move swiftly between private spaces. Enhancing the quality of urban life and social life in urban spaces are prominent challenges in designing of urban field and many comments are posed based on situations and different experiences in this field of research. The creation of responsible and sociable places requires the application of behavioral and social sciences and general analysis of environmental qualities. A great deal researches have been carried out that address the importance of social aspects of urban places only based on qualitative concepts of urban design. The current research tries to establish a logical relationship between environmental qualities and social aspects of urban places through a systematic procedure. To do that، the research tries to keep the qualitative concepts of urban life and urban design in mind. The case study for the research is Jolfa district in Isfahan. Jolfa is a part of historical fabric of Isfahan city where in some of its sections are highly commuted due to its connections with the main structure of the city. However، the rest of it lacks the above-mentioned advantages. Therefore، there are no active social life and interaction in a satisfactory level in that neighborhood. Based on the final goal of this research، the social capital as a prominent aspect of social dimensions and on the other hand، environmental qualities should be assessed in the selected district. Social capital is one of the main factors discussed in sociology and social sciences. It has recently been though as a conceptual tool in urban design field. The current study tries to find a logical relationship between the level of social capital and urban qualities in order to offer an urban approach of social capital and apply it as a functional tool in urban design. This is done by taking into account that improving of urban qualities and their sub-qualities are the main strategies to promote the social life of the city. For evaluating the level of social capital in the selected district، carefully designed questionnaires were prepared which are based on the statistical indicators and were distributed among a certain number of people in the neighborhood (334 people in this study calculated based on Cochran relation). This is done after picking initial questionnaires and reviewing them in terms of clarity and straightforwardness and the capability of questions to convey the desired concept. The analysis of the results obtained from these questionnaires was used to review the level of social capital in social nodes and paths connecting them in the studied district. After calculating the level of social capital، urban qualities should be investigated in the selected social nodes and paths between them. In this research، the main focus was on those qualities which are in close relation with space users’ behavioral needs. Other issues that were taken into consideration were creating sociable urban spaces، improving social capital، and enhancing social interactions in urban fabrics. Walkability، security، safety، sociability، permeability، and sense of richness are environmental qualities which focused in this paper. For each of mentioned qualities، based on review of literature، several sub-qualities are identified and a method is selected for each of sub-qualities for assessment in the selected district. Methods like evaluating the collected questionnaires، field observation، analysis of the maps of the district، and interview were also used in the current research. Since this research tries to find logical relationship between the level of environmental qualities and social capital، the researchers tried to qualify the selected environmental qualities and rephrase them in the shape of digits. In other words، the quantified scales for analyzing the sub-qualities were defined. In order to better compute the ultimate results and achieve the research goal، the technique of Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) was applied. Because of simplicity، flexibility، and simultaneous application of qualitative and quantitative criteria، AHP has been extensively utilized in urban planning and design issues. In the current research، AHP technique is applied in two stages. In the first stage، the weight of each sub-quality is calculated for computing the resultant of each quality. In the second stage، the weight of each quality is calculated for computing the resultant of all selected qualities in the specified node or path. Ultimately، by this procedure the environmental qualities and the resultant of them are calculated and processed as digits. In the last part of research، the resultant of environmental qualities is compared with the level of social capital in each node or path. The results proved the existence of a direct relationship between social capital and resultant of urban qualities in Jolfa district in Isfahan city as a case study. The comparison of the pair of the above-mentioned factors also indicated that the relationships between the urban qualities and social capital are nonlinear. This is because of the impact of several other factors on social capital and the complexity of the relations between them.