Improving the Environmental Qualities as an Approach to Achieve Social Sustainable Development (Case Study: Historical Fabric of Jolfa, Isfahan)

Urban space, as a ground to achieve sustainable development, is not merely regarded as a physical concept. In fact, it associates the physique of a town regarded as a location for urban activities and social interactions. Therefore, urban space, being endowed with functional efficiency, should appear efficient in social co-efficiencies, too and that urban development should be along the formation of social promoting elements. This question is raised that what qualifications and specifications should an urban space include to pave the ground for social and human sustainable development? This article determines qualities of related urban design conducting to the final aims of the research: introduction of criteria for the evaluation and promotion of local sustainability with emphasis on Isfahan Jolfa district as the case study. Then, some sub-measurements are defined and determined for each of the qualities, and the maps of the region are studied, surveyed and analyzed by the aid of survey methods, interview, questionnaire and analysis. Finally, having determined the qualitative rate of each quality and prioritizing them, certain criteria for the measurement of district's sustainability are introduced by the aid of AHP technique. This provides a procedure to enable the urban managers and other decision makers to prioritize their activities for the improvement of environmental qualities based on sustainable development procedure.