Analysis of Architectural Heritage Revitalization Experiences Based on the Measurement of User Satisfaction Case Study: Revitalization Experiences with Residential-Touristic Function in the Historical Urban Fabric of Yazd

Yazd is located in the center of Iran. The Historical urban fabric of Yazd is as an urban heritage with valuable cultural and historical monuments. Until now, numerous activities with revitalization approach have been done in order to conserve the Yazd cultural heritage. In recent years, this conservative approach had led to revitalization of some historical buildings to residential-touristic units in historical urban fabric of Yazd. Assessing the quality of revitalization in these experiences will provide a suitable basis to improve the quality of revitalization process of architectural heritages in future instances. This study is aimed to assessing the quality of architectural heritage revitalization experiences with touristic–residential function that is based on the perspective of tourist users, and has studied the components that are effective on quality of these experiences. This study is based on attitude research and has been conducted using structured questioning for tourist users that have resided in 26 identified cases as architectural and environmental scales. According to user-oriented approach of this study, measurement of tourists' satisfaction regarding the effective components on qualitative fields of revitalization is considered as a basis for evaluating the experiences. Based on the results of this study, average satisfaction of tourism users for the quality of each of affected fields on revitalization experiences is more than 60 percent. Tourist satisfaction of “functional qualities of revitalization” in these cases is at the lowest rank, and satisfaction of “safety and mental relaxation qualities of revitalization”, “social qualities of revitalization” and “the quality of respect for the user in revitalization” are ranked second to forth. Satisfaction of “cultural and valued qualities of revitalization” is in the first rank and has the most impact on ultimate quality of revitalization on both architectural and environmental scales. In these samples on both architectural and environmental scale, the components, which are related to culture and intangible heritage and are effective on related qualities, have higher effect in increasing tourist’s satisfaction of revitalization process in comparison with other measured components that are tangible and controls functional qualities. On the other hand, the components, which have less effect on tourist’s satisfaction in architectural and environmental scales, are mostly physical and tangible ones. These units have some problems in terms of functional and physical aspects of their revitalization that users have emphasized on them. Therefore, when revitalization process leads towards reinforcement of tangible qualities that are related to functional and physical aspects of revitalization, more attention and consideration is necessary. Generally, the experiences of “residential – touristic unit’s revitalization” have been successful in terms of conservation and transferring the semantic values. Tourists’ satisfaction of semantic aspects of revitalization and conservation values shows the success of architectural heritage revitalization process with touristic-residential function in relation to conservation, and introducing and inducing values. The total satisfaction of tourists for the quality of the revitalization of the studied historical buildings indicates the relative success of the cases.