Analysis and assessment of urban walkways with emphasis on health dimensions (Case study: Hamadan Ekbatan walkway)

With fast city development and motorized transportation, The assessment of success of walkways in dimensions of environmental health is necessary problem. The research method is descriptive-analytical and its purpose is practical. Obtaining data is both documental and in-field(questionnaire). 399 people were calculated as a sample size using Cochran formula. Questionnaire were distributed randomly among citizens. Also, 20 authorities and 50 retailers were questioned. The variables include the health criteria, namely physical, social and mental dimension checked by Likert scale. The elements of walkway include hard and soft elements. Findings of T-test showed in Ekbatan walkway the average of physical health indicators (2.89), social (2.67), and mental (2/8), are lower than the middle of (3). Therefore, it can be concluded that the quality of this walkway is low in terms of environmental health criteria respectively. Authorities and retailers confirm these results with minimum differences due to benefit contrast. Also, the results of Pearson correlation coefficient and path analysis of relation of triple factors of health show the highest correlation was between the factors of social and mental health (0.480) and the least one was between the factors of social and physical health (0.309). Furthermore, social health factors (0.375) and physical (0.267) have the maximum effect coefficient with hard and soft elements of Ekbatan walkway respectively. Deprived geographical position, the way of planning and urban management and over physical economical, social factors have had key role to form above results. Finally, according to findings, the practical strategies have been presented.