Analysis and Explanation of Physical Landscape Indicators and Their Changes in the Villages on the Outskirts of Metropolises (Case Study: Villages on the Northern Outskirts of Mashhad Metropolis)

The rural environment is one of the elements of the spatial organization and the landscape of the village with its different physical, functional and semantic dimensions has a special importance and place in the visual organization of the rural environment. Changes in the lifestyle and needs of the villagers in recent years have also intensified and accelerated the process of landscape change. Therefore, the management and planning of these spaces, like a living entity in the suburbs of metropolises, require considerable attention. The present applied research with a descriptive-analytical method is aimed at identifying the indicators of landscape explanation and the extent of its changes in the villages on the outskirts of Mashhad metropolis. To collect data, documentary and field methods (questionnaire and observation) have been used, and data analysis has been done by (Kruskal-Wallis, Wilcoxon and Friedman) tests. The results indicate that among the landscape components, the landscape identity component has changed the most. In fact, the occurrence of physical changes in the villages has caused a decrease in the sense of reminiscence, vitality, freshness, the degree of harmony of different spaces and the fading of local cultural values. Finally, the physical changes have caused "a further change in the identity dimension of the rural landscape". The results of Friedman's test show the highest change in the land use index among all the landscape indices. Therefore, landscape changes should be considered as the most important consequence of land use change.