فصلنامه مطالعات شهری
پیاپی 42 (بهار 1401)

The worldwide outbreak of Covid-19 since the end of 2019 can be considered as one of the biggest challenges in recent decades, which has caused the issue of epidemic diseases to assume a prominent position in the atlas of natural and artificial hazards. The high rate of spread, high mortality rates, and severe damage to various economic and social sectors of societies indicates the importance of considering this key issue. According to the World Health Organization, the coronavirus epidemic is a global crisis that is unique in contemporary history in terms of spatial extent, onset rate, and complexity. Therefore, the present study has sought to answer the following question: which urban resilience variables are associated with higher priority in the struggle against epidemic diseases in the city of Kermanshah, Iran?

Theoretical Framework

A community’s resilience to potential contingencies is determined by the degree to which it can access the required resources and its capability of organizing itself both in advance and when needed. Accordingly, a resilient community is one that functions prudently in reduction of risk, preparation for the various effects of risk, and acceleration of recovery from hazardous events.Following the outbreak of Covid-19, it became clear that urban resilience extends beyond climate, landscape, ecology, and natural disasters. To raise the capability of an urban environment, therefore, such shocks need to be absorbed without significant changes in its structure or function. Hence, urban planners must seek to answer such questions as why urban planning has been inactive in control of the coronavirus epidemic crisis, and whether the concentration and distribution of population and activity has made city dwellers more vulnerable to diseases, terrorist attacks, and artificial and natural disasters. The answers to these questions are essential because there is ample evidence about the influence of urban form and design on the prevalence of epidemics.

The present applied research involved interpretive description. The required information was collected in two ways: through library studies and questionnaires. For collection of data and identification of the initial variables through a review of various study sources, nineteen variables were finally selected for evaluation. After the variables were compiled, the studied sample was analyzed by the elite.Since the Micmac software was used to analyze the data, the questionnaire involved a matrix of cross-adjustment effects, and was validated by experts. The data input to Micmac were obtained using the Delphi method and a questionnaire distributed among fifteen experts familiar with the conditions in Kermanshah (ten people with doctorate degrees and five with master’s degrees). In order to increase the validity of the data, prerequisites were considered such as explanation of the conceptual model based on the latest scientific research, the experts’ acquaintance with the case study, reception of the experts’ feedback about the final results, and independency of the experts.

The present study analyzed the influence of urban resilience against epidemics on the basis of nineteen variables. The findings demonstrated that the following variables had the greatest direct and indirect impacts on the other variables involved in resilience in Kermanshah in the face of Covid-19: the infrastructure for remote provision of professional, administrative, academic, and medical services, access to green and open spaces and recreation-and-sports land uses, access to services and neighborhood scale uses, capacity of urban facilities and equipment such as the electricity network and Internet, and unified, integrated management in crisis conditions. Moreover, the two variables capacity of neighborhoods for walking and cycling and enhancement of local communities’ public participation and social capital exhibited a two-dimensional nature in the issue of resilience in Kermanshah. This means that these variables are affected by others while greatly influencing them.

Based on the factors identified as drivers, suggestions should be made for their promotion. Therefore, four macro approaches were mentioned as priority plans through adaption of the driving factors to what had been proposed in previous studies, including integrated urban management, the digital city, orientation toward the neighborhood, and social capital. In fact, one can implicitly achieve urban resilience against epidemic diseases by placing such approaches at the forefront of the urban planning system.The four proposed approaches are important because the synergy of measures taken in the public and private sectors is expected to improve and prevent waste of time and financial and human resources, aided by integrated urban management. Enhancement of the role of the digital city is important not only for provision of tools for identification and control of carriers of disease but also for better reduction of physical contact through telecommuting capacity, e-learning, online shopping, etc. Orientation toward the neighborhood is also considered significant as it reduces  long inter-neighborhood commute by meeting citizens’ daily and weekly needs on a neighborhood scale. In addition, if urban neighborhoods are properly designed, achievements such as pedestrianization and access to green and open spaces will be realized, which will play a key role in residents’ mental and physical health during quarantine. The impact of social capital is also important because epidemics can be managed only through the people’s empathy and collective will. In fact, as the disease spreads among the people, their support and participation can undeniably help to control it.

The relationship between building density and energy consumption involves a complex interaction between climate factors, location patterns, the way urban open spaces are located, and the adjacency of the buildings of which they are composed. Therefore, this study investigated the thermal performance of residential buildings based on the patterns of residential blocks in Hamadan Province, Iran using the concept of minor climate and thermal islands influenced by density regulations. It aimed to evaluate the effect of these regulations on energy consumption. A comprehensive collection of thermal simulations were conducted based on the climate of Hamadan and a statistical analysis for examination of the effect of height on the energy consumption resulting from increased urban density.

 Theoretical Framework

A criterion used for measurement of the energy consumption of buildings is the micro-urban climate resulting from the density regulations (H/W).  These regulations can affect the access of buildings to sunlight and, thus, the energy performance of buildings. Density regulation indices include two categories: middle-scale and micro-scale. The middle-scale category involves an H/W criterion for measurement of the impact of the outdoor environment. The micro-scale category involves criteria for changes in the building volume geometry, including the surface-to-volume ratio (S/V), ratio of surface exposed to direct sunlight to total surface (Ssn/Ssh), shadow area (Ssu/Ssh), substructure (Ssu/A), volume (Ssu/V), and ratio of window surface to the total wall surface (WSR), which changes as height varies. 

The methodology involved a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods. In the simulation stage, two modes were considered to specify the effect of H/W on energy consumption. First, fixed height and variable street width were considered in the modeling for examination of the effect of the street width index, and fixed street width and variable height were then considered for examination of the height index. For analysis of the findings of the statistical methods, correlation, analysis of variance, and multiple regression were used.The relationships between energy consumption and the variable of street width and each of the indicators of the variable of height were investigated with the Pearson correlation coefficient. For investigation of the simultaneous effect of all the indices of the independent variable on the dependent variable (energy consumption), multiple regression analysis was used to specify which geometric factor exhibited the greatest impact on energy consumption. Analysis of variance was used for comparison and evaluation of the mean differences between the groups.
For validation, two methods were used: experimental (involving field measurements) and comparative (involving a comparison of the results of different software).

The results obtained from the correlation analysis revealed that there is a close direct relationship in all residential blocks of northern patterns between H(fix)/W(6m-36m) and annual energy consumption, while there is no correlation in southern patterns. The relationship between H(4f-10f)/W(fix) and annual energy is direct in northern patterns but inverse and slightly effective in southern patterns.As the H(fix)/W(6m-36m) ratio decreases, cooling energy consumption increases sharply (inverse correlation), and heating and total energy consumption decrease sharply (direct correlation). In this analysis, energy savings are greater on a wider street than on a narrower street, and fixed-height buildings exhibit lower annual energy consumption on a wider street.Positive correlation (high intensity) and negative correlation with heating energy (low intensity) is established between the geometric characteristics of residential parts (S/V, Ssu/S, Ssu/V, Ssu/Ssh, and Ssn/A) and cooling energy consumption. Wider streets receive more sunlight than narrower ones, so those with lower geometric indices exhibit better thermal performance and greater reduction of heating energy consumption.

Building density and its indices are influential in northern patterns, and increase in height and pathway width contributes to the reduction of energy consumption. Therefore, the geometric index of an urban street is effective in northern patterns, and a rise in height through an increase  in the horizontal distance between buildings affects the reduction of energy consumption. However, the value of the index (H/W) is lower on the urban passages of the cold climate of Hamadan (deep urban valleys), and the energy consumption of the building decreases as the absorption of solar radiation increases. Multiple regression analysis showed that the most indicative energy consumption factors in the patterns included the geometric index (H/W), the number of sunny surfaces (Ssu), the ratio of shadow (Ssh) to the substructure (A), and total surface area (S) . The proposed model (involving a change in the occupancy level of the initial model) exhibited the most optimal thermal performance with decreases by 42.9% in cooling energy and by 4.73% in total energy.

Acknowledgment

The article has been derived from the Ph.D. thesis entitled "Determination of housing deployment pattern considering the influence of climate factors on the inside thermal comfort whit an energy management approach (case study Hamedan)", which has been defended by the first author under the second author’s supervision and the third author’s advisory at the Qazvin Branch, Islamic Azad University.

The increase in the development of urban population and replacement of concern for quantitative standards by consideration of qualitative approaches has led to a rise in the quality of urban life and urban livability, where the role of officials and urban management is important, along with the need for a comprehensive study of various dimensions in the city. Following the rapid population growth as a result of migration and the unplanned expansion of the city of Urmia, Iran, the capital of West Azerbaijan Province, and the consequent problems, the need for a comprehensive effort to save the city and improve the quality of life therein has been highlighted more than ever. In response to these problems, various theories and approaches have been proposed, one of which is the livable city approach. Given that livability is a complex, multidimensional concept, and its patterns are completely different from one region to another, no comprehensive model has been presented so far of the effects of livability indicators in the old and new parts of cities in the current conditions and the relationships between them. Therefore, this comparative study was intended to investigate the extent of livability in the old and new parts of Urmia based on the relevant indicators.

Theoretical Framework

Livability is defined as the quality of life experienced by the inhabitants of a city or region. Kennedy and Bai believe that the concept of livability is defined by terms such as the well-being of the society, and represents the characteristics that turn a place into one where people always want to live.

In this descriptive-analytical applied research, data collection was conducted through library studies, available articles, field studies, and census information released in 2016 by the Statistical Center of Iran. Thus, after the resources relevant to livability were studied, twelve indicators were selected from among various effective factors to obtain the research output, given the availability of data on Urmia. These indicators include access to medical use, access to commercial use, access to sports and recreational use, access to green space use, quality of buildings, area covered by sewage, access to academic and cultural use, number of literate people, population density, average land price, number of employees, and access to the main thoroughfares. Given that each of the indicators effective in specification of livability has a different coefficient of importance (weight), the opinions of the elite were used in this article to determine the weights of the indicators. To weigh the indicators according to the BWM method, thirty questionnaires were developed with contents based on their pairwise comparison in terms of the preference of the best indicator over the others and the preference of the other indicators over the worst. In the next step, the questionnaire data were entered into the GAMS software and calculated and analyzed. A weight of 0.081 was calculated with the value of lε obtained for the thirty questionnaires, which indicates the stability and consistency of the calculated weights due to its proximity to zero. For a spatial analysis, the information layers of the indicators were first digitized and edited in the GIS software, and the significance coefficient calculated by the BWM method was multiplied by each of the indicators through conversion of the information layers into a raster and their classification. Using the weighted sum, the indicators were then combined for measurement of livability in the old and new parts of Urmia. 

The calculations of the weights of the twelve indicators in the Gomez software indicates that the highest weight concerns the average land price indicator, with a significance coefficient of 0.169, and the lowest weight pertains to the area covered by sewage, with 0.015. The average value of λε obtained for the thirty questionnaires was 0.081, which indicates the stability and consistency of the calculated weights due to its proximity to zero. 

The results of combining the twelve livability indicators for  the old part of Urmia show that 2% of this part lies in the zone with very low livability, 13% in low livability, 32% in medium livability, 35% in high livability, and 18% is in very high livability. In the new part of Urmia, 7% lie in the zone with very low livability, 21% in low livability, 39% in medium livability, 29% in high livability, and 4% in very high livability. Furthermore, livability is better in the old part than in the new part based on the indicators of access to the main thoroughfares, average land price, population density, access to sports and recreational use, access to medical use, access to academic and cultural use, access to commercial use, number of literate people, and number of employees. On the other hand, livability in the new part is in good conditions compared to that in the old part based on the indicators of building quality, area covered by sewage, and access to green space use.

In the recent decades, the proportion of the world’s urban population has increased. Since the beginning of the twentieth century, the proportion of the world’s population residing in urban areas has risen from about 14 percent in 1901 to about 50 percent in 2000. The rapid growth of urbanization in the world began after the Industrial Revolution in European countries, and was then observed in developed and developing countries. In Iran, the process of urbanization and urban population growth was faster than in developing countries. During a period of about 50 years (1970-2020), the urban population in Iran grew by about 37%. There are a wide range of factors and reasons for explanation of the rapid urbanization in Iran. A reason for the growth of urbanization in Iran is the migration of rural population to urban areas, which has resulted from industrial policies, agricultural sector growth, wage gap between urban and rural areas, and employment opportunities in services and industry in urban areas.

Theoretical Framework

Urbanization began during the Industrial Revolution, and the term is used to refer to the growing number of people living in urban areas. It is not simply about an increase in the number of urban dwellers, but also about a change in the structure from rural to urban in terms of industry, employment, living conditions, and public social services. On the other hand, urbanization refers to the process of population expansion on urban scale, and includes economic, social, and geographic changes. Rapid urbanization is one of the most prominent features of global development today. In general, urbanization can be defined as a process of transition from a dominant world of rural and agricultural activities to a dominant urban world based on non-agricultural activities. Depending on their orientations, social scientists point out different explanations for the existence of cities. Developments in industry, agriculture, and services provide the main explanations for the rate of urbanization in the literature on urban economics. Moreover, wage differences between urban and rural areas, the general rate of prices in urban areas, and educational expenditures have been factors affecting the rate of urbanization in theoretical and experimental studies.

In this study, the spatial econometric approach was used for analysis of the model. Spatial econometrics is a subfield of econometrics that deals with the interactions between geographic units. Units can include postal code, city, municipality, district, province, government, judiciary, country, etc., depending on the nature of the study. Spatial econometric models can also be used to explain the behavior of economic agents and other geographic entities, such as individuals, companies, and governments, if they are interconnected through a network. Given the advantages of the spatial econometric method, this study aimed to investigate the effects of factors affecting urbanization in thirty provinces of Iran during the 2006-2017 period using a spatial econometric panel data method.

In this study, the Eviews and Stata software was used for analysis of the data. The results of the stationary test indicated that the model variables were stationary. Based on the Moran test results, there was a positive spatial autocorrelation in the study data. Other results also confirmed the the spatial Durbin model compared with other models. The results of the Chow and Hausman test also confirmed the superiority of the panel data to the pool data and of the fixed effects to the random effects. Other results demonstrated that the added value of agriculture, industry, and service had significant positive effects on the rate of urbanization in each province and the neighboring provinces. These results indicated that the development of the agricultural sector and the use of new technologies, and thus the increase in the productivity of the agricultural sector, led to the release of part of the labor force working in the agricultural sector in rural areas and their transfer to urban areas and employment in the service sector. The higher wage rates in the service and industry sectors also functions as a recruitment factor, attracting the liberated labor force from the rural sector to the urban sector, which was also demonstrated in this study. In contrast, the increase in the price index of the urban sector, which increased the costs of migration from rural to urban areas, could function as a repellent factor with adverse effects on migration from urban to rural areas. This was similar to the increase in the area of ​​agricultural land in rural areas, which could hinder or delay the transfer of rural population to urban areas. Another factor that played a key role in urban-to-rural migration was the rural unemployment rate, which could encourage the unemployed to migrate to urban areas.

The results of this research demonstrated that the variation in urbanization rate cannot be analyzed in one dimension, and a set of factors effective in the process of urbanization development in Iran need to be considered in the analysis, including a range of economic and geographic factors. In recent years, the focus on cities and regions has been resumed, but this focus on the role of cities and regions does not necessarily resemble the prevailing belief in the early twentieth century that the benefits of aggregation are driving growth in large cities and rich countries. Today, the driving forces of urbanization are different in different countries and even different regions of a country. The results of this study demonstrate that the Iranian economy needs a planned urbanization with a powerful policy for development of the agricultural and industrial sectors for the overall development of urbanization in Iran. Another proposal is to set the government as the main policymaker. In the first place, the government, the most important player in the society, must adhere to the rules in which it plays an important role. Secondly, the government’s policy orientation must be clear to all economic actors..

Areas suffering urban decline are involved with an intertwined combination of physical, social, and economic problems that intensify various dimensions of urban decline (including economic decline, social decline, physical decline, and environmental decline) and reduce the quality of life for residents.Thus, sufficient motivation is provided for urban management and planning systems to intervene in these areas. A new method of intervention is to apply the urban regeneration approach.Based on public-private partnership, this approach leads to regeneration of dynamic urban spaces, in order to sustain and improve the quality of urban life. Accordingly, urban regeneration has put the community empowerment process on the agenda in order to increase the level of citizen participation of the residents of these areas so that they can solve their problems.The community empowerment follows to increase the residents’ shares in decision-making for the living environment in interaction with decision-makers and politicians. With the development of the information and communication technology (ICT), the interaction between politicians and residents is facilitated. Therefore, this article seeks to provide the e-empowerment use case diagram for implementation of cybernetic space for residents of areas suffering urban decline in Isfahan.Theoretical frameworkThis article introduces the following three concepts.A: Areas suffering urban declineThese areas are places with worn-out urban infrastructure, service, and access, unable to meet the needs of their residents. Due to the low income of the residents of these areas and the insufficient motivation for investors, improvement and renovation is difficult to achieve in these areas. The decline in these areas includes economic, social, physical, and environmental aspects.B: Community empowerment in cybernetic spaceThe process of community empowerment seeks to increase residents’ control and the resulting collective gains.This process follows from the decentralization of power, and attempts to upgrade residents’ power of decision-making about their living environment. The capabilities of cybernetic space facilitate the implementation of community empowerment in this field, which is known as e-empowerment. It facilitates communication between citizens and decision-makers for participation with awareness.C: Use case diagramThe diagram of communication between users and their activities in cyberspace is based on the information and communication technology (ICT). This template is a visual representation of the process implementation using the actions, tasks, and activities of the users of that process, which shows the hierarchy of activities in order to solve a problem, produce a product, or provide a type of service to a target population.

This research is conducted in four stages, as follows.A. Analysis of the severity of urban decline in its four types in Isfahan, using the text analysis method (involving texts derived from programs and reports concerning the approvals of areas suffering urban decline).B. Requirements elicitation, including the following:a) analysis of the stakeholders involved in the regeneration of areas suffering urban decline in Isfahan, using the power-benefit matrix method, which utilizes a structured questionnaire for professionals.b) introduction of a community e-empowerment process particular to residents of areas suffering urban decline in Isfahan and use of the social survey method based on behavior measurement and Likert scale measurement, utilizing a structured questionnaire for residents.c) introduction of the implementation mechanism of the community e-empowerment process for residents of areas suffering urban decline in Isfahan using expert panel methods and interviews (involving questionnaires without a special structure for experts).C. Requirements analysis using expert panel methods and interviews (involving questionnaires without a special structure for experts).D. Presentation of the use case diagram’s process of community e-empowerment, dedicated to residents of areas suffering urban decline in Isfahan using the visual paradigm software.

The findings demonstrate that an appropriate e-empowerment process for residents of areas suffering urban decline in Isfahan involves the steps of e- education) with the characteristics of e-empowerment(, e-learning, awareness, e-consultation, and e-involvement. The effective users in this process include residents, facilitating experts, technical experts, instructors, support experts, and decision-makers.

Users of the e-empowerment process (including residents, facilitating experts, technical experts, instructors, support experts, and decision-makers) communicate with each other in cybernetic space within the framework of a use Case diagram by performing the following activities and processes:A- participation and membership in virtual groups and communitiesB- going through the stages of community e-empowerment (teaching the empowerment process, assessing the skills of citizens, holding awareness-raising sessions, establishing and enhancing communications and interactions, creating a spirit of demand, and undertaking responsibility)C- information and mutual opinion announcement D- provision of decision-making skills and fundamentals.AcknowledgmentThis article is Retrieved from the Ph.D. Thesis in the field of urban planning entitled "The application of cybernetic space capacities to design community empowerment model urban decay areas Isfahan " by the first author with the guidance of the second author and the third author The fourth and fifth have been defended in the Islamic Azad University Isfahan (khorasgan) Branch.

The issue of social responsibility for the protection of the environment at all levels of the society is explicitly emphasized in Article 14 of the General Environmental Policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The city of Mashhad is the second most populated city in Iran after Tehran. A city like Mashhad, with a population of nearly five million people, is typically faced with environmental problems such as extremely high temperature, demanding waste management, noise and air pollution, traffic congestion, water shortage, and drought. Expression of environmental problems is a concern, and requires the cooperation of experts and the public to find solutions. Researchers have come up with a variety of solutions to environmental problems, most of which are technological, but they are interested in changing people’s lifestyles and behavioral solutions today due to the high cost of these projects, because environmental hazards result from human intervention. The present issues can be overcome only through changes in human attitudes and behaviors. Citizens with pro-environmental behaviors feel most responsible for the urban environment and the preservation of its natural, historical, and cultural values. The aim of this study was to investigate environmental literacy and its relationship with background variables and the aspects of citizens’ environmental literacy in Mashhad. 

This cross-sectional survey adopted an individual unit of analysis. The population involved the citizens of Mashhad in 2021. A sample of size 689 containing residents in the thirteen municipal districts of Mashhad was selected using the systematic random sampling method, and parameters such as citizens’ awareness, knowledge, concern, and environmental behavior were measured as dimensions of environmental literacy. The data collection tool was a questionnaire, which was completed with reference to the respondents. For assessment of its reliability, a pre-test questionnaire was completed by a sample of fifty people for elimination of probable defects and calculation of reliability. A Cronbach’s alpha coefficient between 0.70 and 0.84 indicated the proper reliability of the questionnaire. Moreover, formal validity was used in this study.  The hypotheses were tested once the data were analyzed using correlation and comparison methods in the SPSS software.FindingsThe results of this study indicated the high level of citizens’ environmental literacy in terms of awareness and knowledge, while the respondents’ score in environmental concern and behavior was only slightly above average. The respondents’ individual environmental behavior ranged between moderate and high. Their environmental behaviors in the public sphere were significantly lower than average and close to low levels. The collective environmental behaviors of men are greater than those of women, but individual environmental behaviors are greater in women than in men. None of the indicators of environmental literacy was related to age except environmental behaviors. The average environmental behavior index was 3.17 for the 18-24 age group, 3.29 for the 25-44 age group, and 3.31 for the 45-64 age group, and the average environmental behavior index for people aged sixty-five years and older was reported to be 3.32. This indicated that the environmental behavior index increased slightly as age rose. The chi-squared test results demonstrated that there was a significant relationship between citizens’ academic degrees and the environmental knowledge index in Mashhad. In other words, environmental concerns increased as academic degree rose. Finally, there was a significant direct relationship with low intensity between environmental awareness, knowledge, and concern and environmental behavior.

The results of the study indicated a relatively poor tendency among the citizens towards environment-friendly behaviors, especially in the public sphere. Although the examined population was mentally concerned about the environment, the concern did not provide them with enough energy and motivation to take an action, for whatever reason. Environmental awareness can change only individual environmental behaviors, which is possible in a small space such as a family and impossible or trivial beyond that. Citizens consider the responsibility of protecting the environment outside their personal spaces, such as a house, car, or workplace, as a responsibility of the relevant municipal institutions, and hardly participate in voluntary activities aimed to protect the urban environment. Therefore, efforts should be made to increase citizens’ environmental literacy, and environmental education should be different for different age, occupation, academic, and gender groups. The capacity of non-governmental institutions to attract participation and cooperation among organizations should be used to promote responsibility in environmental behavior.AcknowledgmentThis article is taken from the doctoral dissertation entitled “Designing and validating a model for attracting public participation in the development of environmental literacy of the citizens of Mashhad”, which down in Payame Noor University of Tehran.

Man is intrinsically a social being whose surrounding space constitutes his social relations. The extent to which the environment affects man’s performance has always been a major concern for environmental designers. Marketplaces are highly important in this regard as thriving, bustling public places. The urban space combines social relations and the structural context, which meets man’s collective functions and conveys a semantic load. It is not made simply for being seen and walked through, as it also helps form social relations among various people in the community. The urban space involves the pleasure and enjoyment of various social groups and their active, continued social presence therein. The marketplace structure has served as the heart of Islamic-era cities in the attempt to meet man’s basic needs, including economic, religious, social, and tourism-pilgrimage needs. It provides a good example for investigation of the reasons for high social interaction and how these interactions are affected by the architectural context. This article seeks to answer the following questions:How does structure impact the social interactions in the historical bazaar of the city of Tabriz, Iran?
How does the bazaar structure contribute to the improvement of social interactions in Saray-e-Amir?
How does the bazaar structure reduce social interactions in Saray-e-Dodari? 

 Theoretical Framework 

This research aims to identify the structural components affecting the interactions in the marketplace and investigate the role of Tabriz’s bazaar as a living, dynamic example of traditional Iranian marketplaces in the interactions occurring there. A review of the literature indicates that Space Syntax can help examine these issues, and an investigation of the components obtained from previous research may serve to help investigate the relevant factors. The components include permeability, flexibility, accessibility in the space syntax, flooring, furniture, spaces for stopping and sitting, visibility, etc. These are structural factors affecting social interactions, which can be investigated with various spatial techniques. As suggested in the literature, the term syntax bears contextual meanings; in other words, it is defined in association with relevant terms. If a building is considered as an object composed of a spatial-communication system, this system will be represented by a plan that manifests the function of syntax in the architectural space. 

 This research uses both descriptive-analytical and survey methods to investigate social interactions and the effects of structure thereon. Upon specification of the components of the marketplace space syntax and social interactions, the study investigates the impacts of the marketplace on the interactions. It provides a comparative examination of various activities of a set using particular space syntax (depth map) software to select and control the three components of permeability, accessibility, and flexibility in the form of integration. Then, the study uses a questionnaire to examine the effects of the structure on the interactions in the marketplace. In this method, each of the components extracted from previous research is investigated separately in the two bazaar spaces using a valid, reliable questionnaire. As mentioned above, the bazaars include Saray-e-Amir and Saray-e-Dodari, which differ in terms of function and geometric characteristics, and experience different interactions. 

Research findings on space syntax suggest that the extent of each selection, integration, and relationship component in Saray-e-Dodari covers a broader spectrum than those in Saray-e-Amir, demonstrating the greater relationship between the former bazaar and other parts of the marketplace. This relationship is poorer in the latter bazaar. This is because Saray-e-Amir is situated at the beginning of the marketplace, while Saray-e-Dodari is located in the middle between various parts. It is demonstrated that the higher the rates of relationship, selection, and interaction in Saray-e-Dodari, the greater the spatial accessibility, permeability, and flexibility. The questionnaire results based on the space users’ views also indicate higher social interaction rates in Saray-e-Amir than in Saray-e-Dodari. 

It is concluded based on the results that the three components of relationship, interaction, and control, which constitute factors improving social interactions from a space syntax perspective, directly impact accessibility, permeability, and flexibility. An investigation of all the three main components of space syntax suggests that centralized spaces and entrances impact the improvement of traffic, concentration of the users, centrality of these two in the decrease in user attraction, and creation of reclusive spaces for social interactions. Furthermore, a review of the structural factors indicates the positive effects of appropriate flooring, visibility, readability, and use of natural elements on the extent of social interactions, as the components of appropriate furniture, accessibility, and pause space differ in the two bazaars, which indicates the changing level of interaction there.

Different types of concept have been formed gradually under the title of knowledge-based spaces with different goals and functions due to the need to use effective, open, participatory innovative solutions and employ ICT capabilities to create sustainable life in cities and respond to the wills and needs of citizens. An understanding of the dimensions and characteristics and a capability of differentiating these concepts will help policymakers and city managers to choose strategies and policies and invest in these areas. This is realized through prevention of mental confusion, emergence of internal contradictions, and incoherent eclecticism of the concepts. On the other hand, the sustainable development of cities has been challenged by global trends such as the increasing urbanization, transformation of cities into places of mass-energy consumption, and production of various environmental pollutants. However, there has been an increase in the need to use effective, open, participatory innovative solutions to create sustainable life in cities and the concern for knowledge-based spaces as a result of the efforts made by cities to attract skilled, entrepreneurial, creative people.

Theoretical Framework 

The existence of different concepts concerning knowledge-based spaces, such as digital city, information city, smart city, wired city, learning city, and knowledge city has led to confusion in attempts to distinguish their meanings. This conceptual confusion is due to the lack of understanding of the dimensions, characteristics, and instances of these concepts, and is a major obstacle against the efforts to persuade policy-makers and city managers to invest in these areas. This ambiguity causes planning strategies and policies to be inconsistent with the institutional environment and governance system or strategies and policies to be fraught with internal contradictions and incoherent eclecticism. In the attempts to address this issue, typology and comparative studies based on specific criteria and components contribute greatly to a better understanding of different types of knowledge-based space. So far, various types of knowledge-based space have been proposed (Castells & Hall, 1994; Dodge et al., 1998; Shiud, 2001; Nam & Pardo, 2011; Nikina et al., 2016; Carvalho et al.; Wenden, 2017; and Lara et al., 2016). Moreover, some researchers have compared two or more knowledge spaces (either directly or implicitly) (Strategy, 2012; Jojaru & Peso, 2013; Yigitjanlar & Lee, 2014; Koch, 2017; Chang et al., 2018; and Yigitjanlar & Inkinen, 2019). However, no integrated comparative study has been performed so far for all concepts of knowledge-based spaces to provide a clear, comprehensive image and a deep, coherent understanding of these spaces. Therefore, the present study seeks to develop a coherent framework to provide a new typology for a better understanding of the types of knowledge-based space. Thus, the aspects and features of distinguishing concepts, trends, and paradigm shifts in knowledge-based spaces become apparent through identification and classification of the main sources pertaining to each space and examination of the definitions and the process of formation and conceptual evolution of each concept and feature and the dimensions and instances thereof.

The present meta-combined systematic qualitative review is conducted to pursue a descriptive-exploratory purpose. In addition to creating a new theory, meta-composition can be used to develop conceptual models or expand understanding of existing knowledge, especially to discover similarities and differences concerning concepts and ideas about a phenomenon. It can involve seven steps, including examination of research questions, systematic review of texts, exploration and selection of appropriate texts, extraction of textual information, analysis and composition of qualitative findings, and quality control and presentation. In the present study, the seven stages proposed by Sandlowski and Barroso (2007) are considered.

Results and Discussion 

This study comparatively examines the concepts of knowledge-based spaces based on the six components of development discourse, type of knowledge required for development, location, key stakeholders, management model, and historical period. Moreover, the typology of knowledge-based spaces is based on the two components of spatiality and type of knowledge required for development. Accordingly, four types of knowledge space are identified: 1- technology-based non-spatial, 2- technology-based spatial, 3- knowledge-based non-spatial, and 4- knowledge-based spatial. The research findings demonstrate that concepts such as smart city and knowledge city (due to semantic inclusion) have largely replaced concepts such as digital city and virtual city, and are currently used more widely in policy-making and planning knowledge-based spaces.

The expression knowledge city has been considered as an umbrella term for other phrases such as knowledge place, learning city, and smart city. Moreover, the findings of the present comparative study of knowledge-based spaces based on the above seven components indicate that that knowledge-based spaces have gone through paradigm changes over time, such as the transition from a focus on the limited concept of science and technology to an emphasis on the broader social concept of knowledge, the transition from the discourse of economic development to sustainable, integrated development in various economic, social, environmental, and institutional dimensions, the transition from citizens’ passive role to their active participation in the creation, development, and management of knowledge-based spaces, the transition from government and centralized management of a limited number of stakeholders with specific guidelines and frameworks to government of networks based on the interaction of a wide range of stakeholders, the transition from a hardware, capital-based perspective involving tangible infrastructure networks to a software perspective based on intangible intellectual capital and knowledge innovation systems, and the transition from management and planning models aimed at increasing livability standards and complexity management to citizen engagement grounding and capacity-building for long-term learning and political and cultural influence. These trends and paradigm shifts represent a kind of conceptual convergence among the features and components of knowledge-based spaces. In addition, the results demonstrate that the typology of knowledge-based spaces is based on the two components of location and type of knowledge required for development, given the significant roles of these components in the differentiation of various knowledge spaces,–calling for a deeper, more expressive understanding of these spaces.