A Framework of Urban Renewal for Leisure Space in Neighborhood Streets: A Case Study of Shazheng Street in Chongqing, China

Abstract

Abstract Urban street spaces serve as a platform for fulfilling people's travel requirements and facilitating complicated and diverse social interactions. In this context, leisure spaces play a crucial role in urban streets. Nevertheless, with the acceleration of urbanization, the current design of street leisure space generally has problems of low quantity, inferior quality, and lack of humanism, which can not meet the needs of people’s rest and communication in the street space. This study applied environmental psychology and typology theories, selected Shazheng Street in Chongqing as the research object， explored the link between the urban street environment and leisure behavior, and proposed a practical and effective design framework for the renewal of neighborhood street leisure spaces. The design framework first analyzes the current status of street leisure space in terms of the general street layout, the building interface along the street, and the structure of sidewalk cross-sections, and then discusses where leisure spaces can be designed for different structures of sidewalk cross-sections, as well as the types and characteristics of existing rest facilities. Then, we creatively combined the Baidu heat map data analysis, which investigates the vitality of a wide range of streets, with behavioral mapping and questionnaires, which accurately investigate people's needs, to investigate people’s leisure needs accurately through the mutual validation of the results. Finally, we proposed zoning design strategies based on an analysis of the current situation and leisure needs. The findings of this study can serve as a reference for future renewal and design projects.