Comparative Assessment of the Sustainability of Rural Housing in the Old and New Textures of Rural Areas: A Case Study in Villages of Central Area of Kabudarahang County

Abstract

Purpose: Sustainable housing can be considered as one of the important indicators of development and progress. Thus, identifying the characteristics and methods of providing sustainable housing is important. Sustainable housing is one of the basic needs which in terms of development and change in the living standards of rural areas displays varying aspects in old and new construction textures. Among the structural components of the village, sustainable housing is one of the most important ones and part of the overall identity of the village. Also, it is the illustration of functional integrity of the village texture. It seems that by passage of time, it has seen the most changes, which have caused a gap in the functional integrity of the structural texture of rural habitations. Therefore, the present study by using physio-environmental, physio-economic, and physio-social indicators, has assessed the sustainability of rural housing in the old and new structural textures in the villages of the central area of Kabudarahang Country. We tried to find out that with regard to the transformation in housing construction and structure, whether there is a significant difference between the sustainability of the old and new construction textures (sustainability of new and old housings). Methods: 10 villages and 300 households, including 150 households living in the old construction texture with traditional and old housing and 150 households of the residents living in the new construction texture with new housings were assessed separately. Results: The obtained results indicate a significant difference between old and new housings with regard to housing sustainability. Conclusion: According to the analysis of responses given by households to questionnaires distributed among them, in the three dimensions of physio-environmental, physio-economic, and physio-social, the housings with old textures (old and traditional housing) possessed more sustainability degree compared to the new structural textures (new housing).