DESIGN FACTORS FOR A SUCCESSFUL SHARED SPACE STREET (SSS) DESIGN

Ranmalsingha R J C Jayakody,Kaushal Keraminiyage,Nuwan Dias,Mark Alston

doi:10.3846/ijspm.2018.3685

Ranmalsingha R J C Jayakody, Kaushal Keraminiyage + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3846/ijspm.2018.3685

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Abstract

The concept of Shared Space Street (SSS) has the potential to bring many benefits to a city. Those include promotion of social interaction, the connectivity within the city for both vehicles and pedestrians, active engagement of the people with the space, walkability, vitality and street livability, better economic wealth and alike. These factors work together to improve livability, vitality of street and indirectly bring economic wealth to municipalities through increasing the footfall to shops, enhancing the health and safety of the locality and increasing the property values. Hence, this clearly is a consideration for strategic property management and relevant professionals. This concept has also been criticized for its practical issues when implemented in some parts of the world. Such issues include difficulties faced by aged people and people with disabilities, harassments faced by the cyclists, etc. This paper explores the methods and approaches that can be used to harness potential advantages of the SSS concept and to overcome its practical issues and criticisms through a detail evaluation of design driven use of space in three case studies within United Kingdom. Finally, this paper proposes a set of design factors which can be applied to a SSS design in order to ensure a successful implementation.

Highlights

The concept of Shared Space Street (SSS) promotes the notion of sharing a single space by both pedestrians and vehicles while the prominence is given for pedestrian movement
The case study findings will be discussed under the four main objectives of successful shared space street
It was observed that, even though it is comparably a small gap, this separation works as a mental barrier separating the vehicular movements from pedestrian movements, somewhat limiting the pedestrian prominence

Summary

Introduction

The concept of Shared Space Street (SSS) promotes the notion of sharing a single space by both pedestrians and vehicles while the prominence is given for pedestrian movement This concept was first emerged in Europe and North America and further developed in Denmark, Northern Holland, Sweden and Northern Spain (Hamilton-Baillie, 2008). The vehicular traffic can discourage the pedestrians, and disrupt the social values of urban streets, yet the spatial segregation can hardly be a solution as it decreases the connectivity and can result inconvenience for all the consumers (Carmona et al, 2003) This segregation or prioritisation of vehicular movement, leads to decrease the quality of streets by removing the characteristics such as community vitality, diversity, distinctiveness and urban quality.

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