Perception of qualitative changes in public open spaces : the case of Alexandria, Egypt

Abstract

The quality of public open spaces is an increasingly familiar topic in current urban design research and practice worldwide. This paper addresses the emerging concern with the diversity of groups of people involved as ‘actors’ in the processes of production, consumption and control of the built environment. It presents a brief discussion of how these actors hold different perceptions of urban quality, related to their individual roles and interests, and how they perceive qualitative changes accordingly. This notion is part of a wider approach towards understanding and assessing the quality of urban areas, which is becoming more and more fundamental to research and studies carried out in the Joint Centre for Urban Design, Oxford Brookes University. This paper outlines a recent pedestrianization experiment in the city centre of Alexandria, Egypt, as a tool to investigate further the above premise. It discusses first, the broad issue of qualitative changes in public spaces and the actors involved. Second, the public open spaces in the case of central Alexandria are introduced along with the current pedestrianization experiment. Third, the interests of different actors in Alexandria are reviewed and their response to the qualitative change achieved by the pedestrianization of central streets is noted. Finally the conclusions drawn from the case of Alexandria are included.