Streetscape Design Research Articles

Desain lanskap jalan (Studi Kasus Jalan Dr. Muwardi Denpasar)

Street in urban areas has an important function to support human activity and social interaction. That matter can be achieved by a good streetscape planning based on regulations and standards for streetscape design. The aim of streetscape planning is to give safety and amenities for street user in urban area. This research took place in Dr. Muwardi street Denpasar. Dr. Muwardi street’s located inside Denpasar City civic center well known as Niti Mandala area. Lack of streetscape planning makes street activities unorganized. A number of street vendors that attract visitor with personal transportation caused a street dysfunction. This study aims to design a good streetscape, and optimize the potential and solve the problems in Dr. Muwardi street. The research used a descriptive qualitative methode through inventory, analysis, synthesis, concept making, planning, and pre-design phase. The result shown that the street design was devided into trading space, pedestrian space, and traffic space. Trading spaces organized by rearrange the street vendor trading zone. Pedestrian space designed by adding sidewalk and street amenities, meanwhile traffic area designed by adjusting streetscape standart into the site. To enchance local characteristic and aesthetic value to the streetscape, additional street landscape trees from Gumi Banten plant list is applied.

Contribution of streetscape features to the hedonic pricing model using Geographically Weighted Regression: Evidence from Amsterdam

This paper aims to explore the contribution of streetscape features to Airbnb accommodation pricing, allowing hosts and tourists to benefit from a more transparent pricing scheme. To this end, a hedonic pricing model based on Geographically Weighted Regression (GWR) is estimated using the data in July and November 2020 in Amsterdam. With the semantic segmentation model Deeplabv3 trained by the Cityscapes dataset, the percentages of 4 types of pixels in the images sourced from Google Street View are measured. Three indicators representing streetscape design (greenery, enclosure, and walkability) are calculated and added to the models. The results suggest that greenery and enclosure have upward effects while walkability has a downward effect on accommodations’ prices. Moreover, accounting for spatial heterogeneity and the inclusion of streetscape related variables improve the model fit by increasing adjusted R-squared and reducing residual sum of squares. • A semantic segmentation model is used to identify the percentage of different pixels in the street view images. • The streetscape features of Amsterdam at 100-m intervals are added to the hedonic pricing model. • The goodness of fit and accuracy of the models are improved with the inclusion of streetscape related variables. • The GWR model has an advantage over the OLS model in explaining the factors that affect accommodation pricing. • The study confirms the contribution of micro-scale urban design in Airbnb accommodations' hedonic pricing.

Multiscale analysis of the influence of street built environment on crime occurrence using street-view images

Assessing the effect of street built environment on crime occurrence is a hot research subject in environmental criminology, which also plays an important role in crime prevention or even urban planning. Recent development in emerging geotagged big data (e.g., the street-view images) makes it possible to quantify the influence of street built environment on crime. However, previous studies have often neglected the multiscale problem in exploring the association between environmental features and crime occurrence. Therefore, in this study, a multiscale analysis method was proposed to quantitatively study the influence of street built environment on crime occurrence using street-view images. Firstly, inspired by the theory of crime prevention through environmental design, we established a multiscale descriptive framework for environmental features with simultaneous consideration of the physical features and scene perception of street built environment. Then, a multiscale geographically weighted regression model was used to explore the spatial scale of influence for different streetscape features on crime occurrence. Experimental results indicated that the proposed method could reflect the difference of the spatial scale of various environmental features on crime, thereby uncovering the association between environmental features and crime occurrence with better accuracy. This study may enrich the theory in environmental criminology, and it provides useful insights for crime prevention through urban streetscape design.

Green Infrastructure and Urban-Renewal Simulation for Street Tree Design Decision-Making: Moderating Demands of Stormwater Management, Sunlight and Visual Aesthetics.

The design of green infrastructure in urban renewal sites is complex, requiring engagement with existing communities and future sustainable development goals, consideration of existing and future urban forms, changing climatic conditions, and the sites often being in low-lying and flood-prone areas. Traditional street tree decision-making approaches are inadequate for addressing the scale, environmental complexity, and mutability of decisions involved in urban renewal projects—new tree selection approaches that consider complex competing criteria for tree selections addressing stormwater management systems, visual assessment and solar amenity are needed. This paper describes a new method of multi-criteria street design decision modelling that combines outputs from hydrology modelling, digital procedural tree modelling and urban form analysis, with animation and gaming technologies. We evaluate our approach through application to the design of a large-scale, urban renewal project underway in Melbourne, Australia. The results of the study demonstrate the functionality of our model, which allowed the simultaneous output of streetscape visualisation, with tree selection responding to integrated stormwater management infrastructure and flooding, along with the likely overshadowing conditions of urban renewal built-form. Our multi-criteria approach makes a significant contribution to the tools available to urban designers, planners and landscape architects in their pursuit of smarter streetscape design decisions that respond to complex spatial, cultural and climatic urban challenges.

Street design preference: an on-line survey

ABSTRACT This paper is a methodological and empirical contribution that reports on the results of an innovative on-line survey of streetscape preference. The ratings of experts and non-experts were compared to gauge the reliability of preference for views about streetscape quality. The goal was to evaluate the degree to which a set of streetscape design characteristics were similar among experts and non-experts and what dimensions of streetscape quality had the most agreement. Results show relatively high correlation between measures of streetscape quality and respondent preference, although there were some differences as well. Interestingly, among the six streetscape qualities studied, the quality of ‘walkability’ showed the least agreement among respondents.

Visual Evaluation of Urban Streetscape Design Supported by Multisource Data and Deep Learning.

This paper integrates classical design theory, multisource urban data, and deep learning to explore an accurate analytical framework in a new data environment, providing a scientific analysis path for the “where” and “how” of greenways in a high-density built environment. The analysis is based on street view data and location service data. Through the integration of multiple data sources such as street scape data, location service data, point-of-interest data, structured web data, and refined built environment data, a systematic measurement of the key elements of density, diversity, design, accessibility to destinations, and distance to transport facilities as defined in the Five Elements of High Quality Built Environment (5D) theory is achieved. The assessment of alignment potential was carried out. The key factors influencing the aesthetics of the street were identified. Based on an extensive landscape perception-based survey, it was found that although different respondents had different views and preferences for the same street scape, their preferences were overwhelmingly influenced by the visual quality of the street scape aesthetics itself, with higher aesthetic quality of the landscape.

Street trees and crime: What characteristics of trees and streetscapes matter

The extent to which street trees affect crime is moderated by many characteristics of tree structure, streetscapes, and tree management. To effectively utilize urban greening interventions as crime preventing programs, it is necessary to distinguish tree-related characteristics that increase crime from those that cause crime to decline. This study derived a complete set of tree-related characteristics and crime attributes from a variety of sources. We then applied ordinary least squares and spatial Durbin regressions to reveal the associations between street trees and crime in New York City. Our results showed that street tree characteristics that were negatively associated with crime rates included tree canopy cover, species diversity, and streetscape greenery, while the opposite was observed for the proportion of small-sized trees. The characteristics of street trees that displayed a dual-feature with crime rates included tree health, proportion of harmful tree guards, and proportion of trees with trunk problems, while tree stewardship was not significantly associated with crime. In addition, our findings demonstrated that tree canopy cover and streetscape greenery were conducive to reduce crime severity. The mixed associations between street tree characteristics and crime could be potentially explained by the “broken window theory”, trees’ view-obstructing effect, the “eyes on the street”, and trees’ therapeutic effect. The revealed findings have important implications for the implementation of tree-planting programs in tackling the dual tasks of improving urban greening and reducing crime, and could help translate crime reduction into specific actions of streetscape design and tree management that can be taken by government and local stakeholders.

윌리엄스버그 컬러니얼 정착마을의 건축양식과 파사드 형태의 보존특징에 관한 연구

The aim of this study is to find what architectural restoration and street-scaping conservation of early settlement in Virginia, which have processed on the style of 18th centuries. One of the settlements in Virginia was Williamsburg that located in the high land between Jamestown and Yorktown. In 1698, the capital of Virginia was moved from Jamestown for the safer environment. At that time they constructed the town like a small urban that had a straight-lined Duke Glocester Street, Georgian style buildings, and landscapes of 18th centuries. Before 1928 the village was flown into ruins, but Rector of the church, Dr. W.A.R. Goodwin, understood the value of reservation to restore the village as colonial architectural style that has an original figure. John Rockefeller Jr. has taken part in his restoration of colonial style of architecture and culture. This paper surveyed nine cases of buildings and srtreet-scape on Duke Glocester Street. Most of the buildings on the street have a proposition, balance, and equipment of Georgian architectural facade in 18th centuries. The conclusion has three points. First, the Williamsburg has been reserved as an early colonial settlement through the restoration of architecture and street-scape design. Second, main architectural style is a Georgian form that has a balance, proportion, and simplicity of facade. Also new buildings and additions of architecture have to keep ‘Design Review Guideline of Colonial Williamsburg’ in order to contribute the existing colonial buildings. Third, the main street-scape, Duke Glocester Street shows Georgian architecture and cultural life pattern with tradition.

Building biodiversity into the urban fabric: A case study in applying Biodiversity Sensitive Urban Design (BSUD)

Biodiversity within cities is fundamental for human health and well-being, and delivers a wide range of critical ecosystem services. However, biodiversity is often viewed as an afterthought or final addition once an urban development nears completion. As such, provisions for biodiversity are typically tokenistic and do not achieve the experience of everyday nature that people need. Considering biodiversity requirements at the start of an urban development allows for strategic, intentional design with biodiversity enhancement in mind. Biodiversity Sensitive Urban Design (BSUD) is a protocol that aims to create urban areas that deliver on-site benefit to native species and ecosystems through the provision of essential habitat and food resources. Here we present a case study demonstrating how BSUD methods can be used to (a) encourage successful outcomes for nature, (b) improve the aesthetics and liveability of the urban form, and (c) engage stakeholders in a process that supports other aspects of urban design including park and streetscape design. Fishermans Bend (Melbourne) is the largest urban renewal project in Australia, and one of the first of this scale to explicitly include biodiversity targets. We outline the methods used to co-create biodiversity objectives with diverse stakeholders, and how these, combined with a quantitative analysis of their potential biodiversity impact, were translated into clear design and planning recommendations. We critically reflect on the success of this method for 1) communicating and facilitating provisions for biodiversity across different stakeholders and 2) providing clear messaging around biodiversity across different planning disciplines.

The Visual Effect of Signboards on the Vitality of the Streetscapes Using Eye-Tracking

This study focuses on whether signboards attract people’s visual concentration as a foreground element of the streetscape and check the difference in streetscape image according to the area of the signboard. For this purpose, 133 street-view photographs were taken at five major commercial districts in Seoul and 17 photos were selected for this study. The photos were then classified into the High Signboard Group (HSG) and Low Signboard Group (LSG) according to the area of the signboards and conducted eye-tracking experiments and surveys. Finally, data from 33 people were collected and a t-test was conducted to identify differences between the two groups. As a result, the number of fixations, the fixation time, and the revisits of fixation on signboards were measured higher in HSG, and the distance of gaze movement (saccade) was lower. The results of the image survey analysis showed that HSG groups had low streetscape satisfaction, signboard satisfaction, and streetscape aesthetic quality. However, Dynamic and Interesting factors were high. Taken together, the signboard can be seen as a landscape element that focuses attention by giving people an active and interesting image, which shows the importance and possibility of using signboards in future streetscape design.

STREETSCAPE AT JALAN TEMENGGUNG, KOTA BHARU, KELANTAN: EVALUATING ITS EFFECTIVENESS TOWARDS THE WALKING CULTURE

This research concerns the visual perception of alternative approaches and methods in urban environments for the transformation of streetscape requiring direct involvement of the users in creating a comfortable and satisfying environment for the community. The aim is to embody a good walking culture in Bandar Kota Bharu, Kelantan, Jalan Temenggung. Since the shop houses' income is decreasing due to the low population coming to the city, new modernized buildings are underway to improve the area’s revenues. This is important to raise and encourage community involvement in the process of preserving Jalan Temenggung’s shop houses culture and heritage. The objective of this paper is to evaluate factors that influenced the architecture interventions on walking culture in the study area. The advent of walking culture architectural projects was motivated by the lack of walking activity in the area and the deterrent of revenue against the heritage shop house. The respondents were asked to rate the streetscape according to the efficacy of the current streetscape. The result of defining physical characteristics and evaluating public expectations about the implications of existing urban streetscape design. In addition, to create good governance in urban planning and design, the finding may be useful to many stakeholders, such as shop house owners themselves to conserve and preserve the culture and heritage of the shop houses.

Sustainable Urban Streetscape: Managing trees as green infrastructure

Green and grey infrastructure plays a significant role in exposing the quality to the urban streetscape. The establishment and post-execution of streetscape planting management practice become a marking factor in measuring the sustainability of roadside tree planting. Due to the acceleration of the urbanization, conflicts in growing healthy roadside tree planting keep arising. Hence, this study is to deliver a discussion of non-numerical data on the potential attributes and approaches that can be adopted and adapted in Malaysia for a better quality of streetscape tree planting practices.
 Keywords: Streetscape Design; Roadside Tree Planting; Tree Sensitive Urban Design Theory 
 eISSN 2398-4295 ©2020. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers (AMER); Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians / Africans / Arabians (ABRA); Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies (cE-Bs), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia
 DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/ajbes.v5i19.193
 

The experience of outdoor physical activity for skin cancer survivors: understanding the importance of the built and natural environments.

Cancer patients are encouraged to do more physical activity (PA). Exercising in outdoor settings, however, may expose people to UV radiation, which is the main risk factor of melanoma. This study aimed to understand how melanoma diagnoses affect people's perception of the outdoor environment for PA. In-depth interviews were conducted among 19 individuals (20-85years) with a history of melanoma at a skin cancer clinic in the Denver metropolitan area. Transcribed interviews were coded for emergent themes. The coding framework included topics related to PA behavior, sun protection, and perceptions of outdoor environment. Respondents reported no change in their level of outdoor activity after the melanoma diagnosis; they tried to reduce the risk of sun exposure by using sunscreen and sun-protective clothing. They also reported seeking shade, trees, and groundcover along urban corridors, in order to avoid sun exposure, reflective surfaces, and heat while being active outdoors. Given the public health significance of UV exposure and extreme heat, further investments should be made to craft streetscape design guidelines and implement sun-proof spaces across public facilities, including parks, schools, and sport fields in order to ameliorate environmental risks for skin cancer survivors, to prevent future cancers among those that are vulnerable to the hazards of excessive UV exposure and extreme heat, and to promote outdoor PA. Skin cancer survivors and other vulnerable population subgroups will benefit from discussions around neighborhood-based design interventions that promote PA while accounting for sun safety.

WALKABILITY FACTORS FOR A CAMPUS STREET

It has been reported that translating walkability is complicated, particularly the execution of its theory in planning practices. This study untangled the queries by presenting factors that makes campus interesting, walkable, and more importantly to be characterised as ‘pedestrian friendly campus’. For this purpose, campus street walkability factors were analysed using factor analysis to find out the most significant measures of street walkability in the campus and its underlying items. All data has been run through SPSS beforehand and have met the assumption required for factor analysis that were formulated with the sample size of 500 respondents. The result from the study reveals that walkability factors of the campus were gratified from four significant factors that are classified as comfort, connectivity, safety and accessibility. The study reveals that proper streetscape design uncovers various potentials of the streets in forming part of a successful campus open space in the future. Moreover, the empirical findings in this research have provided a new understanding of the street function. Aside from functioning as space connectors, the streets offer broader opportunities for various pedestrian activities, which consists of passive and active activities that would contribute to the students’ social and physical enhancement.

The impact of urban façade quality on affective feelings

PurposeMuch of the current literature on streetscape design emphasizes a need for well-articulated edge conditions to enhance pedestrian-orientation and the reason appears to lie in evolutionary biology: humans have a psychological preference for wall-hugging due to a well-established trait in other species: thigmotaxis.Design/methodology/approachThis study seeks to explore the relationship between urban facades and affective feelings through an empirical study, which asks: how do people perceive edge conditions in urban environments? Through a study of affect relative to edge conditions, greater insight can be generated as to the human experience in the built environment. We conducted a laboratory experiment with 76 subjects who each viewed 40 images of urban facades and rated each based on their emotional reaction.FindingsEach subject also completed two validated individual trait difference measures. We found that those images depicting thigmotaxic facades were more highly rated than other facades.Originality/valueHigh quality edge environment resulted in people feeling more pleasant than low quality edges.

A Review on Tree Sensitive Urban Design (TSUD) Approach as potentials Streetscape Design Guidelines

Green fabrics that comprise of roadside tree planting play a vital element in an urban ecosystem. Inappropriate roadside tree planting implementation and even during its post-execution of management practices affect streetscape quality of life (QOL). Roadside tree planting condition in every country and town in Malaysia tend to have different in quality as different authority conducts management and maintenance for different area. This study is to serve as a discussion of non-numerical data on the potential of attributes and approaches that can be executed in the Malaysian context.Keywords: Streetscape Design; Roadside Tree Planting; Tree Sensitive Urban Design TheoryeISSN: 2398-4287 © 2020. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BYNC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians) and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia.DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/e-bpj.v5i13.2086

Talk on the Street: The Impact of Good Streetscape Design on Neighbourhood Experience in Low-density Suburbs

ABSTRACT This paper examines the impact of streetscape design on correlates of social interaction in low-density suburbs. While much research has investigated the impact on social interaction of the physical environment in high-density contexts, few studies have found evidence elucidating how neighbourhood design can improve suburban social interaction. Analyses examined the extent to which three “neighbourhood experience” factors – Neighbourhood contentment; Active socializing and Accessibility – are impacted by the acceptable provision of some streetscape characteristics. The findings show that neighbourhood experience was significantly different between three suburbs, and that good streetscape design had significantly predicted Neighbourhood contentment and Accessibility, even when allowing for the interaction of socio-demographic variables. It was also found that social demographic characteristics – in particular length of residence, but also the number of children and income – significantly impact Active socializing and have independent influence compared to physical design.

Approaches to Improve Streetscape Design in Saudi Arabia

The kingdom of Saudi Arabia is looking to enhance the quality of life in its cities by making the cities livable places. This study focuses on the changes that need to be made to the street design in Saudi Arabia to achieve the goals of the 2030 vision. This paper highlights the importance of aesthetics, accessibility, security and safety and walkability, which needs to be considered during street design. The analytical study uses examples from around the world of applying the basic principles of streetscape design in order to develop the streetscape approaches and recommendations in Saudi Arabia. The research emphasizes the importance of developing the urban environment visual image in the country to enhance the quality of life of both people and the city. Approaches include directing urban planners and designers to the important role of the well-designed streetscape and identifying methods of applying sustainability to streetscape design and making street pedestrian-oriented.

Impacts of temporary pedestrian streetscape improvements on pedestrian and vehicle activity and community perceptions

IntroductionMicro-scale streetscape built environment attributes can support or inhibit physical activity over and above macro-scale community design factors. Quick build projects involve rapid and low-cost approaches for modifying streetscape design elements to improve pedestrian safety and support walking. This study evaluated quick build projects at two intersections in low-income neighborhoods. MethodsTwo intersections were identified using a participatory process with community residents. The projects included painted crosswalks and temporary curb extensions to narrow the vehicle traffic lanes. Video and in-person direct observations were conducted before and during implementation to assess the number of pedestrians and vehicles using the intersection and vehicle/driver behaviors. Resident and stakeholder (e.g., public service workers) attitudes towards the projects were captured through surveys and interviews. ResultsPedestrian activity increased by 23% (p = 0.030) and vehicle activity did not change. The number of vehicles that failed to come to a complete stop at a stop sign decreased by 9% (p = 0.040) and the proportion of vehicles creating two lanes of traffic at the intersection of single-lane streets decreased from 70% to 0%. The mean rating regarding whether residents wanted the project to become permanent was 3.1 on a 1–4 scale, ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree. The primary concerns noted related to burden to drivers. Stakeholders had positive attitudes towards the project but some noted concerns related to large vehicles’ (e.g., fire engines) ability to make turns in the intersection. ConclusionsThe findings suggest that inexpensive quick build streetscape improvements are promising for increasing pedestrian activity and walking. More research is needed to evaluate long-term outcomes of sustained quick build projects.

Characteristics of urban streets in relation to perceived restorativeness.

The research on the restorative capacity of various environments has been growing exponentially in recent years. However, previous researchers mainly focus on urban green spaces, natural environments or urban landscapes. The streetscapes which have a close tie with residents' daily life and may have an essential effect on people's psychological wellbeing have not attracted extensive attention from academic research, failing to provide a cohesive guideline for streetscape design. To address this gap, this paper conducted an experiment to explore the relationship between restorative quality and streetscape characteristics, in which 30 photographs representing the various streetscapes in Xuzhou in eastern China, were used as stimuli, and the restorative qualities of these photographs were measured through online surveys. The results indicated that: (1) the streetscape with higher rate of plants in the view and diverse species of plants implied a high restorative capacity; (2) less non-motor vehicles and clear traffic signs painted on the streets are the other promoters of the restorative capacity of streetscapes. These findings contribute new knowledge about the role of streetscape characteristics to enhance the restorative potential and have applications for designers and urban managers.