Architecture and Urban Development (IJAUD)

A major reason why many developing nations have not made significant advancement in sustainable development (SD) agenda is the neglect of existing building stock which forms the bulk of built assets. Although sustainable development is a universal challenge, it cannot be approached in the same way for all nations, but rather practical response can be defined nationally or locally. This paper reviewed literature into the possibility of using an improvement strategy model to eliminate waste and inefficient facilities in existing buildings from occupants and property managers’ view points for sustainability in developing nations using Nigeria as an example while emphasis is placed on the multi-stakeholder/interdisciplinary approach in which each professional in the built environment add discipline-specific data to a single shared model. Many writers have criticized the ignorance of end-user requirements during the construction briefing, highlighting the communications gap between the end-users, designers and owners, and that little had since improved. This paper suggests a way forward in which “bottom-up” improvement policy formulation and subsequent implementation would stem from occupants and property managers rather than “top-down” governance approach in most developing countries. The concepts of lean thinking, zero emission and green building were incorporated into the Building Information Modeling to develop an improvement strategy model for existing buildings with the condition that the use is retained. It is envisaged that improvement would be cheaper financial-wise than to demolish and rebuild; environmental friendly; and bring about an appreciably reduced maintenance cost.

Culture has always been regarded as the most important element of human communities; we can easily observe cultural changes. What causes these changes has been a matter of controversy. The issues such as people’s increasingly getting detached from each other, psychopathy, behavioral abnormalities, traditions being increasingly faded away, malformation, extravagancy and value conversion into anti-values led the authors to conduct an investigation into the factors which cause such changes to happen. Moreover, the paper proposes strategies for improving the situation. First, the concept of culture and its elements are discussed. Then, the impact of urban physical aspects on the culture is dealt with. In developing a theoretical framework for the study, content analysis was performed. Qualitative and quantitative research methods were employed for small-scale (micro-level) and large-scale (macro-level) case studies, respectively. Finally, the results were discussed and a model was proposed for the impact of the urban physical aspects on culture and behavior.

Human settlements experience continual change. In recent years, many rural areas have experienced dispersed grow (rural sprawl) and population declines in traditional village centers (Hollowing). These paradoxical phenomena have occurred in most developing countries, including rural Iran. This study exامینes this phenomena in three Iranian villages of Kahak area of Qom province, and develops a model that can help predict how these trends will occur in the future. This study randomly selected 138 household for analysis. It analyzed eight variables that affect village development, including heritage, rural- urban migration, households’ structure changes, land price, quality of buildings, and geometrical shape of village. findings indicate that inheritance and migration variables have the highest influence on settlement transformation. Based on this analysis, it is predicted that among the there villages, Veshnave and Khurabad will maintain balanced population, but Abarjis will experience hollowing and decay.

This paper will concentrate on the result of a research based on comparative study between two Persian gardens in different micro climates in arid regions. Sustainability could be observed in many aspects and elements of traditional Iranian architecture and landscape architecture, and this method of design has used to solve many problems for many centuries. Gardens of Iran have had special role to moderate hot and arid climate since many years ago and their design method is an appropriate strategy to create sustainable landscape in our today cities. In this research, the selected case studies are Hasht-Behesht garden in Isfahan, and Jahannama garden in Shiraz, located in two different areas in arid regions of central plateau of Iran. The research method adopted in this paper consists of descriptive-analytic and deductive analyses. By the analysis of sustainable and climatic features and characteristics of these cases, the main goal is to identify the parameters of creating green space for present and future sustainable landscaping with similar climates. Results confirm that the similarities and differences between these two gardens are because of the different microclimatic regions they are located in. At the conclusion part, the main characteristics of Persian gardens from sustainability view will be classified and recommendations for sustainable landscape design will be presented.

Constructing houses in the form of garden-house became popular among Statesmen and the privileged class in Naseri period. Iranian traditional houses which used to be formed around a central courtyard, now were organized around a garden. So the transition from houses with courtyard to garden-houses created a new order of relationships between spaces, resulted in redefining spaces and their forms. The framework structure of the spaces along with their life culture have been investigated in the present research paper since without considering the inhabitants’ behavioral and cultural characteristics the framework patterns shaping the space cannot lead to identifying architectural features. So, the qualitative research method was used to study four aristocratic houses in Tehran within an analytical-interpretative approach. The results indicate a change in space organization. There are sustainability concepts in designing spaces in a house which are attained differently in the garden and sometimes redefined because of the changing needs. At the end, the roles of garden and yard are compared with each other in creating diversity and spatial regularity, defining the privacy and territory, perspective, access, entrance and function.

Urban perception is the result of mutual transaction between human and environment and the process of perception is developed through the three continuous steps of “sensation”, “perception” and “cognition”. In the first step (sensorial perception), the environmental signals are received via sensorial sensors and each different sense based on its own essence, performance and ability has its own specific contribution to develop the process of perception of the environment and replace the concept in mind. The sensorial experience made from these environmental perceptions will lead to better understanding and recognition of urban features and qualities. Different senses play different roles to enrich the environmental experience based on their depth and quantity. This paper aims at remembering forgotten distinguished values of tactility in perception of urban space and study is conducted using analytical method with an interpretive approach. The tactile senses because of their unique features like universality and diversity and experiencing the space without any medium and understanding the time and place are not emphasized much. The present study aimed to manifest the forgotten values of tactile sense and its efficiency in urban environment.

In this paper, a house is assumedas an expression of culture. It has been tried to study a Qajar1 house in Tabriz, in terms of its ties with cultural context.Methods and viewpoints of Amos Rapoport have been used in order to identify and peruse the circumstance of this relationship. The main reason for using Rapoport's viewpoints to understand Salmasi House, as a case study, in addition to contribute to cognition of this house and its relations, is presenting a method to understand many Iranian architecture samples. To explain the ties between built environment and culture, Rapoport has proposed several definitions and approaches according to environment-behavior studies. To study the house, Rapoport's has used a three-step approach, including, dismantling, analyzing, and synthesizing. At first, according to these approaches, two concepts of culture and built environment have been dismantled to variables and components. Then relationship among the variables and relationship among the components have been analyzed. At the final step, the variables have been reassembled and synthesized. Their interrelationships and their ties have been established, in order to understand the essential linkage between house form and its cultural context. The required data has been collected from three sources, direct interview with former inhabitants of Salmasi house to acquainting life and quality of behavior in house. Preliminary studies to acquainting the context of case studies, study the form of the house. The results indicate the adjustment of the form of Salmasi House with wishes, needs and totally cultural characteristics of its inhabitants.

Cities, as the focused centers for human residence and settlement, are faced with various issues and problems. The high rate of crime and anomic behavior are characteristics of today’s major cities. Fear of crime and anomic behavior is perceived as the most important reasons leading to a decline in the use of public spaces in cities by its residents. According to the mutual relation between environment and behavior, clearly, different characteristics of urban spaces can both significantly increase or decrease the rate of crime in a city. The purpose of this paper is to identify the physical factors and parameters which underlie crime and anomic behavior in Borazjan urban deteriorated spaces. The aim of this research is to identify, and therefore, help eliminate these effective environmental factors and reach higher level of safety and regularity in public spaces of deteriorated areas of Borazjan city. According to the results of this research, the most effective factors that give rise to crime in public spaces are physical disturbance, functional disorders and confusion of meaning and identity.

This paper investigates the function of windcatchers in dry regions in Middle East and compares them in different fields in two areas including Yazd-Iran, and Egypt. The study exامینes windcatchers in these areas in terms of cooling system and forms, with different plans, forms, constituent components and decorations.Reassessment of windcatchers in these areas can shed light on these differences. Survey was carried out by systematic comparison sampling. Comparison of windcatcher components and performance in two areas of the Middle East can result in a comprehensive understanding of the differences in these two areas. However, to keep factors affecting windcatcher components constant, two windcatchers in two similar regions are investigated.Case comparison between windcatchers in Iran and Egypt in terms of the constituent components can be informative about the windcatcher architecture in two regions with similar climates and different cultures and can give us general knowledge of the issue. Findings of the research have shown that windcatchers have formed a cooling system in the Middle East traditional buildings and their primary function is conditioning using the wind renewable energy. The cooling system works in two ways: through displacement and displacement and evaporation. The latter has been particularly used for hot and dry climate. In hot and arid regions of the Middle East, the windcatcher shapes were determined according to the prevailing wind direction.

One of the results of urban renovation is population displacement. If these renovations lead to live prosperous social classes, it is called gentrification. In this regard one of the urban renovation strategies is gentrification that is equal in "the acceptability of texture in public opinion" and is known as a synonym of "improving the quality of living environment for residents and citizens". In Iran despite interventions that take place in inner-cities these interventions are not the examples of gentrification; accordingly, it must be understood that what factors influence these interventions and whether renovation of Iranian inner-cities can be occurred in the framework of gentrification? This article tries to review the Navvab Project, by using a descriptive – analytical approach and documentary – library survey. Therefore, while reviewing mentioned project, gentrification obstacles of this project and its generalizations to Iranian inner-cities, hypotheses in three levels, Macroscopic, Mesoscopic and Microscopic scales, have been explained and strategies for preparation of this process provided.