Volume 3 Issue 2 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES AND September 2016 CULTURAL STUDIES ISSN 2356-5926 A Comparative Study on People-Friendly Urban Landscapes in the Walkways of Chaharbagh in Isfahan and Qianmen Street in Beijing Sina Razzaghi-Asl Sina Razzaghi-Asl, Assistant Professor in Urban Design, Shahid Reajaee Teacher Training University. Telephone: +989125025808.- Email: [email protected] Saeideh Rahmani Ph.D Candidate of Architecture, Iran University of Department of Architecture, Shahrekord Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shahrekord, Iran.Residential Address: No.9, Kamran Cul-de- sac, SeyyedalikhanStreet, Golzar Street, 8behesht Ave, Isfahan, Iran Corresponding author: Saeideh Rahmani Telephone: +989131079780 Email:[email protected] Abstract Planning and designing a walkway will be successful when, in addition to physical factors, the social and cultural conditions and even psychological and behavioral patterns of citizens are taken into consideration. The goal of this paper is to discover the most important people- friendliness qualities in the urban landscape of the axes of Qianmen Street in Beijing and Chaharbagh in Isfahan. Hence, the research method is based on field observations. The axes of Qianmen and Chaharbagh streets have been studied based on the field data of a list of collected observations including the most important qualities mentioned by experts in the literature. The literature analyzed with the aid of thematic content analysis, and the most important quality criteria of urban landscape in the two axes have been extracted. Finally, based on a comparative approach, practical strategies have been presented to convert Chaharbagh Abbasi Avenue in Isfahan into a people-friendly walkway. Keywords: Walkway, People-friendly, Qianmen street, Chaharbagh street, urban landscape. http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 1475 Volume 3 Issue 2 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES AND September 2016 CULTURAL STUDIES ISSN 2356-5926 1- Introduction: A city, as one of the substrates on which humans are present, requires many features to qualify for "being a city". "One of the fundamental features of a city is the presence of a public place and urban services in order to create a vibrant center" (Cullen, 2003:135). Cities usually contain a set of various activities, but some of them undertake a specific role and acquire a unique identity (Cullen, 2003:163). A city can take religious, governmental, political, cultural, commercial or other roles, and reveal its predominant identity based on time, place, and presence of humans that define the city's function. Among these, the most important element of human relationship with his surrounding environment is present in an environment so that memories are recorded in their mind. In addition, Schulz says in this regard, "A necessary condition for the application of place in the true sense of the word is memory. A human, after reaching a place, experiences its environmental qualities, and the unification and union of that place - identity - are revealed to him. (Schulz, 2008). The mass production of automobiles and the possibility for major part of social strata to use them intensified this phenomenon (Soltani, 2011). According to Jane Jacobs, the major part of the concept of the "street life" content lies on its sidewalks. To her, these crowded and vibrant sidewalks give meaning to the city center by providing an arena of mutual social relations. (Choay, 1996). There is no doubt that the place of pedestrian and bicycle traffic grew faint in today's urban planning, which is due to multiple factors such as insufficient familiarity with alternatives to base car transportation, attachment to rigid rules and regulations, and incorrect imaginations of the planning and design system about the type and quality of traffic. In this regard, it is important to pay attention to a fundamental difference between the conditions of modern cities and the cities of the past. Walking is considered the first evolved method of movement for every healthy individual (modal, 2007). Walkways are places for the presence of all citizens and their participation in their collective life. These spaces act at the scale of the entire city and embrace different groups of citizens, and in addition to their communication and accessibility role, provide safe and comfortable places for social contact, rambling, watching, and so on. In other words, walkways in urban spaces are places for strengthening communications, activating non-visual senses, perception of environment through the senses, and civic revitalization of urban centers (Malek, 2006). Establishment of civic life in the city (urban space) depends on the manifestation of its corresponding characteristics in the body of urban spaces. Therefore, from this perspective, the quality of collective spaces in a society is of particular importance. People need spaces in which they walk, run, ride a bicycle, alone or with their family play and have fun, have leisure time and take a picnic and/or sit somewhere to study and relax (Parkinson, 2006:12).Therefore, what is considered here, as a freedom-oriented urban space, is one, which possesses a set of people- oriented environmental qualities,providing an appropriate substrate to establish a social life in a civil society. In other words, the mission of designing freedom-oriented urban spaces is to protect the rights of users, and to provide access, freedom of action, and temporary ownership for all the groups (Ghorbanian, 2008). Accordingly, the concept of the freedom-oriented urban space is a concept focused on the "design for all". In other words, a freedom-oriented urban space is a physical manifestation of the public http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 1476 Volume 3 Issue 2 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES AND September 2016 CULTURAL STUDIES ISSN 2356-5926 characteristics of freedom in urban spaces. Therefore, a freedom-oriented urban space can be defined as "A space, which provides the possibility of use, free movement, access to the space for everyone and environmental comfort and equitable allocation of municipal facilities for them; encourages citizens to participate in the creation and interactive use of the space; and controls and foresees the establishment of justice in the form of a particular discipline with consistent management."(Behzadfar, Kordestani, 2009) The main objective of this paper is to identify the environmental qualities affecting the enhancement of people-friendly urban landscape in the index urban axes of Beijing (Qianmen Walkway) and Isfahan (Chaharbagh Walkway). In addition, a comparative study between the indices used in each of the above-mentioned axes in order to implement the features affecting the design of urban landscapes of the walkways under operation across the country is considered another important output of this paper. In this regard, this paper seeks to answer this fundamental question: "Which environmental components and qualities have led to creating a people-friendly urban landscape in the axes of Qianmen in Beijing, and Chaharbagh in Isfahan?" 2- The Research Method: As mentioned above, this paper seeks to discover the most important people-friendliness qualities in the urban landscape of the axes of Qianmen Street in Beijing and Chaharbagh in Isfahan. Hence, the main research methodology of this study is based on field observations. To this end, the axes of Qianmen Street in Beijing and Chaharbagh in Isfahan have been studied in the summer of 2015. The instrument used to collect the field data was the observation log consisting of the most important qualities addressed by experts in the literature. To this end, the literature similar to the subject was analyzed with the aid of thematic content analysis, and the most important quality criteria of urban landscape in the two axes have been extracted. Finally, based on a comparative approach, a comparison has been made between the components of each of these axes in order to extract a common agenda and to identify effective environmental qualities in the plan of human walkways. 3- The research background: Quality of life and quality of environment have always been among the main concerns of scientists in the field of urban development. In the transition from special conditions influenced by the industrial revolution, world wars, economic recessions, etc, which have led to accepting the compulsiveness of social issues and their impact on the place and environment, to a fundamental turn towards the interaction between humans and environment, it can be seen that most recent theorists have tried to consider this mutual effect. Basis on it, they have provided some assumptions in order to improve the lives of human beings. From among these theorists, we can refer to some scholars such as "Jane Jacobs", "Donald Appleyard", "Francis Tibbalds", "Jan Gehl", etc., who have given particular attention to social and functional aspects of public spaces in order to improve the quality of life and environment; and one of the categories regarded by them has been increasing the walkability in the cities. The importance of human presence in the urban space is sometimes imagined to the extent that it has been considered the most important sign of the quality of civilization (Tibbalds, 2004, quoted from Buchanan, 1963). In addition, in http://www.ijhcs.com/index.php/ijhcs/index Page 1477 Volume 3 Issue 2 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES AND September 2016 CULTURAL STUDIES ISSN 2356-5926 2000, an international