Visual Preferences of Small Urban Parks Based on Spatial Configuration of Place

Recently, in terms of context oriented researches, physical aspects of cities in different area such as small urban parks, gradually has been turned to human dimentions such as human psychological aspects of space. The importance of small urban parks in mega cities has been accepted as an essential component of urban lung and restorative settings. As urban population in the world increases and the cost of maintaining large parks escalates, urban authorities are shifting their attention to creating, designing and maintaining smaller urban parks. However, consideration of public psychological aspects in every region could lead to determination of context oriented design. Design considerations of a small urban parks could promote psychological restoration for people who live in surrounding area of these specific places. In this regard small urban parks may present a different ambience due to their location, size and visual appearence. This research examined visual preferences of 16 small urban parks located in the city of Tabriz, Iran. It employed descriptive statistical analysis as a quantitative survey method based on Kaplan and Kaplan information-processing and Appleton’s prospect-refuge theories. In fact, there were as preselected studied variables by expert panels. Participants rated their preferences for 48 randomly selected colored photographs of the small urban parks. Results indicated that Mystery, as an indicator of having winding shapes of the paths and expansive body of trees, is the most preferred spatial configuration of spaces in those small urban parks, followed by Coherence, Refuge and Complexity. In the end, Legibility and Prospect as indicators of wide perspective and sky lines were the least preferred constructs. The results provide information on preferred visual configurations for small urban parks that may assist urban designers and landscape architects to improve their design based on context oriented information of these small urban spaces for the public.

Keywords:

Small Urban Parks , Visual preferences , Information-processing Theory , Prospect- Refuge