Analyzing the Effect of Environmental Quality on Social Capital (Case Study: Garah-Khan Walkable Street in Mashhad)

جغرافیاوتوسعه ناحیه ای

Article 1, Volume 12, Issue 1 - Serial Number 22, September 2014   

Document Type: scientific-research article

DOI: 10.22067/geography.v12i22.18005

Authors

mohammad rahim rahnama; neda mohamadzadeh^*

دانشگاه فردوسی مشهد

Abstract

Objectives: This research seeks to assay and analyze the correlation between environmental quality of walkable streets and the level of social capital of the users of Garah-khan walkable street in Mashhad.
Method: This case study was conducted through a qualitative method on Garah-khan walkable street in Mashhad. For this purpose, the environmental quality of this walkable street was evaluated using six indicators (accessibility, uses and activities, safety and security, comfort, facilities and services and outlook of space) and the level of social capital was evaluated by three factors (social network, social/civic participation and social trust) in form of a survey research by distributing 371 questionnaires amongst people who had been selected randomly from the statistical population.
Findings/ Results: The results of the questionnaire show that the environmental quality of Garah-Khan walkable street in the eye of the users, with an average score of 3.29 on a five-point Likert scale, is relatively satisfactory and the level of social capital of individuals, with an average score of 1.96 on a five-point Likert scale, is fairly unfavorable.
Conclusion: The analysis of the correlation between two variables using Spearman-correlation test in SPSS, with a significance level of 0.02 and correlation coefficient of 0.22, proves that there is a significant positive relation between these two variables, though it is not very strong.

Keywords

Walkable street; Social capital; Urban space; Environmental Quality; Mashhad Metropolis