The Cognition of the City at Night

Subject Areas : Urban Design

Farah Habib ¹ , Mahdi Sashourpour ²

1 - Associate professor, Department of Art and Architecture, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
2 - Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Art and Architecture, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Received: 2012-04-02 Accepted : 2012-05-16 Published : 2012-07-01

Keywords: Perception, Legibility, Cognitive maps, Night,

Abstract :

Human presence and accordingly establishing suitable condition for social interactions are important factorsin shaping urban spaces. Caring to different aspects of improving environmental qualities especially perception aspect and easeof perception from the environment with legibility improvement is an element that was emphasized from the base of urbandesign. The role of time, commence of day and night and its effect on perception and legibility of the environment have not beeninvestigated deeply. Although time effects the level and the way of perception and legibility and it should be noted that there isclear difference between human perception and space legibility during day and night.This research is looking for effective majorfactors on urban spaces qualities in day and night with descriptive and comparison method on the case studies and their imagesof Zanjan and Abadan cities and tries to approve the differences of these images. Results of performing this research clearlyapproving that, social, functional and perceptional dimensions are the most important dimensions of improving space quality atnight. It should be declared that there are a lot of differences between the images and the perception of the city during day andnight. In addition, the mention priority to urban five elements in shaping these maps are differ either.