**6. Selection of the evaluation criteria within the scope of urban design**

The common characteristics of qualified/successful urban spaces are to offer livable, dynamic, and different spaces having character and (most importantly) satisfying the people living there. Nowadays, the first step of constructing these qualified/successful urban spaces is to determine and implement the principles of urban design. The urban design criteria are abstract on their own. However, when they are concretized within the process of development, they have significant effects on the city and consequently on the people because they gain an environment for contacting all the senses of people after the concretization.

The most effective part of these urban spaces is the urban public spaces. Urban public spaces cover all the built or natural environments easily accessed by the public and used free of charge. It covers all the streets, squares, roads, residential areas, parks incorporating commercial or public usage areas for the citizens, open areas, and the public or private properties where the society can freely visit at least in the daytime. The urban spaces should be freely accessible for every person and provide the highest urban quality to the urbanites. The most important necessities in public spaces are comfort, relaxation, active/passive participation, exploration, and human needs [28].

Certain urban design criteria are utilized in order to keep the urban space quality at the highest level. These criteria cannot become clear because of the different perspectives of researches and the spatial conditions in different periods. However, there are also certain common points.

According to the analyses made in the literature by various researchers, the criteria constituting the components of high-quality urban spaces are classified in different ways. The physical needs and the need for security, belonging, respect, and existing in a space are the fundamental needs [24, 29]. Another perspective is about the relationship and continuity of the patterns. The integrity and continuity of spatial relationships are crucial. From this aspect, many principles influencing the quality of urban life have been determined [30]. Another approach is that of Kevin Lynch. The criteria he put forward as design criteria are vitality, identity, adaptation, access, diversity, freedom, and domination [31]. In the criteria discussed by Nasar [32], there are common points besides the differences from the other theoreticians. These criteria were classified as compliance with nature, order, definitiveness, identity, and cleanliness. Similarly, discussing the importance of human scale and the pedestrian- and cyclist-oriented urban design for ensuring the urban quality and the destructive effect of vehicles, Gehl designed the criteria for the livability of urban spaces. These criteria are security, vitality, density, perceptibility, accessibility, and control [33]. From the same perspective, considering that the importance of the urban design criteria arises from livable cities, Llewelyn Davies Yeang also designed certain criteria. These criteria are noise, sound, crowdedness, the material quality of space, presence, function of open and public area, presence of pedestrians, accessibility, service diversity and quality, mass transportation, and security [34].

The criteria selected here are based on the literature review and the participation of a specialist group, which consists of actors playing an effective role in urban design decisions, in Turkey. This group consists of 73 specialist actors (urban planners, architects, and landscape architects). In this approach, the quantitative weight method is used in defining the relative importance of the criteria following the vision of specialists.

Considering the specific conditions of Turkish cities in terms of urban design, the specialists defined the criteria. In the next phase, these criteria were weighted and prioritized.

The "urban design success criteria," which were defined using the literature review, were asked to every specialist separately in the form of survey. Four main criteria and 13 sub-criteria accepted by all the specialists were accepted in the present study. In the next step, the specialists were asked to prioritize the criteria, and the weights of selected criteria representing their importance in the success level of urban design were determined. In the third step, the design and current status of Turkish cities were analyzed in terms of the selected criteria.

Four main criteria and 13 sub-criteria presented in **Tables 2** and **3** were used in analyzing the success level of urban design in Turkey within the scope of this manuscript.

In this parallel, the urban design assessment criteria were defined based on the relevant literature. These criteria are as follows:

1.Urban design quality

	- a. Urban built environment's compliance with nature
	- b. Level of noise
	- c. Appearance and level of cleanliness
	- a. Pedestrian and non-motorized vehicle access
	- b. Mass transportation opportunities
	- c. Urban services
	- a. Pedestrian security
	- b. Balance of daytime-nighttime usage

#### **6.1 Character and identity**

This can be defined as the "location" and its identity. The character is the quality consisting of the combination of topography, building type, geology, traditional structures, urban texture, and borders. In other words, it can be defined as

**Table 2.**

**337**

*Evaluation percentages of assessment criteria and sub-criteria pairs.*

*Assessing the Urban Design Quality of Turkish Cities DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.89779*
