Current World Environment

Introduction

In most of period, human settlements are going through progress and revolution. Universal Changes, that appear in all of the world, have most significant impact on the development and formation of cities.¹ These progress and revolution have affected several urban problem in political, cultural and economical, and managed to arise of environmental problem. Today urban identity in all aspect of city characteristics ² depend on the entire history and social characteristics of a city. Changes in the shape of the city must be balanced in the lives of the inhabitants in order to protect the environment.³ Urban identity in most of eastern countries, consists of a series of cultural events in different period with the aim of preserving the past. This identity can be defined as the characteristic difference between these cities from other one.⁴ An also it has a lively and endlessly changing structure. In all historical stages, each social identity, create in a city has may reflected physical identity of that city.⁵ Urban identity is such a expressive truth took by a procedure from past to present that effects city shape; it  has distinctive scale and stylistic properties in each city; is shaped by physical, cultural, socioeconomic, historical and formational factors; is formed by urban people and their life style; develops continuously and maintains the concept of sustainability.⁶ Urban identity has been accepted as “the sum of the components in the diagnostic quality which defines a city and distinguishes it from the others”⁷ Urban identity is defined with the natural and artificial elements and socio-cultural characteristics of a city and the environment. The urban form in the Iranian cities is defined according to the meaning got by its identity format from the content that is affected by the theoretical foundations of the Iranian architecture, art,⁸ and urbanism, emphasizing that the form-content relationship like the body-spirit relationship is obvious in the worldview foundations.⁹ This study is an attempt associated with two steps to provide a theoretical framework for reviewing Iranian cities,¹⁰ as well as measures to promote urban identity. The main objective of this study is to evaluate the identity of three historical cities in Iran to achieve a theoretical framework for reviewing city's physical identity of urban spaces in Isfahan Shiraz and Yazd.¹¹

Methodology

The issue of city's physical identity in Iranian cities is not a new topic, but, it is an essential tool to create urban identity and physical city planning in Iran.¹² In pursuing this aim, the methodology aims to evaluate the urban physical identity according to public opinion. Therefore, in theoretical part, the paper briefly considers the concept of urban identity, in three historical Iranian cities. Then in practical parts: firstly, a questionnaire containing fifteen questions was designed in three parts. The questionnaire developed for the selected domains and indicators of Natural, Artifact and Human factor and prepare for expert and local people,¹³ and secondly based on a library methods and a review of literature from Iranian cities (flowchart  2). Responding to questions on the form and weight of components and indicators designed to determine the effects of city's physical identity. Validated by experts and professors of the validity and reliability of urban planning and field test has been conducted.¹⁴ The study population consisted of all experts and people who have been in contact with these areas. Based on the financial and time constraints of the study, 150 questionnaires were collected. Of these, 30 questionnaires by experts and citizens in the region of 120 questionnaires were completed. To answer questions, choose the common people used simple random sampling and the selection of experts, the first stage cluster sampling, and then each cluster were randomly selected number.¹⁵
 

Table 1: Table of Analytical Hierarchy Process  Click here to View table

Case Studies

In this research try to choose cities that played important role in physical identity of Iranian cities such as Isfahan, Yazd and Shiraz city (figure 1)
 

Figure 1: location of Isfahan, Shiraz and Yazd Click here to View figure

Isfahan

Isfahan province with an area of ​​about 107,019 square kilometers, allocating 57.7 percent of the country's total area in the center of Iran's plateau. Based on the results of the general census of population and housing, 1390 the population of the province was 4879312 people.¹⁶ Esfahan is the third largest city in Iran after Tehran, Mashhad and the third most populous city in Iran after Tehran and Mashhad. Isfahan is also located 435 kilometers from the capital and in the south of the city.¹⁷ the city is one of the few valuable archaeological centers in the world and many of its ancient works are listed on the historical list.This city is famous for its beautiful Islamic architecture in many beautiful boulevards, covered bridges, beautiful tunnels, palaces, mosques and unique minarets.

Table 2: Components of Isfahan city identity

Shiraz

One of the major cities in Iran and the capital of Fars province. Based on the latest census of the Iranian Center for Statistics in 2006, the city has a population of 1, 214, 808, which has increased to 1,455, 073 in 2009.The original site of this city was at the castle of Abu Nasr. The city of Shiraz was a fortress before Islam, dating back to the Sassanid era. The city is being transferred to the current site during the Bani-omayeh period, and it thrives at the expense of the collapse of the old capital of the Fars province. Shiraz was the capital of Iran during the Safaryan, Boeyan and Zandieh periods. Due to its many historical, cultural, religious and natural attractions, it has always attracted many tourists.¹⁸

Table 3: Components of Shiraz city identity

Yazd

Yazd province with a total area of ​​74493 square kilometers is the fourth largest province of the country, located in the central part of the Iranian plateau in the margin of the plains of the Lut River. The waves are 29 degrees and 52 minutes to 33 degrees and 27 minutes north and 52 degrees 55 minutes to 56 degrees 37 minutes. East is located.

Yazd province has 10 cities (Yazd, Abarkouh, Ardakan, Bafgh, Taft, Khatam, Sadouq, Mehriz and Meybod), 23 cities, 20 districts and 51 villages with Semnan provinces northwest, Isfahan from west, Fars from southwest, Khorasan South of east, Khorasan Razavi from north east and Kremans from east and south east of neighboring.Water reservoirs, wind farms, refiners and mills are the characteristics of this province.¹⁹ Historic city of Yazd, as the first historic city of Iran and the twenty-first historical monument of the country, was registered on the UNESCO World Heritage List.

Table 4: Components of Yazd city identity

Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP)

The Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) is one of the most popular multi-purpose decision-making techniques, first developed by Thomas L. An Iraqi hour was devised in the 1970s. The hierarchical analysis process reflects the natural behavior and human thinking. This technique examines complex issues based on their interactions, and turns them into a simple way to solve them. A hierarchical analysis process can be used when decision-making practice is faced with multiple competing choices and decision criteria.²⁰ The proposed criteria can be quantitative and qualitative. The basis of this method lies in the decision of the paired comparison. The decision maker starts with the process of bringing the hierarchical tree to the decision. The tree of the decision hierarchy, the compared factors, and the competing choices being evaluated in the decision. Then a series of pairwise comparisons is performed. These comparisons show the weight of each of the factors in line with the competing choices being evaluated in the decision. Finally, the logic of the hierarchical analysis process combines the matrices derived from the paired comparisons to arrive at an optimal decision (Table 5). The Principles of Analytic Hierarchy Process Thomas A. Sachet (the founder of this method) expresses the following four principles as the principles of the hierarchical analysis process and has based all the calculations, laws and regulations on these principles. The hierarchical analysis process model involves the following four main steps:

Sources:(David, 1963)[21]

Results and Discussion

Components related to physical identity ²² has been shown in table (1, 2, and 3). In the first level, the research objectives should be addressed. (prioritizing the Iranian physical identity in order to Components of case studies), in the second level Comparisons the elements of these cases by experts and performed using paired comparison and the third level, the prepare the diagram for compare the physical identity which is shown on the basis of the main criteria of the research. (Figure 2)

The weights obtained for each of the three main components are shown in Table 6. Based on this information, artifact factors with a weight of 0.614, natural factors with a weight of 0.268, human factors with the highest of 0.117 have gained. In this calculation, the Inconsistency rate is 0.07, which is less than 0.1, indicating the parallelism between the pairwise comparisons.
 

Table 6: Weights of Main Criteria  Click here to View table

The weight of the natural components is shown in Table 7. Based on the information obtained, the location of natural resources, the components of the natural structure of the region are highest in the order of magnitude. In addition, the level of inconsistency is 0.0224, which is less than 0.10, indicating that compatibility between pair comparisons is very high.
 

Table 7: Weight of Natural Factors  Click here to View table

Table 8 shows the weights obtained for the economic factor. According to the information obtained, General land scape , the point of history and physical indicators and single city monuments rate have the highest weights, respectively.

The Inconsistency is 0.02, which reflects the compatibility between the pair comparisons.²³
 

Table 8: Weights of subsidiary artifact factors  Click here to View table

The weight for each subset is shown in Table 9. According to information obtained, etiquette, language, race, and ancestors have the highest rates. The Inconsistency rate is 0.01, which is less than 0.1 and represents a correlation between pairwise comparisons
 

Table 9: Weight of Human factor  Click here to View table

Performance sensitivity and dynamic sensitivity of Iranian city’s physical identity with main criteria (Isfahan, Shiraz and Yazd) have been presented in table 10 .  based on the obtained results, Isfahan with 44.1% got the highest rate, shiraz with 29.9 and Yazd with 25.9 stand in the next levels. The results obtained from the expert opinions regarding the indicators of urban physical identity  tested under sensitivity analysis using Expert Choice software have been shown in Table 10.as per as the result artifact factor with 61.4% has the highest sensitivity.
 

Table 10: Result of Iranian cities physical identity  Click here to View table

The statistical graphs and diagrams that shows in figure 10 represent the evaluation and comparison of the two components and sub-components and the alternatives relative to each other. The vertical axis represents the final weight of the criterion, and the horizontal axis represents the main criteria. The human, artificial and natural factors of all three dimensions were measured. In the final figure shows the paired comparison between the Iranian cities.
 

Table 11: Result base on study

Table 12: Components of city identity Click here to View table

Conclusion

Urban identity is not known only as physical, Artifact and Human factors , but it is a mental ,Political, and Cultural element that its formation in people’s mind has direct relevance with the interventions of climate, Economic and historical  beliefs.

In Isfahan city, the King was built Naqsh-e Jahan Square, stand on the porch o ali-ghapoo, and shows his power to people. The political aspect is reinforced.and we consequences that Political influence has more effect on the identity of Isfahan  city .

shiraz  city has The most massive and the most eternal of history and civilization of Iran. . Celebrities, literature, philosophy and science was in the shiraz city .Cultural and historical monuments in Fars and Shiraz, was not just put a period to the modern century in all periods of history of the Achaemenid the most important parts of Iran and the entire region. And we consequences that Culture affects identity has more effect on the identity of shiraz city.

yazd with Organic architecture, influenced by the City of climate (bricks and mud), interconnected buildings, arched and domed arches, thick walls, compact urban texture , residential introverted types, wind towers, cistern, streets with awnings, awning stand on first climate and vernacular architecture  level. and we consequences that Climate affects identity has more effect on the identity of yazd  city .

Consequently, urban physical identity is one of the main aspect of the city development. The historical value of the city is the backbone of this identity and, they mostly from the first civilizations in the city, their character is emphasized in compromise the urban physical identity. The urban identity of Iran is an image that reflects human relationships with its environment from past to present time. It has a physical, Artifact and Human factors. This also depends on the popular culture, history and images of the human being, Heritage area , relationships, And the strains combined with this combination make the urban disasters understandable in the city and may be full of events, tangible and intangible  urban identity.

Acknowledgements

The authors of this paper would like to show appreciation of Acecr-Academic Center for Education, Culture and Research for their assistance to access their record regarding to physical identity for Iranian cities. We also thank the anonymous reviewers for their precious comments and recommendations.

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