Senior involvement to validate criteria and metrics for assessing the quality of urban space
A. Ptak-Wojciechowska & A. Gawlak
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AbstractThe research is a continuation of studies carried out in 2020 at the Faculty of Architecture at Poznan University of Technology in the field of creating architectural spaces that support the aging process. Assessing the urban quality of life (QoL) and the concept of age-friendly cities is not a new idea, but it requires further development to address new challenges and sociodemographic conditions (Ptak-Wojciechowska et al., 2022). Many publications devoted to the QoL assessment and the role of the built environment have been already published. However, the aspect of the quality of spatial structure concerning the health and well-being of ageing societies has been underestimated. In gerontological studies, there are insightful publications on the influence of the Person-Environment Fit on the residential satisfaction of older people (Kahana et al., 2003; Lawton, 1982). Yet, existing assessment frameworks are insufficient to comprehensively measure the spatial structure of a city on a neighbourhood level and its impact on the QoL of older individuals (Gawlak et al., 2021; Ptak-Wojciechowska et al., 2021). Moreover, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, there is no study where architects and seniors are involved as groups of decision-makers in the process of formulating criteria and metrics for a city's spatial structure assessment. The following research questions were formulated: In what way the proposed criteria, sub-criteria and metrics could be validated? What does the validated questionnaire for seniors, measuring their perception of a city's spatial structure, look like? Which aspects of the spatial structure of the city are significant for seniors?Keywords: urban quality of life of older people, perceptual quality, workshops, urban design, healthy inclusive environments
A. Ptak-Wojciechowska & A. Gawlak (2024). Senior involvement to validate criteria and metrics for assessing the quality of urban space. Gerontechnology, 23(2), 1-1
https://doi.org/10.4017/gt.2024.23.s.864.opp