Page 57 - EER-2-1

Explora: Environment

and Resource

ORIGINAL RESEARCH ARTICLE
Designing sustainable urban parks: A proposal

backed by practical research

Serkan Yildiz* and Züleyha Oğuz
Department of Real Estate Development and Management, Graduate School of Natural and Applied
Sciences, Ankara University, Ankara, Turkey

Abstract
Sustainable urban park designs are essential in advancing urban sustainability by
addressing environmental issues, enhancing community well-being, fostering social
interactions, and boosting local economies. Hence, this study aimed to develop a
sustainable urban park design model. A total of 32 design elements were identified
through a comprehensive literature review. The significance of these elements to the
sustainability of urban parks was evaluated through a survey conducted with 318
participants. The survey results indicated that “being clean and well-kept” was the
most important design element, receiving a mean score of 4.86 out of 5. In contrast,
“availability of kiosks for buying drinks and snacks” emerged as the least important
element, with a mean score of 3.81. Furthermore, exploratory factor analysis was
used to categorize the design elements into six factors that collectively explained
approximately 60% of the total variance. These factors were labeled as management
*Corresponding author:
Serkan Yildiz quality, life quality, social quality, esthetics and furnishing quality, environmental
(serkan.yildiz@alumni.metu.edu.tr) quality, and activity quality. In the final phase of the study, Altinpark, located in
Citation: Yildiz S, Oğuz Z. Ankara, was examined using the developed model. Altinpark is one of the largest
Designing sustainable urban parks: and renowned parks in the city, encompassing an area of 640,000 m² and housing
A proposal backed by practical over 18,000 trees. The examination revealed that while the park was well-designed,
research. Explora Environ Resour. it exhibited significant shortcomings in terms of sustainability. The findings of this
2025;2(1):5839.
doi: 10.36922/eer.5839 study are anticipated to guide local governments and communities in the design
and construction of urban parks, enhancing their contribution to urban sustainability
Received: November 11, 2024
through improved functionality and serving as exemplary spaces.
1st revised: November 15, 2024
2nd revised: January 20, 2025 Keywords: Factor analysis; Park user preferences; Sustainable urban parks; Urban park
Accepted: February 5, 2025 model; Urban sustainability
Published online: February 19,
2025
Copyright: © 2025 Author(s).
This is an Open-Access article 1. Introduction
distributed under the terms of the
Creative Commons Attribution Today, major cities have become the primary consumers of natural resources and significant
License, permitting distribution, producers of pollution and waste. This transformation has led to urban centers becoming
1,2
and reproduction in any medium,
provided the original work is potential hotspots for various social, economic, and environmental issues, such as poverty,
3,4
properly cited. inequality, unemployment, inadequate infrastructure, crime, violence, and disease. In
Publisher’s Note: AccScience response to these challenges, the concept of sustainable cities has emerged. Sustainable
Publishing remains neutral with cities are defined as areas where measures are implemented to conserve energy, reduce
regard to jurisdictional claims in
published maps and institutional consumption, and protect the environment while simultaneously enhancing the welfare
affiliations. of citizens. A key component of the built environment in sustainable cities is urban parks.

Volume 2 Issue 1 (2025) 1 doi: 10.36922/eer.5839