Urban Forestry & Urban Greening 14 (2015) 573–582 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Urban Forestry & Urban Greening journa l h om epage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ufug Relationships between the visual preferences of urban recreation area users and various landscape design elements Ahmet Tu˘ grul Polat, Ahmet Akay ∗ Department of Landscape Architecture, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Selcuk, Selc ¸ uk Üniversitesi Ziraat Fakü. . ., 42075 Konya, Turkey a r t i c l e i n f o Article history: Received 9 September 2014 Received in revised form 14 May 2015 Accepted 16 May 2015 Available online 23 June 2015 Keywords: Konya Landscape design Landscape visual quality Photo-questionnaire Recreation a b s t r a c t The locations and the relationships between locations that have emerged with urbanization and the growth of cities have placed considerable pressures on city dwellers. In recent times, city dwellers have been seeking comfort both inside and outside their homes. The search for comfort outside of homes, in particular, has increasingly focused on satisfying both the physical and psychological needs of city dwellers. To satisfy such demands, efforts should be made to create locations with aesthetic and functional qualities. In this study, our aim was to evaluate the relationships between the visual quality of urban recreational areas and the structural and vegetation landscape elements of these areas with regards to the preferences of visitors and users. One-on-one interviews using photo-questionnaires were conducted in the study areas with 409 individuals. Based on our findings, it was observed that the water surface area, the widths of pedestrian walkways, the function of recreational areas, plant composition, plant color composition, and plant species diversity can positively affect the visual quality of a landscape area. Furthermore, it was determined that a lack of bush-type plants within the plant composition can have a negative effect on visual quality. © 2015 Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved. Introduction A healthy environment and a high standard of living are the most basic demands of modern societies (Simonic, 2006). In this context, the protection and development of green areas that are closely associated with the environment and human health are very important for urban dwellers, especially in dry or arid city centers (Acar and Sakıcı, 2008). Green areas within cities make significant contributions to the urban landscape, especially with regards to its visual quality. Many studies have been performed to date on the aesthetic quality of townscapes (Abkar et al., 2011; Bernasconi et al., 2009; Chen et al., 2009; Galindo and Hidalgo, 2005; Wong and Domroes, 2005). Emphasis should be placed on the percep- tions of users when planning and managing public resources such as urban green areas. The incompatibility between the expectations of urban landscape users and the current status of the city may lead to various negative outcomes (Daniel, 2001). The perceptions and sentiments of individuals towards the environment may be associated with certain features of that envi- ronment. A coherent setting is orderly; it is organized into clear ∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +90 3322232725; fax: +90 3322410108. E-mail addresses: aakaypm@gmail.com, ahmetakay@selcuk.edu.tr (A. Akay). areas. People can readily discern the presence of a few distinct regions or areas, and those make it easier to make sense of, or understand, a place. The important issue in considering legibil- ity is distinctiveness. To increase legibility, a scene has to have some memorable components that help with orientation. In a legible place, one can imagine finding one’s way, not only to a destination but back again as well (Kaplan et al., 1998). The land- scape preferences of individuals for a particular region can be determined, and specific design criteria based on these findings can be accepted for the region in question. How people per- ceive their environment and what they choose to consider and remember most can be determined and measured through the landscape preferences of individuals (Abkar et al., 2011). While researching the perception and preferences of individuals for natu- ral (untouched) and naturalistic (designed using the characteristics of natural landscapes) areas, importance should be accorded to the different spatial variables that affect landscape preferences (Acar and Sakıcı, 2008). Perception of environmental quality is an important area of study for psychologists, geographers and other researchers in environmental and behavioral sciences (Brown and Daniel, 1987). Landscape perception is considered as a subcategory of environmental perception, and can be accepted as a function of the interaction between individuals and the landscape (Zube et al., 1982). Landscape quality arises from the relationships between the http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ufug.2015.05.009 1618-8667/© 2015 Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved.