International Journal of Applied Science and Technology Vol. 2 No. 7; August 2012 261 Ecological Analysis of Urban Parks (Case Study: Mashhad Metropolitan) Farzaneh Razzaghian PhD student of Urban Planning Member of research staff of Iranian Academic Center for Education Culture & Research (ACECR)-Mashhad Branch Mashhad, Iran Mohammad Rahim Rahnama Associate Professor and PhD of Urban Planning Member of academic staff of Ferdowsi university of Mashhad Faculty of literature, Ferdowsi university of Mashhad Azadi sq, Mashhad, Iran Abstract The symbol of ecological urban sustainable development is the construction of urban ecological parks or Eco- parks. This paper’s aim is to provide standards and criteria for ecological planning in urban parks and use them in the design of parks. Finally the comparison of three existing parks in Mashhad with the principles of ecological parks is the last purpose. The statistical society is all parks of Mashhad metropolitan and the case study are three parks of Mellat, Vahdat and Koohsangi. Evaluation of ecological indicators is in the three main axes of Physical and Ecological Design, Environmental Principles, and Educational and Cultural principles. The current status of these parks is inappropriate that are being non-ecological. In order to improve the quality of existing parks we offer suggestions in micro and macro levels of management, planning and design of urban green spaces. Finally the ecological landscape thinking will be clear at the end. Key words: Eco-park, Ecological indicators, Mashhad, Sustainable development, Urban parks 1. Introduction City is an alive and dynamic system which parks and green spaces are part of it. They are valuable because of the effective role of them to reduce the urban density, completing and improving the functioning of educational facilities, cultural, residential and reserve land for future expansion of the city. (Karim Zadegan, 2003) The distinguishing characteristic in the third millennium is planning based on principles of sustainable development in line with nature and all activities related to urban issues. Ecological concepts and consequently ecological parks refer to a comprehensive and integrated set of measures which create coordination and balance between the constituent elements of the park in order to establish sustainable development. It means that environmentally friendly plants are not the only matter, so at the same time recycling and saving energy is also considered. We can say that it includes such a wide scale of ecological indicators of environmental variables energy and material usage. (Rahnama, 2009) As an example we can mention to different developed countries like Singapore, China, America, Germany, Britain and South Korea where ecological planning is in the top of government policies. First they experess the slogan of sustainable development and then by organizing the Green and Ecological Movements they try to reach the sustainable development. Singapore government consider policies like “The Second Master Plan of Green Buildings” as a progressive plan in sustainable development , the main purpose of this plan is to reach at least 80 percent of buildings become green by 2030. (Wong, et al., 2011)