Toward time-based design: Creating an applied time evaluation checklist for urban design research

Abstract

The perception of a 3D space, in which movement takes place, is subjectively based on experience. The pedestrians’ perception of subjective duration is one of the related issues that receive little attention in urban design literature. Pedestrians often misperceive the required time to pass a certain distance. A wide range of factors affects one'sperception of time in urban environments. These factors include individual factors (e.g.,gender,age,and psychological state), social and cultural contexts, purpose and motivation for being in the space, and knowledge of the given area. This study aims to create an applied checklist that can be used by urban designers in analyzing the effects of individual experience on subjective duration. This checklist will enable urban designers to perform a phenomenological assessment of time perception and compare this perception in different urban spaces,thereby improving pedestrians’ experiences of time through a purposeful design. A combination of exploratory and descriptive analytical research is used as methodology due to the complexity of time perception.

Key words： Time-based checklist; Environmental experience; Time perception; Subjective duration