Design Criteria for an Urban Sidewalk Landscape

Considering Emotional Perception

Byung Joo Lee, Ph.D.1; Tae Youn Jang2; Weijie Wang, Ph.D.3; and Moon Namgung4

Abstract: Pedestrians’ emotional satisfaction when using an urban sidewalk landscapes depends on the sidewalk design elements and
component ratios. It is therefore important for the design of a sidewalk to reflect pedestrians’ emotional perceptions through affective
engineering and design. In this study, sidewalk preference is surveyed based on principles of affective engineering and is modeled in order
to understand the relationships between the design elements and the component ratios in a sidewalk landscape. Through comparisons,
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sidewalk design criteria are presented with the aim of developing a comfortable and pleasant sidewalk landscape. Sidewalk design
elements include sidewalk width, shrub width, tree height, and tree width. Also, component area ratios for greenery, sky, roadway,
sidewalk, and building are used to define the design criteria. This paper is for a Korean case study that is subject to Korean perceptions
on sidewalk landscape. The research shows that it is crucial to consider affective engineering in order to design a comfortable and pleasant
sidewalk landscape.
DOI: 10.1061/共ASCE兲UP.1943-5444.0000013
CE Database subject headings: Urban areas; Walkways; Landscaping; Design; Human factors.

Introduction walks should be designed according to pedestrians’ perception

As traffic demand has increased in urban areas due to urban con-
centration and sprawl, the concentration of car-oriented road sys-
tem has increased significantly. In general, the function of a
roadway consists of both the efficient mobility of vehicles and the
comfortable walking space for pedestrians. Recently, in the age of
high oil prices, it is important to reduce vehicle transportation and
to encourage public transportation, bicycling, and walking. In par-
ticular, the objective of such improvement of the walking envi-
ronment is not only to reduce vehicle transportation but also to
create a comfortable urban environment. For the most part, the
sidewalk in urban areas has not been designed based on pedestri-
an’s perception but on engineering considerations, leading to a
failure to provide a satisfactory pedestrian environment. For the
effective implementation of transit oriented development, it is
important to provide a comfortable walking environment for pe-
destrians. Even if sidewalks are constructed with the same design
criteria, different pedestrian perceptions may be experienced ac-
cording to the specific design elements and component ratios of
sidewalks under various environments. Therefore, in order to
develop a pleasant and comfortable walking environment, side-
1
Official, Jeonbuk Provincial Government, Hyojadong 3-Ga, Jeonju,
Chonbuk 560-761, Korea.
2
Professor, Dept. of Urban Engineering, Chonbuk National Univ.,
664-14 Deokgindong, Jeonju, Chonbuk 561-756, Korea 共corresponding
author兲.
3
Researcher, Dept. of Civil, Environmental, and Urban Engineering,
Wonkwang Univ., 344-2 Shinyongdong, Iksan, Chonbuk 570-749, Korea.
4
Professor, Dept. of Civil, Environmental, and Urban Engineering,
Wonkwang Univ., 344-2 Shinyongdong, Iksan, Chonbuk 570-749, Korea.
Note. This manuscript was submitted on September 8, 2008; approved
on March 27, 2009; published online on April 16, 2009. Discussion pe-
riod open until May 1, 2010; separate discussions must be submitted for
individual papers. This paper is part of the Journal of Urban Planning
and Development, Vol. 135, No. 4, December 1, 2009. ©ASCE, ISSN
0733-9488/2009/4-133–140/$25.00.
and by considering the concept of sensibility ergonomics that is
defined as engineering approach to apply human sensitivity to
product.
In this study, pedestrian perception of sidewalks is modeled
through sensibility ergonomics and various sidewalk design crite-
ria are presented. Most of the existing research concerning side-
walks focuses on pedestrian characteristics 共Kim et al. 2002兲, the
evaluation of sidewalk facilities 共Lim and Kim 2000兲, signals for
pedestrians 共Kim 2007兲, modeling pedestrian walking speed on
sidewalks 共Al-Azzawi and Raeside 2007兲, the evaluation of side-
walk landscapes 共Kim and Oh 2001兲, and pedestrians’ crossing
behavior 共Yannis et al. 2007; Kruszyna et al. 2006; Lee et al.
2005兲. In technically advanced countries, perceived safety, com-
fort, and emotional perceptions have been considered during the
roadway design process 共Mattews et al. 2000; Hassan and Easa
2000兲. These previous studies mainly focus on the sidewalk op-
erations and facilities and the roadway. They do not consider
sidewalk design through human perception and design criteria.
Sidewalk design reflecting the concept of previous studies and
pedestrians’ perception is expected to offer comfortable and
pleasant sidewalk environment.
In this study, an experiment for the perception satisfaction of
sidewalk landscapes through affective engineering is performed
under the basic assumption that there are differences in pedestri-
ans’ perceptions of various sidewalk landscapes. In addition, sta-
tistical methods such as a principal component analysis and a
cluster analysis are conducted in order to examine characteristics
of the design elements and the component ratios for the sidewalk
landscape. Through these methods, the types and attributes of
sidewalk landscapes are identified. Specifically, in order to deter-
mine design criteria for a sidewalk landscape that can satisfy
sidewalk users in terms of sensibility, multiple regression models
are built based on various sidewalk design elements and structure
ratios.

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J. Urban Plann. Dev., 2009, 135(4): 133-140

 Table 1. Example of Sidewalk Landscapes and Main Characteristics
Green Sky Roadway Sidewalk Building Other
Card Sidewalk Shrub Tree Tree ratio ratio ratio ratio ratio ratio
number width width height width 共%兲 共%兲 共%兲 共%兲 共%兲 共%兲
1 4.6 m 2.30 m 6.8 m 3.0 m 67.0 9.9 8.3 5.6 1.4 7.8
2 2.8 m 1.23 m 7.2 m 4.0 m 21.2 12.3 2.5 11.0 45.4 7.7
3 2.1 m 0.00 m 5.0 m 2.5 m 34.9 6.9 4.0 10.6 27.3 16.2
4 1.6 m 0.00 m 0.0 m 0.0 m 2.6 12.8 12.6 12.8 40.4 18.9
5 2.7 m 0.85 m 6.7 m 3.3 m 27.2 5.7 1.5 9.8 54.6 1.2
6 3.5 m 1.00 m 8.0 m 3.2 m 51.4 7.4 7.0 19.2 14.6 0.4
7 1.8 m 0.00 m 5.2 m 2.5 m 9.2 14.5 0.0 9.1 57.4 9.8
8 2.5 m 0.00 m 0.0 m 0.0 m 0.0 18.3 0.5 11.7 62.7 6.7
9 2.8 m 0.85 m 5.0 m 2.0 m 63.5 13.3 7.5 10.3 4.5 0.8
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Data isfaction of a sidewalk landscape is estimated through the seman-

Definition of Experiments
The satisfaction a pedestrian experiences when using a sidewalk
landscape depends on their emotional perceptions. However, in
the current design for existing sidewalks, the elements of a side-
walk landscape are typically determined from an engineering per-
spective, while the location of shrubs and sidewalk trees, etc., is
determined by conditions such as the width of the street. In this
study, in order to overcome the limitations of the engineering
method and to develop comfortable and pleasant sidewalk land-
scapes, an affective engineering approach is taken based on sen-
sitivity ergonomics. Affective engineering is well known in Japan
as Kansei Engineering, which was first introduced by Dr. Mitsuo
Nagamachi of Hiroshima University in the 1970s 共Nagamachi
1989兲. The Japanese word Kansei means “affective” or “emo-
tional,” and was used for the first time in America by the Mazda
Motor Company. Affective engineering refers to the translation of
people’s psychological feelings about a product into perceptual
design factors. Therefore, the purpose of affective engineering is
to measure people’s psychological feelings and to discover the
relationship between feelings and product, and to then develop a
new product based on this data.
The sidewalks in Iksan inner city of Korea are selected as
research case studies and on-site photographs are taken to classify
the various sidewalks studied. Iksan city is located in the south-
west of Korea and has a geographical area of 507.06 km2. The
city’s population in 2007 was about 317,000. The shape of the
inner city closely resembles a regular square. Data on the partici-
pants’ satisfaction of sidewalk landscapes is collected through a
survey that measures emotional perception. The survey was con-
ducted from July to August of 2005. A total of 102 people living
in the local area participated in the survey. The survey items
include the participants’ demographic characteristics and their
walking patterns. Also, the emotional perception in terms of sat-
tic differential 共SD兲 technique, which is a psychological survey
method used in affective engineering. As shown in Table 1, the
photographs of the sidewalk landscapes are classified into nine
types and are then projected onto a screen by LCD monitor. The
participants then record their perceptions of the sidewalk land-
scape images through the questionnaire by voting on a variety of
opposing adjectives that describe various experiences on a scale
of 1–5, as shown in Table 2. In Table 1, “tree height” and “tree
width” refer to the height and width, respectively, of roadside
trees. “Sidewalk width” refers to the effective width of the side-
walk for a pedestrian. For cases where tree groups are located
within the sidewalk, “shrub width” refers to the width of the tree
group. They are design elements. Furthermore, an X-Plan 360
Planimeter 共Ushikata兲 is used to calculate the area ratios of vari-
ous sidewalk component factors 共such as green areas, sky, side-
walk, roadway, and building兲, for all the landscapes from the
photographs. They are component ratios. In addition, in order to
select appropriate words to describe the emotional image of side-
walk landscapes analyzed in this study, 24 image words are se-
lected as necessary words with which to evaluate sidewalk
landscapes based on urban design experts’ advice and Korean
dictionaries and on the references related to emotion such as Shi-
bata and Kato 共1998兲, Park et al. 共1998兲, and Tsumita et al.
共2006兲, especially. Based on survey results of a principal compo-
nent analysis and correlation analysis of the adjectives, the highly
correlated words are deleted. The remaining adjective words are
shown in Table 2.
Participant Characteristics
In this study, a survey is carried out on the demographic charac-
teristics of 102 participants, the main daily travel mode, and the
satisfaction of the sidewalk landscape. The demographic charac-
teristics include gender, age, education level, and whether the

Table 2. Emotional Perception Scale of Sidewalk Landscape SD Survey

Adjectives Very A little Median A little Very Adjectives
1 Closed 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ Open
2 Insufficient green 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ Green
3 Unpleasant 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ Pleasant
4 Rural 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ Urban
5 Dangerous 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ Safe
6 Single 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ 䊐¯ Various

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J. Urban Plann. Dev., 2009, 135(4): 133-140

 Fig. 1. Travel mode and concern of sidewalk landscapes
participant holds a driving license etc. According to the survey,
47.06% participants are male and 52.49% are female. Of the par-
ticipants, 53.9% are under the age of 25 and 46.1% are over 25
years old; 74.5% have achieved less than a college educational
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level and 25.5% have a college degree or higher; 69.6% do not
have a driving license while 30.4% do have one; 25.5% own a
vehicle while 74.5% do not. According to the main daily travel
mode, 36.27% of the participants prefer to walk, while 35.29%
take public transportation, 21.57% use a private car, and 6.86%
use a bicycle. 94.11% of the participants are interested in the
sidewalk landscape shown in Fig. 1. Fig. 2 shows the daily fre-
quency and types of uses for the sidewalk. School purpose is
64.71%, work is 15.69%, and leisure and exercises 8.82%. That
is, sidewalks are mainly used for school trips.
Preference of Sidewalk Landscapes
Characteristics of Design Elements
and Component Ratios
One of the purposes of this study is to identify the specific area
designated as design space for the sidewalk landscape through
participants’ emotional perception satisfaction and to then provide
the appropriate criteria for the design of the sidewalk landscape
and its improvement. The characteristics of nine kinds of photo-
graphs are examined by classifying the design elements of
the sidewalk landscape as well as the perception adjectives into
homogeneous groups. To achieve this, a principal component
analysis is carried out, which is a technique used to reduce mul-
tidimensional data sets to lower dimensions for analysis.
Fig. 2. Purposes of sidewalk use
Table 3. Cluster Analysis for Design Elements of Sidewalk Landscape
Sidewalk
Cluster Card width
1 1, 2, 5, 6 3.400 m
2 3, 7, 9 2.233 m
3 4, 8 2.050 m
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J. Urban Plann. Dev., 2009, 135(4): 133-140
Fig. 3. Component loads of principal component analysis
To classify the characteristics of sidewalk landscapes, as
shown in Fig. 3, component loadings are illustrated. The principal
component analysis shows that there are two components with
eigenvalues over 1.0. The cumulative percentage is 97.12% for
design elements and 72.9% for emotion adjectives, which indi-
cates that it is possible to identify the characteristics of percep-
tion. In the first principal component for design elements, shrub
width, tree height, and sidewalk width are higher impact factors
and are named “greenery.” In the second component, that of “vi-
sion,” the sidewalk width is the highest impact factor and tree
height and tree width show negative values. Also, the area ratios
of greenery, sky, roadway, sidewalk, and building are analyzed.
The ratios for greenery, roadway, and sidewalk in the first princi-
pal component show a positive impact and those for sky and
building show a negative impact, which indicates that, even
though the sky area is somewhat minimal, the sidewalk landscape
where there are more roadway trees and less buildings would be
preferred. This is known as “harmony.” In the second component,
the ratios of sidewalk and building area show a positive impact,
while the ratios of greenery and sky show a negative impact.
Man-made features in this study are known as “artificial” because
of the positive ratios of sidewalk and building area.
By planting more shrubs and roadway trees along sidewalks
and encouraging greenery, the sidewalk will become more harmo-
nious. In an urban center without roadway trees, the area of visual
perception becomes broader, resulting in more man-made side-
walk landscape features. Therefore, it can be said that it is neces-
sary to provide design criteria for sidewalk landscapes in order to
create pleasant and comfortable spaces for sidewalk users.
Classification of Sidewalk Landscapes
The sidewalk landscapes presented are classified based on the
similarity of characteristics. A cluster analysis is based on both a
hierarchical method and a nonhierarchical method. In this session,
cluster analysis is used to classify sidewalk landscapes into sev-
eral groups based on the design elements and the component ra-
tios, as shown in Table 3 and 4. It is found in the analysis that
there is no difference between the results of the hierarchical
method and those of the nonhierarchical method. Specifically, the
Shrub Tree Tree
width height width Satisfaction
1.345 m 7.175 m 3.375 m 62.850
0.283 m 5.067 m 2.333 m 50.268
— — — 31.328
 Table 4. Cluster Analysis on Component Ratio
Green Sky
ratio ratio
Cluster Card 共%兲 共%兲
1 1, 6, 9 60.633 10.200
2 2, 3, 5 27.767 8.300
3 4, 7, 8 3.933 15.200
average satisfaction score of each cluster is offered in order to
investigate the validation of the classification for sidewalk land-
scapes and to clarify the differences in emotional perception of
sidewalk landscapes.
In Table 3, Cluster 1 shows that the average satisfaction score
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is 62.580. A good landscape is created if the sidewalk is wide, and
if sufficient shrubs and sidewalk trees are planted. In Cluster 3,
the average satisfaction score is 31.328. In this case, there is no
planting on the sidewalk, resulting in landscapes that are nega-
tively experienced 共this would be more precise兲. Table 4 shows
the results of the analysis of sidewalk ratios. Cluster 1 scores an
average satisfaction of 74.108. In this case, there is a high ratio of
green area and a low ratio of buildings, resulting in a landscape
that is positively experienced. Cluster 3 scores an average satis-
faction of 31.667, where there is a low ratio of green area and a
high ratio of building, resulting in landscapes that are negatively
experienced.
Preference of Sidewalk Types
The nine kinds of landscapes are classified into three types, in-
cluding “good,” “median,” and “poor” as preference on sidewalk
landscapes, based on satisfaction scores obtained from the princi-
pal component analysis and cluster analysis. Cluster 1 is classified
as good, Cluster 2 as median, and Cluster 3 is bad. In this section,
the landscapes will be evaluated according to sidewalk design
elements. Thus the design elements of sidewalk landscapes are
multiplied by component loadings from the principal component
analysis. The patterns of common components for the samples
will then be identified. Component scores on the design elements
of the sidewalk landscapes are shown in Fig. 4. For the first part
of the component space, vision and greenery are good features,
while the second part indicates that vision is not good but green-
ery is good. The third part of the component space indicates that
vision and greenery are both poor, while the fourth part indicates
that vision is good and greenery is poor. In addition, the compo-
nent score for sidewalk landscape ratio is shown in Fig. 5. The
first part of the component score shows that the landscape feature
is man-made and harmonious, and the second part shows that
the landscape feature is harmonious and nonman-made. The third
Fig. 4. Preference by principal component scores for design elements
136 / JOURNAL OF URBAN PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT © ASCE / DECEMBER 2009
J. Urban Plann. Dev., 2009, 135(4): 133-140
Roadway Sidewalk Building
ratio ratio ratio
共%兲 共%兲 共%兲 Satisfaction
7.600 11.700 6.833 74.108
2.667 10.467 42.433 49.180
4.367 11.200 53.500 31.667
part of the component space shows that the landscape feature is
harmonious and nonman-made, while the fourth part shows that
the landscape feature is nonharmonious and nonman-made.
The sidewalk landscape numbers are shown in Figs. 4 and 5.
The results show that according to the classification of design
elements, the sidewalk landscape of Card 1 has a high evaluation
for greenery on the first component and has a median vision
evaluation in the second component. The sidewalk landscape of
Card 8 has a good evaluation for vision in the second component
and has a low evaluation for the harmony component. This may
be because there is no sidewalk tree and therefore good vision is
attained, yet without a tree there is low greenery. According to the
classification of sidewalk ratio, the sidewalk landscape of Card 1
shows a high evaluation for the first component of harmony and a
low evaluation for the component of man-made landscape, while
that of Card 4 shows a high evaluation for the man-made land-
scape component yet a low evaluation for harmony. As previously
discussed, in terms of design elements of a sidewalk landscape,
when sidewalk trees and shrubs are not featured, the man-made
evaluation and nonharmonious landscape are high. Therefore,
sidewalk trees and shrubs should play significant roles in the de-
sign of sidewalk landscapes and including these elements would
be considered very important from a pedestrians’ perceptive.
Furthermore, as can be seen in Figs. 4 and 5, the areas according
to the results of the cluster analysis show that the classification
results according to component scores correspond. In addition,
the emotional image of sidewalk landscapes closely relates to
the sidewalk landscape ratio. Fig. 6 shows the scores obtained
from the component principle analysis, indicating preferences for
emotional images of sidewalk landscapes such as “closed-open,”
“insufficient green-green,” “unpleasant-pleasant,” “rural-urban,”
“dangerous-safe,” and “single-various” items, which all show
similar patterns to Fig. 5. Therefore, based on this result, it can be
deduced that the research area in the study is valid.
Criteria for Sidewalk Design Elements
This section discusses the criteria for design elements of the side-
walk landscapes for pedestrians. The minimum criteria for design
Fig. 5. Preference by principal component scores for component
ratios

Fig. 6. Preference by principal component scores for emotional im-
ages
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elements in order to achieve a comfortable and pleasant landscape
are also provided. First, after the models for each design element
are completed and the most appropriate models are selected, the
least criteria for the three types of landscapes such as good, me-
dian, and poor are classified.
As shown in Fig. 7, a comparison is made of the SD values
and the satisfaction scores for sidewalk landscape perception. The
sidewalk landscapes that have well established sidewalk trees and
shrubs score a high evaluation, and the SD value is located in the
good score space. The sidewalk landscapes that have poorly es-
tablished sidewalk trees have a poor evaluation, and the SD value
is located in the poor score space. Therefore, in this study the
landscapes that have a satisfaction score of at least 60 points are
selected and this score is considered to be a normal satisfaction.
Based on normal satisfaction, the optimal sizes for design ele-

ments are decided.

Fig. 7. Classification of sidewalk landscape by emotional satisfaction
Sidewalk Width
In order to build a comfortable and pleasant sidewalk landscape,
the appropriate criteria for sidewalk width is necessary. In this
study, satisfaction models for the sidewalk width of a landscape
are therefore constructed. The results obtained from the models
are shown in Table 5. The R-squares for all models are over 0.93,
indicating that there is not a significant difference between them.
Considering the validation, explanation, and appropriateness of
the model, Model III may be appropriate as a satisfaction model
for sidewalk landscapes. The forecasting value of sidewalk width
is also shown in Table 5. As shown in Fig. 5, the normal land-
scapes that have a satisfaction score of sixty points have a 2.80-
m-wide sidewalk. This result is similar to the values of 2.233
⬃ 2.533 m, as obtained for Cluster 2 in the cluster analysis of
Table 3.

Table 5. Satisfaction Model for Design Elements of Sidewalk Landscape

Model I Model II Model III
Item Parameter t-value VIF Parameter t-value VIF Parameter t-value VIF
a a a
Sidewalk width 14.749 25.91 7.727 16.474 33.11 5.032 14.880 27.82 6.042
Shrub width ⫺5.398 ⫺4.73a 3.935 — — — — — —
Tree height 12.067 12.25a 90.248 2.800 5.22a 5.032 — — —
Tree width ⫺19.364 ⫺10.17a 74.368 — — — 2.172 8.02a 6.042
R-square 0.9041 0.8873 0.8915
Adjust R-square 0.9037 0.8870 0.8913
VIF value 10.429 8.8731 9.2166
a
Significance at 95%.

Table 6. Satisfaction Model of Ratio for Sidewalk Landscape

Model I Model II Model III
Items Parameter t-value VIF Parameter t-value VIF Parameter t-value VIF
a a a
Green ratio 0.975 35.89 3.931 0.826 35.25 2.659 0.953 37.78 3.373
Sky ratio ⫺0.301 ⫺2.17a 9.493 0.631 6.06a 4.867 — — —
Roadway ratio 0.720 4.22a 4.058 ⫺0.110 ⫺0.71a 3.024 0.578 3.66a 3.464
Sidewalk ratio 0.743 4.79a 11.427 1.709 13.77a 6.646 0.756 4.87a 11.408
Building ratio 0.391 9.63a 9.537 — — — 0.329 11.31a 4.889
R-square 0.9195 0.9114 0.9191
Adjust R-square 0.9191 0.9110 0.9188
VIF-value 12.422 11.287 12.361
a
Significance at 95%.

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J. Urban Plann. Dev., 2009, 135(4): 133-140

 Table 7. Estimation of Average Scores for Satisfaction
Mean value
Items of difference SD t-value p-value
Model for design elements ⫺0.6089 3.7701 ⫺0.16 0.8757
Model for sidewalk ⫺0.6678 2.1130 ⫺0.32 0.7601
landscape ratio
Shrub Width
In order to build a comfortable and pleasant sidewalk landscape,
the appropriate criteria for shrub width is necessary. In this study,
a satisfaction model for the tree width of a sidewalk landscape is
therefore constructed. The results obtained from the model are
shown in Table 6. The model results show a good R-square value,
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indicating that if sidewalk trees are planted without shrubs, the
satisfaction score is low. Considering the validation, explanation,
and appropriateness of the model, Model II can be chosen as
the nonlinear satisfaction model for shrub width of sidewalk
landscapes. The forecasting results of shrub width are shown in
Table 6. As shown in Table 6, the sidewalk landscapes that have a
satisfaction score of 60 points have a shrub width of 0.70 m.
These results are similar to the values of 0.283⬃ 0.693 m, as
obtained for Cluster 2 of the cluster analysis of Table 3.
Tree Height
In order to build a comfortable and pleasant sidewalk landscape
for pedestrians and investigate the appropriate tree height, a sat-
isfaction model for tree height is constructed. The results obtained
from the model are shown in Table 7, where the R-square values
for all models are over 0.85, with the exception of Model IV.
Considering the validation, explanation, and appropriateness of
the model, Model III is considered to be the appropriate nonlinear
satisfaction model for shrub width of sidewalk landscapes. The
predicted values of tree height are shown in Table 7. The sidewalk
landscapes that have an average satisfaction value of 60 points
have a tree height of 6.60 m. This result is similar to the results of
5.067⬃ 6.300 m, as obtained for Cluster 2 of the cluster analysis
of Table 3.
Tree Width
In order to build a comfortable and pleasant sidewalk landscape
for pedestrians and to investigate the appropriate tree width, a
satisfaction model for tree width is constructed. The results ob-
tained from the model are shown in Fig. 8, where the R-square
Fig. 8. Satisfaction models for sidewalk width
138 / JOURNAL OF URBAN PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT © ASCE / DECEMBER 2009
J. Urban Plann. Dev., 2009, 135(4): 133-140
Fig. 9. Satisfaction model for shrub width
values for all models are over 0.81, with the exception of Model
IV. Considering the validation, explanation, and appropriateness
of the model, Model III is chosen as the appropriate nonlinear
satisfaction model for tree width of sidewalk landscapes. The pre-
dicted values of tree width are shown in Fig. 8. The sidewalk
landscapes that have an average satisfaction value of 60 points
have a tree width of 2.40 m. This concurs with the values of
2.333⬃ 3.267 m obtained for Cluster 2 of the cluster analysis of
Table 3.
Impact Analysis on Sidewalk Landscape Satisfaction
In this section, in order to construct satisfaction models for side-
walk landscapes, the impact of the design elements and compo-
nent ratios on satisfaction is identified. In particular, because
models are based on the subjective judgment of sidewalk land-
scape satisfaction, multicollinearity may exist. A variance infla-
tion factor is used to consider multicollinearity.
The results obtained from the satisfaction model for sidewalk
landscapes are shown in Fig. 9. In Model I, all design elements of
the sidewalk landscape are considered, and the VIF value for tree
height and tree width are 90.248 and 74.368, respectively, which
are higher than the basic VIF value of 10.429. This indicates that
there is multicollinearity. Shrub width has a negative coefficient
value, indicating that satisfaction value reduces as the shrub width
increases. This is generally an unreasonable result and Model I is
consequently excluded from the analysis. Model II and Model III
which include tree height and tree width are considered as the
possible best models. However, the R-square value of Model III is
higher than that of Model II, while the tree height and tree width
have a correlation. Therefore, Model III which includes tree
height is selected, as shown in Fig. 9.
It can be seen that the sidewalk that has a wider tree width is
a comfortable and pleasant sidewalk landscape from the pedestri-
ans’ perspective, as a result of the positive correlation between
sidewalk width and tree width. In addition, Model I indicates that
shrub width has a negative impact for satisfaction, demonstrating
the limitation of this study. It would be expected that, as the shrub
width increases, the satisfaction for the sidewalk landscape would
increase. In order to identify the most appropriate design ele-
ments, the sensitivity of the satisfaction of the sidewalk landscape
is investigated according to the various design elements. The
satisfaction score for Model III is calculated as the sidewalk
width and the tree width increase by 0.25 m from the least widths
until it reaches 60 points, which is the normal score as shown in
Fig. 7. The least sidewalk width is 1.5 m, and the least tree width
 Fig. 10. Satisfaction model for tree height
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is 1.5 m. The maximum widths for both are set as 6.0 m. The
results show that the sidewalk width of 3.50 m and the tree width
of 3.52 m are optimal at the level of normal satisfaction of 60
points.
Fig. 10 shows the result obtained from the satisfaction model
based on the component ratios for green area, sky, roadway, side-
walk, and buildings of the sidewalk landscape. Model I, which
considers all ratios for sidewalk landscape, does not have multi-
linearity based on the variance inflation factor 共VIF兲 value, while
the sky ratio shows a negative impact and the building ratio
shows a positive impact. This is unreasonable because satisfaction
for a sidewalk landscape cannot increase as the building ratio
increases. Also, satisfaction for a sidewalk landscape cannot de-
crease as the sky ratio increases. Model I is therefore disregarded.
Models II and III are built to exclude the ratios for building or
sky. The results show that there is no difference between R-square
values for the two models. Model II can be chosen because the
signs of coefficients are reasonable; in the model, since the ratios
for greenery, sky, and sidewalk show positive impacts and the
roadway ratio shows a negative impact, satisfaction for sidewalk
landscape increases. This result concurs with results obtained
from the principal component analysis and cluster analysis.
In order to identify the most appropriate area ratios for a side-
walk landscape based on the built model, as shown in Fig. 10, the
ratios of 10% each for sky and sidewalk, a ratio of 5% for road-
way, and the ratios of 8% for others are applied to Model II.
These ratios are the initial values. There is no coefficient for
building in the model but a ratio of 35% is considered for it. The
ratios of building and others are the average scores of sidewalk
landscapes. After fixing the ratio for others, decreasing the
ratio for building, and increasing the ratios for sky and sidewalk,
a changing ratio for greenery is applied to the model. For the
satisfaction value of 60 points as the normal score, as shown in
Fig. 7, the appropriate ratios for greenery, sky, roadway, sidewalk,
and building will be 40%, 13%, 9%, and 25%, respectively. This
result is similar to the component ratios for sidewalk landscape
obtained for Card 2, Card 3, Card 5, and Card 6, which indicates
that a sidewalk landscape that has a sidewalk tree, shrubs, and an
appropriate sidewalk width, has a harmonious feature that has a
high satisfaction. Finally, in order to estimate the difference be-
tween the real score and the predicted score for satisfaction of
sidewalk landscape perception, a paired-comparison test is con-
ducted. The results of this test are shown in Fig. 11. The results
indicate that there is no difference between the real score and the
predicted score at the significance level of 95%, which proves that
the built models in this study are appropriate.
JOURNAL OF URBAN PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT © ASCE / DECEMBER 2009 / 139
J. Urban Plann. Dev., 2009, 135(4): 133-140
Fig. 11. Satisfaction model for tree width
Conclusions
In this study, in order to provide design criteria for a sidewalk
landscape based on the emotional perception, an emotional satis-
faction survey was conducted and the characteristics of sidewalk
landscape according to types were identified. In addition, models
of design elements and ratios of sidewalk landscapes were built.
The following conclusions are drawn from this study. First, in
the case of adjusting shrubs and sidewalk trees, the harmonious-
ness and vision of a sidewalk landscape are closely related, indi-
cating that in order to construct a comfortable and pleasant
sidewalk landscape, it is necessary to provide design criteria for
design elements from affective engineering that consider emo-
tional satisfaction. Second, to achieve optimal design criteria for
sidewalk landscapes for a normal satisfaction score of 60 points,
the sidewalk width of 3.50 m and the tree width of 3.52 m are
suggested, respectively. Third, at the emotional satisfaction score
of 60 points, the ratios of greenery, sky, roadway, sidewalk, and
building are 40%, 13%, 13%, 9%, and 25%, respectively. Fourth,
in order to develop a comfortable and pleasant sidewalk land-
scape that takes into consideration emotional satisfaction, it is
necessary to provide trees and to guarantee an appropriate side-
walk width.
It is suggested that it is necessary to consider affective engi-
neering while designing a sidewalk landscape and to provide de-
sign criteria for a sidewalk landscape so that the sidewalk
becomes a comfortable and pleasant activity place for pedestrians.
Our cities should deal with global warming and climate change
partly originated in individual’s use of cars. Green transport such
as walking will play an important role in reducing these environ-
mental problems. The policy implication of this study based on
affective engineering approaches this issue.
In future research, the on-site experiment should be strength-
ened in order to overcome the limitations of the at-lab experiment
during the perception survey of sidewalk landscapes. In addition,
a more realistic perception model should be constructed. Further-
more, sidewalks have various functions for walking, leisure,
and transportation corridors. Research objective will not only
focus on sidewalk landscapes but also on the street landscape.
Also, it will consider functional and useful sidewalk as well as a
pleasant one.
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