Inquiry into leisure and recreation patterns and their relationship to open space and landscape design : the case of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
Abstract
Urban open spaces in Jeddah as a recreational facility fail to respond to the
people's desires and needs. Factors, such as culture and climate, that influence the
people behaviour and their use of the environment and these facilities are ignored in
planning and designing of these places. Alien planning and design concepts gave
priority to vehicular movement and maximized the public domain. Community open
spaces and gardens assumed to be the primary resource for recreation for the family
members. They have the accessibility advantage for everyday recreational activities.
This is more important if we take into consideration the fact that children, ladies,
elders and disabled have no direct access to cars. However, these open spaces often
inadequately designed, maintained and managed which resulted in underutilization of
valuable assets. This research investigates the relationship between leisure and
recreation pattern and the use of the recreational urban open spaces in the city of
Jeddah. It shows the present situation of these facilities.
The thesis starts by introducing the problem and discussing some of the factors
that affect leisure and recreation, such as religion, time, privacy and climate. In order
to pursue the origin of the problem, the thesis discusses the development of the
recreational open spaces and facilities in three periods of the city history. These are
referred to as traditional, transitional and modem. It shows how the social life, the
urban pattern and the recreation and leisure patterns developed from the traditional
environment to the modem. It manifests the change in the social life, the environment
and the emergence of new recreational facilities.
The research involved carrying out survey and observations of selected open
spaces in Jeddah in the spring of 1989. The questionnaire investigates the people
desires, needs and use of the existing recreational open spaces and facilities. The open
space observations explore intensity of use, type of activities, type of users and their
behaviour in using these open spaces. Then, implications of the results are discussed
and the nature of the problem is defined. The research is concluded by explaining the
approach to solve these problems.