Creating Better Places Through Soundscape Design

Creating Better Places Through Soundscape Design

by Fredrick Hedberg

This dissertation is submitted in part fulfilment of the regulations for the Master of Planning (MPlan).

Oxford Brookes University

May 2017

Declaration of Individual Authorship

I affirm that this dissertation contains no unacknowledged work or ideas from any publication or written work by another student or person.

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Statement of Ethics Review Approval

This dissertation involved human participants. A Form E1BE for each group of participants, showing ethics review approval, has been attached to this dissertation as an appendix.

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Abstract People’s sensory experience in the public realm is important for urban designers and soundscape is one part of this detailed mechanism which can either enhance or decrease people’s enjoyment of public places. The main concept of soundscape studied in this research project deals with people’s perception of the acoustic environment in urban areas. The aim of the work was to find out how soundscape design can help create good places. This entails understanding how people perceive their surrounding environment in terms of sound sources. Soundwalks and focus groups were the primary research strategies used to collect qualitative empirical data. The methodology used to collect the relevant data was achieved by using participants to undergo a soundwalk which consisted of five different locations; at each evaluation position the participants completed a questionnaire. In addition to an analysis of the questionnaires, post walk focus groups were held to collect additional information on participants’ perceptions of the soundscapes. Focus Groups 1 and 2 rated locations with South Park being the most pleasant whilst Cowley Road and Headington Road were considered the most unpleasant due to the disturbing sound of constant traffic. The analysis of the methodology enabled the formation of a set of design principles that were tested through a third focus group. The final principles were modelled to allow urban designers to use them within their context to design places that will enhance the quality of soundscapes. This research study has provided design principles that can be used in Oxford and a research method that designers could carry out in their cities. This research has set out a foundation for creating and implementing future design guidelines that should be considered when creating positive places. The work also advances the knowledge and research in the field of soundscape for future projects.

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Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................. 4 Contents ............................................................................................................................ 5 List of Figures ................................................................................................................... 9 Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................ 10 Chapter I Introduction ................................................................................................... 12 1.1 Background ........................................................................................................... 12 1.1.1 Sensory Experience ....................................................................................... 12 1.1.2 The Senses ..................................................................................................... 12 1.1.3 Urban Design ................................................................................................. 13 1.2 Research Focus ..................................................................................................... 14 1.3 Research Question, Aim, and Objectives ............................................................. 15 1.3.1 Research Question and Aim .......................................................................... 15 1.3.2 Research Objectives ...................................................................................... 15 1.4 Methodology......................................................................................................... 17 1.5 Structure ............................................................................................................... 18 Chapter II Literature Review ......................................................................................... 19 2.1 Introduction .......................................................................................................... 19 2.2 Soundscape Explained .......................................................................................... 19 2.2.1 The Acoustic Environment ............................................................................ 19 2.2.2 Soundscape .................................................................................................... 20 2.2.3 Functionality .................................................................................................. 21 2.2.4 Measurability ................................................................................................. 22

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2.3 The Built Environment ......................................................................................... 23 2.3.1 In Today’s Society ......................................................................................... 23 2.3.2 Context .......................................................................................................... 23 2.3.3 Soundscape Expectation ................................................................................ 24 2.3.4 Positive Impacts ............................................................................................. 24 2.3.5 Negative Impacts ........................................................................................... 28 2.4 Emerging Issues and the Need for Empirical Research ....................................... 29 2.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 30 Chapter III Methodology ................................................................................................ 31 3.1 Introduction .......................................................................................................... 31 3.2 Research Strategy ................................................................................................. 32 3.2.1 Soundwalk Strategy ....................................................................................... 32 3.2.2 Focus Group Strategy .................................................................................... 42 3.3 Sampling ............................................................................................................... 45 3.3.1 Sampling Type ............................................................................................... 45 3.4 Limitations & Potential Problems ........................................................................ 46 3.4.1 Soundwalk Limitations .................................................................................. 46 3.4.2 Focus Group Limitations ............................................................................... 47 3.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 48 Findings & Discussion ................................................................................................... 49 4.1 Introduction .......................................................................................................... 49 4.2 Soundwalk ............................................................................................................ 50 4.2.1 Oxford Brookes University ........................................................................... 51 4.2.2 Headington Road ........................................................................................... 52

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4.2.3 Rectory Road ................................................................................................. 53 4.2.4 Cowley Road ................................................................................................. 55 4.2.5 South Park ..................................................................................................... 56 4.3 Focus Groups 1 & 2 .............................................................................................. 57 4.3.1 Focus Group 1 ............................................................................................... 57 4.3.2 Focus Group 2 ............................................................................................... 58 4.4 Preliminary Findings ............................................................................................ 59 4.5 Original Design Principles.................................................................................... 60 4.5.1 The Urban Fabric ........................................................................................... 60 4.5.2 The Civic Nature ........................................................................................... 61 4.5.3 Pathways ........................................................................................................ 62 4.6 Focus Group 3 ...................................................................................................... 63 4.7 Refining Design Principles ................................................................................... 64 4.8 Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 65 Chapter V Conclusion and Recommendations .............................................................. 66 5.1 Introduction .......................................................................................................... 66 5.2 General Findings .................................................................................................. 67 5.2.1 Oxford Brookes University ........................................................................... 67 5.2.2 Headington Road ........................................................................................... 67 5.2.3 Rectory Road ................................................................................................. 67 5.2.4 Cowley Road ................................................................................................. 68 5.2.5 South Park ..................................................................................................... 68 5.2.6 Prominent Findings ....................................................................................... 68 5.3 Concluding Remarks ............................................................................................ 69

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5.3.1 Research Objective 1 ..................................................................................... 69 5.3.2 Research Objective 2 ..................................................................................... 70 5.3.3 Research Objective 3 ..................................................................................... 70 5.3.4 Research Objective 4 ..................................................................................... 71 5.4 Design Recommendations .................................................................................... 71 5.4.1 Soundscape Design ........................................................................................ 71 5.4.2 The Main Issue .............................................................................................. 72 5.4.3 Using Design Principles ................................................................................ 72 5.4.4 Overcoming Traffic Noise ............................................................................. 72 5.5 Further Research ................................................................................................... 74 Bibliography ................................................................................................................... 75 Appendices ..................................................................................................................... 83 Appendix A: Ethics Form ........................................................................................... 84 Appendix B: Soundwalk Route .................................................................................. 86 Appendix C: Evaluation Position Questions .............................................................. 87 Appendix D: Data Processing .................................................................................... 93 Appendix E: Original Design Principles .................................................................. 112 Appendix F: Final Design Principles ....................................................................... 115

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List of Figures Figure Page Reference Figure 1 ……………………………………………………………………………...…20 Figure 2 ……………………………………………………………………………...…25 Figure 3 ……………………………………………………………………………...…25 Figure 4 ……………………………………………………………………………...…26 Figure 5 ……………………………………………………………………………...…27 Figure 6 ……………………………………………………………………………...…27 Figure 7 ……………………………………………………………………………...…28 Figure 8 ……………………………………………………………………………...…32 Figure 9 ……………………………………………………………………………...…33 Figure 10 ..…………………………………………………………………………...…34 Figure 11 …………………………………………………………………………...…..34 Figure 12 …………………………………………………………………………...…..35 Figure 13 …………………………………………………………………………...…..35 Figure 14 …………………………………………………………………………...…..36 Figure 15 …………………………………………………………………………...…..36 Figure 16 …………………………………………………………………………...…..37 Figure 17 …………………………………………………………………………...…..37 Figure 18 …………………………………………………………………………...…..38 Figure 19 …………………………………………………………………………...…..40 Figure 20 …………………………………………………………………………...…..40 Figure 21 …………………………………………………………………………...…..43 Figure 22 ………………………………………………………………………….....…50 Figure 23 ………………………………………………………………………….....…73

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Acknowledgements

The completion of this research study would not have been possible without the expertise, innovation, and valuable support from my supervisor, Dr Laura Novo de Azevedo. I am very grateful that she inspired me during this research project, which made me enjoy every aspect of the research work. I would also like to thank the participants who took time out of their busy schedules to partake in both the soundwalk and focus groups. Thank you to the team behind the scenes in the administration office who were able to advise me and grant an extension. I am thankful to friends and family who have constantly supported and encouraged me throughout this long research project.

Finally, I would like to thank the Bodleian Library and the University of Oxford Botanical Gardens for providing me with a place of inspiration and focus that has enabled me to carry out this research, such beauty reminds me of how incredibly fortunate I have been to have the honour to be able to study in such a wonderful city.

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Chapter I Introduction 1.1 Background 1.1.1 Sensory Experience The human senses are incredible bodily organisms that gather up-to-date data which the brain uses to perceive its surroundings. Our eyes are able to collect a total amount of 36,000 visual data per hour (Jensen, 2008) and our olfactory can distinguish between one trillion odours (Bushdid et al., 2014). In today's society, humans use their senses on a daily basis to navigate through cities for various activities (work, commuting, socialising and errands). The combination of all human senses (multisensory) is used to understand the surrounding environment (Degen and Rose, 2012). The sensory experience of the built environment might evoke a negative sensory experience; but it can also be a positive one due to the design of the built environment being aesthetically pleasing which can improve people’s wellbeing (Keeling et al., 2017). For example, the presence of greenery in an area lowers the feeling of annoyance of that environment due to its visual perception (Viollon, Lavandier and Drake, 2001). When discussing people's experiences in the built environment, the term sensory experience is usually referred.

This term looks at how people perceive the environment in which they are situated by using their senses to create different emotions.

1.1.2 The Senses By analysing the methods in which urban design shapes the built environment, the primary sense used for such an analysis is sight (Lucas and Romice, 2008). This is understandable as it is estimated that over 80% of incoming sensory information is in fact visual (Liu et al., 2013). Second to this is the auditory sense (even though urban

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designers do not tend to create environments with this sense in mind), then followed by the other three senses. In some cases, certain senses are usually brought up in discussions because of their negative impact rather than their positive one. Urban smells and sounds are good examples of these negative impacts, inevitably people will always point out if there is a bad odour in an area or if a street is too noisy (Quercia, Aiello and Schifanella, 2016).

1.1.3 Urban Design This research project is able to provide a link between soundscape design and the creation of ideal urban environments. This will enable further discussion on how specifically this can be achieved. With better understanding and further research into this area, there is scope to create urban design principles that will produce high quality public places. These public places are found in cities and take on multiple forms (Cullen, 1996). They provide cities with a place for people to fulfil their recreational needs (Omar, Ibrahim and Mohamad, 2015) as well as provide urban breathing spaces (Carmona et al., 2010). They contribute to a city’s population through health benefits such as mitigation from cardiovascular and metabolic diseases (Paquet et al., 2013).

According to Cain, Jennings and Poxon (2011), there is a need for future research to thoroughly examine different soundscape interventions and their impact on positive and negative design proposals. Designing a soundwalk methodology will be the starting point. This will enable the researcher to carry out a soundwalk in Oxford in order to understand how urban users perceive the city’s soundscapes. It will also test current soundscape methodological practices by combining different elements from past soundwalks. Lastly, as this research is only focusing on soundscape there can also be scope to look into doing similar investigations with the other three senses. This might benefit urban designers in making high quality public places.

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1.2 Research Focus As described in the background to the research project, sensory experience is an important part of the built environment especially for navigational purposes from one space to another. As urban designers, it is crucial that public spaces are designed so as to provide an enjoyable and comfortable experience for the urban user. By stimulating the senses, it is possible to create an environment which interacts with people moving through it; this in turn will cause intrigue and amusement (Gehl et al. 2006).

Due to sensory experience including a number of senses, it would be advisable to choose a specific sense to investigate for this research project. Hearing will be the chosen sense to be explored in further detail, in particular its concept of soundscape.

The reason for this choice is because hearing is the second major sense that processes information (Rosenblum, 2010) with sight collecting around 83% and hearing collects 11%, and the others a total amount of 6% (Hurt, 2012). There is no universal definition for the concept of soundscape (Liu et al., 2013) but Payne, Davies and Adams (2009, p.2) define it as “the totality of all sounds within a location with an emphasis on the relationship between an individual’s or society’s perception of, understanding of and interaction with the sonic environment”. The general interpretation to be derived from this definition is that the perception people have on all the sounds in the built environment at a given point creates the soundscape.

According to Jennings and Cain (2012), a positive soundscape depends on its context (see Section 2.3.2). This research project will be able to collect qualitative empirical data from a number of different soundscapes (Appendix C) that can be used to create design principles for decision makers (Appendix F). The data recorded will also display the listener’s perceptions of certain soundscapes in order to pinpoint what sound sources create a positive sound environment. Emotional dimension tools were another requirement Jennings and Cain (2012) mentioned in their work in order to aid bridging interventions with positive acoustic environments. Other research has discussed the importance of understanding what makes a positive soundscape in order to help the

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design process (Yang and Kang, 2004) and should thus be integrated in the urban planning system (Botteldooren, De Coensel and De Muer, 2005). This dissertation will help contribute to the soundscape knowledge by determining the major sound sources that affect soundscapes. It will also discuss what urban design principles can be introduced to the public realm in order to improve soundscapes for people.

1.3 Research Question, Aim, and Objectives 1.3.1 Research Question and Aim This research project will seek to answer the following question on the area of sensory experience: “How can soundscape design help deliver good public places?�

The overall aim of this research study is to understand what makes places attractive to people through the design of soundscapes in the public realm. Achieving this aim gives insight to what sound sources are perceived by urban users as pleasant and comfortable.

This in turn can assist the making of design principles that can potentially be able to generate a positive soundscape to people using public spaces.

1.3.2 Research Objectives 1.3.2.1 Literature Review In order to achieve the overall aim of the research, a couple tasks have to be completed.

To understand the link between soundscape in the built environment and the positive feelings of its users, it is important to explore what research has been currently carried out on the subject of soundscape. The achievements and limitations of soundscape need to be understood as well as highlighting gaps that have been left for discussion and have not yet been answered. It is also imperative to comprehend how this type of sensory experience works within the built environment. The literature review on soundscape is vital as it gives the reader an understanding of where this project is situated in current

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research. This also enables the shaping of a contextual framework in terms of what sounds are key to delivering a positive sensory experience in the built environment.

1.3.2.2 Methodology After understanding the complexities of the soundscape, these outcomes should be tested to enable this research project to shed light on how people in urban areas feel about the different sounds they hear. Soundwalks and focus groups are implemented to gather data from urban users on what they characterise as positive and negative sounds in certain public places. These will be compared with the contextual framework to find any correlations. From this data, it is possible to draw up design principles.

1.3.2.3 Design Principles From the conceptual framework acquired in the literature review, the perceptual walks and the focus groups, simple design principles may be drawn up which seek to enhance the soundscape of the built environment (Appendix E). These are important as they demonstrate what sort of actions decision makers can take in order to build better public places in terms of soundscape. They will also encourage future researchers in this field to take the principles to another level of detail and apply them in real life scenarios.

These principles need to be tested through the use of a focus group in order to provide evidence of them working in real life scenarios. This will benefit the research in terms of creating principles that urban users will respond positively to.

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1.3.2.4 Research Objectives To summarise, this project’s research objectives are as follows: 1. Review the existing literature on soundscape and its functionality in the built environment.

2. Design a methodology through soundwalks from which key findings can be extracted.

3. Develop a set of recommended design principles from the analysis of the methodology.

4. Test these principles through the use of a focus group.

1.4 Methodology The collection of empirical data is necessary in order to be able to provide evidence that will aid answering the research question. The methodology used relates to objective 2: design a methodology through soundwalks from which key findings can be extracted.

The reason for this data collection is because the research needs to measure soundscape perception. The soundwalk methodology is widely used in soundscape research and is tailored differently to fit the aim of various projects; an assessment of these past soundwalks was the approach for designing this research’s methodology.

The overall research strategy for this project is soundwalks. This entails subjects to walk from a starting point to a destination whilst stopping at different evaluation positions to answer a questionnaire on the current soundscape. This research strategy was chosen as it is a principle method of measuring soundscape on a qualitative level. It also enables the collection of empirical data that will show which sound sources in the urban environment are favourable and disagreeable to soundscapes.

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1.5 Structure The structure of this research is divided into five chapters that answer the research question. Chapter one introduces the reader to the subject area of this research which investigates the concept of soundscape in terms of sensory experience. Gaps and problems in the literature are brought to light. A rationale for this research is provided in order to justify its contribution to the academic community. Following this, the research question, aim and objectives are set out followed by a brief overview of the methodology used. Finally a detailed structure is outlined to demonstrate the research’s format.

Chapter two fulfils the first objective which sets out a literature review that explores what has been previously discussed about the topic of soundscape. It is followed by understanding its relationship with the built environment as well as finding achievements and limitations of soundscape. From this review, a contextual framework is developed which is used further on in the research to develop design principles.

Chapter three explains the research methodology and completes objective three by developing a research strategy that uses soundwalks. It also describes the data collection and analysis as well as the limitations of the methodology.

Chapter four analyses the data from the soundwalks to produce key findings describing what the participants felt about the different soundscapes they experienced. From these and the contextual framework, a set of design principles are drawn up and tested through the focus group required by objective four.

Chapter five summarises the general findings of the research carried out by the methodology. Following this, it reviews the four objectives set out in Chapter I in which key points are made. It then proceeds to present recommendations in terms of the design principles created. The chapter ends by discussing some of the research project’s limitations which leads to future research.

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Chapter II Literature Review 2.1 Introduction Urban designers and architects are striving to create high quality environments in the public realm; through sensory experience, urban users connect to places through their perception and their senses which are crucial elements designers need to consider (Puyana Romero et al., 2016). Soundscape is an important aspect in creating the change towards incorporating more senses in design. In this chapter, this concept is examined by firstly defining what is meant by soundscape and understanding its relationship with the acoustic environment which will then lead onto to its functionality and measurement.

In a second section, the chapter investigates how soundscape fits into the built environment as well as showcasing some positive and negative attributes. The final section underlines some key gaps in the current research on soundscape and justifies how this research contributes to its academic field as well as explaining why collecting empirical data is important for this body of work.

2.2 Soundscape Explained 2.2.1 The Acoustic Environment In order to fully appreciate the concept of soundscape, we have to understand what is meant by the acoustic environment. This term is defined as the accumulation of a variety of different sounds in the built environment which is able to evoke specific emotions to urban users (Botteldooren, De Coensel and De Muer, 2005). The way in which soundscape fits into this notion is as follows: a soundscape occurring in any

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setting only exists because people perceive it through the acoustic environment of that same setting (Figure 1) (Brown, Kang and Gjestland, 2011). Therefore, it’s not possible to investigate soundscapes without first having an acoustic environment to provide sounds for people to perceive. This then leads the literature review to find out what is meant by soundscape.

2.2.2 Soundscape The concept of soundscape was first established by the composer Murray Schafer whose work has provided the means for many researches to carry out a vast variety of studies on the topic of discussion. He defines soundscape as “[...] any portion of the sonic environment regarded as a field for study.” (Schafer, 1977, p.274). Yet Schafer also includes the term ‘sonic environment’ (which is semantics for ‘acoustic environment’) in his lengthy denotation, meaning that he recognised soundscape as being an acoustic environment. Interestingly, recent research has now separated the two bodies. Kang et al. (2016) see the soundscape as being a perceptual construction, whilst the acoustic environment is seen as a physical phenomenon (Figure 1). Modern day definitions of soundscape would describe it as the totality of all sounds in a place with additional focus on how people perceive, understand and interact with the acoustic environment around them (Payne, Davies and Adams, 2009).

Figure 1: How an acoustic environment is transformed into an urban soundscape (source: author).

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Considering what has been discussed, the review has explained how soundscape functions in terms of the acoustic and built environment. In literature, due to the research topic being a new area of study as well as overlapping in other disciplines, there seems to be an increasing amount of research aimed at standardising soundscape.

This indicates that researchers are seeking to establish a common language between different terms and concepts that can be employed when discussing the acoustic environment (Brown, Kang and Gjestland, 2011). Standardised language and terms will be an asset to future research in the area of soundscape as it will form the basis of better communications and enable researches to share knowledge in other disciplines without creating confusion or misunderstandings.

2.2.3 Functionality The next question that needs to be addressed is: what conditions are required for soundscape to exist? Back in 2008, the Working Group of ISO/TC 43/SC 1 came up with some requirements in order for a soundscape to occur. Initially, a soundscape would need to emerge in a physical place and it would need to bear man-made constructions with the addition of a microclimate. Also, it would have to exhibit acoustical properties which can be identified. People would need to be able to live or frequent the place. Lastly, social interaction with the place and people would be necessary. According to Brown, Kang and Gjestland (2011), these five conditions form a soundscape. Essentially, sounds are introduced to an area that creates the acoustic environment and people visiting/traversing the place use their perception to form the soundscape. For example, street musicians are one of many sound sources in urban areas that enhance the surrounding soundscape creating a unique atmospheric quality (Bennett and Rogers, 2014).

The paramount aspect which represents the key to unlocking the creation of soundscapes in urban areas is people’s perception of the acoustic environment.

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Perception enables individual people to subjectively experience the soundscape around them. This awareness of surrounding sound can determine the quality of soundscapes and is closely linked to personal preferences as well as historical, social and cultural factors (Hall et al., 2011). Perception of soundscape also triggers emotional responses from people. Each sound conveys meaning to a listener and depending on the context (see section 2.3.2) both of these form an opinion on the urban environment (Carles, López Barrio and de Lucio, 1999). This section has provided an understanding of how soundscapes are created; the next step is to investigate how soundscapes are measured.

2.2.4 Measurability Knowing that soundscapes are formed from specific urban characteristics and that perception can determine the attractiveness of the acoustic environment, the next area of interest is to discover if it is quantifiable. Unfortunately, measuring soundscape is not straightforward. The acoustic concept is a multifaceted phenomenon and overlaps with other disciplines making it less likely to perform a simple measurement (Raimbault and Dubois, 2005). If measured by decibel reading, different soundscapes could result in having the same sound level. But this does not take into account the character of sounds heard in an area as they can be perceived differently by a number of people (Jennings and Cain, 2012).

From an urban design and planning point of view, people's perception of an urban soundscape is far more important than how much noise exists. This is due to wanting to create great sensory experiences in the public realm. Perception is the centre point for measuring, assessing as well as evaluating soundscape (Kang et al., 2016), meaning that people’s opinions on the sounds they hear is vital for measuring a soundscape. This research study is trying to comprehend what aspects of soundscapes can be characterised as ‘good’ which can have an impact on the attractiveness of public places.

Currently, research indicates a lack of knowledge in terms of information and precise sounds found in soundscape that could render it a good quality environment (Tse et al., 2012). Therefore over the last few years, the collection of data on soundscape in the

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form of people's perceptions has been a current research method. In fact, soundscape is a tricky element to gather data from; but it seems that people’s perception is the right course of direction to pursue in data collection.

2.3 The Built Environment 2.3.1 In Today’s Society The concept of soundscape is relatively new, however it is increasingly attracting more attention and discussion. Urban designers and decision makers are starting to incorporate this acoustic concept into their work. These professionals realize that they want to create places with great sensory experiences, and perception is crucial for this realisation. It was established in the section 2.2.4 that perception varies from person to person. Perception is also influenced by people’s socio-cultural background (Kang et al., 2016) such as age and culture. For example, depending on the age of people perceiving soundscape they would tend to have different preferences (Liu et al., 2013a). As a person’s age increases, they tend to enjoy nature and human sounds. Vice versa, with the decrease of age there tends to be an attraction to street music and a tolerance for mechanical sound sources (Kang and Zhang, 2009). As shown, human perception is a delicate skill that can fluctuate depending on environmental attributes. This leads on to the discussion of the importance of environmental context to people’s perception of soundscape.

2.3.2 Context Soundscapes in the built environment are perceived by many people thus resulting in different sets of opinions. This variety of soundscape views is influenced by the listener’s context. The context is a mixture of different factors affecting perception. The first of these is the activity the listener is doing which affects his/her state of listening.

There are three states, these are: listening in search, listening in readiness, and

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background listening (Jennings and Cain, 2012). This enables researches to take an activity-centric outlook when beginning to assess soundscapes. Other influences include the listener’s demographic background such as resident or visitor to the place. Temporal and spatial conditions are another contextual aspect that needs to be considered. These include seasons, days of the week, weather, the type of space, culture, morphology, and so forth. Interestingly, these factors in the built environment impact the soundscape perception but are indirectly linked to sound sources (Jennings and Cain, 2012). The context for soundscape is complicated which makes it hard to measure, but probably the most important factor is the listener’s activity in the public place. With this further understanding of the heterogeneous ability of soundscape, discussion on soundscape expectation will follow.

2.3.3 Soundscape Expectation Expectation is defined as someone having a “strong belief that something will happen or be the case” (Oxford Dictionaries, 2017). The manner in which expectation is related to the built environment is through probability and anticipation of an event occurring due to the soundscape in an area. One possible explanation for why urban users encounter expectation due to soundscape can be related to Truax’s (2001) concept of soundscape competence. Essentially, he relates it back to tacit knowledge, or individual experiences, of a past soundscape (Truax, 2001). It implies that the structure of an urban soundscape is remembered from past experiences. This creates a connection between sound sources and their connotation by urban users (Bruce and Davies, 2014). Meaning that a person’s expectation has a chance of composing a piece of the soundscape context. It can be concluded that expectation can influence an urban user’s perception of a soundscape.

2.3.4 Positive Impacts Soundscapes in our urban environment contribute positive elements to produce high quality areas. Noise regulations in various cities have been initiated which encourage the use of noise maps. These types of maps create a strategic visual representation of

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sounds in cities and enable action plans to mitigate the noise impact as well as the effects they create (Arana et al., 2012). An example of these noise maps can be seen on the website called “Chatty Maps” created by the “global group of researchers and practitioners” (Schifanella, Quercia and Aiello, 2016) called “GoodCityLife” in which this group mapped out nearly every street in major cities (London, Barcelona, New York, etc...) to show the distribution of sounds as well as residents’ emotions towards them (Figures 2, 3, and 4). These noise maps can be used to analyse people’s perception of the soundscape and in return can be used to design positive urban areas.

Figure 2: Noise map of London by GoodCityLife (Schifanella, Quercia and Aiello, 2016).

Figure 3: Noise map of Barcelona by GoodCityLife (Schifanella, Quercia and Aiello, 2016).

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Figure 4: Noise map of New York by GoodCityLife (Schifanella, Quercia and Aiello, 2016).

Soundscapes exist in public places and urban designers can construct environments that will stimulate people’s senses. An example of this is Solbjerg Square in Copenhagen which was designed to produce an enjoyable sensory experience. At night, lighting is used to create interesting sceneries which give an enchanting atmosphere to the area (Figure 5). In its centre, a water landscape is formed after it rains thanks to the square’s use of grooves. A network of water jets produces a coat of mist above the ground which enables interaction (Figure 6). In terms of soundscape, a variety of sounds are produced through the use of 32 loudspeaker wells (Figure 7) which stimulate people’s auditory senses (Gehl et al., 2006). It can be concluded that soundscape through design and research can be used to improve the urban realm.

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Figure 5: Solbjerg Square uses lighting to create a ‘red wood’ (Sla.dk, 2016).

Figure 6: Solbjerg Square with mist. (Sla.dk, 2016).

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Figure 7: The loudspeaker wells used in Solbjerg Square (Landezine.com, 2010).

2.3.5 Negative Impacts When discussing soundscape, it has traditionally been viewed as an unfavourable aspect of the urban environments and has come to be referred to as noise pollution. This term was also commented on by Schafer (1977, p.4): “noise pollution results when man does not listen carefully. Noises are the sounds we have learnt to ignore�. This negative perception has led to many studies that focus on measuring noise that is still considered today as an unwanted sound (Raimbault and Dubois, 2005). This type of research is enabling an increasing amount of noise control in certain areas as well as specifying which sound sources decision makers are required to mitigate (Jennings and Cain, 2012).

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It is estimated that an individual's street exposure roughly contributes to about 4% of their annual noise dosage (McAlexander, Gershon and Neitzel, 2015). Even the World Health Organization (WHO) has agreed that noise pollution has health impacts on individuals such as “hearing impairments, sleep disturbance effects, [...] social behaviour” and many others (Rychtáriková and Vermeir, 2011, p.240). One of the predominant noise contributors is traffic and minor changes to it can largely impact soundscape as was discovered by emission mapping (De Coensel et al., 2004). From what has been discovered, noise pollution in the urban environment can impact negatively on people’s lives. But there still seems to be misguided information in terms of the role noise plays in soundscape. Urban soundscape does in fact include negative sounds but it also possesses positive ones too (Yu and Kang, 2013) and can be used to improve the soundscape of the urban area. Noise discomfort also abides by the context of perception meaning that it is very much dependent on the listener’s circumstance (Szeremeta and Zannin, 2009). All seen, soundscape does hold negative sounds such as noise pollution but this does not mean it cannot be moulded to create a favourable soundscape which delivers an enjoyable experience.

2.4 Emerging Issues and the Need for Empirical Research There has been substantial research in and around the subject of soundscape from Yang and Kang (2004), Dubois, Guastavino and Raimbault (2006), and Jeon, Hong and Lee (2012). But there are still some areas in literature that need to be investigated. This research project aims to, in some form or another, contribute towards these academic necessities. From Cain, Jennings and Poxon’s (2011) research, there is a need to create more indicators for soundscape that can then be used for designing adequate soundscape for an urban area. In addition, they mention that these interventions require testing in order to comprehend what design principles contribute positively to the built

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environment. Kang et al. (2016) discuss another gap that needs to be dealt with which entails agreeing on types of descriptors of soundscape that are relevant to specific contexts through the use of semantics.

2.5 Conclusion This chapter has allowed the research project to gain an understanding of what is a soundscape and how it relates to the built environment. Emerging issues have also been investigated. In section 2.2, it was explained that a soundscape is formed from a person’s perception of the acoustic environment. It can be manifested by five specific conditions as discussed in section 2.2.3. One of the crucial elements of soundscape for this research is its measurability. As determined in section 2.2.4, quantitative measuring of soundscapes is insignificant in order for urban designers to create good places. A qualitative approach is far more superior as it allows understanding of how different sound sources are associated with the meanings made by urban users. This has decisive implications on the choice of methodology for this research. When discussing the built environment, context plays a fundamental function for soundscapes. Due to a multitude of parameters, soundscapes can never truly be exactly the same. Soundscape expectation is another intriguing characteristic. Perceptions on soundscapes are partly affected by expectation which relates to a person’s past experiences. Finally, soundscapes have the ability to create enticing and interactive places that stimulate people’s senses. But they are also misunderstood and always described in decision making roles as being negative impacts on the built environment.

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Chapter III Methodology 3.1 Introduction This research has used a research strategy in order to provide evidence to help answer the question: How can soundscape design help deliver good public places? The empirical research carried out will seek to answer objectives 2, 3 and 4. For ease of references, these objectives are listed below: 2. Design a methodology through soundwalks from which key findings can be extracted.

3. Develop a set of recommended design principles from the analysis of the methodology.

4. Test these principles through the use of a focus group.

For this research project, it is essential to collect raw data as comprehending the nature of a soundscape is to understand how people perceive the acoustic environment. Each individual has a different opinion on what they hear; and understanding their perception is essential to be able to devise design principles that will benefit the urban user. This chapter starts with presenting the research strategy used and its data collection process.

The next section seeks to clarify the sampling approach used for this methodology. The limitations and potential problems are discussed following the sampling in order to understand the extent of the methodology used and how it can be improved in future research. In a final section, a conclusion of this chapter is presented to summarise what has been discussed.

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3.2 Research Strategy 3.2.1 Soundwalk Strategy 3.2.1.1 Soundwalks Measuring the soundscape is challenging as it cannot be recorded via numbers due to it not considering the character of different sounds as learnt in subsection 2.2.4 (Jennings and Cain, 2012), instead it will require human perception of the acoustic environment (Kang et al., 2016). The principal method used for this research is the soundwalk. This method originated back in the 1970s as a listening practice method and was mostly aimed at rediscovering the hearing sense and to acknowledge the acoustic environment (Jeon, Hong and Lee, 2012). Today, it is commonly used when studying soundscapes as it provides the necessary means for perception data collection. Essentially, a group of participants are required to walk on a trail designed by the researcher in which a number of evaluation positions are marked (Figure 8). The soundwalk can take place anywhere; usually they are designed in an urban setting such as towns and cities. This method influences urban planners and architects on their perception of the city which will enable them to make appropriate decisions for city design (Jeon, Hong and Lee, 2012).

Figure 8: Graphical representation of a soundwalk (source: author).

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This project chose the city of Oxford to host the soundwalk as it is the researcher's city of residence. A soundwalk seeks to immerse participants into different acoustic environments, meaning they will experience a variety of different contexts as mentioned in subsection 2.3.2. Acoustic environments need to be contrasting so as to provide different contexts for the participants to perceive (Bruce and Davies, 2014). For this soundwalk, five different environments were chosen for the participants. These are listed below with justification of choice.

Oxford Brookes University This environment is a public square which will provide sounds of social interactions from mainly students and staff members at the university (Figure 9). In addition, water sounds will be echoed by a fountain located in the space (Figure 10). A contrasting element to this environment is the different loud sounds generated by Headington Road situated next to the public square. These sounds are predominantly caused by cars, buses, and traffic lights.

Figure 9: Oxford Brookes University has a modern design using a lot of sound reflecting materials (source: author).

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Figure 10: The square possesses a fountain (source: author).

Headington Road This environment is a busy road with regular traffic and is situated between two parks (South Park and Headington Hill Park) in which the sounds of nature and vehicles will be expected to clash. It forms a greenway and creates a natural corridor that amplifies any sound within it (Figure 12). Headington Road is also on an incline, this means that vehicles traveling up-hill change gear causing a high volume of sound (Figure 11).

Figure 11: Headington Road is on an incline which forces vehicles to changer gear when ascending (source: author).

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Figure 12: With the two parks on either side, a green corridor is formed around the busy road (source: author).

Rectory Road This environment is a residential street with only a two commercial buildings (The Star and Rectory Centre) (Figure 13). It is perceived as being rather quiet with some sounds coming from the public house. An interesting note on this location is that it is situated between two primary roads (Cowley Road and St Clement’s Street) (Figure 14); this will be interesting in terms of participants’ comments on the matter.

Figure 13: Rectory Road is a residential street with some vegetation in front gardens of houses (source: author).

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Figure 14: The road joins the busy streets of Cowley Road and St Clement’s Street (source: author).

Cowley Road This environment is a commercial based road with a multitude of shops, cafes, bars and restaurants aligning it (Figure 15). It is expected to create a sense of liveliness of a city environment (Figure 16).

Figure 15: Cowley Road has a variety of shops and restaurants (source: author).

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Figure 16: Cowley Road is a very urban environment with minimal amount of vegetation (source: author).

South Park This environment is a park and a car free area (Figure 17). It was chosen because it is a contrast to other acoustic environments, incorporating nature, wildlife, and pedestrian friendly facilities (Figure 18). It is expected to be quiet and peaceful with nature sounds (wildlife, wind) with the occasional human activity sounds from groups of people socialising.

Figure 17: South Park is an open environment with a heavy presence of nature (source: author).

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Figure 18: Participants filling out their evaluation position questionnaire as a group of people walk on the pathway behind them (source: author).

The researcher should, in principle design a walk that takes a walking time of between 10 to 90 minutes (Jeon, Hong and Lee, 2012). It is recommended that the walk not take more than an hour as it can make the participants tired which in turn may affect their perception of the soundscape (Semidor, 2006). In this research, the soundwalk took approximately one hour. The reason for this time frame was to allow the participants to experience the different acoustic environments; as they were rather spread out which contributed to the additional walking time. In accordance with the research recommendation, each evaluation position was located at a 10 minute walking intervals time from one another allowing the participants to immerse themselves in the next acoustic environment (Bruce and Davies, 2014). In the past, soundwalks were conducted on an individual basis, but today’s studies of soundscape recommend that most soundwalks be conducted in groups (Jeon, Hong and Lee, 2012), which is what

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has been implemented in this methodology. Also, participants were required to carry out the soundwalk in silence to enable them to acclimatise to their new contexts (Adams et al., 2008). A pilot study was carried out with one participant in order to test the walk and evaluate the evaluation position questions. This pilot study successfully demonstrated that the designed soundwalk was fit to be carried out by a group of participants.

3.2.1.2 Evaluation Positions An evaluation position is a stop on the trail in which participants are required to take one minute to listen to the acoustic environment around them (Bruce and Davies, 2014) and then answer a questionnaire about their perception of the sounds they hear (Figures 19 and 20). The selection criteria for these evaluation positions were selected through the researcher’s objective analysis of the area as well as past experiences (Appendix B).

This method of determining the evaluation positions is widely used when conducting soundwalk design as it determines a specific sample size and enables easy analysis between the different perceptions at each stop (Jeon, Hong and Lee, 2012). For this soundwalk, seven questions were asked in the questionnaire, which sought to extract each participant's impression of the acoustic environments. The questionnaire is a hybrid of quantitative and qualitative questions which provides a more complete and integrated use of the empirical data (Agency of Healthcare Research and Quality, 2013).

Inspired by Jeon, Hong and Lee’s (2012) research, the questionnaire ranged from numeric questions about the participants acoustic comfort and pleasantness to open ended questions about how does the soundscape in the evaluation position make them feel. A blank copy of the questionnaire and a filled in copy can be found in Appendix C. The next page gives an outline of the justifications for asking each of the seven questions.

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Figures 19 & 20: Participants completing the evaluation position questionnaire at locations 2 and 5 (source: author).

Question 1 This question seeks to know if the participant had previously visited this location. If he/she had previously visited any of the five evaluation positions, this means that the participant has potentially already formed an opinion on the area through multi-sensory experiences. Literature suggests that people are less affected by irritating noises because of their lack of familiarity (Craig, Moore and Knox, 2016). As a result, the answers for the rest of the questions may be prejudged by the participant; this is not to say that they can alter their perception through this experiment.

Question 2 This question works in a similar way to Question 1. The senses work on an intersensory level, and both the auditory and visual senses work together and reinforce one another (Viollon, Lavandier and Drake, 2001). Personal opinions on visual appearance of a location may also result in prejudice against the acoustic environment. Certain landscape elements such as buildings and vegetation can influence people's perception

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on the soundscape (Liu et al., 2013a); this is more noticeable with natural sounds (Liu et al., 2013b). If the environment is a harsh and unattractive area, participants may also feel dislike towards the sounds they hear and vice versa.

Question 3 This question starts to gather data on the participant's perception. Asking how the participant is feeling in the current evaluation position gives an insight to how they perceive the current acoustic environment, thus shaping the soundscape (see section 2.2.3). From the start, an understanding of which environmental elements shape the participant's perception is gathered by asking them to explain why they feel this way.

This can also help comprehend what elements should be considered when formulating the design principles.

Question 4 This question allows the participant to list up to five key dominant sounds they hear in the current evaluation position. The question then asks participants to rate the multiple sounds on the basis of pleasantness and comfort, and the reasoning for their choice. This enables participants to identify the sounds they predominantly hear that has a direct effect on their perception. It gives an understanding of how positive or negative their perception is as well as specific justification for their judgment. Themes are able to be extracted from analysis of the dominant sounds (Bruce and Davies, 2014) which is a vital requirement for the making of the design principles.

Question 5 This question focuses on the participant's expectation upon entering the evaluation position. As they walk from one environment to the next, they are required to listen to their surroundings. As seen in subsection 2.3.3, Truax’s soundscape competence of the acoustic environment by having previously experienced a similar context (Bruce and Davies, 2014) demonstrates that expectation may influence participants’ opinions on the soundscape.

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Question 6 This question allows participants to have a say about which elements in the built environment allow for an improvement or a deterioration of the current location’s soundscape. This will assist in the making of the design principles as the answers indicate multiple elements that urban design can incorporate into new public spaces, or to improve on if they already exist.

Question 7 This question allows the participant to consider the design of the environment they are located in and to think how it impacts the soundscape. This helps identify how a combination of design elements work together to produce either an appealing or a disagreeable soundscape.

3.2.2 Focus Group Strategy 3.2.2.1 Description Following the research strategy explained above, three focus groups were carried out as part of the methodology. Two of these were carried out after both soundwalks, whilst a third was carried out after analysis (see section 4.6) (Figure 21). It involves more than one participant and no less than a minimum of four who are selected because of being in a particular situation (Bryman, 2012). In this case, the participants were chosen because they had been on one of the two soundwalks. Usually the topic of discussion is quite focused and defined, and the concept behind this method is to enable interaction between participants. These discussions will bring to light different ideas that will be tested by the focus group members, which will assist the researcher to record unbiased opinions on the topic (Bruce and Davies, 2014).

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Figure 21: The different stages of the methodology (source: author).

3.2.2.2 Rationale This research seeks to produce basic design principles for urban designers to use when considering the soundscape of different city areas. These principles will be drawn up from the analysis of the soundwalks, but they need to be tested by the same participants.

Therefore, a focus group is essential for the evaluation of these principles (Figure 21).

This second method was selected because asking the opinion of each participant individually in an interview format would take longer and would require cross analysing their responses. Through this group deliberating on the design principles put forward, participants will not be sharing their views as single individuals but as a group member (Bryman, 2012). The intriguing aspect of a focus group is to see how participants respond to other’s views on the current topic as well as deciding together their overall opinion on the principles. With this focus group, criticism of the design principles will be taken into consideration and applied to enhance their existing qualities.

3.2.1.3 Post-Walk Focus Groups A post-walk focus group was held at the end of each soundwalk. The purpose of this focus group was to collect additional empirical evidence from the participants. This differs from the questionnaire as it allows participants to openly discuss their thoughts together on the various soundscapes they experienced. The questionnaires restricted to a certain point the freedom of each participant's ability to express their full views on the acoustic environments. Because they were asked to answer as a group, it pushed the group to deliberate on a question and form a unified answer. A set of four question

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inspired by Adams et al. (2008) were used for these focus groups. They are designed to draw upon certain comments and observations from the group. The reasoning behind this approach is: Question 1 The group will work together by sharing their perception of each of the five soundscapes they experienced in order to form a collective answer that describes each of them. This helps contribute to the general findings of the research.

Question 2 The group will work together to formulate an agreed ranking for each of the soundscapes and explain their reasoning. This contributes to the research by allowing all of the participants to describe which soundscapes were of high and poor quality. This enables more detailed analysis on their reasoning.

Question 3 This refers back to Truax’s concept of soundscape competence covered in subsection 2.3.3 in which expectations can influence participants’ perception of the soundscape (Bruce and Davies, 2014). By allowing the participants to discuss what they did and did not expect allows the researcher to identify common environmental elements that may worsen or improve the soundscape.

Question 4 This question instigates discussions on whether or not participants pay any attention to their surroundings when navigating in the built environment. This links back to how auditory perception is one of five multi-sensory experience tools, of which sight is the more dominant one. It also links back to habitual sounds and how urban users are accustomed to the sounds they hear in the built environment. But most importantly, it allows the group to think back to the soundwalk and be aware of the different soundscapes they might experience in the future.

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3.3 Sampling 3.3.1 Sampling Type For the soundwalks, convenient sampling has been used. This is a non-probability method of sampling in which, as its name states, the approach is convenient to the researcher. Essentially, the researcher is able to select whoever is accessible and available for their research project’s methodology which is the case for this dissertation.

The only main issue with convenience sampling is that it is most frequently used as a form of exploratory research, which does not claim that the findings of the methodology represent a larger population (Biggam, 2011). This type of sampling has a generalisation issue, but it does allow a springboard for future study on the theme of soundscape and urban design (Bryman, 2012).

Twenty urban users were selected for this methodology. Some had jobs whilst others were students which partly represents Oxford’s demographics. They were used to illustrated ordinary people’s everyday soundscape experiences (Jeon, Hong and Lee, 2012). When research projects use quantitative data collection, sample size becomes an issue (Biggam, 2011); but in terms of qualitative data, sample size shouldn't be too large (say 1,000 respondents) nor too few (2 respondents). Due to the nature of qualitative data and the manner in which the questionnaire is formed, it means that each research booklet needs to be individually analysed by the researcher. As this is a time consuming exercise, having a number of participants over twenty is undesirable.

Each of the participants had to be audiological normal in order for them to participate (Kang and Zhang, 2009) and had to be between the age of 18 to 65. The minimum required age of 18 was used as these participants would have started university studies thus avoiding consent from a parent or legal guardians to take part in the soundwalk.

Studies show that hearing loss affects approximately 42% of the U.K. population at age 50 and above; and affects 71% of the U.K. population at age 70 and above (Action on Hearing Loss, 2016). Therefore, the maximum age of 65 was used as this is the age

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when hearing loss starts to become apparent. The reason for this age range is because it has been found that different age groups have been proved to show different soundscape perceptions to one another (Kang and Zhang, 2009) (Lui et al., 2013b). This methodology divided the twenty participants into two age groups called Age Group A and Age Group B. Age Group A, commonly referred to as the ‘young adults’, has an age band ranging from 18 to 29. Age Group B, commonly known as the ‘adults’, has an age band ranging from 30 to 60. This split between the two groups is reasoned through Levinson’s research (1986) as early adulthood starts to finish between the age of 28 and 30 in which people leave behind their younger self to become more mature. Hence, the splitting of the age range in the hope to find evidence in the empirical data that there are different perceptions of soundscapes between Group A and Group B.

3.4 Limitations & Potential Problems This methodology has provided the research project with a soundwalk strategy to gather empirical data on how participants perceive five different acoustic environments, as well as a focus group to give feedback on the proposed design principles. As with all methodologies, there are limitations and potential problems that can alter the results of the research procedures. This section seeks to identify some of these potential drawbacks.

3.4.1 Soundwalk Limitations The soundwalk was designed by comparing past walks and adapting them to be able to function in Oxford’s urban environment. However, there were some drawbacks that occurred during the course of the walks. Starting with the participant’s numbers, the target amount of twenty participants was not reached. This was due to the fact that the soundwalk should be carried out in groups in order for all participants to experience the same context; the trouble with this is trying to accommodate an hour long soundwalk

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for a range of busy participants. Therefore, it is difficult to coordinate a group of ten people to do a soundwalk on a specific day at a specific time. The first soundwalk group of ten people enabled this research to be carried out; unfortunately, the second group had only six participants. The two soundwalks were carried out on different days at different times due to accommodating participants’ requirements; this also means that both groups experienced two slightly different contexts. In addition, trying to get an equal amount of participants that categorised into Age Group A and Age Group B was challenging. This resulted in having twelve participants in Group A and only four in Group B. In terms of the walk itself, participants were required to conduct the soundwalk in silence during the entire duration of the walk (Bruce and Davies, 2014). During the soundwalks, all of the participants remained silent at evaluation sites but talked to one another “en route” to the next site. The reason for walking to each position in silence is to enable participants to perceive different sounds on approaching the next acoustic environment (Bruce and Davies, 2014). There is much discussion as to how long a soundwalk should take; Adams et al. (2008) suggest it should only take thirty minutes whilst Jeon, Hong and Lee (2012) conducted soundwalks that were an hour long. As mentioned in subsection 3.2.1.1, the soundwalk lasted for approximately an hour as each of the five different environment sites were some distance from each other. The length of the walk could have potentially exhausted some of the participants when arriving at the fifth evaluation site and possibly affected their perception (Jeon, Hong and Lee, 2012).

3.4.2 Focus Group Limitations Focus groups are a great way to obtain views from many participants at the same time through them sharing ideas and coming to a consensus. In this exercise, a couple of issues arose, such as the recruiting of participants for the soundwalk in section 3.4.1.

Recruiting once again the same participants from the soundwalk for a focus group proved to be difficult. As a result, the strategy was conducted with three participants.

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Adding to this, during the group discussion some participants might find themselves expressing their cultural views which they would not have done if it were in an individual interview (Bryman, 2012).

Another problem is that it can be challenging to analyse the vast amount of data procured over a short amount of time. During the transcription phase, there were many minor problems that contribute to this challenge. It takes more time to transcribe a focus group than it is to transcribe an individual interview, as in the focus group, one has to be sure to keep track of what each participant has said during the research strategy. In some cases, focus groups recordings may have inaudible segments to them which make transcribing difficult. In some cases two participants talk at the same time which makes transcribing these segments quite difficult (Bryman, 2012). Even though focus groups are not problem proof, they still are a great method to use during a research project in order to acquire knowledge from participants on a specific topic.

3.5 Conclusion This chapter has outlined the methodology that was carried out for this research project.

Both structure and objectives were discussed, followed by a discussion on the two main research strategies: soundwalks and focus groups. The soundwalk, a unique method used for studying soundscapes, was analysed in terms of the walk itself, the multiple evaluation sites, and finally the post-walk focus groups. The pros and cons of focus groups was discussed, including their function as well as why they are used in this research project. The chosen sampling method, which consisted of convenience sampling, allows the researcher to select available and accessible participants to undertake the soundwalks. Finally, limitations and problems that occurred during both the soundwalks and the focus groups were discussed.

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Chapter IV Findings & Discussion 4.1 Introduction This chapter presents the results and findings from the two strategic methods used in this research project. The research booklets used for the soundwalks were analysed (Appendix D) and revealed a variety of interesting findings. The focus groups were a positive contribution to the research project. The findings of both strategic methods used in this project are described and analysed with the contextual framework produced through the literature review in Chapter II. This chapter fulfils the following objectives:

3. Develop a set of recommended design principles from the analysis of the methodology.

4. Test these principles through the use of a focus group.

The write up of the empirical data is divided into the following sections. In terms of the soundwalk, each questions asked are described and are linked to the contextual framework. The questions are organised in terms of the evaluation position location they were situated in. An example of the research booklet used by participants can be found in Appendix C. The focus groups are separated in terms of the ones that were conducted after the soundwalk and the ones conducted for the design principles. The most interesting and relevant results from the focus groups are presented in this chapter followed by an analysis bridging with the contextual framework. The reader may acquire an audio copy of the focus groups from the author. The structure of this chapter (Figure 22) starts with a description and analysis of the results from the soundwalks in each of the five locations starting at Oxford Brookes University and ending at South

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Park (Section 4.2). Section 4.3 describes and analyse the results from the post-walk focus groups. A preliminary findings section will continue on from the focus groups in order to bring together the main findings from both research strategies (Section 4.4).

This forms the basis for the design principles in Section 4.5. The last focus group which discusses these design principles is analysed using the same methodology as the previous focus groups in Section 3. The discussions created in this previous section helps refine the design principles (section 4.7). Concluding remarks are made in the last section.

Figure 22: The process of getting to the design codes from the soundwalk results.

4.2 Soundwalk The soundwalk is one of the principle research strategies used in this project which enables the researcher to acquire a clearer understanding of participants’ perceptions of different soundscapes around Oxford. Participants were required to stop at five evaluation positions and answer a set of seven questions relating to sound perception. In this section, the results from the questions will be discussed in order to understand what the participants thought about the different soundscapes they experienced. The structure of this section is largely based on each of the five locations participants visited.

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4.2.1 Oxford Brookes University 4.2.1.1 Influences In this location, all the participants were very familiar with their surroundings and felt that it was visually appealing. Such a perception arises from the fact that all participants have either worked or studied at the University and therefore have experienced this environment. In terms of expectations, participants in both age groups equally thought the location was going to be quieter or louder. The main reason for such a perception is that the university is usually busy and has more activities going on in this space.

Through Truax’s concept of soundscape competence, he makes it clear that urban users shape their perception of a place according to their past experiences of the same or similar place (Bruce and Davies, 2014). Therefore, the participants have most likely created a link between the sounds they hear in this location with an associated meaning which can result in influencing their perception of the soundscape (Truax, 2001). The reason why the participants expected it to be quieter or louder was due to the how they perceived this same location in different contexts.

4.2.1.2 Perception The soundscape in this location made most of the participants feel the same. Eleven out of the sixteen participants stated they felt relaxed, calm and comfortable. Some have even mentioned a feeling of familiarity and sociability due to either working at or attending the University. Other participants felt on edge or uncomfortable due to the sounds coming from the road. These feeling were manifested due to the dominant sounds of water, people, nature, and the city atmosphere, as well as the different sounds coming from the road (cars, buses, traffic, ambulance sirens and motorcycles). Certain sounds such as water running and the sounds of birds chirping were positively perceived by urban users; whilst others such as the noises from the road brought about a negative perception of the soundscape (Jennings and Cain, 2012). Yang and Kang (2004) also discuss the use of pleasant sounds acting as masking sounds in a public place. In this

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case, the fountain acted as a masking sound for the sounds from the road and did in fact improve the overall soundscape.

4.2.1.3 Design Most participants in both age groups stated that they think the design of this location has an impact on the soundscape. The physical elements that had a high frequency of mentions from participants in both groups were the fountain (with frequency of 10), the road (9), and nature (6). According to participants, the fountain and nature improved the soundscape of the area whilst the road worsened it. The fountain was used as a masking sound which improved Oxford Brooke’s sound comfort (Yang and Kang, 2004).

Recording and understanding the impacts these physical elements have on the soundscape can help architects and urban planners design new places with different design alternatives that recreate a similar soundscape Jennings and Cain, 2012). It is interesting how some participants were able to hear the sound reverberation due to the materials used in the area (Calleri et al., 2015). Another notable design component that was seen in the results of the soundwalk was how the square enables sunlight to access people using it. This is a design strategy from the literature that exploits non-acoustical elements in order to influence participants’ perceptions (Kang et al., 2016).

4.2.2 Headington Road 4.2.2.1 Influences Most participants were familiar with this location and did not have any opinions on the visual aesthetics. Eight of the participants (including all from age group B) stated the noise level was as they expected it to be, whilst six of the young adults thought it was louder than they expected. This is rather interesting as the participants who thought Headington Road was as expected or louder than expected reasoned that it was due to the actual loud noises from cars and buses. Bruce and Davies (2014) mention this in their work; participants regularly remark on how a location sounded as expected due to the level of loudness in the soundscape they are experiencing.

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4.2.2.2 Perception Most participants perceived this soundscape rather negatively. The most common feeling from both groups was the sense of feeling rushed and uncomfortable. Such sensation was caused by the heavy loud sounds coming from the road as vehicles had to accelerate up the hill which caused even more sounds of discomfort. The most frequent sound recorded by participants was the road and all the sounds associated with it. These were ranked low in terms of pleasantness and comfort. The other dominant sound that was heard was that of nature as this location is situated between two parks. The outcome of this perception corresponds with the literature as sounds belonging to technology such as buses and cars rank negatively in terms of pleasantness of soundscape (Aletta, Kang and Axelsson, 2016). In addition, the feelings of haste can be explained by how annoying sounds will increase a person’s walking speed and vice versa with harmonious sounds (Maculewicz, Erkut and Serafin, 2016).

4.2.2.3 Design Both age groups were in agreement that the location’s soundscape was heavily influenced by its design. Amongst seven young adults, four rated it as very strong. Most participants recorded that both the road and the parks were the physical elements that impacts the soundscape. According to Viollon, Lavandier and Drake (2001), the soundscape perception decreases if the environment is more urban. Headington Road can be described as having both natural and urban qualities to it, yet it didn’t have the best soundscape among all five locations.

4.2.3 Rectory Road 4.2.3.1 Influences Most young adults were familiar with this location and thought it was not aesthetically appealing. Whilst the adults had a range of familiarity (from very familiar to unfamiliar) and thought the aesthetics were quite pleasant. A total of twelve participants (nine of the

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young adults and three of the adults) had quieter expectations for Rectory Road. They thought there would be a heavier flow of traffic due to the road being situated in between two primary roads (Cowley Road and Saint Clement’s Street). These results show that there are many participants who have experienced this type of urban environment before. According to Bild et al. (2016), people’s perception of sounds does not only depend on elements such as physical elements and sociocultural backgrounds, but also on a person’s previous experience of acoustic environments. Interestingly in this case, many had experienced a similar residential area prior to the soundwalk and thought it would be louder due to the two primary roads at each end, yet most found the location quieter than expected.

4.2.3.2 Perception Eleven participants from both age groups felt that the location was peaceful and comfortable. There was no overwhelming sound in this location and yet the ones that were present felt familiar to the participants. The dominant sounds heard by participants were that of nature and people in this location. These received high scores in terms of pleasantness and comfort. The participants also noticed the sound of cars but these did not affect the soundscape on the same level as previous locations. This was probably due to them being distant and still able to keep the location rather quiet. This soundscape can be considered to be a positive one because it is enhanced people’s perception and therefore created positive feelings (Jennings and Cain, 2012).

4.2.3.3 Design From both age groups, twelve participants thought that this location’s design influenced the soundscape. The houses, street and trees were the most frequent physical elements the participants thought impacted the soundscape in this location. What is fascinating about Rectory Road is its curvature street design, which creates its own sound barrier from traffic sounds coming from Cowley Road and Saint Clement’s Street.

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4.2.4 Cowley Road 4.2.4.1 Influences All of the participants are to some degree familiar with Cowley Road and find its aesthetic qualities to be generic. There was an even spread in terms of participants finding the location quieter, louder or as expected. This shows that the context experienced by the participants left them indifferent to their expectations of the location.

Literature mentions that the more different sounds are in agreement with a person’s expectation of the soundscape, the less irritated they feel and the more contempt they become (Maculewicz, Erkut and Serafin, 2016). The sounds on the Cowley Road do not align with the participants’ expectations of the soundscape, thus resulting in mixed perceptions of positive feelings (familiarity and contentment) and negative feelings (rushed, frantic, and exposed).

4.2.4.2 Perception In terms of how people felt, there were mixed responses, but the most frequent descriptor was the feeling of comfort/contentment and familiarity which attributed to positive elements of the soundscape. Meanwhile, the adjectives “unnatural, hurried, frantic and exposed” were used to describe how the participants felt in terms of the negative aspect of the soundscape. Once again the predominant sound heard in this location was the road and its sound components; it was rated poorly in terms of pleasantness and comfort. Other dominant sounds frequently mentioned by participants were the sounds of people and even the sound of bicycles. These findings are interesting as Cowley Road is a busy commercial street with many shoppers yet it still possesses the noisy primary road leading into the city centre. This type of soundscape can be perceived more positively because it has continuous human activity throughout the day, but also slightly negative because of the mechanical noises (Maculewicz, Erkut and Serafin, 2016).

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4.2.4.3 Design Both age groups are in agreement with the fact that Cowley Road’s design influences the soundscape. Twelve of the participants stated that the busy main road was one of the physical elements that impaired the Cowley Road soundscape. However, the participants found that the shops which improved the soundscape and human sounds of people passing by and shopping were positively perceived, but some also felt the lack greenery/nature was unusual for Oxford. This proves that it is vital for soundscapes to incorporate both natural and human sounds in order for the experience to be a positive one (Maculewicz, Erkut and Serafin, 2016).

4.2.5 South Park 4.2.5.1 Influences Nearly all participants on the soundwalk were very familiar with South Park and thought it was very attractive. Interestingly, the majority of the young adults (6 participants) expected the location to be louder whilst all of the adults thought it would be quieter. This might be due to the participants experiencing the same location but in different contexts. One had a higher sound level of cars passing next to the park, whilst the other had close to none. The visual aspect of South Park has indeed influenced the soundscape as the more greenery there is in an area the less it feels annoying to people (Viollon, Lavandier and Drake, 2001).

4.2.5.2 Perception Every participant has described this soundscape in only a positive way, mentioning feeling of peacefulness, calmness, and happiness. This is due to all the sounds of nature being heard (birds trees swaying and wind), as well as the near absence of sound source originating from the road (cars, buses, ambulance sirens and motorbikes). The dominant sounds they heard were of birds and people in the park; some also noticed sounds from people walking on the pathway. These were perceived positively in terms of

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pleasantness and comfort. There was some mention of road sounds but this received a neutral ranking. Because South Park is home to nature and wildlife, the sounds created by these have a positive impact on the participants’ feelings resulting in a preferred soundscape (Kang et al., 2016).

4.2.5.3 Design The participants collectively thought that the design in this location influenced South Park’s soundscape. The trees, play area and gravel pathway were the most frequently mentioned physical elements that improved the soundscape in the park. The open design of the park invites for wildlife to settle and people tend to stay and enjoy themselves, hence the design has positively affected the soundscape in this location.

4.3 Focus Groups 1 & 2 The post-walk focus groups were used as a tool to entice the participants to collectively deliberate on four questions relating to the soundwalk they’ve just carried out. In this section, their results will be discussed and analysed to further the research.

4.3.1 Focus Group 1 In terms of collectively describing the soundscapes in each of the locations, the participants described Oxford Brookes University as familiar, homely, and expected.

One participant mentioned that there was more traffic than expected in this location, and another described the soundscape as a constant noise of traffic. The group discussed Headington Road and said it was noisier than they thought it would be, they could not hear any of the park sounds even thought they were located in between two parks. They went on to agree that it was due to the design of the road which amplified and echoed the sound of cars and buses. Rectory Road was seen as comfortable and very quiet to the group even though it was situated between two primary busy roads. They also mentioned it was very manmade and unnatural as they could not hear any bids singing.

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When describing Cowley Road’s soundscape, they used adjectives such as dislike, urban, busy, and dirty; one participant felt uncomfortable on this road. In terms of South Park, the participants unanimously agreed that the soundscape was very quiet, creating a feeling of freedom due to the openness of the location.

When asked to rank the soundscapes, South Park was ranked the most pleasant followed

by Oxford Brookes University, Rectory Road, Cowley Road because it’s always lively due to the shops and restaurants, and finally Headington Road as participants did not expect it to be so noisy. The group also agreed that most locations were as expected apart from Rectory Road which appeared to be quieter.

And finally, the soundwalk has taught some of the participants to listen more to the urban environment when passing through similar locations. Another participant mentioned that by listening to the acoustic environment, he/she tends to notice sounds that are unpleasant.

4.3.2 Focus Group 2 The second group described the soundscape at Oxford Brookes University as firstly hearing the traffic then the sounds of people. They group expected Headington Road to be louder and felt bored in this location. Mention was made that this location was a car corridor that amplified sound. Rectory Road was described as quieter and most participants were able to hear bird sounds. They also felt this road was similar to South Park’s soundscape with background traffic and familiar sounds of people partaking in activities within their homes. Cowley Road felt more urban and harsher to the participants due to the visual link they also experienced. The sound that surprised the participants the most in South Park was the crunchiness of the gravel path that made them physically feel people's movements.

Group 2 ranked the locations with South Park as the most pleasant followed by Oxford Brookes University and Rectory Road, then Headington Road and finally Cowley Road.

They agreed that it was due to the harshness of the car sounds they heard which made

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this ranking. The participants felt that Cowley Road was unexpected as they enjoy the area but listening to the soundscape made them feel uncomfortable. They also expected to hear more car sounds in South Park but the gravel path was positively unexpected, some did not notice the water feature at the first location.

Overall, the soundwalk made these participants more aware of the different sounds in the built environment. Some admitted their ignorance to the soundscape, taking it for granted and blocking it out because they usually use earphones to listen to music.

4.4 Preliminary Findings In this section, the primary and notable findings from the soundwalk and focus groups are presented. These are the main areas that will be considered when creating the design principles in order to achieve research objective 3. The sound of people talking in locations 1, 4, and 5 has been strongly appreciated by the participants. The sounds of nature such as birds singing and water were also well received during the soundwalks and methodology. The bird sounds were prominent in most of the evaluation position locations; and the water feature at location 1 provided a masking sound from other negative ones. Due to location 1 having an open design, it allowed sun to enter the urban environment which indirectly influenced participants’ perception positively.

Locations 2 and 4 had a soundscape that made participants feel they were in a hurry.

The design of location 3 enabled the buildings and their orientation to act as shields from noises originating from neighbouring roads. The most problematic sounds that affected the soundscape in most locations was the road and its loud, harsh, and disruptive noises. From these preliminary findings, design principles are to be formed and presented in the next section.

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4.5 Original Design Principles From the preliminary findings (section 4.4), design principles are able to be drawn-up (Appendix E). These have the aim of providing basic guidelines for urban designers to use when creating new places in cities. Nine design principles were created in order to try and cover as many of the preliminary findings as possible. These were then categorised into three themes: the urban fabric, the civic nature, and pathways.

4.5.1 The Urban Fabric 4.5.1.1 Design Principle 1: Sociability This design principle seeks to provide areas for social interaction. By providing means for people to congregate and socialise in the public realm, this will create talkative sound sources that urban users can relate and feel part of a community. This sound source has shown to create a soundscape that is vibrant, familiar, and at ease. Providing social opportunities in the built environment through urban design can encourage people to stay longer in places and enjoy themselves through networking and socialising

4.5.1.2 Design Principle 2: Open Spaces This design principle seeks to design open spaces for maximum sunlight. By designing open spaces with more sunlight access helps influence the urban user’s perception of the acoustic environment indirectly. Creating an environment which is warmer and more comfortable to people can influence the urban user’s perception of soundscape.

Designing open aired spaces increase the amount of light in an area which can make people feel safer and happier.

4.5.1.3 Design Principle 3: Deflection This design principle seeks to design deflective streets so they reduce sound levels.

Designing streets that start to deflect the further people venture into them can reduce sound source levels from neighbouring busy roads. This deflection will subtly use the

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buildings on the street to become a sound barrier. As urban users are further away from the end of the street, the less car and bus noises they hear will render a more positive soundscape. On an urban design level, this design principle is a great way to introduce townscape elements to a residential area.

4.5.2 The Civic Nature 4.5.2.1 Design Principle 4: Water This design principle seeks to incorporate water features in open spaces. In open spaces, adding a water feature can prove to be very helpful in enhancing the soundscape. The sound source of water adds an alternative acoustic element which is probably not expected in the built environment. Hence this can be enticing and bring a nature component to the environment. Water features can be designed in multiple ways to give character to the built environment and allow interactivity amongst urban users.

4.5.2.2 Design Principle 5: Vegetation This design principle seeks to include vegetation into the public realm. Vegetation in the built environment brings wildlife within cities that produce natural sounds that people enjoy hearing. Adding trees, hedges, and other plants will improve soundscapes in areas that have a harsher design. Street trees are a great way to design nature into cities and bring wildlife as well as greenery. This will improve not only the healthiness of the city, but also its aesthetics.

4.5.2.3 Design Principle 6: Green Corridors This design principle seeks to encourage the use of green corridors on streets. Green corridors expand on the previous design principle by elongating and increasing the amount of vegetation in the city. It can also act as a form of a natural sound buffer for footpaths which will reduce traffic noises (to a certain degree). These natural corridors encourage more greenery to be added to cities, thus resulting in an increased aesthetic pleasantness as well as encouraging a healthier city lifestyle for urban dwellers.

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4.5.3 Pathways 4.5.3.1 Design Principle 7: Street Furniture This design principle seeks to add street furniture. Providing public places with street furniture will impact the soundscape indirectly. In certain busy streets the soundscape makes people feel rushed. With the ability to access and to visually perceive street furniture, urban users will feel less hurried. Street furniture provides the opportunity for people to stay in public places allowing them to enjoy urban life and the quality of the urban realm.

4.5.3.2 Design Principle 8: Green Waves This design principle seeks to introduce the green waves scheme. This scheme helps coordinate traffic lights with vehicles so as to provide a continuous flow of traffic on a road. This cascade of green traffic lights will allow cars and buses to move more smoothly which will also reduce the noise levels. This in turn will help create a positive soundscape in an urban environment. Green waves enable cars to move quicker through the streetscape, increases the time for people to cross the street, as well as reduces traffic emissions.

4.5.3.3 Design Principle 9: Materials This design principle seeks to use different materials when designing pathways. When designing the streetscape for pedestrians, it is interesting to use a variety of materials that will create different sounds when people walk on them. This can add to the soundscape as it produces a variety in sound sources that urban users can enjoy.

Designing these pathways can be creative and incorporate interactivity for urban users.

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4.6 Focus Group 3 The third focus group tested the design principles created in Section 4.5. Each participant reviewed and discussed the design principles put forward; and recommended ways in which they could be improved or expanded. Please see Appendix E for graphical representations.

Overall, the participants understood and appreciated the design principles put forward from the findings of the soundwalks and the previous focus groups. The feedback was positive and additional suggestions were made on how to improve the design principles.

One of the participants thought that the idea of encouraging the use of green corridors would work as they recalled a section on Headington Road which had a similar characteristic and the noises from the road traffic were significantly reduced. All of the participants agreed that the design principles that aimed to provide areas for social interaction were a good idea as these would create positive sounds to the soundscape.

The first suggestion was to incorporate a design principle that looked at building uses as these have an enormous impact on the soundscape. Current principles only focused on the street and therefore the inclusion of mixed-use building would be beneficial to improving the soundscape of an area. Incorporating a mixed-use scheme of buildings would provide all the necessary services and pedestrian connections for people living in that area who would be able to walk or cycle instead of always using the car. This in turn would also combat one of the main issues that arose from the data analysis, that of traffic noise. In a mix use scheme car usage would decrease as the needs of people living there are met by close proximity provision.

The focus group’s second suggestion looked at the design principle that aims to use different materials for pathways, adding that it could serve as a dual purpose. Different materials can also absorb sound as well as make new ones. Incorporating acoustical tiles that will absorb sound can be retrofitted into bus stops, backing street furniture, and even on decorative murals. The final recommendation from the participants was to

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question what extent these design principles will affect the built environment both in the short and long term and whether they will have an impact on soundscapes on a local and/or city scale.

As per the above recommendations, the design principles have been modified and refined to produce a new set of design principles in Section 4.5.

4.7 Refining Design Principles By testing the design principles with Focus Group 3, the comments made by the participants have been used to refine the original principles created in Section 4.5 and produce a set of final design principles. This section will refer to these final design principles which can be viewed in Appendix F. The first modification to the original design principles is categorising each one as either having short or long term effects. Their scale of impact has also been classified as affecting specific areas, districts, or the city itself. The next change is the addition of a new theme entitled ‘City Life’. This theme has also three new design principles which seek to help mitigate against the main issue of noise pollution from road traffic. The first of these is to discourage people using their cars by restricting car access to certain parts of the city. The second is to incorporate public transport into the city network which will entice people not to use their cars. The final principle is to encourage people to walk and cycle in a city thereby helping to decrease the amount of traffic. These three general design principles will help reduce traffic noise on a city scale and have a long term effect on enhancing the soundscapes of different areas.

The next improvement is to merge the original design principles of ‘Vegetation’ and ‘Green Corridors’ into one as they have similar goals. The ‘Open Spaces’ principle was moved to the Civic Nature theme and became more generic in order to relate to multiple contexts. Its aim is to design places that can provide sensory comfort from the weather,

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using the example of how sunlight influences people’s perception of their surroundings.

Another modification is the addition of a new design principle in the Urban Fabric theme entitled ‘Building Uses’. This principle’s aim is to integrate mixed-use buildings in different areas of the city which will positively contribute to the soundscape by reducing traffic noise and allowing more pleasant sounds to dominate the shopping area.

The last change was made to the ‘materials’ principle that entails adding sound absorbing tiles into the built environment.

4.8 Conclusion This chapter has presented the findings of the methodology and analysed them in order to create a set of design principles. The findings from each location showed that participants appreciated sounds of nature, water and people; however, mechanical noises from traffic were less appreciated. Focus Groups 1 and 2 ranked South Park as the preferred soundscape, followed by Oxford Brookes University, Rectory Road; Cowley Road and Headington Road were ranked last. These preliminary findings were used to create a set of design principles that achieved positive soundscapes in the built environment. Nine design principles (sociability, open spaces, deflection, water, vegetation, green corridors, street furniture, green waves and materials) were grouped under three themes (the urban fabric, the civic nature, and pathways); these were then tested through the use of Focus Group 3 which positively accepted all the design principles and recommended improving the principles with several modifications and two additions. The design principles were further refined with modifications by Focus Group 3 and the final principles can be implemented by urban designers in the built environment to create good public places through soundscape design.

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Chapter V Conclusion and Recommendations 5.1 Introduction This chapter will aim to summarise all aspects of the research project and give recommendations to urban designers and architects when considering soundscapes. As a reminder, the overall aim of this research was to understand how soundscape design can create good places. In order to answer this research question, four objectives were set out in Chapter I which will help focus on the body of research. The objectives are as follows: 3. Review the existing literature on soundscape and its functionality in the built environment.

4. Design a methodology through soundwalks from which key findings can be extracted.

5. Develop a set of recommended design principles from the analysis of the methodology.

6. Test these principles through the use of a focus group.

The structure of this chapter will start by introducing the research project which will lead onto a second section that discusses the general findings for each of the five evaluated locations as well as the research’s preliminary findings. A third section will draw upon different conclusions from each of the research objective findings. This section highlights and discusses the crucial elements found in the research. Section four discusses the concluding remarks from the previous section in order to provide recommendations for urban designers and architects. A final section will be devoted to the project’s limitations that will hopefully encourage future research.

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5.2 General Findings This section will present the overall findings of the methodology used in Chapter III. The soundwalks were carried out by sixteen participants who also took part in post-walk focus groups. The overall findings for each location are presented in sections and the final subsection will be a collection of the most frequent findings from the methodology.

5.2.1 Oxford Brookes University The predominant sounds found in this location were running water from the fountain, people socialising, nature sounds, as well as sounds originating from the road such as cars, buses, motorcycles, traffic noise. Apart from the noise of the traffic, the overall soundscape made the participants feel relaxed, calm and comfortable; it also evoked a notion of familiarity and sociability. As the traffic noise made some participants feel on edge and uncomfortable, the fountain was a design feature that helped to mask the sound of traffic (Yang and Kang, 2004).

5.2.2 Headington Road Most participants perceived the soundscape in this location as negative. The most frequent sounds that dominated this soundscape were that of vehicles changing to lower gear in order to ascend the hill thus creating a revving sound and causing the participants to feel stressed and uncomfortable. Due to the annoyance of this dominant sound source, the participants want to hurry past and avoid this environment (Maculewicz, Erkut and Serafin, 2016). Other sources found in this location were that of nature with birds singing, but these were drowned out by the traffic noise.

5.2.3 Rectory Road In this location, there were no overwhelming sounds that affected the soundscapes such as those on Headington Road. The noticeable sounds of people and nature were evident

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on Rectory Road. This made participants feel at ease, as well as being familiar with the surrounding environment around them. However, there was the sound of distant cars at each end of the street but this did not seem to affect the participants’ perception. Overall, the soundscape was perceived as a positive one as it evoked pleasant feelings (Jennings and Cain, 2012).

5.2.4 Cowley Road When participants were asked to evaluate this location, a variety of sounds were recognised. However, its most dominant sound was traffic noise which caused Cowley Road to be rated poorly in terms of pleasantness and comfort. Although, the participants preferred the other sounds of people and bicycles, they still felt stressed and in an unnatural environment partly due to the lack of vegetation. The human activity elements of the soundscape made it positive, but the mechanical sounds of the cars and lack of vegetation were negative elements (Maculewicz, Erkut and Serafin, 2016).

5.2.5 South Park All of the participants perceived the soundscape in South Park as positive. The predominant sounds were that of birds, people, and sounds from people walking on the pathway. Participants felt peaceful, calm and happy. The near absence of traffic noise was also a positive element to the soundscape. South Park’s soundscape was a positive one due to the abundant presence of nature (Kang et al., 2016).

5.2.6 Prominent Findings Thanks to the participants’ evaluation of all five soundscapes, their results could be analysed to find common results. In this research, it has been shown that the sounds of people talking had a strong positive response in locations 1, 4 and 5. This is also the case for bird sounds, as they could be heard in most of the locations, and the sound of water in location 1. The design of Rectory Road was able to shield the soundscape from the noise of traffic coming from both ends of the road. Participants did not mind the

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distant sound of cars and buses. When the sound of traffic is close enough to be loud, participants felt uncomfortable and hurried. This confirms that the most distinguished negative sound source that affected the soundscapes was the sound of cars, buses and other traffic. This means that traffic noise is the main threat to designing a positive soundscape and has to be taken into consideration when creating design principles.

5.3 Concluding Remarks This section reviews each of the research objectives and discusses their related findings.

Drawing upon these findings, each objective will conclude key elements that help answer the research question and will then be used for recommendations in Section 5.4.

5.3.1 Research Objective 1 This objective required the project to review the existing literature on soundscape and to understand its functionality in the built environment. This produced Chapter II which explained the soundscape concept and led to understanding its relationship with the built environment. The outcome of this review is that soundscapes are a very complex and detailed phenomenon which take place in the built environment. An example of its complexity can be seen through context (see Section 2.3.2). Soundscapes stem from the perception of urban users on the acoustic environment. Perception is one of the most crucial elements of a soundscape as it allows the collection of qualitative empirical data from participants. These perceptions are what define a positive or negative soundscape.

The conclusion that can be drawn from research objective 1 is that urban designers and architects need to consider the extensive variety of soundscapes in built environments.

This is crucial as most of the work produced by these two decision makers is based on visual perception. As Bild et al. (2016) mention in their research, there are a number of individuals that believe the aesthetics makes up the core element of an enjoyable place; to the extent of allowing sight to be the noblest of all five senses. Through soundscape

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design, a move towards a democracy of the human senses can be accomplished in the decision making process of cities (Bild et al., 2016).

5.3.2 Research Objective 2 This objective required the project to design a methodology through soundwalks from which key findings can be extracted. From the literature review, soundwalks and focus groups were employed to collect qualitative data through the participation of sixteen participants. The most notable findings from this methodology were the sounds of people, nature, and water which made the urban users feel comfortable and at ease in the built environment. One of the recurring findings was that traffic noise affected different soundscapes negatively and made the participants feel hurried and exposed.

The concluding remarks for this research objective are that there are many sound sources which contribute positively to soundscapes. These are often birds singing, people walking and talking, and even the sound of running water. The main sound source that undermines these other positive ones and creates a negative soundscape is predominantly traffic noises from cars, buses, trucks, motorcycle and ambulances.

5.3.3 Research Objective 3 This objective required the project to develop a set of recommended design principles based on the methodology analysis. After carrying out two soundwalks with post-walk focus groups, a lot of data were processed and analysed in Chapter IV. This enabled the formation of nine design principles that were grouped into three themes - urban fabric, civic nature and pathways (Appendix E). The concluding remarks for this research objective are the following. The set of design principles provided by this research project can be viewed in different ways to help urban designers and architects achieve the creation of positive soundscapes. These principles will help provide inspiration for building environments making them acoustically enjoyable for the urban user. The design principles are rather broad which allow them to be able to be applied in a range of contexts, depending on the design team.

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5.3.4 Research Objective 4 This objective required the project to test the design principles through the use of a focus group. Three of the participants from the soundwalks were able to participate in the focus group which tested the original principles as seen in Appendix E. The original principles were refined from the comments made and a set of final design principles were created, these can be found in Appendix F. In conclusion, the original design principles have been altered so as to incorporate actions that will address the main issue threatening soundscapes. This issue of traffic noise produced by roads make urban users perceive the soundscape negatively.

5.4 Design Recommendations This section will discuss the recommended approaches for implementing design principles, the final principles can be found in Appendix F. The section will specifically examine soundscape design, recognising the main issue found in this research, applying the recommended principles, and finally overcoming traffic noise.

5.4.1 Soundscape Design As seen in Section 5.3.1, the notion of soundscape is not a priority for urban designers and architects when making decisions concerning the built environment. This can be seen as a weakness as it is crucial to recognise that the quality of the public realm does not exist solely within the aesthetics and functionality of a place. It also has roots in the other senses that urban users perceive, such as soundscape perception. According to The Lancet (2014) high-level exposure to noise pollution can create health problems, especially long-term exposure. Therefore, decision makers need to take into account soundscape elements. The recommendation suggested by this subsection is to start

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appreciating soundscapes in the built environment and understand their role in providing multisensory experiences for the urban user.

5.4.2 The Main Issue Section 5.3.2 highlights the main threat to soundscapes found in this research project.

This is the all-inclusive road noise originating from cars, buses, ambulances and traffic.

These sound sources were found throughout the two soundscape results and were discussed in Focus Groups 1 and 2. The recommendation suggested by this subsection is to recognise that traffic noise is one of the predominant sounds affecting soundscapes and in turn the quality of the public realm.

5.4.3 Using Design Principles As discussed in Section 5.3.3, this research project has created a set of design principles that will enhance soundscape quality within the public realm; these can be found in Appendix F. The principles have been grouped under four themes which included ‘The Urban Fabric’, ‘The Civic Nature’, ‘Pathways’, and ‘City Life’. The recommendation suggested by this subsection is that urban designers and architects should feel inspired by these design principles and use them in relation to their own personal context. They are meant as an array of incentives which decision makers can choose from and implement in their city in order to deliver good places through the use of soundscape design. However, the designer needs to be aware of the context in which the design principles will be implemented as this may result in slightly different outcomes.

5.4.4 Overcoming Traffic Noise As mentioned in Section 5.3.4, these design principles have been devised so as to be able to deal with the main issue of traffic noise. Each principle is coded in terms of both time frame and scale. The time frame of these design recommendations may vary from short term to long term impacts. Short term principles will only remedy the problem for a while but not permanently solve the problem. Whereas, long-term principles are able

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to solve the issue of traffic sound in a more resilient manner. The scaling of the design principles vary from city wide impacts, to an intermediate scale covering districts, and finally to a smaller scale consisting of specific areas. The principles under the ‘City Life’ theme aim to mitigate traffic noise by impacting on a city scale with a long term time frame. The recommendation suggested by this subsection is to understand how each design principle will improve the urban soundscapes according to the three levels of quality (Figure 23). Essentially, there are three levels representing different soundscape qualities. The acceptable level is represented by a base line in which sound sources are comfortable to the urban user. These are sounds such as nature and people talking. The level below represents an undesirable soundscape quality with sounds such as traffic noise. The highest quality represents an ideal soundscape in which the sounds are excellent for a positive perception by urban users. It is important to note that some sounds can be located in two levels at the same time; this is determined by their context.

For example, bird sounds at Oxford Brookes University will be classified as acceptable quality. But if the same sound was in South Park it would be classified as an ideal quality. The design principles recommended by this research project will help decision makers upgrade their soundscapes from one quality level to the next.

Figure 23: The three levels of quality that assess each sound source (source: author).

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5.5 Further Research Through this body of work, the research question was able to be answered. As a reminder, the question was: how can soundscape design help deliver good places? This is firstly achieved by appreciating and understanding the impact of soundscapes on the quality of the built environment. Secondly, to recognise the dominant sound sources affecting a soundscape both positively and negatively. Thirdly, draw up a set of design principles that can be implemented in urban design which will help enhance soundscapes positively. And finally, understand how each of these principles can upgrade the quality level of a soundscape.

This research project essentially demonstrated the technique urban designers and architects can use in order to help deliver good places through soundscape design. But this research has its limitation in terms of context. The results from the participants’ perceptions represent their soundscape experiences within an area in Oxford. In addition, the participant number of sixteen is not enough to represent a general population’s perception of soundscapes in the built environment. Further research should be carried out within the researcher’s context in order for results to reflect cities’ perception of soundscapes. Furthermore, a larger pool size of participants would be required in order to obtain an accumulative representation of urban users’ perception.

Most of the theoretical framework matched with the contextual framework. According to Kang and Zhang (2009), there are no particular soundscape perception differences within gender groups but there should be some through age groups. This theory was tested in this research but most of the results from Age Group A and Age Group B correlated with one another. The reason for this is that there was an unequal amount of participants in each age group (with 12 young adults and 4 adults). Future research should seek to find different perceptions between age groups as soundscape preferences might vary and will therefore need to be incorporated when drawing up context based design principles.

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Appendices

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Appendix A: Ethics Form

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Appendix B: Soundwalk Route

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Appendix C: Evaluation Position Questions

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Appendix D: Data Processing

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Appendix E: Original Design Principles

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Appendix F: Final Design Principles

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