Evaluation and Analysis of the Functionality of Residential Complexes* Case Study: Mehr Housing Scheme (Ghadir Project)

Decreasing qualitative aspects of residential environments is a real problem in residential complexes of Iran. Thinking about living space is related to different factors. Analyzing the factors that shape residential space, help us to find out a comprehensive knowledge about this type of buildings. There are many principles which used to design residential complexes. Researchers don’t limit their studies about a housing unit. They talk about neighborhood, district, life style, urban space, culture and behavior of inhabitants, access to services and so on. They use qualitative or quantitative methods to analyze. In order to create satisfied environments, planners, designers, and policy makers need to understand the structures that cause residents to feel satisfied with their environments. This article is concentrated on the functionality of residential complexes; especially the complexes which is built through Mehr housing scheme. The article tries to evaluate different indictors that determine functionality of an apartment. Mehr housing scheme is a widespread scheme to provide house for low income people. Though the apartments –which is built through this scheme- are small apartments (about 70 m2). Through this scheme about one million and seven hundred thousand apartments built throughout the country of Iran. The scheme aimed to help the low income people to invest in affordable housing and use low interest bank loans. There are many researches about Mehr housing schema. These researches and articles shows inhabitants are not satisfied qualitative aspects of residential environments. Analyzing and assessment the functionality of residential complexes shows the satisfaction level of inhabitants. Case study of this research is Ghadir project (which has about 50000 apartments), that is built in different cities: Golbahar, Ramshar, Parand, Ramin, Sahand, Hashtgerd, and Pardis (all of them are new towns around the metropolises of Iran). For this project more than 30 types of apartments are designed. This article classified them in 10 classes. We use a questionnaire to ask expert’s view about these plans. The questionnaire contains six parts: functionality of living room, functionality of bed room, functionality of kitchen, functionality of bathroom and WC, functionality of entrance, and the last part is about the totality of apartments. To assess each part we use several indicators. Through the questionnaire eighteen indicators asked from experts designers (Professors and professional architects. Analyzing the questionnaires shows that some of indicators have more correlation with the satisfaction level of inhabitants of the apartments. Geometry of plan (the situation of each space and the relation with other spaces) has highest correlation. Functionality of living room has the second highest correlation with the satisfaction level of inhabitants of the apartments. The other indicator that has high correlation is the situation of bathroom and WC. At the end, this article tries to give us some solutions to elevate each indicator. Forty eight solutions (such as solution that help designers to control dimensions of spaces) are offered for ten principle indicators. They help architects to design residential complexes in which people feels better and be more satisfied.