Identifying Culture-led Regeneration Strategies in Historical Districts of Iranian Cities: The Case of Feizabad Neighborhood of Kermanshah

Recent global experiences have shown that culture-led regeneration has played a crucial role in the  urban life quality, particularly in historical-cultural areas. Given the rich cultural background of Iran, the experiences of the recent decade in this country are indicative of a growing tendency toward this approach. A holistic analysis of the literature could easily indicate that there is no clear procedure to identify and develop culture-led regeneration strategies, and the majority of studies have only addressed the achievements of the previous experiences.

The main achievement of the study is introducing a comprehensive process which identifies and prioritizes culture-led regeneration strategies based on the nature of each district.

Based on a case study of the historical district of Feizabad in the city of Kermanshah with its remarkable cultural assets as well as the recent cultural projects conducted in this district, the present study seeks to combine quantitative and qualitative techniques and develop strategies appropriate to the district under study by using content analysis, interpretative-historical analysis, and space syntax analysis. In the process of identifying strategies, first, a conceptual model of practical strategies and policies of culture-led regeneration is devised based on global literature. Next, the process goes through four steps to identify appropriate strategies for culture-led regeneration in Kermanshah as well as other historical cities in Iran. These steps include analysis of cultural assets, identification of cultural projects in the area and evaluation of the residents’ image of these projects, prioritization of the strategies derived from the conceptual model using the opinions of both experts and residents and finding the appropriate places which adapt to the strategies.

Based on our findings, the high-priority strategies in Feizabad Neighborhood include the role of local actors, improvement of the quality of the urban environment, reuse of valuable or abandoned buildings, and mixed-use development.