Westminster Open Spaces Noise Study 2008 Final Report

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Westminster Open Spaces NoiseStudy 2008: Final ReportTable 3. Site TypologiesCivic Paved Space• TrafalgarSquareLocal MixedSurface Space• WestbourneEstateCanalsideGardens• PaddingtonRecreationGround• Riverside WalkGardens• Ebury Square• Inigo JonesGardens• St Anne’sChurchyard• St Mary’sChurchyard• PaddingtonCentral• Golden Square• LowerGrosvenorGardens• Harrow Roadopen space• WestbourneGardensLondon Park• Hyde Park• St James’s Park• Regent’s Park• Victoria TowerGardens NorthCivic Mixed SurfaceSpace• Soho Square• LeicesterSquare Gardens• Hyde ParkCorner WarMemorial2.8.6 Although these typologies provide a logical framework for a comparative assessment ofthese sites and can embrace other sites within Westminster, the suggested methodologyretains enough flexibility to add and assess additional typologies for any future studies.2.8.7 Please note that the site methodologies for acoustic and attitudinal survey were the sameacross all sites. Typologies came into play only at analysis stage.D121316/R1/0210Scott Wilson LtdMarch 2009
Westminster Open Spaces NoiseStudy 2008: Final Report3. Creation of Toolkits3.1 Toolkits3.1.1 One of the key outputs of the study was to develop a ‘Toolkit’ for assessing tranquillity,using an objective yes / no assessment system, which would lead to a ‘tranquillity score’ foreach site.3.1.2 The rationale behind the toolkit method is the question of how and how much the presenceof a particular element of open space (such as grass, water, the presence of people, birds)matters to people’s sense of tranquillity in this ‘type’ of space. Some elements are absent,by default, in some types, e.g., green surfaces in Civic Paved Space. This is different froman element being perceived as not making a difference to tranquillity. When a respondentthought an element did not matter to tranquillity, this was coded as a 0 on the Likert Scale.3.1.3 Questions irrelevant to a given site were marked as such during site visits, and theelements relating to these were ruled out of the analysis for the given site. All sites whichhad the same elements ruled out (e.g., wide open spaces, grassy surfaces) were groupedinto the same typology.3.1.4 Elements of open spaces that we hypothesised as having an effect on people’s sense oftranquillity, and which were part of our questionnaire, are from this point forward termed‘experiential factors’.3.2 Data Input, Analysis and Weighting3.2.1 All questionnaire data were input into MS Excel. In the first instance summary tables wereconstructed for each site to determine the total number of responses. Some sites had nodata due to a lack of potential respondents on site at the time of study (see assumptionsand limitations, Section 3.4). However as weighting scales were created for ‘typologies’rather than sites, data skewing due to low numbers was largely mitigated.3.2.2 With the new typologies described above, it was necessary to code and weight the resultsof the Likert questions in order to develop a Toolkit. The coding used is as shown in Table4 below.Table 4. Likert CodingLikert Strong Dislike Dislike Neutral Like Strong Like Not ApplicableItemCoding -2 -1 0 1 2 No score3.2.3 The assignation of a typology to a site also considered the physical elements of the site,such as water bodies, grassy surfaces, paved areas, etc. By default, some physicalcharacteristics were absent in sites of a given typology, e.g., grassy surfaces in CivicPaved Spaces. Since many of the ‘experiential factors’ listed in table 1 relate to physicalcharacteristics of sites, the interview questionnaire had to be varied across the fourtypologies of sites. This is why four sets of weightings and toolkits (one per typology) werecreated (see below).3.2.4 Once the Likert Coding (Table 4 above) was set up, the experiential factors (Table 1) werethen weighted in order to establish the relative influence of a given factor compared to allthe other factors in a typology. The weighting was calculated using the following formula:D121316/R1/0211Scott Wilson LtdMarch 2009
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