title: Public open spaces for the elderly in urban areas. A case study of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Creators: name: Le, Thi Thuy Hang
Publisher: name: UNSPECIFIED
Year: 2023

description: Public open spaces (POS) play an essential role in enhancing the elderly’s mental, physical, and social well-being, through socialization, outdoor activities, and exercise. A sharp rise in Vietnam's demographic profile toward an aging population over the last decade has raised the need for increased attention to POS. Based on a growing trend of aging in Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) - one of the largest cities with a 9% population of elderly aged 65 and above (reported in 2019), is a prime candidate for a well-planned system of age-friendly POS. However, the lack of green spaces and, more importantly, spatial quality has limited the use of POS among the elderly in HCMC, where an estimated green area is sub-optimal (1.36 m² of land per capita). Additionally, Vietnam government institutions - have neither established guidelines for age-friendly urban spaces nor paid more attention to improving green open spaces. The wide academic-practitioner gap continues to challenge architects, landscape designers, and urban planners to apply their valuable research findings to practice. Through a case study of HCMC, this research aims to identify a practical design method for POS to meet the elders’ needs by comprising (1) the synthesis of age-friendly design guidelines, (2) impact factors and degree of association to the frequency and time spent in POS, (3) reasons, activities, and opinions of the elderly about POS, (4) network between the POS attributes and actions of users, and (5) models of POS for the elderly. In this paper, design guidelines, at their core, work as diffusion curves to bring academics closer to practitioners. At the same time, age-friendly policies for POS are rigorously reviewed to synthesize a framework that tailors effective procedures to match the needs of the elderly. This research uses qualitative and quantitative methods, including survey questionnaires, in-depth interviews, expert interviews, and observation. The experiment was implemented between 2017 and 2018 in ten different types of POS, collecting 353 responses from a survey questionnaire. The actor-network-theory method analyzed observation data collected from study areas to draw a network among built attributes and the users' activities. Statistical analysis was conducted using Chi-square and Fisher’s exact tests to identify the most significant impact factors in using POS. As a result, there is a significant association between social interaction and design features and frequency and time spent in POS among the elderly. Furthermore, the most influential design features in ten POS locations are open fields, pathways, vegetation, and benches, as they connect popular activities such as walking, slow-movement sports, and exercise and sports equipment. The new design guidelines are established by integrating the synthesized procedures and the results of an observational and statistical analysis to form concise language with the order of necessary factors. Remarkably, the method of this tailored approach has received multiple applause from professionals in landscape design for its relevance, acceptability, political expediency, viability, and adaptability. Future research directions are to broaden the application of the structure of POS to other age groups to minimize users’ conflicts.