Decision-Making Tool for Participatory Urban Planning and Development: Residents’ Preferences of Their Built Environment

Usually, people pursue settlements that fulfill their needs and realize their aspirations. Since the 1970s, the Egyptian government has established new urban communities to fulfill the increasing demand for housing. At the national level, the population of Egypt’s 20 new cities did not exceed 766,000 persons in 2006, or only 1.06% of Egypt’s total population. The population of these new cities reached only approximately 30% of the targeted population of 2006. On the other hand, the environmental and urban conditions in existing urban areas are deteriorating, which caused them to become expellant areas. This indicates a gap between housing supply and demand, or in other words, between what government provides and people need; in addition, there is a misallocation of resources. The present study suggests a participatory planning tool where residents elaborate on the planning/replanning process by defining their priorities. The tool, based on the analytical hierarchy process, helps professionals and decision makers to recognize the relationship between residents’ priorities and their built environment, understand residents’ mobility, evaluate existing urban settlements, and design new ones according to residents’ preferences. The paper furthermore tests the applicability of the suggested tool by selecting a middle class income sample, then defining their preferences toward their built environment to evaluate different urban areas, usually inhabited by the same socioeconomic level, using the acquired data. After testing the suggested tool and discussing its advantages and problems faced, it can be deduced that this tool not only provides an appropriate bed for evaluating the built environment based on residents’ preferences, but also facilitates the participation of residents in the urban planning process. The suggested tool could be useful for developers and decision makers while developing a new urban area or regenerating an existing one.