Journal of Researches in Islamic Architecture

Central parts of the cities regardless of their role and function, embrace more people than their own inhabitants heading for meeting their needs. This is more significant in city centers having ultra-city impacts ditto holy places. One of the main centers in pilgrimage cities is the Holy shrines’ surroundings which attract considerable population of non-inhabitants in addition to their own inhabitants. To retain the validity of this principal area, the population’s requirements should be provided at this very zone.

Thus urban planning should predict and provide all types of required services in these areas.

To reach this specific goal utilizing the methods and technics of urban service planning is essential. Despite using various and efficient methods for estimating and planning the services of inhabitants, lack of written procedures for evaluation of such services and considering requirements of fluid and non-inhabitants population are of the most problematic issues in planning of land use and services at the pilgrimage cores.

 This paper is based on the authors’ experience in the field of planning services needed by pilgrims in the pilgrimage cities of MASHHAD and QOM. Due to the uncertainties and questions in this regard, this paper presents principles and methods for planning the needs of this group. In a way that it can be used for planning the developments of religious spaces and major or local urban plans.

To achieve this purpose, two methods of service planning have been used. One of them is based on functionally physical divisions of these areas and finally calculating the required infrastructure activities. And the other is based on utilizing common procedures of urbanism in Iran, the estimation of the fluid population in these areas and their corresponding needs and finally the calculation of their requirements based on per square meter.

 Using of each method has some requirements stated after knowing each confine and determination of management needs. And each one of them has its own features and limitations addressed upon.