Amenity - can we move beyond the concept diagram? - Part 2 principles to get us going

In part 1 of the series on Amenity - can we move beyond the concept diagram we established the value proposition for attempting to quantify and spatially represent amenity. If you accept the proposition put forward...I hope you do... then what we need to get going is to frame our "issue" by a set of principles...establish a framework if you like.

So lets start with some definitions, assumptions and core concepts.

As a reminder of what we are about here is a short definition of amenity

Ok...no great surprises there so what might be a working set of assumptions that will contain the scope of what could be a nebulous concept.

1. Amenity has a location - it is a place-based Value of a location. This is probably self evident however it's worth reminding ourselves it's about location.
2. Amenity is a people-centric concept - Value is defined by people.
3. Proximity matters – some amenity Values extend beyond a Value’s specific location. It's not just where your are it's also where you're near.
4. A locations amenity is the sum of Values we consider add to liveability – amenity is a multi-criteria problem. There is usually more than one contributing factor to amenity.
5. Amenity requires a focus - for example in the urban water utility space amenity is focused around waterways/waterbodies/channels and pipes – that is, the premise being that water systems provide or could provide amenity to the community. It's always amenity provided from something to something - a bit like a transaction. (the 2nd something is us!)
6. To develop a full understanding of amenity all values must be integrated in an accessible way – we need to understand the “where” and “why” of amenity. Where amenity is only gets you so far... two locations may be assessed to have the same amenity value but for different reasons (different contribution factors). It is the combination of factors at a location that help in the decision-making process and define management actions and works design.
7. Amenity values are represented as Amenity Criteria (AC). Factors that contribute to amenity are represented as measurable criteria. Criteria require definition, representation and metrics.
8. Amenity Criteria should try to cover social, environmental, economic value categories (the Triple Bottom Line – TBL). Place-making principles demand we consider amenity from a holistic viewpoint.

Ok...so eight working principles will do for now (feel free to post any that I missed that you feel are important). These principles help to frame the problem and lead us to a set of working concepts for our framework. I came up with six core concepts, including:

Concept 1: Amenity Envelope – the area being assessed for amenity is the Amenity Envelope. Keep in mind your study area may not be as big as you think. If you can validly exclude areas from your assessment do so up front.

Concept 2: Amenity Mesh – to deliver integrated information that defines a location’s accumulative amenity one requires a geography (spatial unit) that enables all criteria to be aggregated (the concept of the integrated evidence base) – this geography is termed the Amenity Mesh. The Mesh plays the role as integrator and also defines the resolution that we can say something valid about amenity for a particular study.

Concept 3: Amenity Value – conceptualising amenity for a location involves defining a set of “Values” that contribute to amenity. This is never easy. Values are people-centric. We decide what matters. This will always require a participatory approach (that is, a co-design paradigm of some kind) to be effective.

Concept 4: Amenity Criteria – a key requirement is to define the spatial representation of each Amenity Value that will be used in the assessment. Amenity Criteria will be based on Triple Bottom Line and Place-making principles and derived from available spatial information (it's rare you get to start from scratch!). Getting the representation right is critical. It is important to consider that Values can operate at different spatial scales and not all Values work at all scales. Additionally, It is rare that we will have direct measures of all Values. Surrogate measures often play a key role in amenity assessments.

Concept 5: Amenity Criteria Classification – to assist in describing the amenity story it is beneficial to have a classification of criteria. Effectively this is means different ways to group criteria when assigning values to the Amenity Mesh. Additional criteria must have metrics (ratings) to enable evaluation and combination. How we group criteria can have a effect on the relative importance (weight) placed on any one criterion's contribution to amenity. One advantage of the Mesh is that we need not worry about groupings up front - get your criteria into the Mesh, explore a bit THEN see if you need a classification framework.

Concept 6: Amenity Location Typology - for large geographic spaces that contain a diversity of land uses that operate as distinct clustered (for example, urban vs rural land uses) it may be of value to regionalise you amenity study - that is define a typology of landscapes where different criteria (factors) may apply or contribute to amenity. Splitting your study area is valid but it has consequences.

The diagram below is a representation of the concepts from a workflow perspective.

Well that's probably a lot to absorb... in the next post in this series I'll walk through a demo to see how this might all work in practice.