METHODOLOGY: We will then be able to establish the type of correlation between the height and the distance from the CBD using Spearman’s Rank correlation coefficient (R) calculation. Using Spearman’s rank is appropriate because it allows us to get a wide range of data ( see data table in appendix B) and to establish accurate correlations.
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The further we walk from the CBD, the more the environmental quality will decrease.
The CBD is supposed to be an attractive place for the citizens . The environmental quality (air, pollution, vegetation) should therefore be high so that people are attracted to this place and spend their money. It decreases as we walk further away, in the transition zone for example, because the city invests less in cleaning and keeping the city in good shape. It was however difficult for us to say whether we really entered the transition zone of Hannover or not because some areas such as the Zoo and the Machsee ( see figure 6) areas are quite far from the city center but still display a very high environmental quality.
SAMPLING TECHNIQUE: In order to be able to evaluate this statement, an environmental survey was conducted at five different locations along different routes. The group members will have to evaluate the cleanliness of the streets, the noise, and the street furniture, the quality of the buildings and the general environmental quality. The values will then be mapped and processed using isoline maps. The values will go from -3 being the worse, to +3 being the best. This evaluation is however very subjective and the results might therefore not be very significant. All these hypothesis were made according to the model of the CBD above. If the results are contradictory, a new CBD model for Hannover will be proposed. Again, we used a very systematic method where we divided the city in transects in order to be able to cover as much area as we could and to give general impression of the city. It was also easier for everyone to follow one route rather than having to cover a specific area.
METHODOLOGY: The environmental quality of Hannover will be represented on maps with isolines in order to identify the trends of increasing or decreasing environmental quality.
See environmental survey in Appendix A
ASSUMPTIONS
Buildings height: The height of the buildings is going to decrease in some areas but it might as well increase or stay the same in some other areas. Some people are going to walk towards some more residential areas where the height of buildings will decrease but some people walking toward Steintor for example might find higher buildings since there are still shops and public buildings.
Some areas with high buildings would be Aegidientorplatz which has the Nord LB building ( bank) which is one of the highest one in Hannover. Some areas with lower buildings would be the Karmachstrasse due to its closeness to the old city and the height regulation have to be respected there.
Environmental quality: The environmental quality is generally going to increase as we get away from the CBD of Hannover. It is a contradiction to the models since they state that the environmental quality is at the highest in the CBD to attract people. It is however not the case for Hannover which being totally renovated. For example, the area around the Machsee is a very clean and pleasant area and it is quite far from the CBD while and area like Steintor which is very close from the city center, doesn’t have such a great environmental quality.
DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS
Hypothesis I – The height of buildings
Hypothesis II – The environmental quality
DESIGN OF A MODEL FOR HANNOVER
After investigating two hypotheses and stating that one of them was not valid, it seams relevant to design a model of the CBD of Hannover since it does not correspond to the core frame model.
Inner core
Outer core
Residential area
Frame
CONCLUSION AND EVALUATION
In order to investigate the CBD of Hannover, two hypotheses were proposed to evaluate the extent to which Hannover conforms to a typical CBD.
Firstly, we suggested that the height of buildings would decrease as we walked away from the center of the CBD. To test this hypothesis, we counted the numbers of floors on every tenth building and used the Spearman Rank Correlation to identify a correlation.
The sampling method was not accurate and it might have been more effective to investigate the real heights of the buildings for more precise results. The Spearman’s Rank correlation is however a very effective and accurate way to identify correlations and their accuracy as we were able to identify a strong negative correlation between the height and the distance, which was shown to be very significant.
Regarding the hypothesis concerning the environmental quality of Hannover, the sampling technique was not accurate since it was a very subjective evaluation. It might have been more accurate to survey a wide range of people and calculate averages. The use of isolines as a way to find patterns is however relevant because it allows to detect anomalies easily.
Because only one of the hypotheses was confirmed, a new model for the CBD of Hannover was proposed. The hypothesis concerning the environmental quality can however not be confirmed because the results of the survey were disturbed by the fact that the city was in complete renovation and therefore the values for the cleanliness and the noise were altered.
The new model proposed is quite different from the generally accepted “core-frame model” as it does not for example have a proper frame area. A limitation of this proposed model is that we only investigated the area that we believed was the CBD of Hannover. It might have been valuable to our investigation to walk a bit further and see if we could find a proper frame area or maybe have more routes in order to get a greater variety of results.
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APPENDICES
Appendix A
Appendix B
Appendix C
Spearman’s Rank coefficient:
R =( 1 - 6Σd 2) / (n3 – n)
Where d is the difference between the ranks and n is the number of pairs
R = -0.531
Figure 10 : The likehood of the correlation occurring by chance/ Significance table
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The core frame model :
Marked in yellow on master map
Marked in yellow on master map
