“Implications of change in Urban Landscape on the Quality of Life in the traditional town Harisiddhi “

Abstract

Urbanization is a global phenomenon evolving problems including urban blight, gentrification, urban poverty, urban sprawl which results into delineation of built environment of its spatial extent, change in function, transformation of a town,which forces prior local residents into poorer and isolated environment with less choices and social networks.The problems emerging reflects in the change in urban landscape of the traditional town.Traditional core settlement of Harisiddhi has gone through massive change in due to Gorkha earthquake 2015.It has affected the life of the local residents residing in the core area of the traditional town Harisiddhi.The research aims to examine how the change in urban landscape has changed and how it has impacted quality of life in the traditional neighborhood of Harisiddhi.After a brief on study area the paper introduces the research approaches and methods with different paradigmatic stances adopted for the research. Perception survey was carried out for the quantitative method whereas for the qualitative method literature, historical photographs and maps were studied to understand the change over time, following pragmatic and interpretivist paradigm alongwith direct observations, questionnaire surveys,key informant interview and focus group discussions.It was measured in terms of physical attributes and environment,level of independence and social aspect based on WHO attributes