Visual quality evaluation of the landscape along the Soekarno-Hatta road green corridor in Palembang using the scenic beauty estimation and semantic differential methods

Green belts on medians and traffic islands play a crucial role in shaping the visual quality of urban road corridors. This study aims to evaluate the visual quality of road green spaces along Soekarno-Hatta Street in Palembang based on respondents’ preferences and perceptions, and to formulate improvement recommendations. The study employed a quantitative descriptive method through field observations, photographic documentation, and questionnaires distributed to 50 respondents. Visual assessments were conducted on 40 landscape photographs taken from 10 vantage points, with four viewing directions at each point. Data were analyzed using the Scenic Beauty Estimation (SBE) method to measure visual beauty preferences and the Semantic Differential (SD) method to assess landscape visual characters based on 14 pairs of bipolar adjectives. The results showed that based on the SBE method, 13 landscapes were categorized as high, 21 as moderate, and 6 as low, with the highest score in L1 (138.70) and the lowest in L37 (−152.16). Meanwhile, the SD method classified 13 landscapes as high, 13 as medium, and 14 as low, with the highest mean values in L15 and L40 (4.58) and the lowest in L37 (2.55). In conclusion, the visual quality of green belts is heavily influenced by vegetation arrangement regularity, maintenance neatness, plant composition, and surrounding visual elements. Formulated recommendations include implementing routine vegetation maintenance, arranging more orderly planting patterns, adding and replacing plants, and controlling disturbing visual elements to enhance the aesthetic value of the road corridor.