Introduction 
Informal businesses in the urban fabric of Iranian cities, such as street vending and widespread peddling, have undeniably caused detrimental effects on the urban landscape of these cities. Disorder, lack of coordination, and physical and visual disturbances significantly impact these issues. Consequently, organizing informal businesses at the city level has become a significant concern for urban officials and managers. Iran is no exception to this rule. Economic recession, oil-based and single-product economy, inflation, an ailing banking system, and many other factors have increased this phenomenon in different cities of Iran. Street vending in urban areas is a complex and multidimensional issue that demands the collective expertise of various fields, including urban management and planning, sociology, and psychology. However, a significant aspect of this issue, particularly its impact on the urban landscape, falls within the purview of architecture and urban planning. This underscores the need for interdisciplinary collaboration in addressing this complex urban issue. Based on this assumption, it can be said that due to the lack of economic and spatial planning regarding informal jobs in the urban fabric, the urban landscape (especially in metropolises) in the country has been damaged in such a way that one of the concerns of today’s urban management in Iranian cities is the establishment of urban street vendors in the urban space and its impact on the culture of the urban landscape. Today, more than ever, the onslaught of disorder in various aspects of the city’s image is observed in cities, especially metropolises. Now, the urban image has less order, and the apparent difference in forms, consumable materials, roughness and softness, protruding and receding, height of buildings, as well as the chaos resulting from the overlap of functions due to the existence of street vending, especially in the central and traditional spaces of cities, form an unharmonious and unbalanced appearance and image. Street vending is a phenomenon that has created the conditions for an increase in informal employment in the central city area. This is due to the offer of goods at relatively low prices, which has been met with public enthusiasm for purchasing inexpensive goods. In addressing this urban-social problem, there are four general approaches in chronological order: the anti-vending approach, the permissive approach, the vending-compatible approach, and the inclusive approach. Regarding the relationship between streetscape and street vending, it can be stated that street selling has a long history in the history of countries and major cities around the world; in many countries (such as China, Egypt, and Arab countries) in the past, vendors added a remarkable liveliness and vibrancy to the streetscape and shaped economic-service activities within it. However, today, with the definition of the structure of urban public spaces, the illegality of street vendors on streets and sidewalks due to the excessive use of urban public spaces has become tangible. In some cities, vendors establish large stalls in public gatherings within the urban fabric. Passersby are disturbed on the sidewalks and passages due to the crowding of street vendors, and the passage of people through the narrow corridors created by the vendors’ stalls becomes hard. The intensity of the crowding and human traffic on the sidewalks causes people distress, which is considered a dangerous action. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to get acquainted with a variety of approaches for organizing hawkers in the field of urban landscape in different countries such as Turkey, India, Bangladesh, Thailand, and Malaysia and to benefit from their experiences and solutions adopted in dealing with this issue.
Materials and Methods
The research method in this study combines descriptive and interpretive methods, aiming to examine various experiences, compare perspectives, and explore the approaches to the issue of street vending and peddling within the urban landscape. The data was collected through library research, with the tools for gathering data related to practical experiences, existing documents, and records. Eleven case studies of street vendor management experiences in different countries were examined.
Findings
Street vending is essential to reducing poverty and the financial burden of costly implementation policies related to relocating and organizing street vendors in urban spaces. This contributes significantly to achieving inclusive urban governance. Structural changes in national economies, the rise of temporary employment, and unemployment have led to an increase in the street vendor population. This necessitates a shift in urban studies towards government and city policies regarding street vending. The need to consider various solutions such as formalizing street vendors and their workspaces is crucial due to criticism of the detrimental impacts of current policies. Examining recent policies reveals an analytical framework for the formalization of street vending. By studying 11 international examples, a broader perspective on this phenomenon can be gained. Among the successful countries in street vendor organization are Turkey, India, and Singapore. The analysis of successful cases underscores that the participation and support of the street vendors themselves is not just a key factor, but an empowering force. The relocation of street vendors, through the collaboration and participation of vendors and authorities, has resulted in building trust between the parties and granting social recognition to the vendors. Some of the positive points are granting concessions such as issuing business licenses, granting loans and training programs to peddlers, determining a suitable location for the bazaar, marking them in the city, and advertising the bazaar on social media. However, harassment of vendors, confiscation of their goods, bribery, corruption in municipal management, and lack of continuity in implementing such schemes have been weaknesses in organized vending programs.
Conclusion
Street vending negatively and positively impacts the urban system across different economic, social, cultural, and political domains. Examples of these opportunities are creating temporary employment for unemployed members of society and reducing social deviations. However, the most critical issue that many cities face in this regard is the problem of the presence of street vendors on the sidewalks of city centers, which functionally leads to the formation of small-scale distribution activities, the creation of a diversity of items and their attractiveness to people, etc. Physically, it causes pedestrian and vehicular traffic, the destruction of landmark architecture, and the degradation of the urban fabric. Semantically, it results in the loss of sensory experience in rich spaces due to the fading of various activities replaced by false occupations. Regarding street vending, the approaches can be conciliatory or coercive. The points that street vending has created in the urban landscape and the typical examples studied can be discussed in three categories: functional, physical, and semantic. The stagnation of the formal sectors despite the desirable spatial quality due to inflation and financial crisis provides the opportunity to create diverse activities for different population groups and new uses to sustain street vending. This diversity is critical to the functional dimension, including transporting goods by cart within the city, changes in spatial-mobility relationships, and reduced effective road widths and population density. In the physical dimension, it leads to the loss of sensory experience in rich spaces due to the fading of various activities replaced by false occupations, strengthening and increasing social interactions, and threatening the authenticity of the historical urban fabric. The semantic dimension leads to the loss of sensory experience in rich spaces due to the fading of various activities replaced by false occupations.
Regarding the solutions in functional components, one can refer to items such as universal functional design, providing access for different groups, attention to providing the necessary facilities, attention to the scale and size of activities, and so on. In the area of physical components, solutions can include sequencing of sidewalks and pedestrian areas to allow the simultaneous presence of street vendors, vehicles, and pedestrians, creating temporary zones for street vending, inclusive spatial design, aligning the type of fabric with the level of street vendor supply, preparing an urban trade map, attention to the scale and size of sales spaces, and so on. Solutions in semantic components can include understanding the linkages (logistics, customers, role in the urban retail hierarchy).