The settlement space along China’s Grand Canal is an important part of cultural heritage, boasting high value of conservation and inheritance as a museum of local culture in an active state. The paper is aimed at revealing the current situation and satisfaction with the settlement space environment along China’s Grand Canal Tianjin Section from the perspective of resident perception. We set up a structural equation model to perform an empirical analysis of the inherent relation of the components of the settlement space environment along China’s Grand Canal Tianjin Section and the inherent law influencing its current state. The research results show that the ecological factor of life along China’s Grand Canal exerted a positive influence on the ecological factor of production and the path coefficient was 0.344. The ecological factor of life and the factor of accessibility were in a relation of positive influence and the former had the most prominent influence on the latter, with a path coefficient of 0.534, while the path coefficient of the influence of the latter on the former was 0.131. The factor of social culture exerted a positive influence on the ecological factor of life, with the path coefficient being 0.765. The research conclusion analyzed the realistic difficulties of the settlement space environment along China’s Grand Canal, revealed the inherent law between different surveyed factors and provided basic reference for feature extraction, evaluation and optimized development of the settlement space along China’s Grand Canal.

The settlement space along China’s Grand Canal composes an important part of the Canal heritage, has a close bearing on the production and life of the residents there, nourishes rich culture and wisdom and boasts vital value of conservation and inheritance. Due to China’s rapid urbanization and industrialization, the settlements along the canal have been destroyed to some extent and their in-site characteristics urgently need excavation and conservation. Through field investigation, space syntax and GIS analysis, this paper performs quantitative analysis of the in-site characteristics of 18 typical rural settlements there. The findings show that: (1) The settlement space of industry dominant type for commerce and trade is comparatively dynamic and the capacity of topology and integration and the attractive force of the settlement center are stronger. (2) The dynamic scope of the citizens’ everyday traveling in the settlements has the closest correlation with the data of public-service facilities. (3) The settlements along the canal boast multiple, causal and blended in-site phenotype. The research findings provide new standards to categorize the settlements along China’s Grand Canal, paths and methods to explore the characteristics of the settlements and new cognitive perspectives to conserve and renew the settlements along China’s Grand Canal Tianjin Section.