Abstract: Rural human settlement is a significant sign of living standard of peasants, and its improvement can contribute to promoting the positive interaction between inhabited environment and social, economic and resource environment in the countryside. According to the field investigation in the first batch of pilot villages of new countryside planning and construction in Beijing, this paper attempts to discuss the elemental characteristics, influential factors and development levels of human settlement quality since new countryside construction being carried out in Beijing, and to seek for an optimization route to inprove human settlement quality based on urban-rural integrated development. In our study, the evaluation index system of human settlement quality is divided into 5 dimensions by using satisfaction evaluation method, which contains the levels of economic development, infrastructure facilities, public service facilities, ecological supports and social coordination, accordingly, the secondary indexes total up to 25. The results indicated that, firstly, with the construction of new countryside, great changes have taken place in the human settlements of suburban countryside in the aspects such as infrastructure, public services and natural environment. Secondly, the regional characteristics of human settlement quality are very remarkable in Beijing suburban new countryside, in which near-suburban area is better than other regional types. Thirdly, matching infrastructure and social environment play the most important role for the residents to form their overall impression of human settlement, while those factors such as income, road condition of villages, waste treatment facility, village clinics notably impact the satisfaction of human settlement. Finally, there are some key links to optimize the quality of human settlement, which include increasing peasant's income, enhancing investment and construction in rural public goods, and establishing a long-term management and protection mechanism to these public goods.

Key words: Beijing suburb, human settlement quality, new countryside, satisfaction evaluation