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There is currently great interest in the creation of sustainable and liveable cities, both in the UK and globally. While it can be argued that good progress is being made in thinking about the needs of future cities, meeting these needs and aspirations in practice poses major challenges of understanding and measurement (what is meant by these terms and how can progress towards their achievement be measured?), complexity (cities are complex systems of systems with many interacting parts) and resilience (will interventions made today be relevant and effective in the future?). The Liveable Cities research programme created a systematic decision-making method for improving urban sustainability and liveability: the Liveable Cities Method (LCM). The LCM prioritises four criteria – individual and societal well-being, resource security, resource efficiency and carbon dioxide emissions as a proxy for environmental harm – in an interconnected framework and assesses the need for, and the resilience of, interventions designed to move cities towards improved sustainability and liveability. This paper illustrates the LCM through an example intervention made to the city of Birmingham, UK, and highlights how addressing sustainability and liveability in this way offers unique opportunities for the UK civil engineering profession to lead thinking among urban professionals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introducing the SUE-MoT (metrics, models and toolkits for whole-life sustainable urban development) series, this paper highlights some of the barriers that need to be addressed if the vision for holistic assessment is to be realised. The complexities of sustainability assessment raised in this paper will be further discussed in detail in the SUE-MoT series of papers that will be published in forthcoming issues of this journal. This paper highlights the priorities to address when assessment tools are presented to decision makers of urban development projects. This discussion is limited to the issues, values and solutions in the UK context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years the social dimension (or 'social sustainability') has gained increased recognition as a fundamental component of sustainable development. This paper explores the notion of social sustainability and its main assessment methods, together with the pioneering social sustainability framework devised by the City of Vancouver, Canada. The paper illustrates how there is no consensus on the definition of social sustainability because this concept is currently being approached from diverging study perspectives and discipline-specific criteria, making a generalised definition difficult to achieve. In addition, traditional 'hard' social sustainability themes such as employment and poverty alleviation are increasingly being complemented or replaced by emerging 'soft' and less measurable concepts such as happiness, social mixing and sense of place. Within this context, the paper looks at how Vancouver's local authorities have approached urban social sustainability and discusses the importance of the selection of sustainability principles, objectives, themes, assessment techniques and indicators from a social perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainability checklists are designed to provide practical tools (including indicators) that help with planning and measuring sustainability within new developments and redevelopment schemes. Unfortunately, a checklist - due to its very nature - tends to consider elements of sustainability in isolation, narrowing it to a set of individual tick boxes. Successful planning strategies for sustainable utility infrastructure require a more holistic approach that considers elements of water, energy and infrastructure in tandem rather than isolation, therefore suggesting that a checklist approach may not be wholly appropriate. By critically examining the 2007 version of the sustainability checklist for south-east England with respect to 12 questions that relate to sustainable utility infrastructure alone (five for energy, four for water and three for infrastructure provision) this argument is explored further. The thorough examination provided in this paper serves to analyse the framing of the questions used in the checklist and test the validity of the aims and scoring method used (including weightings). This paper also examines whether these questions can jointly form a successful holistic strategy for infrastructure, not least in terms of the ability to ensure that supply meets demand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of an integrated data repository for urban sustainability analysis is presented; it aims to enhance quantitative analysis of urban sustainability on real statistical data with relevant geographic references. The method is complementary to qualitative and quantitative analyses of sample data, which are the main approaches adopted in conventional urban sustainability analysis. The paper highlights the background and importance of using statistical data for urban planning and analysis. Selected statistics sources and various geospatial objects relevant to the geo-references of the statistical data are reviewed. The conceptual model of the integrated data repository is described and the logical integration of statistics from different sources is illustrated. The detailed geospatial conceptual model shows the geospatial classes, main attributes and relationships between these geospatial classes. The paper details the procedure of setting up a server-based database to host both geospatial and non-geospatial data, and uses PostGIS query to interrogate geospatial information in the database, including how to convert the database tables from other formats. A geographic information system (GIS) is introduced as a user-side tool to reveal geospatial and non-geospatial data. Case studies of application of the database for urban sustainability analysis are described. Data maps generated for these case studies can assist planning and design professionals in analysing some urban sustainability issues. Potential applications in various sustainability analyses, barriers and future improvements are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Complex adaptive systems are central to many persistent problems locally and globally. In cases where the effects of a policy play out slowly and propagate through interdependencies with other systems, the broader view and understanding gained from complex adaptive system analyses allow us to recognise the causal relationships involved and solve persistent system-level issues. This is particularly true with the risks due to climate change, economic crises, energy disruptions and food insecurity. Climate change and the challenge of addressing the resulting global risks provides a common set of problems on which to build a global community of practice that utilises earth systems' engineering approaches and sustainability goals to understand and resolve problems in complex adaptive systems of systems. Structural adaptation under environmental stress, simple rules for entity interactions and condition-dependent behaviours are key attributes of complex systems. These attributes provide the means for creating models that behave the way the real system does and for the same reasons, improving understanding and designing effective solutions. This paper presents general concepts for infrastructure adaptation and examples of successful applications of an expanded engineering process for complex systems of systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Making cities more sustainable is a top priority - for national governments, for cities and for the people who live, work and visit urban areas. The past decade has seen a concerted UK effort to develop, apply and assess sustainability solutions for the present and near future; however, little has been done to test urban regeneration solutions beyond that. This paper describes a methodology that has developed future scenarios for the year 2050 against which to test the robustness of current engineering solutions, thereby providing unique insights into the potential impacts of present urban planning and design decisions, and thus financial investments. If a proposed solution delivers a positive legacy, regardless of the future against which it is tested, then it can be adopted with confidence. When there are very different outcomes depending on the future, the solution can either be modified to create an improved outcome regardless of the future or implemented in the knowledge of the likely impacts if the future develops in different ways. The urban futures methodology has been applied to the Lancaster Luneside East regeneration site, for which contextual information is described along with a justification for its use as a case study to trial the methodology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The physical structure of a city frequently defines how people interact with each other and their environment. This paper examines the use of personas as a user-centred design tool for the re-engineering of a city to promote sustainable behaviour and social inclusion of its citizens (the Eight Eyes of Dublin Project). The research was carried out through the adoption of personas and collaboration with design partners to identify barriers to sustainability, and resulted in recommendations for the future development of Dublin city, Ireland. These recommendations are then compared with the draft Dublin development plan 2011-17 to determine the effectiveness of personas as a design tool for identifying key issues for sustainability in the built environment. The results suggest that personas may be an appropriate tool for universal design and may act as a good diagnostic tool in the early stages of the re-engineering of urban areas towards sustainability. It is concluded that personas may work most effectively when used in combination with other user-centred design tools, such as participatory design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multi-criteria analysis is often used in planning for evaluating alternative development options against a set of evaluation criteria. In the context of sustainable development, the definition of these criteria is quite controversial because of the complex and fuzzy nature of this emerging topic. Decision making for sustainable (re)development at urban planning level requires an understanding of the multiple issues implied in the problem. The multi-modal framework can help decision makers handle the multiplicity of issues embodied in the concept of urban sustainability by guiding the selection of appropriate criteria for evaluating alternative solutions. This paper applies this framework to an Italian urban (re)development decision-making process by using the analytic network process, a most advanced network version of the analytic hierarchy process. This is the first mathematical theory that makes it possible systematically to deal with all kinds of dependencies and feedback. It requires a network structure to represent the decision problem, as well as pairwise comparison with established relations within the structure. The multimodal framework is used to structure the case study problem towards a more sustainable solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Traditionally regarded as a technical process to determine the performance of buildings against sustainability criteria, calls are now emerging for sustainability assessment to be better integrated with the subjectively-based decisions taken across a project lifecycle, to support stakeholder engagement and to promote a culture of learning about sustainability in practice. In order for sustainability assessment fully to realise this wider role, it is necessary to recognise the significance played by knowledge and its flow between stakeholders in the promotion of a common understanding of the actions required to deliver a sustainable urban environment. This paper presents the findings of a knowledge mapping exercise focused on understanding the nature of this flow during application of sustainability assessment within a university campus building project. Knowledge exists in a variety of types and forms; the key sources drawn upon by a key decision-maker were identified and classified. The mapping exercise stressed the significance of supporting the flow of not only explicit sources of knowledge, but also implicit sources such as expert and tacit knowledge. Ensuring that pathways are dynamic and facilitated through effective management to deliver continued engagement between key decision-makers, the rest of the team and wider stakeholders was highlighted as essential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban design and sustainability are critical issues in creating better urban environments. The UK government is endorsing sustainability through its sustainable communities agenda and is urging the public, private and third sectors to emphasise high quality design in their urban development projects. However, with little guidance as to how to design sustainable urban development projects, decision-makers may end up wasting time, money and resources in projects that are unsustainable for themselves, the community and beyond. One option for decision-makers is loosely to follow a generic process for urban design that demonstrates, by way of a series of stages and activities, when to make decisions and to consider sustainability, what tools are needed to make decisions and who should be making decisions. To further the understanding of the use of a process in sustainable urban design decision-making, a baseline model was first created that amalgamates stages and activities from relevant processes found in a variety of disciplines and professions. A case study was then conducted, showing the process for the urban design and development of Brewhouse Yard, Clerkenwell, London. Through analysis of interviews, archival material and site analysis, three distinct periods of the process were discerned. These periods are discussed by way of process stages, decisions, tools and sustainability. The paper then compares this process with the baseline process to understand how the former can help improve the latter as a tool for assisting decision-makers in creating more sustainable urban environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article highlights a variety of sustainability indicators applied in decision-making processes for urban regeneration projects in Great Britain. It examines the indicators operating at city level, quarter level and individual development site level. It explores the role of indicators in achieving a more sustainable development and analyses how and when these indicators have formed an integral part of the decision-making process.

Problems on mass housing estates are currently a topic for research on energy and policy interventions in Cyprus. Modernist urban detached/semi-detached and suburban row houses often have insufficient green areas and lack consideration of the climatic features of the building site where the neighbourhoods are designed without concern for urban planning laws and regulations. These purpose-built residential building stock models represent 30% of the existing building stock. This research primarily investigates the potential of particular design interventions in detached two-storey houses in a Mediterranean climate in order to reduce the need for fossil fuel to heat and cool the houses. The aim of this study is to develop and test feasible retrofit strategies aimed at optimising the energy performance of the existing residential buildings. To accomplish this, the study first examines the energy performance of a building before and after the retrofitting phases as base case scenario models. The Autodesk Revit 2017 plug-in Green Building Studio energy performance analysis software was used for simulation of the adapted energy-efficient retrofit measures. This study also outlines the results from the prototype analysis to demonstrate the difference between a retrofitted building and the existing state of a building in their respective energy use impacts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including walkable neighborhood, sustainability, and urban redevelopment.

The article presents a case study which examines the development of an assessment and reporting framework for a particular property developer company (PDC) in Great Britain. It describes the problems and advantages of each framework and the lessons learned in the development of the methodology. It concludes that the assessment control is simple to apply, easy to characterize and relies on the self-assessment of strategic indicators.