Solution spaces for decision-making-a sustainability assessment tool for city-regions

Journal Article · Mon Aug 15 04:00:00 EDT 2005 · Environmental Impact Assessment Review

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eiar.2004.09.009· OSTI ID:20713487

Wiek, Arnim ^[1]; Binder, Claudia ^[1]

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1. Institute for Human-Environment Systems, Department of Environmental Sciences, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, ETH Zentrum HAD, 8092 Zurich (Switzerland)

The sound development of city-regions presents a major planning challenge, as these regions are and will be the living spaces for the majority of the population. Therefore, a key question is how city-regions can be managed so that they develop in a sustainable way. Although Environmental Impact Assessment, Integrated Assessment, and other currently used approaches provide significant inputs for managing transition-processes towards sustainability, they must be extended to respond to three major deficiencies, which are (i) using lists of isolated indicators (ii) not performing a consistency analysis of the targets to be achieved, and (iii) not utilizing the potential of transdisciplinary approaches. The authors present an approach to constructing Sustainability Solution Spaces for Decision-Making (SSP). This approach fulfils the systemic, normative, and procedural requirements of an appropriate sustainability assessment as elaborated in the technical literature. It provides a consistent set of targets considering the systemic relations among the indicators representing the city-region. This gives the decision-makers a concise guideline for sustainable decisions and makes them aware of the synergistic and contradictory effects of their decisions. The modular tool is first depicted as a general procedure and later differentiated into two transdisciplinary approaches, a participatory and an expert approach.

• OSTI ID: 20713487
• Journal Information: Environmental Impact Assessment Review, Journal Name: Environmental Impact Assessment Review Journal Issue: 6 Vol. 25; ISSN 0195-9255; ISSN EIARDK
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
DECISION MAKING
ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
MATHEMATICAL SOLUTIONS
PLANNING
POLLUTION CONTROL
SOUND WAVES
URBAN AREAS