Abstract
This study presents a comprehensive methodological framework for assessing the economic-socio-cultural (ESC) sustainability of neighborhood-level urban communities (NLUCs) in Kolkata, India. The present study aims to propose a set of indicators through a top-down approach that meets certain criteria for assessing ESC sustainability in specific contexts. In the initial phase, the framework has used a set of existing indicators and tools to measure sustainability. Subsequently, the study has categorized the indicators to measure ESC sustainability based on the assessment of an expert opinion for which the Delphi technique has been employed. Grey relational analysis and RIDIT test have been instigated to validate the importance of the selected sustainability indicators and determine the relationships among the indicators. At the decisive stage, the VIF test is conducted followed by employing Random Forest Classifier, a supervised machine-learning algorithm to identify the redundant indicators. The variables that will be contributing positively towards the prediction performance of the model were included in the final list of indicators. This study prepared the base for designing a model for assessing the ESC sustainability of both planned and unplanned NLUCs.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
Tables showing list of NSA tools and their comparative analysis.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fZGux-VvxzsLJWw_S4CMNt3mV0PD-5Z5/view?usp=sharing
References
Agyeman, J., & Evans, T. (2003). Toward just sustainability in urban communities: building equity rights with sustainable solutions. Ann Am Acad Political SocSci, 590(1), 35–53.
Ali, S., Haiyan, Xu., Ahmed, W., Ahmad, N., & Ahmed, Y. (2019). Metro design and heritage sustainability: conflict analysis using attitude based on options in the graph model. Environment, Development and Sustainability. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-019-00365-w.
Alsaati, T., El-nakla, S., & El-nakla, D. (2020). Level of sustainability awareness among university students in the eastern province of Saudi Arabia. Sustainability, 12(8), 1–15.
Bahadure, S., & Kotharkar, R. (2018). Framework for measuring sustainability of neighbourhoods in Nagpur, India. Building and Environment, 127, 86–97.
Bai, X., Wieczorek, A. J., Kaneko, S., Lisson, S., & Contreras, A. (2009). technological forecasting and social change enabling sustainability transitions in Asia: the importance of vertical and horizontal linkages. Technol Forecast Soc Change, 76(2), 255–266.
Bardhan, R., Kurisu, K., & Hanaki, K. (2015). Does compact urban forms relate to good quality of life in high density cities of India? case of Kolkata. Cities, 48, 55–65.
Baynes, T. M., & Wiedmann, T. (2012). General approaches for assessing urban environmental sustainability. CurrOpin Environ Sustain, 4(4), 458–464.
Berardi, U. (2013). Sustainability assessment of urban communities through rating systems. Environment, Development and Sustainability, 15(6), 1573–1591.
Bhatt, R., Macwan, J. E. M., & Bhatt, D. (2013). Sustainable building assessment tool: Indian leading architects’ perceptions and preferences. J Inst Eng (India), 93(4), 259–270.
Bijoux, D., & Pathway, B. (2012). A neighbourhood sustainability framework for New Zealand: Beacon’s research and tools.
Biswas-Diener, R., & Diener, Ed. (2006). The subjective well being of the homeless and lessons for happiness. Social Indicators Research, 76(2), 185–205.
Blum, A. (2007). HQE2R—research and demonstration for assessing sustainable neighborhood development. Sustain Urban Dev, 2, 412–428.
Bond, A., Morrison-Saunders, A., & Pope, J. (2012). Sustainability assessment: the state of the art. Impact Assess ProjApprais, 30(1), 53–62.
Bose, N. K. (1965). A premature metropolis. Calcutta: Scientific American.
Bose, S. (2016). State and management of architectural heritage in Kolkata. J Archit Conserv, 21, 178–194.
Braulio-Gonzalo, M., Bovea, M. D., & Ruá, M. J. (2015). Sustainability on the urban scale: proposal of a structure of indicators for the Spanish context. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 53, 16–30.
Breiman, L. (2001). Random forests. Mach Learn, 45(1), 5–32.
Brundtland, G. H. (1987). World commission on environment and development our common future. New York: Oxford University Press.
Burgess, R., & Mike, J. (2002). Compact cities: sustainable urban forms for developing countries. Routledge: Taylor and Francis Group.
Census. (2011). Kolkata District Population Census 2011–2019, West Bengal literacy sex ratio and density. Retrieved from https://www.census2011.co.in/census/state/west+bengal.html.
Chakraborty, S. (1990). The growth of Calcutta in the twentieth century. Calcutta: Oxford University Press.
Chudgar, A. (2014). International journal of educational development the promise and challenges of using mobile phones for adult literacy training: data from one Indian state. Int J Educ Dev, 34, 20–29.
Conroy, K. M., Elliott, D., & Burrell, A. R. (2013). Developing content for a process-of-care checklist for use in intensive care units: a dual-method approach to establishing construct validity. BMC Health Serv Res, 13(1), 380.
Dalkey, N., & Helmer, O. (1963). An experimental application of the delphi method to the use of experts. ManagSci, 9(3), 458–467.
Elkington, J., & Rowlands, I. H. (1999). Cannibals with forks: The triple bottom line of 21st century business. Alternatives Journal, 25(4), 42.
Fu, Y., & Zhang, X. (2017). Trajectory of urban sustainability concepts: a 35-Year bibliometric analysis. Cities, 60, 113–123.
Guha, D., & Ferreira, J. (2009). Old new city: A study of spatial interactions in traditional neighborhoods of Kolkata to identify a new paradigm for urban design. Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Haapio, A. (2012). Towards sustainable urban communities. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 32(1), 165–169.
Hair, J. F., Black, W. C., Babin, B. J., & Anderson, R. E. (2009). Multivariate data analysis, Upper Saddle River, NJ [Etc.]. New York: Pearson Prentice Hall.
Hassan, A. M., & Lee, H. (2015). The paradox of the sustainable city: definitions and examples. Environment, Development and Sustainability, 17(6), 1267–1285.
Hasselager, A. B., Lauritsen, T., Kristensen, T., Bohnstedt, C., Sønderskov, C., Østergaard, D., et al. (2018). What should be included in the assessment of laypersons’ paediatric basic life support skills? Results from a Delphi consensus study. Scandinavian Journal of Trauma, Resuscitation and Emergency Medicine, 26(1), 9.
Heiko, A. (2012). Consensus measurement in delphi studies: review and implications for future quality assurance. Technol Forecast Soc Change, 79(8), 1525–1536.
Hopwood, B., Mellor, M., & O’Brien, G. (2005). Sustainable development: mapping different approaches. Sustain Dev, 13(1), 38–52.
Huang, Lu., Jianguo, Wu., & Yan, L. (2015). Defining and measuring urban sustainability: a review of indicators. LandscEcol, 30(7), 1175–1193.
Jozsa, Alex and David Brown (2005) “Neighborhood Sustainability Indicators Report on a Best Practice Workshop.” School of Urban Planning, McGill University and the Urban Ecology Centre 1–20
Kaur, H., & Garg, P. (2019). Urban sustainability assessment tools: a review. J Clean Prod, 210, 146–158.
King, L. O. (2016). Functional sustainability indicators. Ecol Indic, 66, 121–131.
Kline, R. B. (2015). Principles and practice of structural equation modeling. New York: Guilford publications.
Kock, N., & Lynn, G. S. (2012). Journal of the association for information lateral collinearity and misleading results in variance-based SEM: an illustration and recommendations lateral collinearity and misleading results in variance. J AssocInfSyst, 13(7), 546–580.
Komeily, A., & Srinivasan, R. S. (2015). A need for balanced approach to neighborhood sustainability assessments: a critical review and analysis. Sustain Cities Soc, 18, 32–43.
Komeily, A., & Srinivasan, R. S. (2016). What is neighborhood context and why does it matter in sustainability assessment? ProcediaEng, 145, 876–883.
Krueger, R., & David, G. (2007). The sustainable development paradox: urban political economy in the United States and Europe. New York: Guilford Press.
Kumar, N. (2016). Crisis of trust: Why Indians evade taxes. Scroll.In, 1–10. Retrieved from https://scroll.in/article/820397/why-people-evade-taxes.
Kumar, Sudeshna and Haimanti Banerji (2018) Analysis of transformation of urban planning practice by mapping changes in economic, social , cultural and built environment of the neighborhood level urban communities (NLUC): case study of. Pp. 1553–64. In 54th International Society of City and Regional Planners (ISOCARP) Congress 2018, edited by D. Bogunovich. Bodø, Norway: ISOCARP
Kumar, S., Santara, A., & Banerji, H. (2020). Pentagram sustainability model. International Review for Spatial Planning and Sustainable Development, 8(2), 100–117.
Kyvelou, S., Baer, I., Sinou, M., & Papadopoulos, T. (2012). Developing a South-European eco-quarter design and assessment tool based on the concept of territorial capital. London: INTECH Open Access Publisher.
La, D., Spyra, M., & Inostroza, L. (2016). Indicators of cultural ecosystem services for urban planning: a review. Ecological Indicators, 61, 74–89.
Lawrence, D. P. (1997). The need for EIA theory-building. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 17(2), 79–107.
Long, J. (2016). Constructing the narrative of the sustainability fix: sustainability, social justice and representation in Austin, TX. Urban Stud, 53(1), 149–172.
Lopes Gil, J. A., & Pinto Duarte, J. (2013). Tools for evaluating the sustainability of urban design: a review. Proc ICE-Urban Des Plan, 166(6), 2013.
Lorr, M. J. (2012). Defining urban sustainability in the context of north American cities. Nat Cult, 7(1), 16–30.
Louppe, G., Wehenkel, L., Sutera, A., & Geurts, P. (2007). Understanding variable importances in forests of randomized trees. 1–9.
Louppe, G., Wehenkel, L., Sutera, A., & Geurts, P. (2013). Understanding variable importances in forests of randomized trees. In Advances in neural information processing systems (pp. 431–439).
Lützkendorf, T., & Balouktsi, M. (2017). Assessing a sustainable urban development: typology of indicators and sources of information. Procedia Environ Sci, 38, 546–553.
Marshall, J. D., & Toffel, M. W. (2005). Framing the elusive concept of sustainability: a sustainability hierarchy. Environmental Science and Technology, 39(3), 673–682.
Meshkat, B., Cowman, S., Gethin, G., Ryan, K., Wiley, M., Brick, A., et al. (2014). Using an E-Delphi technique in achieving consensus across disciplines for developing best practice in day surgery in Ireland.
Mitra, T (2013) Delineation, Transformation Assessment and Intervention Initiatives for ‘Grey Zones’ of Kolkata, India. 1–13
Msengi, I., Doe, R., Wilson, T., Fowler, D., Wigginton, C., Olorunyomi, S., et al. (2019). Assessment of knowledge and awareness of ‘sustainability’ initiatives among college students. Renew Energy Environ Sustain, 4, 6.
Pope, J., Annandale, D., & Morrison-Saunders, A. (2004). Conceptualising sustainability assessment. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 24(6), 595–616.
Pupphachai, U., & Zuidema, C. (2017). Sustainability indicators: a tool to generate learning and adaptation in sustainable urban development. Ecol Indic, 72, 784–793.
Rachel Lombardi, D., Porter, L., Barber, A., & Rogers, C. D. F. (2011). Conceptualising sustainability in UK urban regeneration: a discursive formation. Urban Stud, 48(2), 273–296.
Raskin, M. S. (1994). Thedelphi study in field instruction revisited: expert consensus on issues and research priorities. J Soc Work Edu, 30(1), 75–89.
Rayens, M. K., & Hahn, E. J. (2000). Building consensus using the policy delphi method. Policy PolitNursPrac, 1(4), 308–315.
Sawyer, Lindsay and Christian Schmid (2015) Bypass Urbanism. Pp. 213–15. In Jahrbuch Yearbook, ETH Zurich
Searfoss, L (2011) Local Perspectives on HUD’s Neighborhood Stabilization Program. MUP Capstone
Sengupta, U. (2010). The hindered self-help: housing policies, politics and poverty in Kolkata, India. Habitat Int, 34(3), 323–331.
Sharifi, A., & Murayama, A. (2013). A critical review of seven selected neighborhood sustainability assessment tools. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 38, 73–87.
Sharifi, A., & Murayama, A. (2014). Neighborhood sustainability assessment in action: cross-evaluation of three assessment systems and their cases from the US, the UK, and Japan. Building and Environment, 72, 243–258.
Sharifi, A., & Murayama, A. (2015). Viability of using global standards for neighbourhood sustainability assessment: insights from a comparative case study. J Environ Plan Manag, 58(1), 1–23.
Tanguay, G. A., Rajaonson, J., Lefebvre, J.-F., & Lanoie, P. (2010). Measuring the sustainability of cities: an analysis of the use of local indicators. Ecol Indic, 10(2), 407–418.
Tao, Yu., Li, F., Crittenden, J., Zhongming, Lu., Weixin, Ou., & Song, Y. (2019). Measuring urban environmental sustainability performance in china: a multi-scale comparison among different cities, urban clusters, and geographic regions. Cities, 94(June), 200–210.
Tran, L. (2016). An interactive method to select a set of sustainable urban development indicators. Ecol Indic, 61, 418–427.
Tripathy, Biplab and Subhechya Raha (2019) Role of Government on Women Empowerment in India Role of Government on Women Empowerment in India. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science Research (November)
UNDP. 2015. Goal 11_ Sustainable Cities and Communities _ UNDP
United Nations (1992) United Nations Conference on Environment and Development Rio de Janerio, Brazil, 3–14
Valentin, A., & Spangenberg, J. H. (2000). A Guide to community sustainability indicators. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 20(3), 381–392.
Verhagen, A. P., de Vet, H. C. W., de Bie, R. A., Kessels, A. G. H., Boers, M., Bouter, L. M., & Knipschild, P. G. (1998). The delphi list: a criteria list for quality assessment of randomized clinical trials for conducting systematic reviews developed by delphi consensus. Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, 51(12), 1235–1241.
Vet, De., Emely, J. B., De Nooijer, J., Dijkstra, A., & De Vries, N. K. (2004). Determinants of forward stage transitions: a delphi study. Health Edu Res, 20(2), 195–205.
Watson, Crystal R., Matthew C. Watson, Gary Ackerman, and Gigi Kwik Gronvall (2017) Expert views on biological threat characterization for the U.S. government : a delphi study. Risk Analysis 37 (12): 2389–2404
Weingaertner, C., & Barber, A. R. G. (2010). Urban regeneration and socio-economic sustainability: a role for established small food outlets. Eur Plan Stud, 18(10), 1653–1674.
Wu, C.-h. (2007). On the application of grey relational analysis and ridit analysis to likert scale surveys. Int Math Forum, 14, 675–687.
Yang, B., Tong, Xu., & Shi, L. (2017). Analysis on sustainable urban development levels and trends in China’s cities. J Clean Prod, 141, 868–880.
Van Rozema-Zeijl, A., & Martens, P. (2010). An adaptive indicator framework for monitoring regional sustainable development: a case study of the INSURE project in Limburg, The Netherlands. Sustain Sci Pract Policy, 6(1), 6–17.
Zheng, H. W., Shen, G. Q., & Wang, H. (2014). A review of recent studies on sustainable urban renewal. Habitat Int, 41, 272–279.
Acknowledgements
We acknowledge Srikanta Sannigrahi and Shahid Rahmat for providing valuable inputs to this study. This study is part of an ongoing Ph.D. research conducted at the Department of Architecture and Regional Planning, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur and is funded by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), Government of India.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
Additional information
Publisher's Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Kumar, S., Bhaumik, S. & Banerji, H. Methodology for Framing Indicators for Assessing Economic-Socio-Cultural Sustainability of the Neighbourhood Level Urban Communities in Indian Megacities: Evidence from Kolkata. Soc Indic Res 154, 511–544 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-020-02559-6
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-020-02559-6