The next wave of sustainable planning: green neighbourhood assessment systems

Abstract

Since the 1970s, seeking solutions for global environmental problems have been on the agenda of both national and international debates where quantifying and measuring 'sustainability' have been an emerging foci. Within this perspective, analysis of areas through new methods and measurable parameters is among recent research fields in both academia and practice. To this end, in the literature, studies on 'green building rating and assessment systems' aiming more liveable places through less carbon emissions and more environmentally friendly construction materials gained significant importance. Among such rating systems, leadership in energy and environmental design (LEED) and building research establishment environmental assessment method (BREEAM) are the two well-known 'building' rating systems both in the literature and practice. On the other hand, these parameters based on the 'building' scale are now on the pursuit of 'neighbourhood' or even ` regional' scale applications. The subject of re-questioning these rating systems with the focus of ` neighbourhood' level rather than only 'building' scale is a new research field in the literature with few cases in practice. Having started in the early 1990s, the UK-based BREEAM and US-based LEED systems have responded to these needs by formulating BREEAM-communities and LEED-ND (LEED-neighbourhood design) in 2007. This paper aims to perform a comparative analysis of the parameters covered by assessment systems (LEED-ND and BREEAM-communities) through literature survey and evaluate how they can contribute in urban planning studies with an emphasis on the state of these assessment systems in Turkey.