Spatial-based sustainability assessment of urban neighbourhoods: a case study of Johor Bahru City Council, Malaysia

Abstract

Rapid population growth has caused expansion of many major cities. Cities begin to expand into new areas as the demand for housing increases, thus, contributing to demand for a variety of natural and man-made resources for urban communities. However, it is our responsibility to sustain these resources so that their usage can be prolonged to the next generation. With sustainability as a goal, the use of indicators for urban monitoring and regulation is becoming more in demand. There are many non-spatial indicators in the form of words and statistics developed by local authorities for assessing urban development sustainability. This chapter proposes the use of spatial indicators for the same purpose. The indicators are derived from the Malaysian Urban Indicators Network (MurniNet) and are then developed using Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) comprising spatial elements of points, lines, and polygons. The AHP is used to determine the ranking of sustainability of urban areas. This study selects Johor Bahru City Council (JBCC) administrative area as a case. The result shows that spatial indicators can contribute to a better visualisation of sustainability via the production of sustainability map.