IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/vua/wpaper/2001-27.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Pathways to urban sustainability

Author

Listed:
  • Finco, Adele

    (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Faculteit der Economische Wetenschappen en Econometrie (Free University Amsterdam, Faculty of Economics Sciences, Business Administration and Economitrics)

  • Nijkamp, Peter

Abstract

The concept of sustainable development has become very much "en vogue" in the past decade. We have also observed a shift in the interpretation of this concept from a global perspective to a meso perspective, i.e. a local, regional or sectoral level. This paper aims to highlight the urban dimension of environmental issues. After a sketch of urban pollution problems and of economie analysis tools, the notion of urban sustainability will be advocated as a meaningful analytical and policy concept. Next, the main focus of this paper will be on a typological approach to urban sustainability issues on the basis of three characteristic angles, viz strong and weak sustainability, absolute and relative decoupling and the spatial ecological footprint. Various methodological issues will also be discussed, while the paper will be concluded with some policy perspectives.

Suggested Citation

  • Finco, Adele & Nijkamp, Peter, 2001. "Pathways to urban sustainability," Serie Research Memoranda 0027, VU University Amsterdam, Faculty of Economics, Business Administration and Econometrics.
    • Handle: RePEc:vua:wpaper:2001-27
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://degree.ubvu.vu.nl/repec/vua/wpaper/pdf/20010027.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. R. K. Turner & Kenneth Button & Peter Nijkamp (ed.), 1999. "Ecosystems and Nature," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 1518, March.
    2. Camagni, Roberto & Capello, Roberta & Nijkamp, Peter, 1998. "Towards sustainable city policy: an economy-environment technology nexus," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 103-118, January.
    3. Common,Michael, 1995. "Sustainability and Policy," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521436052, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Angioletta Voghera & Benedetta Giudice, 2019. "Evaluating and Planning Green Infrastructure: A Strategic Perspective for Sustainability and Resilience," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-21, May.
    2. Saulė Petronienė & Saulutė Juzelėnienė, 2022. "Community Engagement via Mural Art to Foster a Sustainable Urban Environment," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(16), pages 1-13, August.
    3. Nelunika Priyashani & Nayomi Kankanamge & Tan Yigitcanlar, 2023. "Multisource Open Geospatial Big Data Fusion: Application of the Method to Demarcate Urban Agglomeration Footprints," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(2), pages 1-23, February.
    4. Juan Tang & Hong-lin Zhu & Zhi Liu & Fu Jia & Xiao-xue Zheng, 2019. "Urban Sustainability Evaluation under the Modified TOPSIS Based on Grey Relational Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(2), pages 1-21, January.
    5. Nuno Quental & Júlia Lourenço & Fernando da Silva, 2011. "Sustainability: characteristics and scientific roots," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 257-276, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Mike Danaher, 1998. "Towards sustainable development in Japanese environmental policy-making," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 6(3), pages 101-110.
    2. Daniela Smiraglia & Luca Salvati & Gianluca Egidi & Rosanna Salvia & Antonio Giménez-Morera & Rares Halbac-Cotoara-Zamfir, 2021. "Toward a New Urban Cycle? A Closer Look to Sprawl, Demographic Transitions and the Environment in Europe," Land, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-14, January.
    3. Martin Whitby & W. Neil Adger, 1996. "Natural And Reproducible Capital And The Sustainability Of Land Use In The Uk," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(1‐4), pages 50-65, January.
    4. Stern, David I., 1997. "Limits to substitution and irreversibility in production and consumption: A neoclassical interpretation of ecological economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 197-215, June.
    5. Vincenzo Formisano & Bernardino Quattrociocchi & Maria Fedele & Mario Calabrese, 2018. "From Viability to Sustainability: The Contribution of the Viable Systems Approach (VSA)," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-17, March.
    6. Tassilo Herrschel, 2013. "Competitiveness AND Sustainability: Can ‘Smart City Regionalism’ Square the Circle?," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 50(11), pages 2332-2348, August.
    7. James Keirstead & Matt Leach, 2008. "Bridging the gaps between theory and practice: a service niche approach to urban sustainability indicators," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 16(5), pages 329-340.
    8. Elena Battaglini & Nicoletta Masiero, 2015. "Sviluppo locale e resilienza territoriale. Un?introduzione," ECONOMIA E SOCIET? REGIONALE, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 0(3), pages 5-22.
    9. Halkos, George E., 2011. "Nonparametric modelling of biodiversity: Determinants of threatened species," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 618-635, July.
    10. Finco, Adele & Nijkamp, Peter, 1999. "Planning for sustainable spatial development : principles and application," Serie Research Memoranda 0030, VU University Amsterdam, Faculty of Economics, Business Administration and Econometrics.
    11. Angela Connelly & Jeremy Carter & John Handley & Stephen Hincks, 2018. "Enhancing the Practical Utility of Risk Assessments in Climate Change Adaptation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(5), pages 1-12, May.
    12. Abbas Hassan & Hyowon Lee, 2015. "The paradox of the sustainable city: definitions and examples," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 17(6), pages 1267-1285, December.
    13. Roberta Capello & Roberto Camagni, 2000. "Beyond Optimal City Size: An Evaluation of Alternative Urban Growth Patterns," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 37(9), pages 1479-1496, August.
    14. Kostas P. Bithas & M. Christofakis, 2006. "Environmentally sustainable cities. Critical review and operational conditions," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 14(3), pages 177-189.
    15. Fiorillo, Fabio & Palestrini, Antonio & Polidori, Paolo & Socci, Claudio, 2007. "Modelling water policies with sustainability constraints: A dynamic accounting analysis," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(2-3), pages 392-402, August.
    16. Erik T. Verhoef & Peter Nijkamp, 2000. "Externalities in Urban Sustainability," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 00-077/3, Tinbergen Institute.
    17. Halkos, George, 2010. "Modelling biodiversity," MPRA Paper 39075, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Ying Li & Robert J. S. Beeton & Xiaofeng Zhao & Yeting Fan & Qingke Yang & Jianbao Li & Linlin Ding, 2024. "Advancing urban sustainability transitions: A framework for understanding urban complexity and enhancing integrative transformations," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 11(1), pages 1-14, December.
    19. Tan Yigitcanlar & Md. Kamruzzaman, 2015. "Planning, Development and Management of Sustainable Cities: A Commentary from the Guest Editors," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(11), pages 1-12, November.
    20. Mingshun Zhang & Yitong Yang & Chun Xia-Bauer, 2021. "Measuring Urban Low-Carbon Sustainability in Four Chinese Cities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(21), pages 1-15, November.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • Q20 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - General
    • R58 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Regional Government Analysis - - - Regional Development Planning and Policy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:vua:wpaper:2001-27. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: R. Dam (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/fewvunl.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.