Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912

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Journal of Cleaner Production

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jclepro

Review

Neighborhood sustainability assessment tools: A review of success

factors
Ayyoob Sharifi a, *, Ayotunde Dawodu b, Ali Cheshmehzangi b
a
Hiroshima University, Graduate School of Humanities and Social Science, Graduate School of Advances Science and Engineering, Network for Education
and Research on Peace and Sustainability (NERPS), Japan
b
Department of Architecture and Built Environment, Faculty of Science and Engineering, University of Nottingham Ningbo China, Ningbo, 315100, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Since 1990s, many building sustainability assessment tools were developed and implemented in
Received 25 July 2020 different parts of the world. Encouraged by the considerable success of these tools in promoting sus-
Received in revised form tainability principles and practices, a movement to upscale building-centered assessment methods by
3 January 2021
focusing on the neighborhood scale was born in the subsequent decade. This movement has evolved
Accepted 7 January 2021
Available online 11 January 2021
considerably over the past two decades, and there are now many tools for neighborhood sustainability
assessment. Also, during this period a large body of literature on neighborhood sustainability assessment
Handling editor: Prof. Jiri Jaromir Kleme
s tools has been published. In this study we seek to identify and categorize successes regarding the
development and implementation of these tools through a systematic review of the literature. Based on
Keywords: evidence reported on 40 tools from different parts of the world, we identified two major success cate-
Neighborhood sustainability gories, namely, structural, and procedural. Tool improvement over time, provision of measurable in-
Assessment tools dicators for assessment, and recognition of context-specific issues through developing some local tools
Successes are major structural successes. Also, major successes related to procedures are the promotion of sus-
LEED-ND
tainable design, improvements in environmental performance (e.g., reduced travel demand and sprawl
BREEAM Communities
control), and usefulness for identifying priority development locations. One major issue is that reported
CASBEE-UD
evidence is mainly related to some prominent tools, namely Leadership in Energy and Environmental
Design for Neighborhood Development (LEED-ND), Building Research Establishment Environmental
Assessment Method for Communities (BREEAM Communities), Comprehensive Assessment System for
Building Environmental Efficiency for Urban Development (CASBEE-UD), and Green Star Communities.
Further research on other existing tools is needed to gain a better understanding of the successes.
Overall, this study demonstrates that neighborhood sustainability assessment tools have great potential
in contributing to the transition towards sustainable urban development.
© 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Contents

1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. Materials and methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. Results and discussions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.1. Brief summary of the trends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.2. Successes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3.2.1. Successes related to structure and methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3.2.2. Successes related to procedures and outcomes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4. Summary and conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

* Corresponding author. Address: 1-3-1 Kagamiyama, Higashi-Hiroshima City,

Hiroshima, 739-8530, Japan.
E-mail addresses: sharifi@hiroshima-u.ac.jp, sharifigeomatic@gmail.com
(A. Sharifi), Ayotunde.Dawodu@nottingham.edu.cn (A. Dawodu), ali.
cheshmehzangi@nottingham.edu.cn (A. Cheshmehzangi).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.125912
0959-6526/© 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
A. Sharifi, A. Dawodu and A. Cheshmehzangi Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912

Declaration of competing interest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Supplementary data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

1. Introduction disregard of the fact that cities are heavily dependent on their
hinterlands and complex cross-scale interactions should be
In recognition of the rapid urbanization trends and significant considered, and overemphasis on quantitative indicators that fail to
roles that cities can play in making progress towards sustainability, consider qualitative values have been mentioned in the literature
the 21st century is increasingly referred to as the urban century (Kaur and Garg, 2019; Merino-Saum et al., 2020).
(Elmqvist et al., 2019). In fact, over the past two decades, many Some efforts have been made to address some of these issues by
cities around the world have taken a wide range of actions to developing assessment tools for different levels in the urban hier-
promote sustainability (He et al., 2018). These, for example, include archy, including buildings and neighborhoods. In this regard, NSA
slum upgrading initiatives or plans developed for reducing energy tools are considered as the latest generation of assessment tools
consumption and associated emissions in cities (Casta n Broto and developed for mainstreaming sustainability into urban develop-
Bulkeley, 2013). The release of international agendas such as the ment. Compared to city-centered assessment, NSA is argued to be
New Urban Agenda (Habitat, 2017) and the United Nations Sus- more suitable for considering social interactions and providing
tainable Development Goals (UNSDG, 2015) has lent further mo- tangible and context-sensitive results (Sharifi and Murayama,
mentum to urban sustainability initiatives in the past few years. 2013). NSA tools are often developed by organizations that have
Such initiatives are available at different scales, ranging from previously developed tools for sustainability assessment at the
buildings to blocks, neighborhoods, and cities (He et al., 2018). building scale. In other words, they are extended/evolved versions
Neighborhood is a scale that has received particular attention for at of Building Sustainability Assessment (BSA) tools (Sharifi and
least two major reasons. First, it is a basic urban unit that is small Murayama, 2013). For instance, after the successful development
enough to experiment with innovative planning and design ideas, and implementation of BSA tools in the 1990s, the United States
and large enough to take systemic and integrated approaches to Green Building Council (USGBC) and the Building Research Estab-
urban development that account for interactions between different lishment (BRE) introduced NSA tools in the late 2000’s. The deci-
urban elements (Benites et al., 2020; Sparshott et al., 2019). Second, sion to extend assessment beyond the building scale is motivated
neighborhood is argued to be an optimal scale for considering/ by the two main reasons mentioned earlier. In addition to tools that
promoting social interactions between residents and engaging local extend the scope of BSA, there are also some ad hoc tools that have
stakeholders in sustainability initiatives, which is emphasized in been developed by institutions that are specifically focused on
the New Urban Agenda and the SDGs (Benites et al., 2020; Sharifi neighborhood scale. A good example of these is the EcoDistricts
and Murayama, 2014). Accordingly, there are now various initia- Protocol, developed by the EcoDistricts institute (Ecodistricts,
tives aimed at promoting sustainability at the neighborhood level. 2018).
These initiatives build on a long history of neighborhood planning The surge of interest in developing/implementing NSA tools is
that goes back to the early 20th century (Sharifi, 2016b). explained by their utility for various stakeholders. For instance,
Along with these trends, over the past two decades, there has local authorities may use assessment tools to monitor performance
also been an increasing interest in developing and implementing and track progress towards the achievement of the goals (Sharifi
Neighborhood Sustainability Assessment (NSA) tools in many parts and Murayama, 2013). They may also use assessment results as a
of the world. NSA is part of a broader and more established urban basis for planning control and/or granting development permission
sustainability assessment movement that dates back to the early to developers. In contrast, developers may mainly be interested in
1990s when the United Nations adopted the Agenda 21, empha- improving their competitive edge and use NSA tools for branding
sizing the significance of local efforts for achieving global sustain- purposes (Garde, 2009). Additionally, assessment results can also
ability (Merino-Saum et al., 2020). Since then, numerous tools, improve citizen awareness about strengths and weaknesses of
indicator sets, and rating systems have been developed and development plans and allow them to make more informed de-
implemented to, among other things, track achievement of sus- cisions regarding where to live and work. Further benefits of NSA
tainability targets, and guide transition towards sustainable urban tools will be discussed in the following sections.
development. Efforts aimed at assessing urban sustainability rely Over the past two decades, a substantial volume of literature has
on a diverse set of methods such as ecological footprint analysis been published on various topics related to NSA tools. This provides
(Suzuki et al., 2010), life cycle costing (Suzuki et al., 2010), input- a good opportunity to review the existing knowledge on them and
output models (Fung and Kennedy, 2005), and urban metabolism gain better insights about their successes and failures. Despite this,
models (Fung and Kennedy, 2005). However, the most common to the best of our knowledge, there is still no review article focusing
approach is arguably using quantitative metrics to develop sus- on successes reported in the literature. By success, we mean any
tainability indices (Merino-Saum et al., 2020; Sharifi, 2020). Urban actions, achievements, and positive outcomes that contribute to
sustainability assessment tools and indicator sets have been to informing decision making and guiding transition towards sus-
some extent effective in mainstreaming sustainability thinking in tainable neighborhood development. There are some critical re-
urban planning and development (Kaur and Garg, 2019; Sharifi, views that analyze the contents of selected NSA tools’ manuals to
2020; Sharifi et al., 2020). However, many studies have high- examine their suitability for guiding transition towards sustain-
lighted several major shortcomings that may hinder them from ability (Ameen et al., 2015; Sharifi and Murayama, 2013; Wangel
providing optimal outcomes. For instance, issues such as over- et al., 2016). While these studies are useful for comparative anal-
emphasis on environmental indicators, adoption of universal and ysis of the tools, they fall short of providing details on successes.
standardized methods that are not capable of capturing context Identifying success factors and stories can provide information on
sensitive issues, failure to consider interactions between indicators, measures that are needed to enhance the effectiveness of NSA tools.

2
A. Sharifi, A. Dawodu and A. Cheshmehzangi
It can also encourage further focus on NSA and lead to further
uptake of the tools. These, in turn, can accelerate local efforts aimed
at the transition towards sustainability.
Against this backdrop, the main objective of this review paper is
to identify the successes of NSA tools through a systematic review
of the literature. We explore successes related to development
(content and structure), as well as, implementation of the tools. In
addition, the study highlights incentives and recommendations
that have been suggested for improving the uptake and perfor-
mance of NSA tools.
Review methods and materials are explained in the next section.
Results of the systematic review, including a brief description of the
development trends and lists of success factors, are reported and
discussed in Section 3. Finally, Section 4 concludes the study by
highlighting the main findings, identifying major gaps, and
providing some recommendations for future research.
2. Materials and methods
The procedures taken for data collection and analysis are sum-
marized in Fig. 1, and briefly explained here. These procedures are
aligned with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews
and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines (Moher et al., 2009). The
data used for the purpose of this study was extracted from articles
published in peer-reviewed journals. The Web of Science and
Scopus are two major databases that index scientific articles. The
latter was selected for retrieving NSA-related articles due to its
wider coverage of research fields. The initial literature search was
done on June 2019, using a broad-based search string that includes
different variants of terms related to NSA, and titles of NSA tools
that have been frequently used in the literature (Ali-Toudert et al.,
2019; Ameen et al., 2015). These are tools including, but not
limited to, Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for
Neighborhood Development (LEED-ND), Building Research Estab-
lishment Environmental Assessment Method for Communities
(BREEAM Communities), Comprehensive Assessment System for
Building Environmental Efficiency for Urban Development (CAS-
BEE-UD), and Green Star Communities. The complete search string
is available in the Appendix. Using the string for initial search in
titles, abstracts, and keywords of articles indexed in Scopus
returned 147 articles. Titles and abstracts of these articles were
manually checked by the authors to exclude irrelevant papers that
were not focused on NSA tools. At the end of this screening process,
105 articles were selected for detailed content analysis. While
reading these papers, their reference sections were also checked to
Fig. 1. Procedures for literature selection and data extraction.
3
Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912
find out if there are relevant papers that should be added to the
review database. In addition, the Search Alert function of Scopus
was activated to receive notifications about newly published
research. Twelve more articles were added to the database via these
processes. Therefore, a total of 117 articles were analyzed.
To extract required data, an excel sheet was designed with
selected articles on the rows, and columns for collecting data on a
wide range of items and issues, including titles of the NSA tools,
successes, and recommended solutions for building on success
stories. Selected articles were analyzed in four steps. First, each co-
author reviewed a group of papers to extract the necessary data
(Step 1). Upon completion of this step, the lead author went
through the collected data to categorize and code them based on
commonalities (Step 2). The coded data extraction sheet was then
sent back to the co-authors for the second round of review (Step 3).
During this round, co-authors not only double checked the papers
to enhance accuracy, but also added new categories/codes if
deemed necessary. Finally, during step 4, the lead author double
checked the collected data by reviewing all articles in the database
and refined the categories based on the feedback received from the
co-authors during Step 3. During this round, it was found that
successes can be divided into two broad categories, namely, con-
tents and structures, and processes and outcomes. The first cate-
gory mainly includes issues related to dimensional coverage of the
tools, and methodological approaches used for assessment. In
contrast, the second category is focused on procedures taken for the
development and implementation of NSA tools. At the end of the
fourth step collected information related to successes were ranked
according to their frequency. This, however, just indicates that the
higher-ranked issues have been more discussed in the literature
and does not mean greater importance. More information on these
categories, as well as some brief description of the tools, is pre-
sented in the following section.
3. Results and discussions
3.1. Brief summary of the trends
As Table 1 shows, 40 NSA tools have been studied in the
reviewed papers. This indicates that NSA is a popular topic among
researchers and urban policy makers, and it now has an extensive
knowledge base. These 40 tools are originated from 18 different
countries from across the globe. However, there is a geographic
imbalance and most tools are originated from the US (nine),
Australia (five), and the UK (four). In terms of continental
A. Sharifi, A. Dawodu and A. Cheshmehzangi Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912

Table 1
Tools studied in the literature.

Tool Main developer (s) Origin Year Latest Count

version

LEED-ND US Green Building Council (USGBC) US 2009 2018 88

BREEAM Communities Building Research Establishment (BRE Global) UK 2009 2012 40
CASBEE-UD The Institute for Building Environment and Energy Conservation Japan 2007 2014 30
(IBEC)
Green Star Communities Green Building Council Australia (GBCA) Australia 2012 2016 11
HQE2R Scientific and Technical Center for Building (CSTB) France 2001 - 8
Pearl Community Rating System Abu Dhabi Urban Planning Council UAE 2010 - 8
IGBC Green Townships Indian Green Building Council India 2008 - 6
Global Sustainability Assessment System Gulf Organization for Research and Development Qatar 2007 - 6
DGNB for Districts German Sustainable Building Council Germany 2012 - 5
GBI Township Greenbuildingindex Sdn Bhd (GSB) Malaysia 2011 - 5
BCA Green Mark for districts Building and Construction Authority (BCA) Singapore 2009 2017 5
EnviroDevelopment Urban Development Institute of Australia (UDIA) Australia 2006 - 4
STAR Communities STAR Communities (now merged with the USGBC) US 2012 2016 4
Neighborhood Sustainability Framework (NSF) Beacon Pathway New 2005 2014 4
Zealand
EarthCraft Communities Greater Atlanta Home Builders Association, the Atlanta Regional US 2005 2014 3
Commission, the Urban Land Institute, etc.
Ecocity EU research project EU 2002 - 3
One Planet Communities BioRegional Development Group UK 2004 - 3
AQUA Bairro e loteamento label Fundaça~o Vanzolini Brazil 2011 - 2
EcoDistricts EcoDistricts US 2012 - 2
Green Township Index Siew (2018) Malaysia No - 2
data
Green Rating for Integrated Habitat Assessment (GRIHA LD) GRIHA Council and The Energy and Resources Institute India 2015 - 2
Sustainable Building Tool (SBTool) International Initiative for a Sustainable Built Environment (iiSBE) Canada 2007 2020 2
Sustainable Community Rating (SCR) VicUrban, the Victorian Government’s land development agency Australia 2007 - 2
EcoQuartier res Transition e
Ministe cologique Cohe sion des territoires France 2012 2020 1
2030 Districts Architecture 2030 US 2010 - 1
Assessment Standard for Green Eco-districts (ASGE) Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development of the People’s China 2018 - 1
Republic of China
Building Environmental Assessment Method (BEAM) Plus Hong Kong Green Building Council Hong Kong 2016 - 1
Neighborhood Assessment Tool (China)
Comprehensive Assessment Method for Sustainable Urban Ali-Toudert et al. (2019) Germany 2019 - 1
Development (CAMSUD)
Circles of Sustainability UN Global Compact Cities Programme Australia 2014 - 1
Conavi CEV Mexican Code National Housing Commission Mexico 2015 - 1
EEWH Assessment System for Eco-community Architecture and Building Research Institute Taiwan 2010 - 1
Enterprise Green Communities Enterprise Community Partners US 2004 2020 1
Green Star SA (South Africa) Green Building Council South Africa South Africa 2017 - 1
GreenTRIP TransForm US 2008 - 1
Living Community Challenge International Living Future Institute US 2014 2017 1
SNM (Successful Neighborhood Model) author of the paper South Africa 2019 - 1
SPeAR (Sustainable Project Appraisal Routine) ARUP UK 2000 2017 1
Sustainable Sites Initiative (SITES) American Society of Landscape Architects US 2009 2015 1
VicUrban Sustainability Charter (Master Planned Government of Victoria Australia 2006 - 1
Community Assessment Tool)
Wulvern Indicators of Neighborhood Sustainability (WINS) Wulvern UK 2006 - 1

distribution, Africa and South America lag behind, with only one
tool originated from each (i.e. South Africa and Brazil).
The first tool, Sustainable Project Appraisal Routine (SPeAR) was
developed in 2000 by ARUP that is a well-known multinational
architecture and planning firm. More tools have been developed
ever since. Interestingly, almost half of the tools have been devel-
oped before, and another half after 2010. One interesting trend is
that tools originated from developing countries have mainly
emerged in the last ten years. These include tools from Brazil,
Malaysia, Mexico, India, China, and South Africa. This trend in-
dicates that developed countries have played a pioneering role and
others have followed their lead. It may also indicate the growing
recognition of the rapid urbanization trends in developing coun-
tries such as Brazil, China, and India and the need for sustainability
guidelines/indicators that can help avoid undesirable patterns.
A major finding is the dominance of a few number of tools.
These are, namely, LEED-ND, BREEAM Communities, and CASBEE-
UD that have been studied in 88, 40, and 30 papers, respectively
(out of the 117 papers reviewed). In fact, there are studies arguing
that these tools have played a pioneering role and have guided the
development of other NSA tools, particularly in developing
countries (Kamble and Bahadure, 2019; Vilela et al., 2019). Other
frequently studied tools are Green Star Communities (GSC), High
Quality Environment and Economy in Regeneration (HQE2R),
Pearl Community Rating System (PCRS), Indian Green Building
Council Green Township (IGBC Green Township), Global Sustain-
ability Assessment System (GSAS), Deutsche Gesellschaft für
Nachhaltiges Bauen (DGNB) for Districts, Green Building Index
Township (GBI Township), and Building and Construction Au-
thority Green Mark for Districts (BCA Green Mark for Districts). A
noteworthy point is that the first versions of the top-two most
studied tools (i.e., LEED-ND and BREEAM Communities) were
released towards the end of 2000’s, when 17 other tools already
existed. Despite this, LEED-ND and BREEAM Communities have

4
A. Sharifi, A. Dawodu and A. Cheshmehzangi Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912

gained significant attention and, as will be later discussed, have
also been more implemented. Some possible reasons for this will
be discussed in the following sections.
3.2. Successes
Successes and strengths can be divided into two broad cate-
gories related to structure, and procedures and outcomes. The
former includes issues related to the structure of NSA tools and
methods that they use for assessment. In contrast, the latter cate-
gory deals with issues related to assessment processes and out-
comes of NSA tools.
3.2.1. Successes related to structure and methods
Success factors and strengths that are mentioned in the litera-
ture are listed in Table 2, in descending order of frequency (note
that in Tables 2 and 3 higher count does not indicate that the dis-
cussed issue is of greater importance. Instead, it just means that the
issue has been discussed more frequently in the literature). This
table also provides information on NSA tools, in the context of
which, these success factors have been discussed in the literature.
This information is important because for some issues, such as
dealing with interactions between different indicators, evidence
has only been discussed in relation to one or a few number of NSA
tools, and therefore it cannot be generalized to all tools.
Tool improvement over time: The most frequently-mentioned
success factor is the improvement of tools over time (Adewumi
et al., 2019). As Table 1 shows, some NSA tools have updated
their original versions after receiving feedback from their stake-
holders during the initial years of practice. While our investigation
shows that 14 tools have released updated versions, the reviewed
literature has only discussed this success issue in relation to
BREEAM Communities, CASBEE-UD, and LEED-ND.
Three major types of improvements have been highlighted in
the literature. First is regarding better recognition of context-
specificities and avoiding environmental determinism that is
often argued to be a major weakness of NSA tools (Aranoff et al.,
2013). To address this issue, NSA tools have taken measures to
become less prescriptive in their updated versions (Pedro et al.,
2019). In fact, several studies have discussed how updated ver-
sions of tools such as LEED-ND and BREEAM Communities have
become more flexible by allowing selection of relevant assessment
indicators and adjustment of weighting factors (Kyrkou and
Karthaus, 2011; Lietz and Bijoux, 2014). For instance, to increase
applicability in other contexts, BREEAM Communities allows
applying regional weights whenever needed (Berardi, 2013; Sharifi
and Murayama, 2013). The second major improvement is in terms
of transparency, as updated versions have provided more details
and justifications related to the suggested indicators (Ameen et al.,
2015; Komeily and Srinivasan, 2015; Sharifi and Murayama, 2013).
Finally, a noteworthy improvement is inclusion of indicators aimed
at promoting innovation. Accordingly, updated versions of the tools
allocate more points to innovative measures that can provide more
sustainability benefits compared to business as usual practices
(Ameen et al., 2015; Komeily and Srinivasan, 2015; Sharifi and
Murayama, 2013).
Providing measurable indicators for assessment: As expected,
another major success factor is the provision of measurable in-
dicators for assessing sustainability that is often argued to be a
normative concept (Sharifi and Murayama, 2013). Quantifiable in-
dicators offer a better understanding of the sustainability perfor-
mance of neighborhoods that can result in enhanced
communications with stakeholders (Pedro et al., 2019). For
instance, evidence of using LEED-ND and BREEAM Communities in
Lisbon, Portugal shows how quantifiable indicators can be used to
identify differences between desirable and undesirable sustain-
ability performance and inform decision makers of the state of
progress in achieving targets (Pedro et al., 2018, 2019). It is worth
noting, however, that there are also arguments that quantitative
indicators of NSA tools are not suitable for assessing performance
against some measures such as happiness, quality of life, sense of
place, and aesthetics that are inherently qualitative in nature (Boyle
et al., 2018; Lewin, 2012). As mentioned in the Introduction section,
this is an issue that applies to most urban sustainability assessment
tools and needs further attention (Boyle et al., 2018).
Local tools ensure context specificity: The third highly
mentioned structural success is on the effectiveness of local tools
that are developed by taking into account the local priorities and

Table 2
Structural successes.

Issue Highlights Count Related NSA Tool (s)

(out of
117)

Tool improvement over time
Providing measurable indicators Better ability to measure the state of progress, enhanced
for assessment
Local tool ensures context
specificity
Adequate coverage of
sustainability dimensions
Design standards of NSA tools
can provide co-benefits (e.g.,
public health)
Upscaling building-based
activities
Providing methods for dealing
with interactions between
different indicators
User friendliness
Enhanced context-specificity, improved transparency,
promotion of innovation
capacity to differentiate between desirable and undesirable
performance
Better recognition of local priorities and idiosyncrasies,
providing locally relevant recommendations, better uptake of
the tools
More balanced coverage of sustainability dimensions in the 4
new tools
NSA criteria can provide co-benefits related to resilience,
health, and climate change adaptation and mitigation
Better ability to consider interactions between buildings and 3
other components of the urban system, improved recognition
of systemic approaches
Improved consideration of hierarchical and multi-
dimensional structure of cities as complex and dynamic
systems
Improved prospects of application, enhanced chances of
increasing local awareness
12 LEED-ND, CASBEE-UD, BREEAM Communities
7 BREEAM Communities, LEED-ND, GreenTRIP, Circles of
Sustainability, EnviroDevelopment, Green Star Communities,
Living Community Challenge, One Planet Communities,
CASBEE-UD
5 Green Township, WINS
BREEAM Communities, Green Star Communities, IGBC
Township, GBI Township, ASGE
4 LEED-ND, Enterprise Green Communities
LEED-ND, BREEAM communities, CASBEE-ND, IGBC Township,
GBI Township
2 CAMSUD, LEED-ND
1 2030 Districts, LEED-ND, BREEAM Communities

5
A. Sharifi, A. Dawodu and A. Cheshmehzangi Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912

Table 3
Procedural successes.

Issue Highlights Count Related NSA tools

(out of
117)

Promoting sustainable design Raising general awareness of sustainability principles, 53 Generic

Improving performance (walkability,
quality of life and resident
satisfaction, costs, revitalization,
sprawl control)
Highlighting priority development
locations and areas that need further
improvement
Facilitating stakeholder engagement
and improving transparency
Informing decision making
Relative success in terms of adoption
Expediting planning and decision-
making processes
promoting sustainable urban development, encouraging
innovation in planning and design, sharing best practice
ideas
Enhanced energy efficiency, improved walkability, 13 LEED-ND, BREEAM Communities, CASBEE-UD, One-
enhanced resident satisfaction Planet Communities, GBI Township, 2030 Districts
Minimizing detrimental environmental impacts, regulating 9 LEED-ND, REEAM Communities, CASBEE-UD
urban growth, encouraging infill and brownfield
development
Better adoption of formative approaches, improved 9 Green Star Communities, EnviroDevelopment, LEED-ND,
implementation prospects, better ability to sustain WINS, EcoDistricts, HQE2R, Living Community Challenge
initiatives beyond the timeline of the assessment process
Enhanced opportunities to modify initial development 6 Generic
plans, better integration of sustainability considerations
Enhanced market awareness and recognition of the 6 Green Star Communities, LEED-ND, SITES, AQUA B&L,
significance of sustainable design, improved procedural BREEAM Communities, CASBEE-UD, Star Communities,
simplicity, use of incentives to promote sustainability design EcoQuartier, Environdevelopment, DGNB for Districts,
GREENTRIP
Facilitating evidence-based decisions regarding 3 LEED-ND, BREEAM Communities
development proposals, assisting local authorities when
they have limited capacity to assess sustainability
performance

idiosyncrasies. For instance, Sharifi and Murayama (2013) demon-
strated that local tools, which are embedded in the planning pro-
cess perform better in terms of addressing sustainability concerns
and providing locally relevant recommendations. In Cheshire, UK, it
is shown that the WINS tool is capable of guiding action plans and
leading to meaningful changes that facilitate the transition to sus-
tainability (O’Shea, 2011). Similar results have been observed
regarding the application of the Green Township Index (GTI), which
is a locally-specific tool applied in Malaysia (Siew, 2018). In addition
to reflecting local needs and priorities, GTI is also aligned with the
requirements of Malaysian planning and construction sectors that
contribute to better uptake of the tool (Siew, 2018). Despite these
success factors, it is argued that developing and implementing
locally-designed tools are data and resource-intensive processes
that may not always be feasible (O’Shea, 2011; Sharifi and
Murayama, 2013). This is arguably one of the main reasons for
the better uptake of tools such as LEED-ND and BREEAM Commu-
nities that tend to use standardized indicators for assessment
across different contexts. However, several studies have raised
concerns about the desirability of such standardized approaches as
they would not be able to appropriately reflect locally-sensitive
issues (Boyle and Michell, 2017; Gouda and Masoumi, 2018).
Adequate coverage of sustainability dimensions: A common
criticism of NSA tools is their failure to account for various eco-
nomic, environmental, institutional, and social dimensions of sus-
tainability in a balanced manner (Komeily and Srinivasan, 2015;
Sharifi and Murayama, 2013). In other words, some tools empha-
size specific dimensions at the expense of others. Specifically, NSA
tools have been criticized for overemphasizing the environmental
dimension of sustainability (Komeily and Srinivasan, 2015; Sharifi
and Murayama, 2013). Recent evidence, however, shows that
measures have been taken to address this issue in newly-developed
tools and/or updated versions of pioneering tools such as BREEAM
Communities and Green Star Communities. For instance, while
social and institutional dimensions were underrepresented in
earlier versions of these tools (Sharifi and Murayama, 2013), the
issue has been resolved in their updated versions (Boyle et al., 2018;
Dawodu et al., 2017, 2020). Among the recently developed tools,
6
Green Township Index (GTI) and Assessment Standard for Green
Eco-districts (ASGE) are highlighted in the literature for their suc-
cess in addressing multiple sustainability dimensions in a balanced
manner (Dang et al., 2020; Siew, 2018). However, despite these
recent improvements, many tools are still mainly focused on
environmental aspects and further attention to socio-economic and
institutional dimensions is needed.
Design standards of NSA tools can provide co-benefits: An
important benefit of NSA tools is their utility for achieving co-
benefits in terms of resilience, health, and climate change adapta-
tion and mitigation. For instance, energy-efficient design strategies
that facilitate indoor and outdoor thermal comfort and reduce
energy demand (e.g., passive building and urban design techniques,
smart metering systems, etc.) provide health, as well, as climate
change mitigation co-benefits (Houghton and Castillo-Salgado,
2019; Rodenhiser, 2008). Also, they can increase resilience to
various stressors such as extreme heat events and energy shocks
(Fahmy et al., 2018; Sharifi and Yamagata, 2016). Despite this, po-
tential co-benefits have only been discussed in a few studies. In
their analysis of LEED-ND, Uda and Kennedy (2018) elaborate on
the potential co-benefits of the tool in terms of resilience to
different stressors such as energy shocks, extreme weather events,
food shortages, and sea level rise. Such resilience co-benefits are
achieved via various design measures such as green infrastructure,
passive design, street connectivity, and open space provision (Uda
and Kennedy, 2018). A similar examination of other tools, howev-
er, provide fewer promising results. For instance, in their analysis of
BREEAM Communities, STAR Communities, and Green Star Com-
munities, Diaz-Sarachaga and Jato-Espino (2019) show that only
resilience characteristics related to flood risk management and
emergency response capacity are appropriately considered. They
argue that more indicators related to absorption and adaptation
capacities of resilience are needed. In addition to these theoretical
discussions, there is also some empirical evidence on co-benefits.
For instance, evidence from Washington D.C. shows that Incorpo-
rating Enterprise Green Communities and LEED standards in low-
income housing renovation projects improve health and housing
conditions (Jacobs et al., 2014). Health benefits were also observed
A. Sharifi, A. Dawodu and A. Cheshmehzangi
in a study examining walking behavior of students in Salt Lake
County, US. There, it was found that neighborhoods designed with
LEED-ND standards increase physical activity of students, thereby
providing health co-benefits (Stevens and Brown, 2011).
Upscaling building-based activities: Until early 2000’s sus-
tainability assessment activities were mainly focused on the
building scale and limited attention was paid to cumulative impacts
of buildings, as well as, interactions between buildings and other
components of the urban system. The development of NSA tools,
therefore, has been successful in scaling up assessment efforts
beyond the building level. Neighborhood-based activities require
stakeholder participation and partnership that are essential for
accelerating the transition towards sustainable development
(Sharifi and Murayama, 2013). They also facilitate more systemic
and integrated approaches to sustainable urban development
(Benites et al., 2020; Sparshott et al., 2019). Such integrated ap-
proaches not only allow to, ideally, accommodate complex inter-
linkages between different components and sectors, but also
encourage planners and policy makers to extend their planning
efforts (energy, water, waste, etc.) beyond the building scale. This,
in turn, offers synergistic opportunities and reduces potential
conflicts and trade-offs (Dall’O et al., 2013; Wu et al., 2018). It is
worth noting, however, that despite these initial upscaling efforts,
cross-scale interactions are not yet thoroughly considered in NSA
tools and working on more integrated approaches is essential
(Wangel et al., 2016).
Providing methods for dealing with interactions between
different indicators: Closely related to the previous point, NSA
tools are expected to clarify how different indicators are linked to
each other. This is, however, to a large extent, not appropriately
addressed by NSA tools. However, some methods have been
recently introduced that provide opportunities to deal with this
challenge. For instance, Khan and Pinter (2016) have proposed that
using ‘scaling’ indicators that consider the hierarchical and multi-
dimensional structure of cities as complex and dynamic systems.
In addition, interactions between different indicators have also
been considered in CASMUD, a recently developed NSA tool.
However, this is still an under-explored area and further research is
needed to better understand how to deal with interlinkages (Ali-
Toudert et al., 2019).
User friendliness: The final structural success is regarding ef-
forts taken to develop user-friendly assessment tools. While,
generally, assessment requires certain levels of technical knowl-
edge about the assessment indicators, some measures such as
providing assessment guidelines and quantitative examples can be
taken to make NSA tools applicable for different stakeholders. This
increases the prospects of applying the tools either via formal
certification procedures, or as self-assessment practices to improve
local awareness (Barnes and Parrish, 2016). The tools listed in
Table 1 often provide such guidelines.
3.2.2. Successes related to procedures and outcomes
Table 3 shows that, compared with structural successes, pro-
cedural ones have been more frequently discussed in the literature.
Overall, there are 7 success factors that have been, cumulatively,
mentioned 99 times across the 117 reviewed papers. These are
briefly discussed in the remainder of this section.
Promoting sustainable design: This is by far the most discussed
success factor in the literature. There is a broad consensus that NSA
tools have been successful in raising general awareness of sus-
tainability principles and promoting sustainable urban develop-
ment (Garde, 2018; Vilela et al., 2019). They have been used as
frameworks to stimulate discussions over development pathways
and communicate sustainability concerns with various stake-
holders, early in the design and planning processes (Boyle et al.,
7
Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912
2018; Wangel et al., 2016). Increased consumer awareness of sus-
tainability has encouraged developers to move beyond the estab-
lished development practices to maintain their competitive edge
(Boyle et al., 2018). This, in turn, has contributed to encouraging
innovation in planning and design, and recognizing/promoting best
practices of sustainable urban planning and design (Crosson, 2017;
Mapes and Wolch, 2011). Best practice cases can also be used for
benchmarking purposes, thereby stimulating constructive compe-
tition towards achieving excellence in performance (Dall’O et al.,
2013).
Additionally, engagement in certification processes has facili-
tated collaboration and experience sharing among developers that
can further advance the sustainability agenda (Boyle et al., 2018). In
addition to the urban policy and development sectors, NSA tools
have proven effective in other sectors such as education. They have
been used in planning and design courses to educate students
about the best practices of sustainable urban design and have been
effective in promoting creating and sustainability in urban planning
and design (De Monsabert and Miller, 2009). Additionally, some
NSA tools such as LEED-ND have provided insights on how to up-
date and improve existing planning and regulation codes as shown
in the case of Miami, US (Garde et al., 2015). They are also expected
to stimulate such improvements in other regions such as the
Middle East, where a growing market for NSA tools exists (Issa and
Al Abbar, 2015).
Improving sustainability performance: Related to the previous
point, considerable evidence has been reported on how de-
velopments certified by NSA tools have resulted in tangible per-
formance improvements, particularly regarding the environmental
dimension. The reported evidence is, however, mainly related to
some tools such as LEED-ND. For instance, projects certified by
LEED-ND and 2030 Districts have demonstrated substantial energy
efficiency improvements associated with enhanced building en-
ergy performance and reduced Vehicle Miles Travelled (VMT)
(Barnes and Parrish, 2016; Szibbo, 2016). As a case in point, a study
of LEED-ND pilot projects in the US showed their per capita VMT is
significantly lower than the regional average (Ewing et al., 2013).
This is explained by a combination of attributes such as being
located in highly central areas, mixed use development, and
walkability improvement measures. Walkability enhancement is
also reported in a study by Stevens and Brown (2011) that shows
children living in walkable LEED-ND certified neighborhoods have
more physical activity compared with their counterparts from less-
walkable neighborhoods. It is, however, acknowledged that this
could be explained by self-selection, as families aiming to walk
more may choose to live in more walkable neighborhoods (Stevens
and Brown, 2011).
Limited evidence has been reported on the socio-economic
performance of NSA-certified tools. In Malaysia, it was found that
GBI Township certified developments have improved resident
satisfaction by enhancing environmental quality through design
characteristics such as connectivity and accessibility (Tan, 2016).
Similarly, a case study from Cairo shows that LEED-ND measures
related to green infrastructure and passive design increase quality
of life and resident satisfaction by enhancing microclimatic per-
formance (Fahmy et al., 2018). Another social benefit is related to
the inclusion and performance of affordable housing in certified
projects. While, overall, NSA tools are criticized for limited success
in providing affordable housing (Sharifi and Murayama, 2014), ev-
idence shows that including affordable housing offers low-income
residents major cost-saving benefits. In her analysis of LEED-ND,
Szibbo (2016) showed that living costs of residents of affordable
housing located in LEED-ND certified projects can be substantially
reduced through lowering utility costs and improving trans-
portation efficiency.
A. Sharifi, A. Dawodu and A. Cheshmehzangi
Overall, an important issue is that while many developments
have been certified using other tools such as EcoQuartier, Envi-
rondevelopment, SITES, Star Communities, Green Star commu-
nities, and DGNB for Districts, there is still a lack of research on their
performance. Such research is needed to understand if those NSA
tools have also contributed to enhancing sustainability.
Highlighting priority development locations and areas that
need further improvement: One way to improve sustainability
performance could be identifying priority development locations
that can minimize detrimental environmental impacts. Some NSA
tools such as LEED-ND and BREEAM Communities have successfully
been used to identify appropriate sites for future developments and
areas that need to be further improved. NSA tools are useful for
locating desirable development sites since they consider the im-
pacts beyond the development boundaries. For instance, they
inform developers and policy makers of potential impacts on the
natural ecosystem or the transportation system (Holzer and
Lockrem, 2011). This way, they can complement building-focused
tools that have limited attention to the implications of locations
and linkages (Holzer and Lockrem, 2011). Given these potentials,
NSA tools can, for example, be used to determine priority sites for
infill and/or brownfield development, thereby regulating urban
growth and providing synergistic opportunities that can lead to
reduced travel demand and its associated emissions, enhanced
walkability, and improved accessibility to services (Chrysochoou
et al., 2012; Holzer and Lockrem, 2011). Indeed, case studies show
that LEED-ND, BREEAM Communities and, CASBEE-UD have been
effective in promoting infill and brownfield development that
could contribute to containing urban sprawl (Sharifi and
Murayama, 2014; Smith and Bereitschaft, 2016). An analysis of
certified LEED-ND projects in the US shows that most of them are
located in highly urbanized areas, demonstrating success in
encouraging infill and brownfield development (Smith and
Bereitschaft, 2016). This promising result can be attributed to the
high emphasis placed on smart location and linkages in LEED-ND
(Sharifi and Murayama, 2014).
Additionally, NSA tools can be used for identifying priority sites
at larger scales. For instance, applying BREEAM Communities to the
whole area of Lisbon, Pedro et al. (2019) showed how its design
standards can facilitate the identification of priority locations for
sustainable urban development. It also demonstrated that different
parts of cities have different development needs. For instance,
while improving energy efficiency and green coverage are priority
actions in the historical core, the north and western areas require
additional public transportation investments. Similar utilities have
been reported for Libyan neighborhoods, where LEED-ND can help
planners identify priority intervention areas for neighborhood
revitalization (Elgadi et al., 2016).
Facilitating stakeholder engagement and improving trans-
parency: If designed and/or implemented in collaboration with
stakeholders, NSA tools can facilitate stakeholder participation in
the decision making process and improve transparency (Adewumi
et al., 2019; Sharifi and Murayama, 2013). Literature shows that
process-based tools such as HQE2R, EcoDistricts, and the Living
Community Challenge that have adopted formative approaches
towards assessment have been more successful in this regard
(Holden et al., 2016; Ramiller, 2019). Formative approaches involve
consultation with stakeholders during different stages of the
development to understand their needs and priorities and design
locally-relevant strategies (Sharifi, 2016a; Xia et al., 2015). Further,
such approaches provide awareness raising benefits and improve
citizen buy in, thereby, improving implementation prospects
(Sharifi and Murayama, 2013). The HQE2R experience is a good
example showing how formative and co-designed approaches to-
ward identifying needs, defining intervention priorities, and
8
Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912
developing action plans contribute to assessment processes that
effectively guide sustainable neighborhood development. Such
processes also allow sustaining sustainability initiatives beyond the
lifetime of the assessment process (Blum et al., 2008). In addition to
formal assessment processes, evidence shows that using NSA tools
such as Green Star Communities for self-assessment can also
encourage stakeholder participation and offer sustainability bene-
fits (Xia et al., 2015). Therefore, developing simplified versions of
NSA tools that could be used for self-assessment can be a good way
of promoting the sustainability agenda at the neighborhood scale.
Informing decision making: Generally, NSA tools have shown
potential in informing planning and decision-making processes.
Applying tools early in the planning process facilitates negotiations
between different stakeholders, including developers and author-
ities (Cabrita and Alvarez, 2010). As discussed with respect to
BREEAM Communities, this not only provides opportunities to
modify initial development plans according to the opinions of other
stakeholders, but also enables local authorities to better examine
whether the socio-economic and environmental consequences of
the proposed plan have been duly considered (AlWaer and Kirk,
2016). Assessment results can, therefore, inform decision makers
of modifications that need to be applied before granting develop-
ment permission (Bahadure and Kotharkar, 2018). This way, NSA
tools can complement other assessment mechanisms (e.g., Envi-
ronmental Impact Assessment and Strategic Environmental
Assessment) or fill the gap when such mechanisms do not exist
(Wangel et al., 2016). Overall, the process is expected to improve
the initial development plan by integrating sustainability consid-
erations (Sharifi and Murayama, 2014).
Relative success in terms of adoption: The tools listed in Table 1
have been totally adopted by 1,674 developments from 47 different
countries to assess their sustainability performance. As shown in
Tables 4 and 5, there is an imbalance regarding the location of
developments and tools that have been adopted for assessment.
Countries such as the US, France, Australia, China, Germany, and
Canada have larger numbers of certified developments. Also, highly
used tools, in descending order, are EcoQuartier, LEED-ND, Envi-
rondevelopment, SITES, Star Communities, Green Star commu-
nities, DGNB for Districts, BREEAM Communities, GREENTRIP.
Overall, the relative success of these tools can be attributed to
several factors such as appropriate efforts to enhance market
awareness and recognition of the significance of sustainable design
(Boyle and Michell, 2017), procedural simplicity (Benson and
Bereitschaft, 2019), provision of uptake incentives (Benson and
Bereitschaft, 2019; Sharifi and Murayama, 2013), and garnering
government support (Morris et al., 2018). The USGBC (developer of
LEED-ND), in particular, has made efforts to enhance market
recognition for low-carbon and sustainable urban development
(Boyle and Michell, 2017; Morris et al., 2018). Additionally, local
governments and municipalities have contributed to better uptake
of LEED-ND by providing incentives such as density bonuses and
expediting planning permission applications (Benson and
Bereitschaft, 2019; Diaz-Sarachaga et al., 2018; Prickett and
Bicknell, 2010). Government support, in terms of funding and
management, has also played a substantial role in the success of
Green Star Communities in Australia (Morris et al., 2018). It is ex-
pected that such supports, in combination with other factors such
as enhanced public awareness and market recognition will further
stimulate developer’s interest in adopting NSA tools. This may
instigate competition and lead to innovative planning and design
ideas (Vilela et al., 2019).
Expediting the planning and decision-making process: In
addition to leading to better uptake, local governments’ recognition
and support for NSA tools can also expedite planning and decision
making processes (Cabrita and Alvarez, 2010). This is explained by
A. Sharifi, A. Dawodu and A. Cheshmehzangi Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912

Table 4
Frequently used NSA tools.

Frequently used tools

Tool Count

EcoQuartier 486
LEED-ND 473
Environdevelopment 140
Star Communities 75
Green Star communities 70
DGNB for Districts 65
SITES 62
BREEAM Communities 57
GREENTRIP 51
2030 Districts 22
Living Community Challenge 20
EcoDistricts 17
One Planet Communities 16
HQE2R 14
Earthcraft Communities 11
GBI Township 11
NSF 10
GRIHA LD 8
BEAM 8
Circles of sustainability 6
BCA Green Mark 6
CASBEE-UD 5
Ecocity 4
Green Star SA 2

Table 5
Location of certified projects.

Location of certified projects

Country Count

United States 626

France 500
Australia 215
China 53
Germany 48
Canada 45
United Kingdom 42
Malaysia 19
Japan 11
New Zealand 10
Turkey 9
India 9
Denmark 8
Brazil 7
Singapore 6
Spain 5
Norway 5
Italy 4
Sweden 4
Finland 4
South Africa 4
Iceland 3
Poland 3
Luxembourg 3

the fact that NSA tools provide a means to make evidence-based
decisions regarding developments and their implications for sus-
tainability (Cabrita and Alvarez, 2010; Sharifi and Murayama, 2013).
NSA tools have already provided such benefits in countries such as
the US, the UK, and Spain (Cabrita and Alvarez, 2010; Sharifi and
Murayama, 2013). Using NSA tools for this purpose is particularly
recommended when local authorities have limited capacity to
assess the sustainability performance of development proposals.
Under such circumstances, NSA tools can assist them to make more
informed decisions (Cabrita and Alvarez, 2010).
4. Summary and conclusions
Over the past two decades, many tools have been developed for
assessing sustainability at the neighborhood scale. Through a sys-
tematic literature review, this study identified successes related to
the development and implementation of 40 NSA tools, and divided
them into two broad categories, namely, structural and procedural.
Major successes related to structure are the improvement of tools
over time, provision of measurable indicators for assessment,
development of context-specific tools, adequate coverage of sus-
tainability dimensions in recently developed tools, provision of

9
A. Sharifi, A. Dawodu and A. Cheshmehzangi
health and climate co-benefits, and provision of some methods for
dealing with interactions between indicators. Among these, the
most frequently mentioned success is the improvement of the tools
over time. This has led to enhanced flexibility, better consideration
of locally-specific issues, improved transparency, and further
attention to promoting innovation. Also, the provision of measur-
able indicators for assessment is another important structural
improvement that has contributed to making the sustainability
concept more tangible. In addition, it has contributed to more
informed decision making and has facilitated tracking progress
towards achieving goals. Despite these successes, it should be
mentioned that some success factors such as consideration of
context-specificities and consideration of interactions between
indicators and across scales have only been discussed in a few
studies and in relation to a few NSA tools. Therefore, more research
across different tools is needed to understand if they have also
gained success regarding these issues. Particularly, it is needed to
think of better solutions for addressing cross-scale interactions to
ensure that neighborhood sustainability efforts are not taken in
isolation from the broader urban and regional contexts.
Compared with structural successes, more discussions on suc-
cesses related to procedures and outcomes have been made in the
reviewed papers. Successes related to this category include: pro-
moting sustainable design, improving environmental performance,
highlighting priority development locations and areas that need
further improvement, facilitating stakeholder engagement and
improving transparency, informing decision making, improving
adoption rate, and expediting planning and decision making pro-
cesses. Among these, promoting sustainable design has been dis-
cussed in over 50 studies. There is a broad consensus that NSA tools
have done so by, among other things, stimulating discussion about
sustainability principles, enhancing stakeholder awareness of sus-
tainability principles, and improving market recognition of sus-
tainable design. Another promising point is that there is some
evidence suggesting that developments certified by NSA tools have
acceptable performance in terms of environmental sustainability.
Specifically, they have contributed to reducing VMT and improving
energy efficiency. However, more quantitative information on the
impacts of NSA tools is needed in order to gauge their success in
promoting environmental sustainability. In particular, although
mitigation of climate change is argued to be inherent in many in-
dicators of NSA tools, information on the magnitude of energy and
emissions savings is still missing (Benites et al., 2020; Charoenkit
and Kumar, 2014). This is partly because NSA tools do not require
reporting actual/potential contributions to energy/emissions sav-
ings. In addition, detailed performance data is often not disclosed,
and the final results are only presented in the form of rankings and
checklists. Therefore, further transparency in terms of performance
data is needed. Also, more research on the performance of certified
neighborhoods is needed to better understand their contributions
to achieving sustainability.
Despite this, the limited knowledge on the environmental
contributions that is reported in this paper shows that NSA can
provide major contributions. It is, therefore, hoped that more up-
take of NSA tools can contribute to achieving environmental sus-
tainability targets. It would also facilitate doing more research on
the real-world impacts of NSA tools. It was discussed that taking
measures such as providing uptake incentives, improving market
recognition, and securing government support can lead to better
uptake of the tools. Unlike the environmental dimension, limited
success related to other dimensions has been reported. This may
indicate that NSA tools have failed to make major socio-economic
contributions. Further studies on this should, however, be made
before jumping to conclusions.
Overall, this study shows that about two decades of research
10
Journal of Cleaner Production 293 (2021) 125912
and practice on NSA tools have provided considerable success. The
success factors highlighted in this study can inform development of
new tools and/or reform of existing ones. Communicating these
success factors to the stakeholders can also lead to further interest
and investment in NSA and sustainable neighborhood planning.
However, more research is needed to better understand the out-
comes of this movement. This review showed that reported evi-
dence is mainly related to some tools, namely LEED-ND, BREEAM
Communities, CASBEE-UD, and Green Star Communities. It is,
therefore, critical to further study other tools to obtain more
generalizable results. The fact that many developments have been
assessed using tools such as EcoQuartier, Environdevelopment,
SITES, Star Communities, and DGNB for Districts offers a good op-
portunity for further analysis of their outcomes. Other suggested
areas for future research are as follows:
 More research is needed to examine if and how regular updates
of NSA tools have resulted in structural and procedural
improvements;
 Better investigation of the co-benefits (of NSA standards) for
resilience, health, and climate change mitigation and adaptation
is needed.
In terms of methods, it should be mentioned that, in addition to
the systematic literature review, successes can also be explored
using other approaches such as detailed case studies of certified
projects and/or survey analyses involving developers and end-
users of certified projects. Such approaches are recommended as
they can provide additional insights. However, a major challenge
that may hinder conducting such research is the lack of access to
data on the detailed characteristics and performance (socio-eco-
nomic and environmental) of the assessed/certified projects. In this
regard, more transparent reporting of the assessment results is
essential. Finally, this study has only looked into success factors.
Failures and limitations of NSA tools should also be studied in the
future. Some major methodological limitations have been dis-
cussed in a recent study (Sharifi et al., 2021). However, more
research on other limitations is needed.
Declaration of competing interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing
financial interests or personal relationships that could have
appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary data to this article can be found online at
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.125912.
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