Existing Sustainability Assessment Tools used in Measuring Urban Spaces

It is projected that more than half of the world’s population currently reside in towns and urban cities. This can be seen as a result of urban growth, urban development alongside population explosion. This uncontrolled growth has resulted in the degradation of agricultural lands, urban congestion, drastic climatic change, various forms of pollution, and the creation of slums/urban sprawl. The application of sustainability theories in the design of urban spaces emphasises how spaces should be built with sustainability and resilient principles throughout the whole life cycle from design/planning, construction and operation of cities to achieve a better quality of life. This has led to the development of sustainability assessment tools which are broadly defined as processes that direct the planning and decision-making process towards achieving sustainable development with the use of a selected set of indicators. This paper presents an overview of the current existing sustainability tool used in measuring the level of sustainability achieved within urban spaces in developing countries. The result shows the need to develop a robust assessment tool as current assessment tools do not comprise of most pressing indicators