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The purpose of this paper we present a case study where the Swedish planning support system Citylab is applied to a Chinese case in Changzhou's Tianning District.

China's planning system is a vertical system based on policy development on the national level, policies which are to be implemented on local level. There is a gap between the ambitious central policies and the implementations on local levels. China is now exporting its planning model to other developing countries which makes it urgent to show examples of other strategies including more horizontal planning involving the public. The planning system in Sweden is based on a much more horizontal process. Therefore, the authors try to learn from Sweden's vertical planning system in the urban development environment of China.

A key message for policy makers in China is that systems like Citylab can play an important role in developing practical and scalable examples of more sustainable city districts. The paper concludes that a barrier for local sustainability planning in China is still lack of effective communication between local actors including the public.

The authors exemplified Changzhou Tianning District's practical exploration, thus proving the adapted Citylab method's practical operability. Based on the common problems faced by eco-city development in developing countries, the method framework of Citylab is applicable to other developing countries, with strong room for deduction and development.

The quality of city life and well being of city dwellers is central goal of urban planning approaches. Nevertheless, unsystematic and short-term planning approaches of cities have produced incomprehensible sprawl, which deteriorates social, economic and ecological sustainability of the city. The need to alleviate or remove these problems systematically for improving the social, ecological, spatial and economical components of the city is contemporary issue, though most of the planning systems do not yet explicitly address those issues of sustainability. This paper considers Urban planning as a key term as it has the capability to reveal the implications of land use strategies, policies and programmes for the social, economic and physical components of environment. In addition, all the traditional urban planning approaches have outlined to explore their soundness in the sustainable city planning, discuss the main approach followed for sustainable city planning, and outline emerging approach in both theory and sustainable city planning practice.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate Chinese municipal infrastructure management using urban landscape design smart technologies and to propose an adaptive approach to introduce the best policy and architectural sustainable planning in the country.

The topic of urban environment design is deemed significant as no universal model for the implementation of landscape design ideas in China have been proposed yet.

The study presents the authors' socioeconomic and socio-ecological vision of the strategies closely related to sustainable development concept. Besides, the paper provides a comparative analysis of the developed vision and other studies' approaches to determining Chinese cities' readiness for the implementation of smart services, architectural and territorial planning in conformity with the laws of nature. The study uncovered the main directions and residents' preferences for the introduction of urban environment design technologies in the cities of China for sustainable management of territories.

Step-by-step recommendations were developed for municipal infrastructure management. The article proposes directions for sustainable architectural planning and urban landscape design in compliance with the principle of harmonious human–nature coexistence and environmental safety.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the measures implemented under the spatial planning law of the Republic of Lithuania, along with various initiatives, to identify whether Lithuania is following the international trend of greening cities.

The authors’ analysis is based on an evaluation of the urban theory-based approach towards greening cities and adopting urban agriculture in Lithuania and legal regulations introduced by the Lithuanian government. The paper specifically analyses the legal requirements enshrined in Lithuanian law that are intended to encourage green infrastructure and urban agriculture in cities as part of the adoption of the principles of sustainable development. The paper focuses on Vilnius, the capital city of Lithuania, to gauge the extent to which the new regulations encourage urban greening and agriculture.

The authors’ reveals that Vilnius is lacking initiatives with regard to urban agriculture, while existing areas for urban agriculture are disappearing. This is happening despite the promising spatial planning reform in Lithuania, which introduced the principle of sustainable development into spatial planning regulations. This is a cause for concern and should lead to renewed calls for a coherent and ambitious approach to the greening of Vilnius and other cities in Lithuania. Furthermore, the lack of action shows that the vague wording used by the regulations does not actively encourage urban agriculture and even results in ignorance of its virtues. Therefore, more precise regulations on encouraging urban agriculture and greening of the cities should be introduced.

This paper is the first to analyse the extent to which the newly adopted principle of sustainable development in spatial planning could affect the greening of Lithuanian cities and encourage urban agriculture. The paper identifies the sequence of opening the meaning of the sustainable development principle in regular legal norms which encouraging the greening and indicates the lack of imperative norms to ensure the due implementation of sustainable development principle.

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate significant problems in the US' development pattern of regional automobile‐dependent sprawl and local growth management and to make suggestions about adopting a regional growth management model that might better provide for more sustainable development of the built environment.

This paper reviews trends in the USA and elsewhere to determine the negative effects of the current system of sprawl and the potential benefits of developing higher‐density urban centers. The paper also looks to models in some US cities and Europe to further analyze potential legal and political issues related to this type of regional sustainable development.

Unsustainable, automobile‐dependent regional sprawl is a result of local zoning, growth management, and parking programs and has negative effects both now and for the future. The result has been more time, money, and resources wasted in automobile transit instead of new planning models that would lead to a more sustainable and less automobile‐dependent future.

A metropolitan sustainable development governing framework for growth management in the twenty‐first century is essential for a sustainable future. This includes higher‐density urban centers, transit‐oriented development centers, and a change in public attitude away from “not in my back yard” thinking.

This paper provides the potential benefits of creating a metropolitan governing framework to identify and regulate “growth areas” in a region. It further demonstrates how linking these areas to regional transit planning will help achieve the development of higher‐density, mixed use, and intensive urban core job/housing areas where people could live, work, shop, and play without the use of the automobile.

This paper aims to propose an integrated urban planning framework to achieve sustainable urban development (SUD) in the Malaysian context.

In the course of developing this framework, this paper reviews the related literature and Malaysian policies, programs and plans.

The findings highlight the importance of developing an integrated urban planning framework with respect to the processes, content and outcomes to achieve SUD in the Malaysian context. Successful SUD planning should be participatory and based on building consensus. Moreover, the content of the plan should include economic growth, social inclusion and development and environmental protection components.

This study makes a valuable theoretical contribution to the SUD and urban planning literature by proposing an urban planning framework for the promotion of SUD. In addition, this study has a number of practical implications for the Government of Malaysia and local authorities aiming to facilitate SUD.

The paper aims to present a pedagogical model tailored to the development of key competences in the urban planning profession in post-socialist transitional countries that is based on the creation of an integrated platform for dialogue and the development of professional competences as part of the process, whereby students produce their final projects.

The pedagogical model is based on the principles of education for sustainable development and focuses on the establishment of a repeatable platform for dialogue between students and mentors, members of the mentoring team, the local community, external members of the consulting team of experts and foreign master’s degree programmes, in the process of producing students’ projects. The proposed method addresses several dimensions, including: the education of students, teachers, professionals and local experts, the establishment of a network for cooperation and collaboration and the delivery of practical and usable results.

The paper provides a comparative overview of the pedagogical model’s application in producing the final master’s degree projects of three generations of students, as well as its alignment with the needs of re-defining the role and reach of the profession of urban planner in an environment of post-socialist transition. The model was improved, enhanced and optimised through this process and then corroborated with its practical implementation.

The innovative pedagogical model comprises an instrument to enhance the professional capacities of all participants in the production of final master’s projects: academics, practitioners and future professionals/students, through discussions of topical issues, innovative modes of work and new professional responses grounded in the local context and tested by a broad range of stakeholders. It is of particular importance for countries in transition experiencing a shift in the paradigm of professional action, especially as the proposed pedagogical model establishes a problem-solving platform that surpasses academia.

This article aims to show the opportunity and benefits of linking territorial foresight tools to urban planning procedures. Additionally, it suggests ways to reinforce the scenario design method with more in‐depth analysis, without losing its qualitative nature and communication advantages.

These assumptions are tested in a scenario design exercise that explores the future evolution of the sustainable development paradigm and its implications in the Spanish urban development model.

Major findings are obtained on the feasibility of a systematic approach that provides anticipatory intelligence about future disruptive events that may affect the natural environment and the socioeconomic fabric of a given territory. In addition, the study confirms that foresight offers interesting opportunities for urban planners, such as anticipating changes, fostering participation and building networks, in contrast to its perception as a mere story‐telling technique that generates oversimplified visions without the backing of rigorous analysis.

In order to boost the perception of scenario design as an added value instrument for urban planners, three sets of implications – functional, parametric and spatial – are displayed to provide substantial information for policy makers.

The value of the present work lies in the synergy that can be generated between territorial foresight and urban planning, offering a great opportunity for policy makers to use futurists' output as input for urban planners' work.

Since sustainability is an optimization between physical (both natural and man-made), economic and social dimensions of development and conservation, plans, policies and applications in rapidly growing metropolises play a pivotal role for manifestation of this challenge. This article consists of three inter-related parts. First, core issues of a sustainable master plan are identified from a wide range of readings of the current literature. Second, as one of the most populated and rapidly growing metropolises of the world, Istanbul's master plans between 1980 and 2009 are evaluated in terms of their convenience to the core issues of sustainability. Finally in context of sustainability, the actual position of Istanbul is criticized on the basis of some additional qualitative and quantitative data. The above-mentioned core issues are: urban compactness, sustainable transportation, conservation of historical heritage, a clear balance between nature and man-made environments / permeability of the built environment (for natural corridors), protection of vulnerable natural assets, rehabilitation of natural ecosystems, natural resource management, a place-based economy, control of the population pressure over the environment, (low-income) housing, provision of social equity and cultural diversity. Consideration of these issues aids in analyzing the main policies of the three master plans (1980, 1995 and 2009) in context of sustainability on the one hand and picturing today's Istanbul, on the other. In fact the gap between planning and the actual situation is a characteristic problem for developing countries where illegal developments are almost legitimate. In these countries, planning also suffers from guiding development in sustainable terms due to lack of institutional capacity, participation and inadequate legal arrangements. In brief, this article focuses on the reasons and consequences of such a gap in the case of a rapidly growing metropolis.