Sustainable Community and Neighbourhood

Sustainable Community

What is the sustainable community? According to the Institute for Sustainable Comunities, the term of "sustainable community" can be define as: 

"A sustainable community is one that is economically, environmentally, and socially healthy and resilient. It meets challenges through integrated solutions rather than through fragmented approaches that meet one of those goals at the expense of the others. And it takes a long-term perspective—one that's focused on both the present and future, well beyond the next budget or election cycle."

As a result, a sustainable community manages its human, natural, and financial resources to meet current needs while ensuring that adequate resources are equitably available for future generations. It seeks:

• A better quality of life for the whole community without compromising the well being of other communities.
• Healthy ecosystems.
• Effective governance supported by meaningful and broad-based citizen participation.
• Economic security.

Sustainable community can be equated to a "perfect society" where it can solve any problems that may happen if they follow the rule of this sustainable community. to create such a sustainable community is theoretically easy where we can suggest anything but good policies related to the sustainable issues. however, when it comes to the implementation, little are known about the success of this theory. 

The Government of the United Kingdom defines a sustainable community in its 2003 Sustainable Communities Plan: "Sustainable communities are places where people want to live and work, now and in the future. They meet the diverse needs of existing and future residents, are sensitive to their environment, and contribute to a high quality of life. They are safe and inclusive, well planned, built and run, and offer equality of opportunity and good services for all."

Existing patterns of urban and suburban development seriously impair our quality of life. The symptoms are: more congestion and air pollution resulting from our increased dependence on automobiles, the loss of precious open space, the need for costly improvements to roads and public services, the inequitable distribution of economic resources, and the loss of a sense of community. By drawing upon the best from the past and the present we can first, infill existing communities, and second, plan new communities that will more successfully serve the needs of those who live and work within them. 

In the context of Malaysia, I may found it is difficult to implement this policies at the moment. Malaysian, unlike any othe developing contries, still unaware about the importance of being sustainability in many aspects of life. They (including  me) may think that protect the environment and recycling is the sustainability, without knowing that is just the surface or the skin of the sustainable. For the sustainable community issue, as we live in multicultural environment, it is not an easy task to implement such an idea. It make takes along time for us to fully adapt the sustainable way in our community. 

It can be concluded that community development is an important aspect in the development of a country. Reflection on the future stability of the country has actually discovery through the current realities of the communities in our country. In order to meet the housing needs of an increasingly demand with the increasing number of the population, especially in urban and suburban areas , the multi-storey housing development is seen as the best solution. But negligence in fulfilling the quantity , the quality is sometimes at stake . Quality impairments including housing element will have implications for the development of the community in the area. Recommendations for improving sustainable community development in general and specifically in the area of community development planning studies that apply directly to each residential development in particular areas of high density housing to ensure the well being of the family unit and the community secure and protected for the survival of the community.

“We cannot hope to create a sustainable culture with any but sustainable souls.”

=)