ABSTRACT
As countries address the issue of increasing urban density while preserving the natural environment and improving the livability of their cities, it is important to evaluate progress being made and alignment to the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Post-Occupancy Evaluation (POE) is a method to assess the gap between expected or intended performance and the actual performance of a built work and can be used to support decision-making processes based on evidence data. The chapter focuses on assessing the environmental sustainability of neighborhoods through a POE approach performed on Hobsonville Point, Auckland, the largest master-planned residential “greenfield” development in New Zealand. Based on existing international guidelines and tools and previous successful national experiences, a guiding POE matrix was developed to assess the environmental performance of neighborhoods according to energy and land use, water management and conservation, ecology and habitat, and waste management and pollution control. The research highlights the interdependencies between the neighborhood and block scales and the influence of city-wide strategic planning. It also highlights the importance of goal setting together with a detailed set of assessment criteria to enable the outcomes to be measured against desirable performance levels on a short, medium, and long term.
