Introduction
Sustainability can be perceived as ensuring continuity by addressing human beings’ actions and needs in an environmentally friendly and socioeconomically stable manner. It involves the use of natural resources with future spawns in mind. The process addresses the community’s current and future concerns for long-term supportable development without necessarily compromising future generations (Flint, 2016). The process goes beyond rationing resources as it takes pre-emptive steps not to affect the value and availability of a society’s assets. Arguably, the main goal of sustainable actions is to enhance the quality of life for a man regardless of the continent or country one resides.
In recent years, the topic of community development has seen an upsurge in discussions about sustainability. The considerations are deliberate efforts to factor in self-reliance within a community set-up. Additionally, these discussions seek to make states better places to live by thinking about the future needs of local and global communities. This paper seeks to explain what it means for a community to be sustainable in a general sense. Additionally, continuity will also be linked to environmental, economic, and social aspects.
Economic sustainability is about implementing economically sound policies that influence jobs in a specific and employability positively. It is keen on providing the business community with incentives to reduce the financial burden. Regarding social sustainability, members of the community must be aware of the legislated protective policies to curb pollution. It is also about maintaining access to essential resources without compromising the quality of life. Regarding environmental sustainability, businesses are to be regulated to prevent pollution and ensure they keep their carbon emissions low.
Land Use Planning
How people plan and develop the space within their community is critical in creating a vibrant, healthy community and sustainable infrastructure. A sustainable infrastructure preserves natural systems and requires an efficient plan that creates closer-knit neighborhoods and a sense of community within them (Rogerson, 2015). Accordingly, a smart growth approach to support more sustainable land-use planning decisions is encouraged. The approach suggests the implementation of high-density zones with diversity in regards to housing schemes, land usage, and integrated logistics solutions. Arguably, smart growth rejuvenates communities by creating healthy and progressive neighborhoods, boosting the quality of individual living, and presenting a new development model based on mixed-use, transportation networks, and pedestrian walk-ways.
Sustainable Transport
There is a need for sustainable transport within the community. A sustainable system of transport is affordable, accessible, environmentally friendly, and safe. Such an arrangement ensures that the team considers the impact of economic and social activities on the environment when evaluating transport activities. Barton (2018) argues that vehicle emission levels and fuel consumption, as well as congestion and safety, should be sustained into the indefinite future without harming future generations of humans throughout the world. As such, it is proposed that the strategy of Transport Demand Management (TDM) be adopted. Through TDM, members of the community will implement the shared-ride program. Besides, alternative fueled, fuel-efficient vehicles are recommended to help achieve pollution reduction and resource conservation objectives.
Benefits of Sustainable Development
The main reason for implementing sustainability is to reduce the impact of development on the environment. Sustainable development practice is eco-friendly; it reduces the over-use of resources and wastes emissions while limiting the damaging effects that human beings have on the environment. The appeal of green and sustainable living requires individual communities to lower or eliminate their carbon footprint to have a positive impact on the environment, thus ensuring continued usability.
Community members stand to enjoy reduced costs over time as the standard costs of operation will slowly decrease. This is attributed to the fact that less money will be used on restocking supplies as a significant percentage of the activities prompted by sustainability extend the shelf-life of the same supplies. The immediate consequence of reduced cost is communal financial independence and stability, thereby boosting the community economy.
Additionally, sustainable development will ensure better work-life trade-offs. The economic value and cost-effectiveness typically mean less strain on each household in the community (Rogerson, 2015). Necessities like energy, transportation, and housing are positively affected by sustainability as they become cheaper, therefore, there is less need for more use of resources to ensure quality. With fewer working hours, community commitments and involvement rates increase, thereby improving work-life trade-offs.
Conclusion
In conclusion, numerous things have to be considered when engaging on matters of sustainability. Whether this relates to the frugal use of the dwindling earth’s resources or otherwise does not matter. It can be stated that sustainability makes public services to be easily accessible to community members. The placement of public facilities like libraries and parks must factor in the distance. Additionally, through a shared-ride program, public transport systems should be made available to help the community members overcome access difficulties. TDM will help to reduce blockages caused by traffic, high consumer rates for services, crashes, and pollution by encouraging more efficient property use patterns. The community will sustainably develop when the suggested strategies for improving walking and cycling, supporting public transport use, and restricting automobile traffic are implemented.
References
Barton, H. (2018). Sustainable communities: the potential for eco-neighborhoods. Earthscan.
Flint, R. W. (2016). Practice of sustainable community development: A participatory framework for change. Springer.
Rogerson, R. J. (2015). Sustainable communities: Skills and learning for place making. University of Hertfordshire Press.