Priorización de indicadores urbanos locales para la planificación de barrios sostenibles en la ciudad de Cuenca

Abstract

The consideration of local contexts in the evaluation of urban sustainability is important to contribute to the planning of sustainable cities, since it is transcendental to distinguish from the beginning the most urgent problems to be addressed in the city. In relation to this, the present research proposes to prioritize and weight sustainable urban indicators that respond to needs of Cuenca’s neighborhoods, through the application of the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) method, which through the consultation of a group of professionals with experience in the planning and development of Cuenca allowed obtaining objective, critical and reliable results. The results indicate that the three categories with the highest priority to be addressed in the city are “Ecology, land use and occupation”, “Infrastructure and facilities” and “Transportation and mobility” with high scores of 22.20%, 20.30% and 17.90%, respectively. These criteria reflect the current challenges facing the city and must be carefully connected and integrated to curb the accelerated urban sprawl that Cuenca is experiencing, the problems concerning mobility, and effectively reduce the demand and consumption of resources in urban environments. The research concludes with a framework of weighted indicators to guide the planning of new urban projects or facilitate the evaluation of existing ones on their way to sustainability and to support the identification and creation of sustainable urban policies at the local level that can be extended to more complex contexts.