This study provides an interdisciplinary account determining how children and adolescents understand urban and architectural aspects of sustainable development. The concept of sustainability implies complex relations between ethical, economical, social, technical and other qualities of our environment. The concept is difficult to understand for children who lack the abilities of abstract reasoning and multi-dimensional thinking. A new measure of sustainability understanding was formed based on pictorial rather than textual format and was applied to a large sample of over 2000 participants aged 6-19 years. The results indicated that girls had higher levels of appreciation toward sustainability issues than boys. The results also showed that understanding of sustainability issues increased progressively with age, particularly with adolescents from urban environments. The findings are discussed in terms of cognitive changes in adolescence and their implications for educational policy.

This article addresses visual language in architecture and spatial disciplines, using it as a means of communicating and conveying information, knowledge and ideas about space that are permeated by their interdisciplinary character. We focus in particular on the transmission of messages between professionals and the general public, arguing that this process aids the long-term formation of a responsible and critical public, which is then able to take an active part in sustainable planning and design practices. The article highlights some findings of an empirical study of 245 people that tested the effectiveness of selected presentation techniques in communicating spatial messages to the general public and placing them in the framework of existing knowledge

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The rapid evolution of information and communications technologies has brought the potential held by urban analytics up to a higher level and thus promises more well-informed decisions, including advances in the assessment methodologies and monitoring based on existing data and its reuse. The paper provides an insight into an ongoing national research project examining the assessment methodologies and data integration for the purpose of monitoring the progress as regards sustainability and quality in urban environments. Specifically, we focus on the level of the neighbourhoods; by measuring the extent to which the built environment comprehends the required characteristics and configuration for efficiency, or contribute to quality living and sustainability. Current study covers the aspect of efficient mobility and connectivity, revealing the potential of the location-based data provided by mobile devices and associated infrastructures. While such data are widely recognised as a beneficial source of information in various fields and solid advances have been made in both analytics and modelling, little progresses has been seen in exploiting that potential as regards sustainability assessment tools. This study examines the viability of indicators addressing travel time reliability throughout the empirical testbed, exemplified by six strategic routes associated with three neighbourhoods in Ljubljana, Slovenia. The paper summarizes current progress of the study.   Received: 21 January 2021 / Accepted: 22 March 2021 / Published: 10 May 2021

The paper provide an insight into the research conducted by the University of Ljubljana, and the Urban institute of Slovenia committed to the assessment of the efficiency related to the management of local resources at the level of neighbourhoods. The reduction of energy consumption and energy efficient built environments are key objectives of many sustainability agendas which is followed by suitable assessment methods in urban analytics. However, there are two important hesitations occurring: first, traditional assessment methods that focus solely on the energy reduction and efficiency are often too narrow in their analysis and limited in their scope of impact. According to the recent advances in research worldwide, efforts solely related to reduction of energy consumption will unlikely lead to more responsive environments or rise the living quality. Thus, more comprehensive methodologies for assessing and monitoring the change and transformation in built environments shall be sought for to reach long-term sustainability. Second, to date, the majority of the evaluation methods - whether focusing to energy consumption or broader sustainability issues - are building- or household- oriented, thus systematically examining separate spatial and social entities, but neglecting the spaces between, the holistic aspect and the community aspect. The research develops structured evaluation model, where two main research pillars are addressed: 1) the development of the structured and modular system of indicators; and 2) the development of the methodology to interpret the resulting values. The paper presents first two stages of the research process and subjects the outcomes to the debate.

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This article proposes and formulates the visual urban vocabulary for tacit, intuitive, experiential, but none-the-less fast, plausible, generative, informative, sketch-like composition and visualization of urban stories. Through visual and socially ‘inherited’ clues, the authors explain the complexities of urban spaces, their elements, interrelations and cause–effect phenomena to expert and non-expert public alike. The rules, syntax and overall advantages of such a vocabulary are grounded in the existing linguistic, cognitive, psychological theories, visual sociology and theories of urban design, combined and supported by the authors’ own research into visualizations and tools for evaluating, understanding and presenting urban spaces. With many illustrations, the article demonstrates the use for – and the use of – generic urban stories in discussions about urbanity, urban environments, livable places, etc. and positions them into educational, research and participatory planning and commercial contexts.

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