sustainability

Article
Developing Policy Scenarios for Sustainable Urban
Growth Management: A Delphi Approach
Sajida Perveen, Md. Kamruzzaman ID
and Tan Yigitcanlar * ID

School of Civil Engineering and Built Environment, Queensland University of Technology (QUT),
2 George Street, Brisbane, Queensland 4001, Australia; sajida.perveen@hdr.qut.edu.au (S.P.);
md.kamruzzaman@qut.edu.au (M.K.)
* Correspondence: tan.yigitcanlar@qut.edu.au; Tel.: +61-7-3138-2418

Received: 21 August 2017; Accepted: 29 September 2017; Published: 2 October 2017

Abstract: In many parts of the world, a rapid urbanization process is taking place at an unprecedented
scale, and its drastic impacts on societies and the environment are evident. To combat the externalities
of such rapid, and to a degree uncontrolled, development, many cities around the globe introduced
various urban growth management policies. However, policy making—to provide sustainable
outcomes, while generating growth opportunities—has been a daunting task for urban administrators.
To ease the task, scenario-based planning methods are introduced to produce alternative visions for
managing urban growth in sustainable ways by incorporating various socio-environmental issues.
However, even though modelling urban growth and associated impacts based on these scenarios
have emerged to strengthen and quantify the future of urban policies and related planning actions,
this process has a number of glitches. Major issues include the uncertainties associated with the
selection of suitable methods to generate scenarios, identify indicators to be used to assess scenarios,
evaluate scenarios to prioritize for policy formulation, and assess the impacts of policy scenarios.
This paper aims to address the challenge of developing suitable policy scenarios for sustainable
urban growth. As for the methodological approach, the study undertakes a thorough review of
the literature and current practices, and conducts a two-round Delphi survey—involving experts
from public, private and academic sectors specialized in the fields of urban planning, environmental
planning, social planning, transportation modelling, and economic development. The expert driven
policy scenarios are validated in a local context by comparing findings against the policy options as
proposed in the South East Queensland Regional Plan 2017 (Australia). The findings offer valuable
guidelines for planners, modellers, and policy makers in adopting suitable methods, indicators,
and policy priorities, and thus, easing the daunting task of generating sustainable policy solutions.

Keywords: sustainable urban development; urban growth management; policy scenarios;

scenario-based planning; sustainability indicators; Delphi method; regional plan; South East
Queensland; Australia

1. Introduction
This study focuses on addressing the research question of: How can alternative policy scenarios
for sustainable urban growth be developed? Urban areas are the most functional centres on the planet
earth [1,2]. Due to their functional diversity, sustainable management of urban growth is a major
challenge for urban planners and administrators. The complexity of urban ecology, social aspirations,
and economic concerns have never provided a perfect solution that may lead to a sustainable urban
growth policy [3]. Additionally, major environmental challenges such as climate change, resource
depletion and deterioration of biodiversity have made this desire more difficult to achieve [4,5].
Technological advancement has also contributed to increased environmental problems. For example,

Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787; doi:10.3390/su9101787 www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability

Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 2 of 27

air pollution is considered to be one of the major second-order consequences of combustion engine
motor vehicles [6], although these undesirable effects were not originally intended by the technological
advancement of the early 1900s [7]. As a response, sustainability science has emerged to deal
with these intricate issues of urban growth through an analysis of complex interactions of diverse
systems and providing ideas for sustainable societies accompanying technological advances [8–10].
Sustainable urban development is a contemporary paradigm to address the abovementioned challenges
to provide a way to achieve a desirable urban future. It is deliberated as improving the quality of life
in urban areas, including socio-ecological, institutional and economic components without draining
the natural resources [11].
Traditionally, master plans, land use allocation, and functional zoning were used as the main tools
for urban growth management [12]. Functional zones were used to prescribe land use characteristics
and economic functions of an area, while master plans were employed to locate the future functional
zone [3]. With the technological advancement, planners have adopted highly innovative and modern
methods to envisage urban growth plans and assess their effectiveness. Particularly with the use of
computers, modelling algorithms and big data processing have enabled urban planners to utilize such
methods effectively and efficiently to address future problems. However, questions still remain about
their reliability against uncertainties particularly when an analysis is focused on the sustainability
of urban growth. Urbanization process can produce both negative and positive outcomes in a
socio-environmental context. Urban growth management approaches to manage the urbanization
process may generate unexpected or unwanted and uncontrolled results, when approaches failed to
find a right balance between negative and positive effects of urbanization [13]. To identify sustainable
urban growth management solutions, it is of critical importance that planners and urban growth
managers are able to forecast and mitigate conflicts as well as prepare the cities for potential shocks.
Recently, scenario-based planning approaches have gained importance to deal with uncertainties
associated with economic, social, and environmental outcomes of urban growth. Researchers have
combined scenario-based planning approaches with urban growth models to simulate alternative
urban growth scenarios and to assess their impacts [14–18]. In contrast to the traditional planning
approaches, scenario-based planning is not merely a prediction; rather it is an imaginative explanation
of possible future images that might unfold by analysing past, present and future challenges [19,20].
Therefore, the scenario-based planning method is a remarkable progress towards the notion of
sustainable urban growth, as scenarios assist policy makers to select strategies via exploring alternative
futures, warn people about uncertainties, and help all parties in developing a sound vision [19,21].
However, even though modelling urban growth and associated impacts based on these scenarios
have emerged to strengthen and quantify the future of urban policies and related planning actions,
this process has a number of glitches. Major issues include the uncertainties associated with the
selection of suitable methods to scenario generation, identify indicators to be used to assess scenarios,
evaluate scenarios to prioritize for policy formulation, and assess the impacts of policy scenarios.
Previous works of the authors have contributed to solving the first two issues—scenario generation and
indicator selection process [18,22,23]. This paper aims to address the challenge of developing suitable
policy scenarios to steer sustainable urban growth. The findings of this research form critical evidence
base of what constitutes a sustainable urban growth management policy. The policies identified in
this study are not specific to any geographical location. Furthermore, the policies identified in this
study cover all three aspects of sustainability—i.e., social, economic and environment—and provide a
broad area of application. Therefore, researchers, planners, and policy makers can use the findings of
this study to evaluate the potential outcomes of alternative urban growth policies to select the most
suitable scenario for sustainable growth in different parts of the world. However, this research urges
to validate the suitability of the identified policy scenarios when applied in a particular context.
From an operational perspective, it is critical to proactively develop policies that would enable
growth management in a sustainable way rather than following a reactive approach [16]. A reactive
approach relies on historical data and trend analysis to generate growth management policies without
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 3 of 27

taking into account uncertainties and potential technological disruption [9,24]. Existing research
studies have also taken the policy measures as given and focused more on analysing their sustainability
outcomes rather than focusing on how to develop policy scenarios that would generate a sustainable
urban development [10,25–30]. This research is an attempt to address this research gap, and aims to
apply a systematic method for the generation of sustainable growth management policies, and their
validity in a local context namely, South East Queensland (Australia). Section 2 of the paper provides a
detailed review of the literature with an intention to identify a range of policy options that have been
used to manage urban growth in a sustainable manner. Section 3 outlines the methodological approach
employed to assess the suitability of policy scenarios for sustainable urban growth management.
Section 4 presents the evaluation results of the policy scenarios. Section 5 discusses the results in
operational terms, and concludes the paper by highlighting the key findings.

2. Literature Review

2.1. Sustainable Urban Development and Growth Management

Natural resources have been significantly compromised and degraded due to rapid
urbanization—i.e., increasing urban population, urban sprawl, and extending transportation networks
and industrialization. Therefore, the concept of sustainable urban development has been a prime
concern of policymaking and government to aware and mitigates the impacts of climate change due
to fast paced and irreversible urbanization [31,32]. Urban growth management has been defined in
many ways, but essentially it involves government’s actions to guide the location, quality, and timing
of development [33]. Urban growth management policies are frameworks or tools to manage urban
growth in a way to restrain its implication to natural areas and the environment [34]. These policies
can be regulatory or incentive oriented to manage urban development by using diverse strategies [35].
Land use zoning is a key method used for urban growth management [36]. Different urban growth
management plans have been practiced by local governments to guide land use allocations at
different scales, such as city, region and state levels [37]. However, growing concern about the
socio-environmental cost of urban growth in the 1960s and 1970s indicates a surge in anxiety about
the impacts of urbanization and importance of managing growth [35]. Such concerns are closely
linked to quality of life, environmental conservation, efficient urban form, urban revitalization,
transportation choices, and affordable housing [38]. Urban growth management policies that can lead
to the development of environmentally, economically, and sociality sustainable urban areas are key
topic of urban planners, policymakers, and scholars.
To overcome the weakness of traditional planning practices, alternative urban growth
management approaches are proposed [18]. These alternative approaches include: dispersed city
(continual low density suburban development) [39,40]; compact city (increased population density
within a central group of suburbs) [41]; fringe city (further growth predominantly on the fringe of
the city); corridor city (growth along linear transportation corridors originating from the central
business district) [42]; city cluster development (regional city cluster that consists of cities of different
sizes instead of one large city) [43]; and transit-oriented development (integrated amenities and
neighbourhood development within a walkable distance from public transport) [44]. Hence, various
policy instruments are available for policy makers and planners to manage the future urban growth.
However, sustainable urban growth policies require an in-depth understanding of the impacts of
current urban growth policies to prepare for and mitigate unexpected outcomes. Additionally, urban
growth management policies, to achieve sustainable development, require a holistic approach to
involve all stakeholders from relevant areas in the decision process, such as transportation, land-use,
environmental, and economic developments [45].
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 4 of 27

2.2. Indicators of Sustainable Urban Growth

Sustainable urban development concept was adopted by planners as an ideology or a development
philosophy as early as 1970s [13]. Since its formulation, the approaches for achieving sustainable
urban development aimed to incorporate environmental issues along with socioeconomic challenges in
growth management policies. To understand about the state of, or changes to, urban areas for achieving
sustainable urban development different sets of indicators, a number of frameworks and assessment
tools have been employed [11,46]. These urban sustainability assessment frameworks and indicators
were developed to better inform urban management policy formulation and decision-making processes.
Today, a wide range of indicators for monitoring sustainable urban development is in use across
the world, which varies according to their specific goal in different geographic locations [47–49].
Dur et al. [50,51] described an indicator as a parameter, or a value derived from parameters,
which points to, provides information about, describes the state of a phenomenon/environment/area.
An additional term composite indicator by definition refers to an aggregate metric derived from
a set of indicators. Composite indicators are based on a complex concept used to define a set of
multidimensional indicators by using mathematical and statistical tools.
During the last decade, researchers used various indicators and indices to analyse sustainable
urban growth. These indices included indicators such as: land use indicators [52]; transportation
indicators [25,53]; land-use and transport integration indicators [50]; environmental indicators [54,55];
and socioeconomic indicators [55–57]. Sustainability assessment indicators were employed as a tool
for analysing the urban growth impacts on environment and as policy formulating instrument to
identify way for achieving sustainable urban development [58]. Furthermore, sustainability assessment
indicators are increasingly being used as a key instrument to monitor the human-environment
interaction in the world. It provides valuable information to assess the performance of existing
economic, social and environmental policies [59]. In general, sustainability indicators and indices are
employed for four main purposes: (a) providing information about the current state of a phenomenon;
(b) supporting policy making; (c) monitoring the efficiency and impacts (or outcomes) of policies;
and (d) increasing awareness by providing information on environmental externalities of urban
development [60].

2.3. Scenario-Based Planning for Sustainable Urban Growth

The term “sustainability” has been integrated in a number of ways with the term “urban” since
early 1990s [10]. Few of the examples are “sustainable cities” [30], “sustainable urbanization” [61],
“urban sustainability” [62], “sustainable urban planning” [63], “sustainable urban form” [5],
and “sustainable urban development” [64,65]. Usually, these terms are interchangeably used in
the literature [10]. However, there are some important differences. For example, the term “sustainable
city” can be defined as a self-sufficient city that utilize the resources produced within the city
independently [66]. The term sustainable urban development refers to the mechanism to achieve urban
sustainability—i.e., urban sustainability is the desired development outcome [67]. Thus far, the terms
“sustainable urban development” and “sustainable urban growth” are both used as synonyms to
each other, as both terms refer to the same process. As described by Dizdaroglu and Yigitcanlar [68],
sustainability is a manifesto for destructive human activities. The concept of sustainability of urban
areas has led to the self-contradictory term sustainable urban development. Sustainability refers to
maintaining the existence of the ecosystem and its services, while also providing for human needs,
whereas, in contrast, urban development refers to any activity that improves the quality of life by
depleting natural resources and devastating natural areas [68,69]. Therefore, the sustainable urban
development concept is presumed as a solution to minimize the environmental externalities caused by
widespread urbanization on the ecosystem [69].
Scholars define sustainable urban growth as a process of integrated development of all subsystems
(i.e., economic, environmental, and social) of urban areas without compromising the wellbeing of
communities while reducing the pressure on natural resources [70,71]. However, sustainable urban
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 5 of 27

growth requires active involvement of all stakeholders affecting (or being affected by) urban growth
including policy planners. Thus, the ultimate aim of sustainable urban growth management is to
find a balance between environmental, economic, and social aspects of urban areas to minimize
negative impacts of fast paced urbanization on natural system. To achieve this aim, a holistic approach
is required—as discussed in Section 2.1. While there is substantial agreement about the theoretical
definition of sustainable urban growth, a major challenge is the conversion of the theory into a planning
policy or standard of urban growth management practices [26].
Institutions, urban planners and governments adopted various frameworks and assessment
tools to promote sustainable urban growth [46]. Sustainability indicators, composite indices and
integrated assessment models like multi-criteria analysis (MCA) are few examples of the tools used to
promote sustainable development [72]. Recently, scenario-based planning has gained considerable
importance as it facilitates the policy makers to foresee and mitigate the conflicts among urban
growth subsystems—i.e., environmental, economic, and social. In addition, scenario-based planning
let policy makers and governments to prepare for the uncertain future and prevent them for the
undesirable surprising outcomes of their urban planning policies [21,73–78]. Perveen et al. [18]
elaborated that scenario-based planning methods are the key instruments for urban planning because
planning policies are often undertaken for longer time spans—e.g., 10, 20, 50 years—and based on
present day assumptions of future conditions, and therefore, involve a great deal of uncertainty
to reach the policy goals. The conventional urban planning model—e.g., zoning of different land
uses—employs trend projection as an approach for future development, and therefore, lacks the ability
to take into account uncertainties associated with urban development. Among many challenges
to achieve sustainable urban growth, addressing the prospect socio-environmental issues required
participatory and community based planning. Consequently, researchers have used scenario-based
planning methods to produce alternative visions for managing urban growth in sustainable way by
incorporating the socio-environmental issues.
Scenario-based planning practices highlight that it is impossible to predict one future that would
be the reality because it is unknowable and human adoptions play a significant role in developing the
future. For these reasons, futurists do not practice a single scenario, but foresee several alternative
scenarios. Nonetheless, there are no set criteria for an ideal number of scenarios. Pillkahn [79] explained
that the number of scenarios can range between two to 10 according to the definition, aim and scope
of a project. Mostly, scenario-based planning practices rely on three to five scenarios to model the
impacts of urban growth [4,29,80–82]. Schwarz [83] indicated that a large number of scenarios have a
tendency to blur the differences between scenarios, and lose their meaningful distinctions as decision
tools. On the contrary, fewer scenarios are not proficient to apprehend the complexity and uncertainty
associated with future urban growth. Therefore, multiple scenarios are essential to understand the
information outlooks about uncertain and challenging transformation of futures.

2.4. Methods of Scenario-Building

Different techniques have been used to develop urban growth scenarios as shown in
Table 1 [16,84–86]. Urban growth scenarios generated through assumptions are generally based
on historical values and trends. An expert, or a group of experts, assuming a scenario can have
personal influence on the facts due to particular knowledge area, which can mislead the outcomes of
the scenario. More specifically, the past trend analysis method relies on temporal availability of data
and involves great efforts, time and investment due to dependency on past data. Other methods to
generate urban growth scenarios involved stakeholder consultation through working group meetings,
workshops and seminars. This method is helpful for both scenario generation and consensus building
because the selected stakeholders are knowledgeable on local context. However, such a method suffers
from external validity of the generated scenarios because of the narrow locally based perception of
stakeholders about sustainability issues. As a result, the outcome cannot be generalized given that
every context is different and the method is tailored to fit for unique situation [87,88]. In addition,
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 6 of 27

the method requires face-to-face interaction among the stakeholder groups which can result in overly
optimistic opinions with the possibility that the voice of minority groups could suppressed by
influential actors. Likewise, these practices require reasonable finance, time and effort to involve
a desired number of experts in the scenario generation process.
Delphi technique is defined as a systematic method for the solicitation and aggregation of
informed judgments from a group of experts on a particular subject [89]. It enables structured
communication among group of individuals allowing them, as a whole, to deal with a complex
problem in an effective way [90]. More specifically, urban growth management involves an engagement
of diverse actors and Delphi technique lends itself suitable for such engagement. It enables the
collaboration of a diverse group of experts through an iterative survey process as opposed to
face-to-face meetings. Susskind, McKearnan and Thomas-Larmer [88] emphasized that consensus
building exercise needs to be initiated by a facilitator or a group of facilitators in a position to
bring the key stakeholders together. In a Delphi process, a facilitator or coordination team designs
a questionnaire that is then sent to a group of selected experts. Thus, it facilitates involvement
of geographically dispersed experts in the process and brings external validity of the scenarios.
Furthermore, Delphi technique ensures the anonymity of experts, and therefore warrants that the
results are not biased due to dominance of a single group/individual. Participants in Delphi methods
feel more comfortable in sharing their opinions on uncertain issues in an anonymous form, which
leads to a higher response rate compared to other group communication methods, such as seminars,
workshops, and working/focus groups. Besides, the notion of what constitutes a sustainable urban
growth management policy has been a subject of extensive debate, which cannot be identified by a
precise analysis technique. The underlying objective of Delphi technique is to establish a consensus
among a number of experts. As opposed to relying on the judgment of one expert, the group consensus
is more credible approach due to aggregated weights and scores of different perspectives of experts [91].
With the advancement of computer-based communication technologies, Delphi technique offers
significant potential for enhancing consensus building. Obvious advantages include time savings and
increased convenience [92]. Despite the benefits, Delphi technique is criticized for its purely expert
driven approach often overlooking actors, who own a problem in a particular context [4].
In summary, none of the scenario generation methods can qualify all the criteria that need to be
met—i.e., resource efficient, unbiased, externally valid, and context sensitive. However, it is noted
that [93], keeping all other factors constant, if a quick and low budget synthesis is required and simple
expert consultation is employed, this is likely to be less reliable than using expert elicitation using the
Delphi method.

Table 1. Methods used to generate urban growth scenarios.

Methods Used Scenario Strengths Weaknesses References

Numbers
Based on assumption 2, 3 Simplicity Personal influence on [24,94,95]
facts due particular
knowledge area
Past trend analysis 3 No calibration required Temporal data [16]
dependency
Proposed by a group 3 Effective storytelling to make Overly optimistic [17]
of experts (expert the consequences of different predictions (bias)
opinion) alternatives policies
Stakeholder 3 Effective storytelling to make Require time [85]
consultation the consequences of different investment to involve
alternatives policies trained personals
Informed qualitative 3 Informed decision making Pure accuracy in [96]
ranking through pinpointing areas of
expert opinions future growth
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 7 of 27

Table 1. Cont.

Methods Used Scenario Strengths Weaknesses References

Numbers
Collaboration with 2 Successfully implemented in Personal’s Influence on [86]
the planning practice facts due to particular
department (expert knowledge area
opinion)
Delphi technique 3 Iterative process, involvement of Need time and efforts [97,98]
multidisciplinary stakeholders, to involve desire
anonymity (no bias) or influence number of experts
of an expert on the outcomes

2.5. Types of Scenario Planning

Scenario- based planning is the testing and application of different scenarios to come up with a
plan. It is a powerful way to deal with uncertainties of the future associated with urban growth, and has
been a common practice in recent years with technological advancements [99]. Researchers used
scenario typology to define various scenarios in different areas of application [100]. Scenario typology
is a classification of scenario practices on the basis of purpose, process of development and issues for
the different types of scenario methods. However, there does not exist a standard typology of scenario
planning and researchers often classified their types according to the objective of a given application.
Ducot and Lubben [101] identified three types of application: (a) exploratory or anticipatory (i.e.,
given the causes, what the effects are, or given the effects, what the causes could have been); (b) trend
or peripheral (not hypothetical—rely on estimation of scenario probabilities); and (c) descriptive or
normative (an ordered set of possible occurrence, irrespective of their desirability or undesirability).
Table 2 outlines these application types in different studies. The exploratory-descriptive type
has been most commonly applied in urban planning [101]. Bishop et al. [102], in contrast, has
outlined a typology of scenario planning approaches with eight classes: judgment, baseline/expected,
elaboration of fixed scenarios, event sequences, back-casting, dimensions of uncertainty, cross-impact
analysis, and modelling based scenarios. These classes have again been divided into 23 sub-classes.
Van Notten [100] has developed a series of typologies for three different themes of planning and
includes: (a) formulation of project goal: exploration vs. decision support; (b) process design: intuitive
vs. formal; and (c) scenario content: complex vs. simple. The first theme deals with project goal,
scenario’s objectives and requirement and can be divided into two—i.e., explorations and decision
support systems. Exploration scenarios contain awareness raising, the stimulations of creative thinking,
and gaining insight; on the other hand, decision support scenarios suggest concrete strategic options.
The second theme is a process design which is associated with the degree of quantitative and qualitative
data used, or the choice for stakeholder workshops, expert interviews, or desk research. It has two
dimensions—the intuitive approach, and the formal approach. The intuitive approach is qualitative
scenario development and considers scenarios as an art. Accordingly, the development of stories and
storylines are important. On the other hand, the latter is quantitative scenario development and uses
quantified knowledge and computer simulation. The third theme is scenario content. It addresses
the nature of variables and dynamics in a scenario, and how they interconnect. Complex scenarios
deal with an intricate web of causally related, interwoven, and elaborately arranged variables and
dynamics, while simple scenarios may be limited to the extrapolation of trends. Sometimes the latter
can deliver a stronger message than the former.
In summary, the numerous definitions of scenarios types are of necessarily vague and cannot
cover all of the characteristics involved in scenario practices. Literature also reveals that there is no
ideal typology, which is generally acceptable as better or no. Given the nature of this study, it is,
therefore, important to generate exploratory-descriptive scenarios to answer the research question
posed in the Introduction section—i.e., how can alternative policy scenarios for sustainable urban
growth be developed?
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 8 of 27

Table 2. Type of planning scenarios.

Name of Planning Scenarios Type of Scenario Citation

A contiguous new town development Exploratory or descriptive Jun and Hur [103]
A scenario with new towns (baseline) Exploratory or descriptive Jun [104]
One with no new towns (no-new-town scenario)
Employment decentralization scenarios Trend or peripheral Burke et al. [105]
Scenario-A (“nothing changed/trend” scenario) Exploratory or descriptive Feudo [94]
Scenario-B (TOD regional plan)
Scenario-C (discouraging car use)
Industrial decentralization Trend or peripheral Aysan, Demir, Altan and
Dokmeci [24]
Historical growth scenario (HU) Trend or peripheral Hua, Tang, Cui and Yin [16]
Regional and urban planning scenario (RUP)
Ecologically sustainable scenario (ES)
Scenario 1: Business as usual (S1) Exploratory or descriptive Plata-Rocha,
Crisis (S2) G¢mez-Delgado and
Innovation and sustainability (S3) Bosque-Sendra [17]
Business-as-usual (BAU) Based on assumptions Mittal, Dai and Shukla [95]
Low carbon scenario (LCS)
Baseline development, Exploratory or descriptive Tian and Qiao [85]
Rapid development
Green land protection

3. Materials and Methods

This research applied Delphi as a preferred method for the validation and evaluation of policy
scenarios. The procedure applied in this research is outlined in the following subsections.

3.1. Delphi Survey Questionnaire Development

In total, 19 policy scenarios under three groups (environmental, economic, and balanced) were
selected from the literature based on their relevance to sustainable urban growth management.
The selected policies were transformed into a web-based questionnaire using an online survey tool
(Key Survey). The questionnaire consisted of a question for each of the selected 19 policy scenarios
under three groups (environmental, economic, and balanced) as listed in Table 3.
The questionnaire was designed in a way so that relevant experts can provide an importance
rating for each of the policy scenarios on a 5-point Likert scale (1, least important to 5, most important).
The Likert scale method was applied for importance rating based on the literature [89,98,106].
Experts were also given option to suggest additional policy scenarios they feel are important but not
included in the original questionnaire. The questionnaire was pilot-tested by three local experts for
clarity and consistency, and then updated as per their advice. Necessary ethical clearance was obtained
from a relevant Human Research Ethics Committee prior to conducting the Delphi survey.
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 9 of 27

Table 3. List of policy scenarios identified from the literature for expert evaluation.

Scenario A: Environment Focused Scenario

(1) Reducing greenhouse gas emission by 5–15% below emission levels as of now in the next 30 years
(2) Reducing natural resource consumption (planning to promote neighbourhood accessibility to reduce the
automobile usage)
(3) Conserving green areas, agriculture land, natural landscapes, wild life areas, heritage places and
archaeological sites
(4) Avoid high risk development in flood zones
(5) Development away from the coast due to increased intensity of storm tides
(6) No development in the bushfire prone areas
(7) Preservation of habitat loss and environmentally sensitive areas (coastal, estuarine, riverine and
hinterland)
Scenario B: Economy Focused Scenario
(8) Monocentric development, increased accessibility and reduction of commuting time and cost in future
(9) Development on peripheral regions (dispersed urban growth)
(10) Fast paced development to accommodate demand for housing, infrastructure and services such as health,
education, electricity, water and other utilities
(11) Development of areas for agriculture industry
(12) Development of new commercial and employment centres to accommodate increasing population
(13) Development of socio-economically vulnerable areas
Scenario C: Balanced Scenario (Balanced Environmental and Economic Gains)
(14) Development in rural areas to reduce the gap between urban wealth and rural poverty (substantial
reduction in rural–urban migration due to economic incentives)
(15) Afforestation specially near industrialized areas and increase in agricultural productivity to decrease
greenhouse gas effects
(16) Sustainable scale of economic activity within the ecological life-support system
(17) Less energy-intensive and efficient public transport systems with low fares to demote private car
usage—this substantially decreases the use of natural resources and emission of greenhouse gas
(18) Selection of priorities listed above in “Scenario A: Environment focused scenario”, which support the
self-contained economic activities
(19) Selection of priorities listed above in “Scenario B: Economy focused scenario”, which support
environmental improvements

3.2. Identification of Experts for the Delphi Study

Identification of relevant experts is a critical task in a Delphi survey to grab the broad cross-sectoral
perspective on the importance of urban growth policies. Previous studies have explicitly emphasized
integrating a diverse set of viewpoints in scenario development to prevent misleading consensus
among a like-minded group of experts [107]. Similarly, the reliability of survey results relies on their
knowledge and experience. Involving experts with different cognitive and functional backgrounds in
evaluating strategic issues could be a way to increase ambivalence in perceptions about strategic issues.
Therefore, an expert identification approach was developed with the following three pronged criteria:

• Relevant experience and expertise measured in terms of their years of experience;

• Geographical diversity for external validity of the selected policies; and
• Sectoral diversity given that the policies cover a wide range of sectors.

A thorough review of professional profiles was undertaken to prepare a list of over 100 experts
from the following academic and professional disciplines:

• Urban planning;
• Transportation;
• Economic development;
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 10 of 27

• Environment; and
• Social development.

The prevalent groups of panellists (24.1% each) were academics and urban planning practitioners,
followed by transportation planners (20.7%) and environmental scientists (13.8%). A lower
representation of economists (10.3%) and social planners (6.9%) was probably due to their
understanding that the topic is not directly linked to their area of expertise. Spatially, the panellists
were based in Australia (31%), Asia (24.1%), Europe (20.7%), USA (10.3%), and Africa (13.8%).
From a geographically dispersed and multidisciplinary expert’s panel, the outcome of Delphi survey
was improved due to fair collection of information and opinions from all regions of the world.
Significantly, a higher rate of expert’s participation from different spatial regions with diverse expertise
and knowledge provided a valuable input and critical insight in the policy selection process.

3.3. The Delphi Method

Delphi survey was executed in two rounds. In the first round, focus was given to the
experts’ consensus on the importance and validity of the selected 19 policy scenarios under three
groups; whereas, the second round was conducted to seek further opinion on their importance rating
and then ultimately to reach a consensus. Feedback on the rating scores from the first round was
provided to the experts for evaluation in Round 2.

3.3.1. Delphi Round 1

Experts were invited through emails for participation in the survey during October to December
2016. Reminders were sent to the invited experts to accomplish the survey process twice.
Initial participation agreement was 35%; however, finally, 29 experts submitted their complete response
within time. Table 4 presents a comparison of sample size in previous studies using a similar Delphi
survey approach.

Table 4. Sample sizes used in Delphi surveys.

References Field of Study Round 1 Round 2

Sample Sample
Size Size
Hemphill, McGreal and Berry [92] Sustainable urban growth 19 19
Spickermann, Grienitz and von der Gracht [107] Urban planning 57 39
Hayati et al. [108] Land use and transportation 9 9
Cavalli-Sforza and Ortolano [97] Land use and transportation 17 12
Manoliadis et al. [109] Urban sustainability 20 20
Cavalli-Sforza and Ortolano [97] Land use and transportation 30 30
Kaufmann [98] Land use scenarios 18 10

Four summary statistics were derived based on the importance rating of the policy scenarios from
Round 1 of the survey: median score, standard deviation (SD), interquartile range (IQR), and expected
probability of occurrence (EP). Median score was calculated to measure the central tendency of the
given ratings. The level of dispersion on rating was derived through SD and IQR in order to analyse
the collective judgments of respondents for each policy [110,111]. IQR is the absolute value of the
difference between the 75th and 25th percentiles and with smaller values indicating higher degrees
of agreement. A higher IQR score indicates a wide variance of opinion in positioning the ranked
items [112]. Likewise, a higher level of SD is associated with weaker agreement because of the high
distribution of scores around the mean. Conversely, a smaller SD demonstrates a stronger agreement
because responses will be clustered more closely around the mean [113]. An IQR value of 1 or less and
the standard deviation below 1.0 were considered as low dispersion level in the ratings based on the
literature [106,113,114]. Additionally, for analysing the feedback on Likert-type scale data, the use of
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 11 of 27

median is highly recommended in the literature for Delphi studies [29,97,106,111]. The median score
and EP were used to provide feedback on the level of consensus to the experts in Round 2. EP was
calculated to represent the frequency of responses on the scale of 0–100%—i.e., if 60% of experts rated
a policy as highly important, the calculated EP is 60% [115]. An EP of at least 50% on a scale 0–100% is
used as a standard measure for consensus level [89,111].

3.3.2. Delphi Round 2

Before executing second round of Delphi survey, the outcome of first round was analysed to
identify the policies that already reached consensus, and the policies that did not. A summary statistics
table showing the consensus level measured by median score and EP of occurrence from Round 1
was provided with each policy scenarios in the second round. A 50% cut-off point was set for the
consensus level based on the literature [111]. For example, if 50% experts rated a policy as highly
important, that policy was assumed to reach a consensus. Therefore, the questionnaire in the second
round contained only those policies that had not reached a consensus. Experts were asked to provide
their opinion on the statistical summary provided by asking the following question: “to what extent do
you agree or disagree with the scores” based on a 5-point Likert scale (1, strongly agree to 5, strongly
disagree). An email was sent to the 29 experts, who participated in Round 1 of the survey, requesting
to participate in Round 2 in February 2017. A reminder email was sent in March 2017. All 29 experts
completed the questionnaire in Round 2 by March 2017, yielding a 100% response rate. The responses
were analysed to identify consensus level in Round 2. Overall, it was felt that a third round of the
survey would not add to the understanding provided by the first two rounds and thus the survey
was concluded.
Although the responses were collected on a 5-point Likert scale in Round 2, these were recoded
into 3-point scale in order to create more meaningful categories based on the literature. The agree
and strongly agree categories were combined to obtain the percentage of agreement and the disagree
and strongly disagree categories were combined to obtain the percentage of disagreement [116,117].
The neutral category was retained as neutral. A combination of criteria was used for consensus
measurement in the Round 2. Consensus levels were denoted if the respondents were in agreement for
certain level as shown below and the score fell either in the agree or disagree range instead of neutral
(on a 3 point Likert scale) [89]:

• 50% agreement: less important;

• 60% agreement: moderately important;
• 70% agreement: important; and
• 80% agreement: highly important.

The need for the categorization for the policies were felt due to the diverse opinion for generating
urban growth scenarios overall and converging towards optimal opinion specifically to identify the
highly suitable policy scenarios for sustainable urban growth management.

3.4. Validation of the Generated Policy Scenarios

As indicated earlier, the generation of policy scenarios for sustainable urban growth management
through Delphi survey has certain advantages (e.g., external validity). However, an externally valid
scenario does not necessarily mean that this is valid in a local context where contextual norms and
preferences of local stakeholder might outweigh the experts’ knowledge. As a result, it was required to
test the applicability of the expert driven policy scenarios in local contexts. In this research, the South
East Queensland (SEQ) Region in Australia was selected to test the validity of the identified policy
scenarios. In particular, the growth management policies as proposed in the SEQ Regional Plan 2017
(Shaping SEQ) were compared against the policy scenarios as identified by the experts. This comparison
enables the research to identify whether the expert driven policy scenarios are a reality or rhetoric.
The SEQ Regional Plan 2017 was chosen for three reasons: (a) This the most recent plan published in
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 12 of 27

2017 which means that the plan was developed in parallel with the development of policy scenarios
for this research, and, therefore, the issues are contemporary in nature. (b) Similar to this research,
the SEQ Regional Plan has a regional focus rather than the city or local level. (c) The SEQ Regional Plan
has provided a greater emphasis to manage urban growth in a sustainable way over the next 25 years.
In particular, the plan focuses on responding to the region’s projected growth, and the opportunities
and challenges associated with global megatrends. With this plan Queensland Government sets the
direction for sustainability, global competitiveness, and high-quality living by identifying a long-term
sustainable pattern of development. This issue is further discussed in Section 4.4.

4. Results

4.1. Consensus in Round 1

The experts rated 19 policy scenarios under three groups—i.e., environmental, economic,
and balanced scenarios. Table 5 provides a summary of consensus level of the 19 policy scenarios
evaluated in this study. According to the consensus criteria used, Table 5 shows that no policy has
gained consensus in the first round of survey. However, out of 19 policies, there were nine policies
scored more than 40% of EP including two policies with 48.3% of EP score of being highly important,
thus, only less than two per cent away from consensus level as listed below:

• Monocentric development, increased accessibility and reduction of commuting time and cost in
future; and
• Less energy-intensive and efficient public transport systems with low fares to demote private car
usage—this substantially decreases the use of natural resources and emission of greenhouse gas.

The results of the first round of the survey validate the usefulness of iterative Delphi technique
in scenario planning for urban growth management. The diverse nature of experts’ opinion and
expectations from future urban growth make it difficult to get an effective and optimal opinion.
Successive round of information, hence, reaches every panel member, so that the opinions can be
retracted, altered with the provided feedback.
As requested in the questionnaire, experts have suggested some policy strategies to include.
The suggested strategies were examined for inclusion in this research. However, we found that the
essence of many of these suggested policies were already included in Round 1. In addition, some of
the suggestions were not directly linked to urban growth management but broadly related to regional
level analysis. Hence, these suggestions did not provide any new insight to the objective of this study
and were not included in the second round of the Delphi survey.

Table 5. Round 1 rating results of importance of policies for sustainable urban growth.

Focus Scenario Med IQR SD EP

Reducing greenhouse gas emission by 5–15% below
4 1.5 0.9 31
emission levels as of now in the next 30 years
Reducing natural resource consumption (planning to
promote neighbourhood accessibility to reduce the 4 2 1.1 38
automobile usage)
Conserving green areas, agriculture land, natural
Environment landscapes, wild life areas, heritage places and 4 2 1 31
Focused Scenario archaeological sites
Avoid high risk development in flood zones 4 1 0.8 45
Development away from the coast due to increased
3 1 1.1 41
intensity of storm tides
No development in the bushfire prone areas 3 1 1.1 28
Preservation of environmentally sensitive areas (coastal,
4 1 0.7 45
estuarine, riverine and hinterland)
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 13 of 27

Table 5. Cont.

Focus Scenario Med IQR SD EP

Monocentric development, increased accessibility and
4 1.5 1 48
reduction of commuting time and cost in future
Development on peripheral regions (dispersed urban
4 1.5 1.1 34
growth)
Fast paced development to accommodate demand for
Economy Focused housing, infrastructure and services such as health, 4 1 0.8 48
Scenario education, electricity, water and other utilities
Development of areas for agriculture industry 3 2 1.1 34
Development of new commercial and employment
4 1 1 45
centres to accommodate increasing population
Development of socio-economically vulnerable areas 4 1.5 1.1 41
Development in rural areas to reduce the gap between
urban wealth and rural poverty (substantial reduction in 3 2 1.2 34
rural–urban migration due to economic incentives)
Afforestation specially near industrialized areas and
increase in agricultural productivity to decrease 4 1.5 1.2 38
greenhouse gas effects
Sustainable scale of economic activity within the
4 1.5 1.1 34
ecological life-support system

Balanced Scenario Less energy-intensive and efficient public transport

systems with low fares to demote private car
4 1.5 1 45
usage—this substantially decreases the use of natural
resources and emission of greenhouse gases
Selection of priorities listed above in “Scenario A:
Environment focused scenario”, which support the 4 1 1 41
self-contained economic activities
Selection of priorities listed above in “Scenario B:
Economy focused scenario”, which support 4 2 1.2 28
environmental improvements
Note: EP = expected probability of occurrence, SD = standard deviation, IQR = inter quartile range, Med = median.

4.2. Consensus in Round 2

Table 6 illustrates the results from Round 2 of the survey for each policy strategies. Overall, all
policy scenarios for sustainable urban growth management have gained consensus among the experts
according to the defined criteria. However, out of 19 policies, two of them gained consensus as highly
important, seven as important, seven as moderately important, and three as less important.
The policies that reached consensus as highly important among the experts in Round 2 are:

• Avoid high risk development in flood zones; and

• Development of new commercial and employment centres to accommodate increasing population.

Both of the above policies were also reached a reasonable level of agreement in the first round
of the survey—i.e., 45% of the experts rated both policies as highly important in first round too.
The results from both rounds show that there was strong agreement among the experts on these two
policies so that this could be termed as “critical policies for achieving sustainable urban growth”.
However, a higher level of consensus cut-off point (80% agreement) for highly important policy
scenarios results in less number of strategies (10.5%). Furthermore, seven policies (36.8%) gained
consensus as “important” are:

• Fast paced development to accommodate demand for housing infrastructure and services such as
health, education, electricity, water and other utilities;
• Sustainable scale of economic activity within the ecological life-support system;
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 14 of 27

• Less energy-intensive and efficient public transport systems with low fares to demote private car
usage—this substantially decreases the use of natural resources and emission of greenhouse gas;
• Selection of priorities listed above in “Scenario A: Environment focused scenario”, which support
the self-contained economic activities reducing greenhouse gas emission by 5–15% below emission
levels as of now in the next 30 years;
• Reducing natural resource consumption—planning to promote neighbourhood accessibility to
reduce the automobile usage; and
• Preservation of environmentally sensitive areas—coastal estuarine, riverine and hinterland.

An aggregated analysis of consensus level from both rounds is elaborated in the following section
to policy scenarios that would lead sustainable urban growth management.

Table 6. Round 2 consensus agreement results of the importance of policies for urban growth.

Focus Scenario Disagree Neutral Agree Consensus

Reducing greenhouse gas emission by 5–15% below
14 7 79 Important
emission levels as of now in the next 30 years
Reducing natural resource consumption (planning to
promote neighbourhood accessibility to reduce the 14 7 79 Important
automobile usage)
Conserving green areas, agriculture land, natural
Environment Moderately
landscapes, wild life areas, heritage places and 7 28 66
Focused important
archaeological sites
Scenario
Highly
Avoid high risk development in flood zones 0 7 93
important
Development away from the coast due to increased Moderately
3 34 62
intensity of storm tides important
No development in the bushfire prone areas 0 32 68 Important
Preservation of environmentally sensitive areas (coastal Moderately
3 17 79
estuarine, riverine and hinterland) important
Monocentric development, increased accessibility and
7 28 66 Important
Economy reduction of commuting time and cost in future
Focused Development on peripheral regions (dispersed urban Less
Scenario 17 31 52
growth) important
Fast paced development to accommodate demand for
Highly
housing infrastructure and services such as health, 7 21 71
important
education, electricity, water and other utilities
Less
Development of areas for agriculture industry 4 41 56
important
Development of new commercial and employment Moderately
0 14 86
centres to accommodate increasing population important
Less
Development of socio-economically vulnerable areas 24 17 59
important
Development in rural areas to reduce the gap between
Moderately
urban wealth and rural poverty (substantial reduction in 14 24 62
important
rural–urban migration due to economic incentives)
Afforestation especially near industrialized areas and
Moderately
increase in agricultural productivity to decrease 7 25 68
important
Balanced greenhouse gas effects
Scenario Sustainable scale of economic activity within the
4 25 71 Important
ecological life-support system
Less energy-intensive and efficient public transport
systems with low fares to demote private car
7 21 72 Important
usage—this substantially decreases the use of natural
resources and emission of greenhouse gas
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 15 of 27

Table 6. Cont.

Focus Scenario Disagree Neutral Agree Consensus

Selection of priorities listed above in “Scenario A:
Environment focused scenario” which support the 3 24 72 Important
self-contained economic activities
Selection of priorities listed above in “Scenario B:
Moderately
Economy focused scenario” which support 0 33 67
important
environmental improvements

4.3. Scenario Alternatives

There are 19 key policy scenarios under the three groups are proposed in this study. The scenario
generation process has involved identification (through literature review) and verification (through
Delphi survey) of the policy scenarios according to their relevance to the sustainable urban growth
management. Based on the aggregated results from both rounds of the Delphi survey, following
alternative scenarios are outlined.

4.3.1. Scenario A: Environment Focused Scenario

This scenario takes into account various environmental concerns, which need to be incorporated
at policy level when planning to manage future urban growth. The environment focused scenario
aims to create an urban area that will be more sensitive to the environment. The following policies
under environmental focused scenario are identified based on the established consensus of this study.

• Avoid high risk development in flood zones;

• Reducing greenhouse gas emission by 5–15% below emission levels as of now in the next 30 years;
• Reducing natural resource consumption (planning to promote neighbourhood accessibility to
reduce the automobile usage); and
• Preservation of environmentally sensitive areas (coastal estuarine, riverine and hinterland).

The identified policies as mentioned above highlight the environmental concerns. Fast paced
urbanization in vulnerable areas along the coastal creeks and rivers is causing significant damage to the
population and infrastructure due to floods [58,118,119]. Furthermore, urbanization processes always
lead to the consumption of natural resources and the result of which is the emission of greenhouse
gases [4,70,120]. The policies verified in this study as important, including the reduction of greenhouse
gas emission and reduction of natural resource consumption, have been widely discussed in the
literature because they have the potential to reduce climate change and to avoid resource depletion
by using reusable resources [4,120]. Besides, underpinning to these activities must be to preserve the
environmentally sensitive areas from further loss, as well as incorporating ways to address mitigation.
The protection of environmentally sensitive areas would help to maintain the biological integrity of
the urban areas for achieving sustainable development [121–123].

4.3.2. Scenario B: Economy Focused Scenario

This scenario takes into account various economic concerns, which need to be incorporated at
policy level when managing future urban growth. This scenario aims to create an urban area that will
be more sensitive to the economic development. Following are the list of policy scenarios that were
verified by the experts as “important” and “highly important” to address the economic challenges in
order to manage urban growth.

• Development of new commercial and employment centres to accommodate increasing

population; and
• Fast paced development to accommodate demand for housing infrastructure and services such as
health, education, electricity, water and other utilities.
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 16 of 27

Economically, urban areas in the world will continue to grow to deliver prosperity for its
residents and businesses [124]. Due to increasingly being driven by industrial demand, investment,
and population growth, urban region’s economy is changing into one of high value professional
services and niche manufacturing [3,118,119]. Development of new commercial and employment
centre in the growing urban areas away from the city centre will reduce the travel demand from these
areas to the core economic areas such as CBD. Furthermore, the stress on the existing facilities of
the cities can be minimizing if the need of housing and infrastructure demand fulfilled in efficient
way. This will not only reduce the disparity among different urban areas, but also improve the
economic growth of the overall region and reducing the maintenance cost of existing facilities due to
overutilization [3,7,118,119].
Therefore, the key policies identified in this study will help the economic growth of the urban
areas. Interestingly, the policies addressing environmental aspects under economic scenario were rated
less important for economic growth of the region as shown below:

• Development on peripheral regions (dispersed urban growth);

• Development of areas for agriculture industry; and
• Development of socio-economically vulnerable areas.

Knowingly, the involvement of experts representing diverse stakeholders of urban growth may
lead to conflict of interest on economic growth at the cost environmental impacts.

4.3.3. Scenario C: Balanced Scenario

This scenario provides a balanced approach. It highlights strategies for economic growth while
improving the environmental outcomes. Only the following three policies are identified as key policies
under the balanced scenario:

• Sustainable scale of economic activity within the ecological life-support system;

• Less energy-intensive and efficient public transport systems with low fares to demote private
car usage—this substantially decreases the use of natural resources and emission of greenhouse
gas; and
• Selection of priorities listed above in “Scenario A: Environment focused scenario”, which support
the self-contained economic activities.

The proposed key policies under balanced scenario are revealing a combination of ecological,
social, environmental and economic policies, which can help policy makers and urban growth
managers to mitigate the “already happened” scars on the environmental and socioeconomic aspects
of urban growth. Economic growth at one end promotes urban growth and on the hand, demotes
environment system. Moreover, economic growth is not a panacea for environmental problems;
indeed, it is not even the main issue. However, to deal with environmental externalities of urban
growth, policy makers need to modify the economic policies to meet the environmental challenges.
Therefore, such economic policies need to adapt to provide the right incentives for protecting the
resilience of ecological systems. This will enable humans to promote urban growth by assuring a
sustainable scale of economic activity within ecological life support systems [125–127].

4.4. Comparison of Policy Outcomes with South East Queensland Regional Plan
South East Queensland (SEQ) is the fastest-growing metropolitan region located in the State of
Queensland in Australia, and attracting on an average 55,000 immigrants each year [128]. SEQ has been
experiencing rapid urban growth over the last few decades. Historically, this region was characterized
by isolated, low-density urban developments with spatially uneven distribution of settlements and
industries. However, the dispersed urban growth causes loss of biodiversity, natural areas and
increased travel distances. Therefore, to sustain the rapid population growth in the SEQ region,
recently a strategic plan—i.e., Shaping SEQ: South East Queensland Regional Plan 2017 [129]—has
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 17 of 27

been developed to manage future urban growth in sustainable way. This plan is the latest edition of a
series of strategic development plans of the region that was first put into action in 2005. The findings
of this study were compared against the strategies identified in the SEQ Regional Plan to validate the
results and gain confidence for further analysis. As presented in Table 7, the policies identified through
a Delphi-based stakeholder’s consultation are also proposed in the SEQ Regional Plan to promote
sustainable urban growth. Although the study in hand was carried out a year before the legitimization
of the SEQ Regional Plan (based on non-Delphi based stakeholder consultation), the results are
validated as shown in Table 7. The similarities between policies identified in our study and the SEQ
Regional Plan indicate that through a Delphi approach policy scenarios for sustainable urban growth
management could be developed. However, these policies should be treated as rule of thumb or generic
policies, and sensitivity analysis and ground-truthing in their adoption to a locality is a necessity.

Table 7. Comparison of identified urban growth policies with SEQ Regional Plan.

Policies Identified through Delphi Method in the Policies Identified through Stakeholder Consultation in the
Reported Study SEQ Regional Plan 2017 [129]
Avoid high risk development in flood zones; Use disaster risk management planning, adaptation strategies
and avoidance of exposure to high-risk areas to minimize
SEQ’s vulnerability to climate change impacts.
Reducing greenhouse gas emission by 5–15% below Reduce greenhouse gas emissions by adopting patterns of
emission levels as of now in the next 30 years. urban development that reduce the need and distance to travel
and that encourage the use of active and public transport.
Reducing natural resource consumption (planning to Achieve a high-quality urban form that promotes a walkable
promote neighbourhood accessibility to reduce the urban environment within regional activity centres, to
automobile usage). encourage interaction and collaboration.
Plan for an increased range and mix of complementary activity,
including higher residential densities, in and adjoining those
centres with direct access to high frequency public transport
Preservation of environmentally sensitive areas Protect and sustainably manage the region’s catchments to
(coastal estuarine, riverine and hinterland). ensure the quality and quantity of water in our waterways,
aquifers, wetlands, estuaries, Moreton Bay and oceans meets
the needs of the environment, industry and community.
Development of new commercial and employment Plan for and support continued growth in population-serving
centres to accommodate increasing population. employment and traditional economic industries.
Fast paced development to accommodate demand for Ensure planning and delivery of land use and infrastructure
housing infrastructure and services such as health, for new communities, including major development areas, are
education, electricity, water and other utilities. integrated and sequenced, and deliver complete communities
in a timely manner.
Sustainable scale of economic activity within the Protect regional biodiversity values, and the ecological
ecological life-support system. processes that support them, from inappropriate development
Less energy-intensive and efficient public transport Extended and reliable high-frequency public transport
systems with low fares to demote private car connections to significantly improve accessibility and create
usage—this substantially decreases the use of natural more efficient and functional urban environments
resources and emission of greenhouse gas.
Selection of priorities listed above in “Scenario A: N/A
Environment focused scenario”, which support the
self-contained economic activities.

5. Findings and Discussion

Urbanization, presently, is unavoidable due to rapid population growth, increased demand of
economic gains and social aspiration for quality of life. As a result, in many cases biophysical, strategic
agricultural land and other ecologically sensitive areas are at high risk with magnified use of resources
and high level of greenhouse gas emissions. Subsequently, these challenges have made the urban
planners’ job harder, daunting, and of global significance to achieve a balance between environmental
quality and socioeconomic growth in urban areas. Research has indicated that effective urban growth
management policies have the ability to minimize problems linked with inevitable urban growth—such
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 18 of 27

as externalities on the environment, congestion, and longer commuting times [130]. The prevailing
problems linked with urban development across the world indicates the failure of existing planning
practices [19]. A lack of integration between the physical elements and environmental elements makes
it difficult to see the functions of urban system in a holistic manner. City planning practices have a
tendency towards short-term policy approaches for a speedy solution rather than long term future
vision. The limited collaboration of stakeholders and a lack of involvement of public and private
sectors is another reason of present day planning failures due to conflict of interests. The future of
urban development is not the exclusive interest of the government agencies and the urban planners.
Also a successful planning practice require the partnership among agencies, sectors and communities.
Therefore, as demonstrated in this study, the visioning of alternative futures of urban growth is critical
in order to manage urban growth in a sustainable way – i.e. to mitigate the environmental impacts of
urban growth [75].
Developing alternative scenarios for future urban growth requires holistic approaches. Neither a
conservative nor a luxurious planning policy can be a sustainable solution in current situation
of fast paced urbanization in highly competitive environment. In practice, sustainable urban
development is an interactive but at the same time a highly complex concept, which can never
be achieved in isolation [5,8–11,26,61–63,65,67,70,71,131]. Urban growth policies with optimistic and
balanced environmental, economic and social concerns are proven better choices in the literature.
However, polices are not universal truth which can be implemented without pragmatic understanding
of the local facts. Thorough consideration is required for identifying urban growth management
policies and future outcomes before any plan. In this regard, Delphi technique has been employed for
deliberating the identified policies in the form of consensus by sharing the knowledge of experts from
diversified fields but having a common interest in sustainable policy making [98,132–135].

5.1. Effectiveness of the Method

The study first identified a range of policy scenarios from the literature, and then used a two-round
Delphi survey to assess their suitability as urban growth management policies for sustainable
development. Findings of the study highlight the effectiveness of Delphi method for developing
alternative urban growth management policies through involving experts from different backgrounds
located all over the world. Delphi method’s particular strengths over the other methods includes
the ability to consult from distance to produce a higher number of response and higher quality of
ideas [136]. This study aimed to generate place-less urban growth scenarios, which is why the pooling
of expert knowledge from all over the world was deemed to be more useful in identifying sustainable
urban growth policies. As discussed in Section 2.4, scenarios are constructed by researchers and
experts from diverse backgrounds, often with stakeholders, resulting in the use of a large number
of approaches and techniques. These approaches and techniques have been systematized in several
ways, depending on the general purpose of the planning exercise [102]. The use of Delphi method to
generate urban growth scenario is supported by a vast literature, as shown in Table 2. A critical review
of the sustainability scenario design tools was conducted by Kishita et al. [137].
One good example is the study conducted by Kaufmann [98] that used Delphi method to identify a
number of urban growth management policies through stakeholder consultation to generate alternative
scenarios for the development of Dalmatia (Croatia) for the time frame of 2014–2031. The Delphi
method was also employed to assess the impacts of knowledge-based economic development practices
on the urban development in the case of Multimedia Super Corridor, Malaysia—in order to develop a
more accurate policy mechanism [138]. Likewise, Watkins [139] employed Delphi method to prioritized
regional urban growth strategies to generate urban growth scenarios for shaping the future of Northeast
Michigan (USA). Furthermore, Bailey et al. [140] demonstrated the usefulness of Delphi method to
create a large number of alternative scenarios (seven scenarios) through stakeholder’s consultation
from different sectors (i.e., political, economy, social, spatial planning, transport, energy and climate
change) in the Bristol region (UK). Consistent with the vast majority of the urban growth scenario
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 19 of 27

literature, the results of this study confirm that the involvement of relevant experts improve the
selection of urban growth policies for sustainable development [4].
Delphi technique encourages honest opinion which is free from peer group pressure [141].
However, extensive time commitment is needed to execute the Delphi survey, as used in this study,
took more than six months. Furthermore, the involvement of experts from different area of interests
was quite effort taking task, as not every “identified suitable expert” was ready to participate.
Therefore, the list of experts was revised many times to finally reach a reasonable number of suitable
experts willing to participate in this study. It is also recognized that lack of clarity by which consensus
may be defined and the resultant differing interpretations required extensive literature review for
careful and explicit decision-making for both i.e., consensus and analysis criteria.

5.2. Appropriateness of Scenarios

This study has illustrated the importance of considering the multiple future scenarios as
alternative instead of one predicted growth scenario. Three alternative futures are generated
in this study under environmental, economic and balanced scenarios that fulfil both criteria for
sustainable urban growth policy—i.e., alternative scenario development and stakeholder involvement.
The numbers of scenarios are appropriate for urban growth management studies as too less number
of scenarios offer no alternative visions Pillkahn [79]. Furthermore, too large numbers of scenarios
can blur the future visions, and create difficulty in data collection and analysis [83]. Further analysis
of the outcomes of these alternative futures will be done in a prospective study to select the most
desirable policy set for sustainable urban growth. The analysis of the outcomes of these alternative
scenarios will also help to eliminate the uncertain and unexpected future growth through formulating
effective policies [18]. As discussed in previous sections, scenarios are not and should not predict the
future outcome rather they draw possible alternatives of the future. Therefore, getting visions of the
alternative future is one of the important uses of scenarios [102,142]. Therefore, alternative scenarios
identified in this study question conventional views and theories and lead us to explore uncertainties
of future urban growth. Consequently, the identified scenarios will help policy makers to consider
alternative paths and expected risks for future urban growth.

5.3. Determination of Policies

Out of total 19 policies, 12 are verified as key policies under three groups to manage urban growth
in a sustainable way. Verified policy scenarios in this study are holistic and cover all critical aspects of
urban growth—economy, environment, and society [45]. However, at large, impression of the results
is slightly more inclined to environmental considerations over the economic ones. This is more likely
due to the universal nature of understanding of the conserving, preserving and protecting the natural
environment [4,125,143–146]. Moreover, human beings have more and more aware of the importance
of environment to people’s health and overall well-being. As discussed widely in the literature, to
archive the sustainable urban growth, a wide range of economic, social and environmental needs
must be all satisfied. Therefore, urban areas have to be developed under the policy that will not lead
to the depletion of natural resources [147]. The policies identified in this study support this theory
for promoting a balanced approach in promoting urban growth while preserving environmentally
sensitive areas [143].
Furthermore, the findings of this study both verify the suitability of Delphi technique and expose
the shortcomings of the technique. The survey was conducted successfully within a feasible timeframe,
using least labour and other resources (cost) applying a technologically advanced survey technique
(online tool), covering wide range of expert from across the world [113,114]. However, such diversity
results in a lack of consensus among the experts on the importance of policy scenarios. Even though,
the policy scenarios are valid internationally. Their relevance and validity in a local context remains
an issue which requires further validation of the policy scenarios using stakeholders (including those
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 20 of 27

who affect a policy decision and who are likely to be affected by a policy decision) drawn from a local
context [87,88].
Similar to many other exploratory studies, the study also has limitations, which may have
impacts on the findings. For instance, the number and fields of experts participated in the study
are major limiting factors. Although 29 professionals from diversified fields of expertise is an
acceptable figure, however, increased number with different combination of expertise may change the
findings. Moreover, experts might have a bias in their selection of policies due to their backgrounds.
Additionally, the method of policy consensus seeking approach is another area with different
techniques is reported in the literature may produce different outcomes. The policies identified
in this study are from expert’s views, which need ground-truthing and further analysis as planned
in the successive study. Furthermore, a list of 19 polices provided to experts for consensus might be
improved if suggestions were provided according to the objective of this study from the experts in
the first round of the survey. In our prospective studies, by focusing on the limitations, a final list of
policies for scenario development will be validated through using modelling frameworks for scenario
comparison in order to analyse the policy outcomes.
Lastly, the findings from this research reveal that various policies need to be implemented for a
sustainable urban development. However, it is not clear which of these policy scenarios would bring
the most positive outcomes. Our future research is planned to address this issue as well.

6. Conclusions
This research contributes to the knowledge by selecting and verifying a universal list of policy
scenarios for sustainable urban growth management. Initially, 19 policy scenarios were selected from
the literature. The suitability of these scenarios was tested through a two-round of Delphi survey
involving experts from five sectors (urban planning, transport planning, economic planning, social
planning, and environmental planning) from all over the world. The experts rated the importance
of the scenarios which were statistically analysed to identify key policy scenarios according to their
importance (highly important, important, moderately important, and less important). The findings,
therefore, offer valuable guidelines for planners, modellers, and policy makers in adopting suitable
policy priorities, and thus ease the daunting task of generating sustainable policy solutions. In this
research, the policy scenarios are classified under three themes: environment focused, economy
focused, and balanced between environment and economy. This thematic classification would also
enable practitioners to select the right set of policy scenarios according to their own priority setting
within a local context.
The identified policy scenarios are not meant to predict or forecasts, instead they are to
create visions for alternative outcomes. Therefore, the identified policies will be input to the
analysis/evaluation (second) part of this research to find out the most suitable policies with least
environmental externalities. Academia, business managers and policymakers can use the proposed
alternative urban growth scenarios for further analysis as an instrument to gain knowledge of the
future. Specifically, the proposed scenarios can assist in the sustainable urban growth management
through visioning of possible futures and making people aware of uncertainties in their decisions
in any region of the world despite of its geographical locations. The expert’s participated in this
study were selected from all over the world and thus represented the worldwide view of sustainable
urban future. The experts selected carefully in this research for stakeholder’s representation and
were not anonymous to the facilitator. However, the participants were anonymous to each other,
and therefore, the results are free from conflict of interest and dominance bias. The key policies
identified belong mainly to environmental concerns of urban development. Policies of “avoiding high
risk development in flood zones” and “sustainable scale of economic activity within the ecological
life-support system” should be considered as imperative in the process of urban growth management.
Additionally, the policy on “less energy-intensive and efficient public transport systems with low fares
to demote private car usage” can help substantially decreases the use of natural resources and emission
Sustainability 2017, 9, 1787 21 of 27

of greenhouse gas. Similar to these policies, “reducing environmental pollutions”, and “urban growth
policies for conserving environmentally sensitive areas” should be kept highly important in planning
future urban growth policies.
Many of the countries, facing rapidly growing urban population all over the world, are developing
strategies to achieve urban sustainability [104]. Cities have great impacts on people’s behaviours,
lifestyles, and resource consumption patterns. Therefore, a development that is sustainable is crucial
not only for increasing the liveability of cities, but also for mitigating the environmental problems.
Therefore, the concept of sustainable urban development is broadly linked with urban density, form,
design, amenities and infrastructure [144]. This research is based on the idea that we can shape
urban development principally by formulating sustainable urban growth policies—even though the
terms “sustainability” and “development” are contradicting and for many scholars “sustainable
development” is an oxymoron [105,106]. However, still the presented urban management and
development approach helps institutions and governments to initiate a thought process for wider
and successful implementation of the sustainability agenda, and, consequently, move us one step
closer to achieve more sustainable outcomes [145]. Particularly, utilisation of collaborative planning
methods [148] along with the presented approach would improve quality, reliability and performance
of scenario-based planning in achieving sustainable outcomes.

Acknowledgments: Authors wish to acknowledge the financial and in-kind support of Queensland University of
Technology and Australian Postgraduate Award (APA) Scholarship for the research upon which this paper is
based. Authors are also grateful to the anonymous reviewers for their time and constructive comments.
Author Contributions: This paper represents a result of teamwork. S.P., M.K. and T.Y. designed the research; S.P.
conducted the research; S.P. prepared the first draft of the manuscript; S.P., M.K., and T.Y. jointly finalized the
manuscript. All three authors read and approved the final paper.
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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