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A process-based approach is used to examine the deployment of two neighbourhood-scale sustainability assessment systems and their tools in two European cities. It explores how these sustainability assessment systems and their tools are contextualized within a larger design and planning process by considering how stakeholders collaborate, how they set design problems, how they make decisions and how they propose design solutions in the early design phases. Specifically, using interviews conducted with key project actors in Malmö, Sweden, and Barcelona, Spain, this paper examines how the sustainability assessment systems in each respective case study were framed, and how this framing impacted upon the design process. A key finding is that how sustainability assessment systems are framed has just as significant an impact as the nature of the tools, especially on the processes entailed. Community participation can have a strong, positive impact on the design process and on outcomes. The case studies confirm that context and players cannot be divorced from tools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The term ‘net-positive development’ has gained significant recognition by both academics and professionals, especially in architecture. A net-positive development increases or creates economic, social and ecological capital(s) and makes a positive contribution to ecosystem services. Designing how excess resources may be used beyond a site's boundary is a very appealing notion, but difficult to put into practice without the tools and methods to support net-positive development. The effectiveness and potential impact on community design of ‘net-positive development’ is questioned when its evaluation is limited to a quantitative analysis only. A broader definition of net positive is offered that equally places social dimensions alongside ecological health through ‘mining’ for synergies and leverage points in the early stages of a design project. An emphasis is placed on the undervalued first step in the design process of ‘mining: evaluating the dormant, inherent potential’. This can be done through a process of questioning the conventional parameters of a context's predefined limits. A framework is also provided that can prove beneficial at this phase. It is posited that strong mining can provide full-spectrum change where true positive benefits, on multiple scales and for multiple stakeholder interests, are achieved. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]