The objective of this dissertation is to determine if New Urbanism is a sustainable alternative to conventional neighborhood development patterns with the hypothesis that New Urbanism is a sustainable alternative. For this research, sustainability was defined as reducing the consumption of nonrenewable resources and encouraging the consumption of renewable resources through the physical design of an area. To test the thesis of this dissertation, New Urbanist neighborhoods in Maryland were evaluated by the author using the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for Neighborhood Development (LEED-ND) standards and the sustainable neighborhood principles, as developed by the author, to establish their sustainable attributes. In theory the principles of compact, mixed-use, mixed-income, walkability, as well as accessibility by various means of mass transportation, such as those supported by New Urbanism, suggest an alternative to conventional, low-density, single-use, automobile-dependent development patterns. However, the lack of empirical evidence to support this claim fails to expose New Urbanism as a sustainable alternative to low-density, automobile-dependent developments. By assessing the sustainability of New Urbanism through the LEED-ND standards and then the twelve sustainable neighborhood principles, the author was able to contribute to the literature gap by empirically establishing a relationship between the ideas of New Urbanism and sustainability.
The objective of this dissertation is to determine if New Urbanism is a sustainable alternative to conventional neighborhood development patterns with the hypothesis that New Urbanism is a sustainable alternative.