Formulating and Validating Sustainable Residential Area Indicators in Suburban Metropolitan Jakarta

Abstract

In today's empirical studies on sustainability, researchers still rely on the concept of "triple bottom lines" (economic, social, and environmental), which are influential in covering development issues. However, this concept has limitations for specific cases, such as regional, local, and sectoral levels. One sector that should adopt sustainability principles is the residential area in the suburban area. The academic discourse on sustainable residential area (SRA) is still requiring extensive research, especially on generating reliable and valid indicators. In the policy arena, particularly in Indonesia, an accurate indicator of measuring SRA is not available. Thus, this study intends to develop and validate the SRA indicators. The "citizen-led" approach was used in this study to observe 332 households spread in the cities of South Tangerang, Tangerang, Depok, and Bekasi. These cities are spatially located in the hinterland of Greater Jakarta. Households are divided into residential and non-residential area households. By extending into a literature review, this study develops 51 SRA indicators grouped into economic, social, environmental, infrastructure, technology, and governance parameters. Moreover, using structural equation modelling with a confirmatory factor analysis approach, this study generates 36 valid and reliable SRA indicators. This study provides that the model could be considered a structure and system that enhances the SRA.