Smart neighbourhood: A TISM approach to reduce urban polarization for the sustainable development of smart cities

Purpose This paper aims to identify the key factors to design efficient, healthy and potentially economical neighbourhood places in the surroundings of smart cities to reduce the urban polarization for the sustainable urban development. Design/methodology/approach A two-stage methodology is followed. First, the key factors for neighbourhood are identified from literature studies. The selected factors are validated by sample t-tests. Second, the total interpretive structural modeling is used to interpret the complexity of relationships among various factors. Further, cross-impact matrix multiplication is applied for classification analysis to find the most driving factors for neighbourhood design. Findings The contribution of this research is to show hierarchical relationships among the various factors to design the neighbourhood places as smart from the perspectives of city planners and decision makers. Research limitations/implications The applicability of the research findings is limited to developing countries mainly where population is large and most of cities have high pressure on its infrastructure to fulfil the citizens' demands. Practical implications This paper will aid policymakers, city planners and government officials to design a sustainable smart city model in which smart neighbourhood would also be the potential solution to decrease pressure on a city's critical infrastructure especially in developing countries. Social implications A smart city could be considered as the centre point of smart initiatives to develop a place smart, and it should continue beyond the city boundaries to enhance the facilities, services, resources utilization and working environment in neighbourhood places also. Originality/value The study explores the various literature on neighbourhood planning and then link with smart city development as current need of urban development scenario. The authors propose a hierarchical relation framework to develop the neighbourhood places as smart places to meet the future demand of urbanization in developing countries like India.