The study presented in this article adds to the body of research on the socio-cultural dimension of sustainable cities by looking at the efforts of the City of Freiburg, Germany to create neighborhoods that acknowledge the importance of the social dimension of sustainable development. The research in this article is centered on evaluating the social responses of living in Freiburg’s two recognized sustainable neighborhoods Rieselfeld and Vauban. The study focuses on the motivational factors that prompted todays residents of the two neighborhoods to move there in the first place, their level of satisfaction living there now, and their perceived social interactions and level of community engagement. Result show that satisfaction with living in a place and reinforcing its assets through social resiliency or livability can result in long-term community staying power. In general, there were few differences in preferences ratings of physical and social assets between the two communities. The levels of importance of social factors contributing to place satisfaction and staying power were not significantly different in both neighbor-hoods. Having a “cluster” of social factors present that were important to residents contributed significantly to place satisfaction. In fact, survey results showed that it was these social factors that were seen as more important to place satisfaction than the physical attributes of sustainable developments.

Climate change is one of the most salient challenges to society, both today and in the near future. Considering the complexity, uncertainties, and scale of possible global climate change (GCC) impacts, there is agreement that urban planning has the capacity to facilitate the development and implementation of adaptation as well as mitigation strategies. The land use planning system provides a framework to reduce greenhouse gas emissions considerably by addressing central issues such as community design, transportation networks and use, and increasing development density. Planning can also play an important role in impacting public behavior, thus slowing the pace of GCC and allowing the development and implementation of adaptation measurements. The purpose of this article is to examine the important role of the planning profession in developing and successfully implementing mitigation and adaptation strategies. There is a growing sense that planning will receive increasing attention as an important policy instrument for addressing both the causes and impacts of climate change. This work also supports the argument that climate action plans can be a vital instrument in confronting the challenges of climate change and that planners need to be more involved in the development and implementation process of such plans.