Vol.:(0123456789) Environment, Development and Sustainability (2024) 26:19177–19194 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-023-03463-y 1 3 REVIEW Measuring spatial configurations for spatial neighborhood sustainability assessment Mahsa Khatibi 1,2  · Khairul Anwar Mohamed Khaidzir 1  · Sharifah Salwa Syed Mahdzar 1  · Ayyoob Sharifi 3 Received: 20 March 2023 / Accepted: 5 June 2023 / Published online: 23 June 2023 © The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V. 2023 Abstract Neighborhood Sustainability Assessment (NSA) has become an important topic of interest in promoting sustainable cities. It is the suitable scale of a neighborhood that allows mean- ingful evaluation of social, economic, and environmental impacts. Also, a neighborhood’s representation of the link between the city and an individual further adds to its popularity. In an era of growing interest in socio-spatial measures for addressing sustainable neighbor- hoods, this paper explores the significance of measuring spatial configurations through the Space Syntax method for NSA. The study provides a bibliometric overview of Space Syn- tax research and a systematic literature search to review 13 research articles that use Space Syntax as part of the NSA. The review identifies integration and connectivity as the most frequently used metrics in NSA and finds that linking Space Syntax to neighborhoods’ sus- tainable development, especially environmental sustainability, is a newly emerging topic. Finally, the paper concludes with a discussion on the significance and limitations of Space Syntax as a spatial assessment method. Keywords Sustainability assessment · Neighborhood sustainability · Spatial configuration · Space syntax · Spatial assessment · Urban planning 1 Introduction The growing urban population and urbanization trends in many parts of the world pose a serious threat to achieving sustainable development goals. To overcome these chal- lenges, the development and usage of sustainability assessment tools have become a com- mon practice enabling local decision-makers to evaluate and benchmark the sustainabil- ity performance of regions, cities, neighborhoods, and buildings. Although the prominent * Mahsa Khatibi khatibi.mahsa@graduate.utm.my 1 Department of Architecture, Faculty of Built Environment and Surveying, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia 2 Architecture Department, Engineering Faculty, Herat University, Herat, Afghanistan 3 The IDEC Institute and Network for Education and Research on Peace and Sustainability (NERPS), Hiroshima University, Higashihiroshima, Japan