1 2 0 1 1 The Significance of Applying Strategic Environmental Assessment to Neighborhood Scale Planning Planning Strategy for Sustainability Ayyoob Sharifi 1 and Akito Murayama 2 ___________________________________________________________________________ ABSTRACT Many scholars have emphasized on the importance of integration of impact assessment principles as ultimate means by which sustainable development can be achieved. Strategic environmental assessment (SEA) has been brought up as an initiative to among others, incorporate environmental/sustainability issues in strategic decision-making, improve the strategic action by making it clearer, more internally consistent, educate decision-makers about the environmental impacts of their decisions and equally important to involve the public or its representatives in the decision-making process. SEA provides a continuous source of environmental information throughout all the stages of decision-making and can incorporate sustainability principles throughout decision making: from policies, plans, and programs (PPPs) down to the level of projects. However, since its genesis, SEA has mainly focused on higher and larger scales of planning and development. In contrast the local and neighborhood scale and its importance on the way towards sustainability have been to a large extent overlooked. In fact starting from neighborhoods, planners can make faster progress towards sustainability than efforts spread across an entire city because there is a better context for public participation and considering the higher possibility of acquiring reliable data; it will be much easier to come up with more rational and appropriate alternatives for future development. In this paper, following a brief review of relevant literature, the problems that Japanese planning system is faced with and the potential of SEA to improve current system are discussed. Japan has a relatively long history of neighborhood associations and experience in practicing Machizukuri initiative as a way of introducing bottom-up approach into planning process and city management, and these factors can be an invaluable asset to the development of SEA in the neighborhood level with the aim of improving the willingness of citizens to cooperate; finding new ways of raising funds, time and support; setting more clear goals for assessment; utilizing wider methodological factors; and turning the roughly technocratic planning system into a more democratic one. KEYWORDS: Strategic Environmental Assessment, Neighborhood Planning, Sustainability, Machizukuri. 1 Ph.D. Candidate, Dept. of Environmental Engineering and Architecture, G. Sch. of Environmental Studies, Nagoya Univ. , Nagoya, Japan. Email: sharifi.ayyoob@a.mbox.nagoya-u.ac.jp 2 Associate Prof., Dept. of Environmental Engineering and Architecture, G. Sch. of Environmental Studies, Nagoya Univ. , Nagoya, Japan. Email: murayama@corot.nuac.nagoya-u.ac.jp 1.0 BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE The economic and social transformation of the twentieth century saw a dramatic increase in human population, economic activity and demand for natural resources. In particular, the end of World War II was followed by a marked acceleration in the scope, scale and intensity of human impacts on the environment [1]. Cities are the main centers of development in the world and fast urbanization has Sharifi, A.& Murayama, A., "The significance of applying strategic environmental assessment to neighborhood scale planning", Nishimura, Y.& Dimmer, C. (Eds.), The selected papers of the 11th international congress of Asian planning schools association, 2013, p.146-157