A Qualitative Approach Towards the Implementation of Urban Sustainability in Tehran

Sustainability as a predominant paradigm of 21st century, is adopted as the best approach to tackle the issues which threat the environment and people’s well-being. As cities in the world are places in which most of the population in the world settles, the best way of ensuring sustainability would be by observing a set of rules and regulations. There are various sets of urban regulations, rating systems, about sustainability in the globe with different names. In this article, six rating systems of ISCA, BREEAM, LEED-ND, CASBEE, Green star, DGNB were chosen to be evaluated. By this evaluation, one may determine their features as well as finding the most fitting rating system which can be employed to ameliorate present situation of Tehran which is a megalopolis and the capital of Iran. The rating systems were analyzed based on the ASTM E2432-17. The methodology selected for this research was qualitative since the research was exploratory, so structured interviewing applied to do so. Finally, the LEED-ND was recognized as the best rating system which is able to mitigate  unsustainable issues of Tehran. Consequently, related rules and regulations in Iranian legal system were investigated to find out if there is anything on which one can rely on implement urban sustainable development or prevent urban unsustainability. Although the comprehensive plan of Tehran can cover a lot of ground of LEED-ND, it is absolutely essential that parliament of Iran pass special acts supporting urban sustainable development, because the regulations passed by authorities other than parliament cannot give a full guarantee to implement urban sustainable development.