Evaluating the Needs for Housing and Water in the UK's East Midlands

摘要

This paper is part of the Special Issue of European Environment devoted to the outputs of the EU SRDTOOLS project,1 which developed and applied a new model of regional sustainable development evaluation. The paper reviews the regional development objectives and strategy of the East Midlands region of the UK, in the context of strong pressure for new housing and limited freshwater supplies and wastewater treatment facilities. The various interactions between these issues are explored using the 'four-capital model' and the idea of critical thresholds, which were found to deliver more specific insights than other methodologies into the trade-offs that tend to arise between the various dimensions of sustainable development.