Sustainable Framework for Waterfront Development in Penang, Malaysia

Tan, Daniel Ying Shin (2023) Sustainable Framework for Waterfront Development in Penang, Malaysia. Masters thesis, Tunku Abdul Rahman University of Management and Technology.

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Abstract

The interactions between human with land and water in realising economic dynamism and sustainability with vast diversity human usage and needs is a great challenge that often with the resultant of rising tensions among stakeholders and the users. It is established with various evidence that human needs water to survive and progress by witnessing the early civilisations around the world that morphed and prosper around waterfront. While the right to development is an absolute human right, along the development pathway should at least preserve or sustain the ecological systems for the future generations while maintaining the socio-economy balance. This research firmly positions its research on Penang and applying the mixed methods research methods to reveal the underlaying elements to examine the sustainable waterfront development goals that will benefit the stakeholders and users of Penang. The 17 United Nations Sustainable Developments goals are adopted for this research with the adaption of Ostrom’s socialecological system framework in producing a sustainable framework for waterfront development in Penang, Malaysia. The mixed methods used in this research was the quantitative approach that collects data from questionnaires surveys and qualitative approach covers interviews where the analysis point of interface converged the results producing a constructive good health, quality education and deserving a quality living place as a sustainable inference to address the land and water mixed application challenges in Penang. The targeted respondents comprise of the authority, developers, professionals, contractors, and the end-users (public) in Penang and or in relative to waterfront development with a targeted sample size of 250 respondents for quantitative and 10 interviewees for the qualitative approach. An estimated of 1118 invitations were distributed for the quantitative approach with 508 feedback and 12 successful interviewees from 14 invitations for the qualitative approach. Based on the obtained results, the validity of the mixed methods approach was proved, and an inclusive attention was introduced on the strategies and perspectives to overcome the land and water use challenges to enhance the sustainable waterfront development in Penang. Thus, the Sustainable Framework for Waterfront Development in Penang, Malaysia was introduced.