Evaluating the Sustainable Development of Metropolitan Cities by the Analytic Hierarchy Process

The recent development of metropolitan cities, especially in Europe, requires an effective integrated management of city services, infrastructure, and communication networks at a metropolitan level. A preliminary step towards a proper organizational and management strategy of the metropolitan city is the analysis and benchmarking of the metropolitan areas through a set of indicators coherent with the overall sustainability objective of the metropolitan city. This paper proposes the use of the Analytic Hierarchy Process multicriteria decision making technique for application in the smart metropolitan city context, with the aim of analysing the sustainable development of energy, water and environmental systems, through a set of objective performance indicators. Specifically, the 35 indicators defined for the SDEWES (Sustainable Development of Energy, Water and Environment Systems) Index framework are used. The application of the approach to the real case study of four metropolitan areas (Bari, Bitonto, Mola, and Molfetta) in the city of Bari (Italy) shows its usefulness for the local government in benchmarking metropolitan areas and providing indications on how to formulate the sustainable development strategy of the metropolitan city.