Sustainable development by emphasizing on satisfying the current needs of the general public without threating their futures, alongside with taking the environment and future generations under consideration, has become one of the prominent issues in different societies. Therefore, identifying and prioritizing the key factors of sustainable architecture according to regional and cultural features could be the first step in sustaining the architecture as a process and an outcome. In this paper, the key indicators of the environmental sustainability in contemporary architecture of Iran has been identified and prioritized. This study has been performed in three phases. First, identifying key factors of environmental sustainability according to the experts' point of view and transforming the collected data to triangular fuzzy numbers. Subsequently, the best-worst multi-criteria decision-making method (henceforth BWM) under grey system circumstances has determined the weights and priority of the identified criteria. Eventually, identified key factors were prioritized by the complex proportional assessment method (hereafter COPRAS) under the condition of fuzzy sets. The results indicate that the key factors of creating engagement between buildings and other urban systems has the highest priority in the built environment sustainability in contemporary architecture and proving building management systems has the lowest.

Background: Multiple channels of sustainable urban development could be managed in the process of an inter-disciplinary cooperation and creative involvement of all stakeholders. The paper aims to verify how the specific methods of virtual reality simulation could be used as an effective tool for setting an efficient participation platform between the stakeholders to improve environmental, social and energy sustainability of urban development in modern cities. The paper is based on the case study of Vilnius City.

Improving public spaces is a strategy of great importance for the successful future of our cities and their communities. The potential of places for citizen communication is often underestimated as stimulus for growth and development of urban communities and therefore public spaces are underused. The article analyses socioeconomic and psychological effects of architectural arrangement of traditional public spaces in modern perspective as areas for social interaction between different neighbourhood and citizen groups in an urban community, based on case examples of two cities: Vilnius in Lithuania and Weimar in Germany. Analysis of changing spatial composition and principles of social functioning are directly dependent on socio-political system of each different historical period and represent the chronological evolution of the present architectural appearance of the presented urban squares. The importance of local urban territorial communities is underlined in the article as they are the most important social entities for identifying the needs of local residents and in many cases are ready to take over the responsibility for re-arrangement of the public spaces adjacent to their areas of residence. Based on a careful observation of public activities on going in the analysed urban squares in Vilnius and in Weimar, the principles of planning, functionality and spatial arrangement are analysed in the aspect of facilitation of social interactions on going or potentially possible in these spaces. The research identifies planning and spatial arrangement models that could facilitate the preferred ways of social interactions and generate the better overall aesthetical and functional quality of those places.

The purpose of the article is to define the material, institutional, and intellectual infrastructure of a region and identify the innovative processes that determine its creation. Our main research hypothesis is that the processes that influence the creation of a region's infrastructure determine a region's competitiveness as well. To verify these premises, we conducted a study among the residents and employees of a municipality. The research employed deductive and inductive methods and a qualitative analysis was performed. Pearson's linear correlation coefficient and factor analysis (inference based on the modal and median values) were used in the study. The research verified the hypothesis that innovative processes influence the creation of a region's infrastructure and that innovative processes in the studied region exhibit low dynamics, which is caused by financial and psychosocial barriers. The important role of social leaders in municipalities was identified as well, above all as regards building civic society and social activity. The added value of the article is threefold: the developed model of infrastructure construction in the material, institutional, and intellectual dimensions of a region; recommendations for the investigated municipality; and a structured questionnaire that, together with the model, can be used for research in municipalities. Keywords: regional development, regional competitiveness, material infrastructure, institutional infrastructure, intellectual infrastructure, entrepreneurship behavior, municipal management, model of infrastructure construction. JEL Classification: R50, O31.

Abstractthe question of quality of modified landscape is critical for the client and the users and depends on the quality of projects. After theoretical and empirical research, the paper proposes the framework for quality assessment criteria and corresponding indicators for assessing landscape architecture projects. By thorough analysis of the recent international research and design and implementation practices in Lithuania, the paper gives the flexible and universal set of environmental, socio-economic, and aesthetic quality criteria and relevant indicators in the context of sustainable performance.