Community Space and Social Sustainability

The transformation of space from low-rise to high-rise has had a tremendous impact on the form and structure of today's Dhaka city, Bangladesh. This high-rise urban dwelling style has ushered in a new socio-cultural era in Dhaka. This scenario is not compatible with our traditional culture; rather it ignores our social values. The focus of the study is to analyze the spatial organization of the community space of high-rise apartment buildings in relation to the high-rise community-based organizations that are responsible for managing, maintaining and keeping the social harmony through various active performances. With these assumptions, the study develops a conceptual framework based on relevant theories and concepts and aims to analyze thereby the socio-spatial context and evaluate the findings regarding the issue of social sustainability. There have been two case studies on two high-rise apartment buildings in Dhaka city. The study shows how quality community space and active social organization can maintain and promote social sustainability within high-rise apartment buildings in Dhaka city of Bangladesh.