How stakeholders experience and value the sustainable design elements of a residential high-rise building

Globally, cities are rapidly becoming denser, increasingly accommodating the majority of the world's population. Australian cities have followed these global trends, with cities becoming denser to house urban population growth. These increasing urban densities have raised social and environmental concerns, heightening the need for residential dwellings to become more sustainable. In response, several rating systems have been developed to assess and encourage the adoption of sustainability principles in building design. However, to date, the majority of the growing body of green building literature has focused on the commercial market from an engineering and property economics standpoint. Limited research into the residential sector, and specifically, the end user perspective, has been undertaken. This thesis seeks to address this gap by providing an understanding of the lived experience of sustainable high-rise apartments. Three important issues are addressed in this thesis: 1) identifying consumers' levels of knowledge and motives when purchasing into a sustainably designed residential high-rise building; 2) comparing stakeholder perspectives about which aspects of a green residential high-rise building occupants value; and 3) exploring how occupants identify with and construct meaning in relation to the sustainable design elements of a green building. In order to explore these issues, a theoretical underpinning of green building literature, consumer behaviour, and stakeholder and change theories was used in this thesis. Data were collected from 22 in-depth interviews with property industry experts and residents of two case study buildings located in Brisbane and Melbourne. A visual ethnography method utilising 10 to 12 images per building was also used in order to prompt personal narratives and allow for multiple interpretations of the participants' social and/or cultural experiences. The study's findings revealed a staged loss of knowledge regarding the sustainable design of an apartment building throughout the development lifecycle. The findings also showed that a poor dissemination of sustainability knowledge results in end users (e.g. occupants) having a poor understanding of the building's sustainable design features. Subsequently, this limited understanding impacts the use of some sustainable design features and the on-going performance of the building. This study found that a mobile application is an ideal platform to significantly improve the occupants' education and induction protocols to green residential buildings. This recommendation is based on the finding that occupants highly valued features that were conveniently accessible and provided them with the ability to track and compare their personal use/performance. Potential design inclusions for a mobile application and an improved educational process have been developed drawing on these findings and the role of stakeholders within green residential buildings advanced in this study. This thesis presents a framework for the property development industry to inform the end users of green residential buildings of the inclusion, performance, and fundamental benefits of a building's sustainable design elements.