Planning for Experience: A Systematic Review of the Link Between the 15-Minute City and Neighbourhood Satisfaction

Source abstract

This systematic literature review comparatively examines two largely parallel research streams: the 15-minute city (15MC) and neighbourhood satisfaction (NS), identifying their overlaps, divergences, and unresolved tensions. It combines a bibliometric analysis of two thematic corpora with an in-depth full-text synthesis of empirical studies, following Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) reporting practices. The bibliometric results show a rapidly expanding 15MC field since 2020, centered on proximity, accessibility, and sustainability, while NS research has a longer tradition focused on subjective well-being and perceived neighbourhood experiences, including environmental comfort, social cohesion, safety, and neighbourhood quality. Across the literature, the synthesis shows that spatial proximity and measured accessibility are important but insufficient to explain NS without also considering service quality, environmental comfort, perceived safety, and social relations. The review highlights persistent gaps in linking objective accessibility metrics with subjective outcomes, as well as mismatches in neighbourhood definitions and spatial scales. It also identifies limited evidence on temporal dynamics, population heterogeneity, and the social effects of proximity planning, including gentrification and displacement. Building on five conceptual bridges, the review proposes an integrated framework connecting objective proximity-based planning conditions with subjective, social, and contextual determinants of neighbourhood satisfaction.