Sustainable Urban Forms and Climate Adaptation Policy: A Sparsity-Responsiveness Framework Based on Chinese Cities

Sustainability is recognized as a key driver for the formation and evolution of sustainable urban forms, serving as a critical approach for guiding and assessing urban sustainability. In the context of global warming, climate adaptation has become a pressing concern in shaping sustainable urban forms. However, the complex mechanisms linking sustainability, urban form, and climate adaptation are difficult to identify and track due to variations in data precision, research scales, and stakeholder needs. This study first re-views the relevant literature to clarify the current state and trends in this field. It then employs locally weighted regression to analyze the relationships between sustainability principles, urban form, and climate adaptation from 2005 to 2024. Based on the “mitigation-adaptation” framework, sparsity-responsiveness indicators are constructed to define four types of climate adaptation. These types are used to classify 31 representative cities in China. Considering the cities’ developmental stages, the study proposes design strategies that prioritize sustainability.