This review examines the evolution of infrastructure planning from Neolithic times to the present. It is argued that conventional approaches are trapped in an unsustainable extraction-growth relationship. Using Inayatullah's Futures Triangle as an analytical lens, historical patterns, contemporary challenges and emerging alternatives in infrastructure policymaking are examined. A systematic review of 162 largely peer-reviewed articles and a quantitative analysis of global material flows demonstrate how population growth, increasing individual consumption and fortification drive unsustainable infrastructure development. This research identifies the entrenchment of infrastructure planning in an anthropocentric worldview, which is insufficiently responsive to ecological limits and inadequately equipped for post-normal uncertainties. A shift toward a human-built-natural triad is proposed, reconfiguring the human relationship with nature from one of colonial exploitation to a regenerative partnership. In doing so, 10 propositions are suggested for theoretical and practical application toward more sustainable infrastructure futures that integrate foresight and empirical approaches.
Richard MacGeorge (Sat,) studied this question.