Social–Ecological Performance Evaluation of Old Neighborhoods in Mountainous Cities and Sustainable Renewal Research: A Case Study of Daxigou Subdistrict, Chongqing

Old neighborhoods in China’s mountainous cities generally face the dual challenge of a decline in social vitality intertwined with the fragility of ecosystem functions; there is an urgent need to develop a socio-ecological performance evaluation tool suited to the mountainous context to guide decisions on sustainable regeneration. Taking nine typical aging communities in Daxigou Subdistrict, Yuzhong District, Chongqing as case studies, this study, based on socio-ecological systems theory, constructed an evaluation system comprising 31 indicators across social, ecological, and spatial environmental subsystems. The entropy-weighted TOPSIS method was employed to quantitatively measure the communities’ comprehensive socio-ecological performance, whilst K-means clustering was used for community classification and the identification of weaknesses. The results indicate that the overall socio-ecological performance of Daxigou Subdistrict is relatively low, with scores across the various subsystems distributed unevenly. Correlation analysis reveals the decisive role of resource-related factors in community performance. Based on the evaluation results, an integrated and operational decision making framework combining diagnosis, classification, and policy implementation was established, providing a reference for the targeted regeneration and sustainable development of aging communities in mountainous cities.