Socio-environmental impacts of settlement growth under conditions of fostered infill development : a methodological framework for a multicriteria assessment

The major objective of this study is to analyze socio-environmental conditions under which a sustainable and resource-preserving settlement development can be promoted and to assess respective impacts of greenfield and infill development. By doing so, an essential part of this study is dedicated to the development of an innovative theoretical and methodological concept of a two-stepped Multicriteria Assessment scheme (MCA) for a demography-driven and scenario-based assessment of land use change. The first step of this concept is characterized by the assessment of socio-environmental prerequisites of future housing sites of a city and their contribution to a sustainable settlement development defined by the term Quality of Place (QoP). It results from a close collaboration between planners and scientists within a research-project on sustainable settlement-development. Test-runs and discussions with planners have been conducted throughout a period of three years to discuss the necessity of the socio-ecological indicators and to identify individual weights. The second step is formed by an on-site-assessment of socio-environmental impacts on the target concepts Quality of Life (QoL) and Urban Ecosystem Services (UES) due to the housing-development of varying densities within housing scenarios. A prototype of a Decision Support System (DSS) integrates both steps of assessment and is presented within this work.Sozio-ökologische Folgen von Siedlungswachstum unter Bedingungen verstärkter Innenentwicklung : ein methodisches Rahmenwerk für eine Multikriterienbewertung Hauptziel dieser Arbeit ist es, die sozio-ökologischen Bedingungen, unter denen eine nachhaltige und ressourcenschonende Siedlungsentwicklung realisierbar ist, zu analysieren und die entsprechenden Folgewirkungen von Außen- und Innenentwicklung zu bewerten. Hauptbestandteil der Arbeit ist somit die Entwicklung eines theoretisch und methodisch innovativen Konzepts einer zweistufigen Multikriterienbewertung für eine demographieorientierte und szenariobasierte Bewertung des Landnutzungswandels im Rahmen der Siedlungsentwicklung. Der erste Schritt dieses Konzepts besteht aus der Bewertung der ökologischen und sozialen Rahmenbedingungen und Standortqualitäten („Quality of Place“) von Wohnbaulandpotenzialen und ihren Beitrag zu einer nachhaltigen Siedlungsentwicklung. Er basiert auf einer engen dreijährigen Zusammenarbeit zwischen Planern und Wissenschaftlern im Rahmen eines Forschungsprojekts zur nachhaltigen Siedlungsentwicklung, in der im Rahmen von Testläufen des Bewertungsmodells und Diskussionen planungs- und entscheidungsrelevante Indikatoren extrahiert und entsprechend ihrer Bedeutung gewichtet wurden. Der zweite Schritt des Konzepts ist die Vorortbewertung potentieller Wohnbauflächen gemäß sozio-ökologischer Folgewirkungen in verschiedenen Bebauungsdichten hinsichtlich der Konzepte Lebensqualität („QoL“) und urbane Ökosystemdienstleistungen (UES). Der Prototyp eines Entscheidungsunterstützungswerkzeugs (“Decision Support System” (DSS)) wird in dieser Arbeit vorgestellt

Actors and factors - bridging social science findings and urban land use change modeling

Recent uneven land use dynamics in urban areas resulting from demographic change, economic pressure and the cities’ mutual competition in a globalising world challenge both scientists and practitioners, among them social scientists, modellers and spatial planners. Processes of growth and decline specifically affect the urban environment, the requirements of the residents on social and natural resources. Social and environmental research is interested in a better understanding and ways of explaining the interactions between society and landscape in urban areas. And it is also needed for making life in cities attractive, secure and affordable within or despite of uneven dynamics.\ud The position paper upon “Actors and factors – bridging social science findings and urban land use change modeling” presents approaches and ideas on how social science findings on the interaction of the social system (actors) and the land use (factors) are taken up and formalised using modelling and gaming techniques. It should be understood as a first sketch compiling major challenges and proposing exemplary solutions in the field of interest

Can annual land use plan control and regulate construction land growth in China?

Annual land use plan (ALUP) stands for the quota allocation of land converted to non-agricultural use, which has been in place since 1987 in China. Although the ALUP has been implemented for more than 30 years and has played an important role in China’s non-agricultural land growth management, little has been done to assess the effect of its implementation. The purpose of this research is to evaluate the effect of the ALUP on controlling the growth of construction land in China. The province-level data on land use in China during the period of 2006–2013 were collected and then analyzed using panel data model. The results show that (1) the ALUP can effectively curb construction land growth, and the construction land decreased about 1721 ha with a 1% increment of the intensity of growth management. Construction land growth is closely related to the implementation intensity of the ALUP, which decreases 30,892 ha under strict implementation but increases an extra 181,451 ha with relaxed implementation; (2) the implementation effect of the ALUP shows significant differences between provinces, and the provinces of northwestern and eastern China show better performance than provinces from the southwest and central regions. National development strategy and region’s differentiation land policy may have contributed to this phenomenon; (3) taking both the goal achievement and effectiveness into account, the implementation of the ALUP is described as effective though not completely successful; and (4) for more efficiency and success, the study proposes some suggestions on improving policy implementation in the future

Socio-environmental impacts of settlement growth under conditions of fostered infill development : A methodological framework for a multicriteria assessment

The major objective of this study is to analyze socio-environmental conditions under which a sustainable and resource-preserving settlement development can be promoted and to assess respective impacts of greenfield and infill development. By doing so, an essential part of this study is dedicated to the development of an innovative theoretical and methodological concept of a two-stepped Multicriteria Assessment scheme (MCA) for a demography-driven and scenario-based assessment of land use change. The first step of this concept is characterized by the assessment of socio-environmental prerequisites of future housing sites of a city and their contribution to a sustainable settlement development defined by the term Quality of Place (QoP). It results from a close collaboration between planners and scientists within a research-project on sustainable settlement-development. Test-runs and discussions with planners have been conducted throughout a period of three years to discuss the necessity of the socio-ecological indicators and to identify individual weights. The second step is formed by an on-site-assessment of socio-environmental impacts on the target concepts Quality of Life (QoL) and Urban Ecosystem Services (UES) due to the housing-development of varying densities within housing scenarios. A prototype of a Decision Support System (DSS) integrates both steps of assessment and is presented within this work.Sozio-ökologische Folgen von Siedlungswachstum unter Bedingungen verstärkter Innenentwicklung : ein methodisches Rahmenwerk für eine Multikriterienbewertung Hauptziel dieser Arbeit ist es, die sozio-ökologischen Bedingungen, unter denen eine nachhaltige und ressourcenschonende Siedlungsentwicklung realisierbar ist, zu analysieren und die entsprechenden Folgewirkungen von Außen- und Innenentwicklung zu bewerten. Hauptbestandteil der Arbeit ist somit die Entwicklung eines theoretisch und methodisch innovativen Konzepts einer zweistufigen Multikriterienbewertung für eine demographieorientierte und szenariobasierte Bewertung des Landnutzungswandels im Rahmen der Siedlungsentwicklung. Der erste Schritt dieses Konzepts besteht aus der Bewertung der ökologischen und sozialen Rahmenbedingungen und Standortqualitäten („Quality of Place“) von Wohnbaulandpotenzialen und ihren Beitrag zu einer nachhaltigen Siedlungsentwicklung. Er basiert auf einer engen dreijährigen Zusammenarbeit zwischen Planern und Wissenschaftlern im Rahmen eines Forschungsprojekts zur nachhaltigen Siedlungsentwicklung, in der im Rahmen von Testläufen des Bewertungsmodells und Diskussionen planungs- und entscheidungsrelevante Indikatoren extrahiert und entsprechend ihrer Bedeutung gewichtet wurden. Der zweite Schritt des Konzepts ist die Vorortbewertung potentieller Wohnbauflächen gemäß sozio-ökologischer Folgewirkungen in verschiedenen Bebauungsdichten hinsichtlich der Konzepte Lebensqualität („QoL“) und urbane Ökosystemdienstleistungen (UES). Der Prototyp eines Entscheidungsunterstützungswerkzeugs (“Decision Support System” (DSS)) wird in dieser Arbeit vorgestellt

Actors and factors - bridging social science findings and urban land using change modeling

Recent uneven land use dynamics in urban areas resulting from demographic change, economic pressure and the cities’ mutual competition in a globalising world challenge both scientists and practitioners, among them social scientists, modellers and spatial planners. Processes of growth and decline specifically affect the urban environment, the requirements of the residents on social and natural resources. Social and environmental research is interested in a better understanding and ways of explaining the interactions between society and landscape in urban areas. And it is also needed for making life in cities attractive, secure and affordable within or despite of uneven dynamics. The position paper upon “Actors and factors – bridging social science findings and urban land use change modeling” presents approaches and ideas on how social science findings on the interaction of the social system (actors) and the land use (factors) are taken up and formalised using modelling and gaming techniques. It should be understood as a first sketch compiling major challenges and proposing exemplary solutions in the field of interest

Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) and Multi-Criteria Analysis: An Integrated Approach

With the aim of enhancing the level of sustainability of plans and pro- grammes adopted by local, regional and national authorities, the European Com- mission (EU) has adopted the Directive 2001/42/EC on the assessment of effects of plans and programmes on the environment. Starting from the analysis of strengths and possible uses of Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA) and the investigation of its application in combination with the SWOT Analysis and the Stakeholder Analy- sis, the paper aims at presenting a multi-methodological approach based on the use of MCA for Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA). Given the spatial nature of the decision problem the multi-methodological approach is moreover combined with Geographic Information System (GIS). The Multicriteria-Spatial Decision Support System (MC-SDSS) proposed is able to support the decision-making processes in the field of environmental management by providing evidence and increasing the level of choices’ transparency and legitimacy

Understanding Sentiments and Activities in Green Spaces using a Social Data-driven Approach

Green spaces are believed to enhance the well-being of residents in urban areas. While there is research exploring the emotional benefits of green spaces, most early works are based on user surveys and case studies, which are typically small in scale, intrusive, time-intensive and costly. In contrast to earlier works, we utilize a non-intrusive methodology to understand green space effects at large-scale and in greater detail, via digital traces left by Twitter users. Using this methodology, we perform an empirical study on the effects of green spaces on user sentiments, emotions and activities in Melbourne, Australia and our main findings are: (i) tweets in green spaces contain more positive and less negative emotions compared to those in urban areas; (ii) emotions in tweets vary seasonally; (iii) there are interesting changes in sentiments based on the hour, day and month that a tweet was posted; (iv) negative sentiments are typically associated with large transport infrastructures such as train interchanges, major road junctions and railway tracks; and (v) each green space is often associated with a specific type of activity and/or event, which can be a useful information for Online recommender systems. The novelty of our study is the combination of psychological theory, alongside data collection and analysis techniques on a large-scale Twitter dataset, which builds upon traditional methods in urban research and provides important implications for urban planning authorities