Proximity to locally unwanted land uses as an indicator in environmental justice measurement through urban plans

Abstract

This study aims at expanding the scope of environmental justice measurement by evaluating the development zones in urban plans besides existing settlements. Focusing on the proximities to locally unwanted land uses (LULUs) in Afyonkarahisar, Turkey, the distance-based measurement method of this study utilised geographic information systems (GIS). Case-based results indicate that the trend of environmental (in)justice is continued through the urban plan of Afyonkarahisar. The disadvantaged settlements in terms of LULU proximity have the highest proportion (29.7%) of the population whereas the advantaged settlements have the lowest proportion (8.7%). In the disadvantaged group, there are four urban settlements with 219,923 people whereas there are six development zones and no rural settlements with such high scores. The study emphasises the gradual measurement method by using weighted scores of multiple distances to all LULUs from urban, rural, existing, and proposed settlements rather than a fixed distance to a certain facility from existing urban settlements.