Abstract
Planning delay time is a ubiquitous but under-researched land use regulation method. The aim of this study is to link planning delay time with the loss of urban locally provided ecosystem services (ULPES) caused by land development. Our main hypothesis is that the planning delay is an informal tool that ensures social welfare in a given urban area increases even if land is developed and the ULPES associated with the undeveloped land are lost. Whereas the developer’s objective is to maximize his profits, the planner’s target is to achieve the greatest social welfare, as calculated by considering public interest based on the value of open space and the developer’s expected profits. Our results show that, when the ULPES provided by an undeveloped parcel are sufficiently high, planning delay times can be used to prevent the execution of low quality initiatives and to only permit projects that improve general welfare and justify the potential ULPES loss. Planning delay times are interpreted as the expression of continuous negotiation between the interests of the public and those of real-estate developers, regarding the value of ULPES. The implication of the study is that ULPES values are introduced using a simple game-theoretic model allowing interaction between developers and planning authorities. The main significance is an alternative explanation for planning delay times as a consequence of ongoing negotiations between developers and urban planners that represent the general public in the city.
Highlights
Urban growth is the source of one of the most extensive and permanent land use changes worldwide [1]
Ecosystem services are bundles of benefits that people obtain from natural ecosystems, even those located within urban areas [5]
The ecosystem services provided by green urban areas are hard to measure [7], making it difficult to assess the negative external costs involved in the eventual replacement of these green areas by built structures
Summary
Urban growth is the source of one of the most extensive and permanent land use changes worldwide [1]. Every parcel of land is fixed in a specific location and is strongly influenced by the uses and attributes of nearby parcels, as well as the public investments made in its surrounding areas. These characteristics hinder land market competitiveness and impose externalities that are sometimes difficult to quantify [16,17]. There are several types of land market failures, related to issues such as urban infrastructure or the social cost of the transportation network, but one of the most widespread externalities is difficulties associated with the social value of open spaces [19]
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