Land Development In Cities Research Articles

The implementation, impact, and challenges of balanced scorecard in Ethiopian land development and management office

The purpose of this study is to examine BSC implementation, contribution, and challenges encountered in Addis Ababa concerning Kolfe-keranyo Sub City Land Development and Management office. The study adapted a concurrent mixed-method approach, descriptive research design, primary and secondary data source, and probability and non-probability sampling techniques, to achieve the objective of the study. A five-point Likert scale questionnaire and structured interview were used as a data collection tool. The questionnaire was administered to employees and an interview was held with leaders. The findings of the study generally indicate that the contribution of a balanced scorecard in measuring service performance in land management is minimal because performance indicators are poorly designed, standards are unrealistic, which ignores the nature of the service, and performance data is not properly recorded. Finally, the study presented some recommendations, including redesigning the scorecard, setting realistic time standards, allocating adequate resources, strengthening training and awareness programs, and strong leadership support and commitment. Keywords: Balanced Scorecard; land management; performance.

Balancing equity-based goals with market-driven forces in land development: The case of density bonusing in Toronto

This article explores the connections between planning and land rent through a case study of density bonusing in Toronto, known as ‘Section 37’ – a form of land value capture. Density bonusing facilitates speculative bidding on future rents by private developers seeking ‘highest and best’ land uses – or efficient land uses – yet has implications related to equity when the unearned increment is extracted to recover value and invest in public goods. We situate land value capture within debates on the unearned income derived from land development in cities. We view the case of density bonusing through the lens of discretionary planning systems operating through flexible mechanisms. Specifically, we consider the direct role of planners towards balancing private interests with public goods in the face of shifting market and political contexts. The findings show that securing public goods from private land development through the unearned increment lacks consistency and predictability when the flexibility exercised by development actors drives planning decision-making. We conclude with a discussion on the implications for discretionary planning and land value capture in market-intensive, neoliberal environments.

Spatially-explicit prediction of low-density peri-urban development: comparison between urban and rural scenarios in the Moreton Bay Region in South East Queensland, Australia

Mainstream urban modelling literature focuses on urban expansion featured by a relatively fast urbanisation process, but relatively less research is available to understand and model the slow-paced urban and rural land development in the low-density peri-urban context. This study aims to address this knowledge gap by simulating the urban and rural land development in the Moreton Bay Region in South East Queensland (SEQ), Australia using two cellular automata (CA) models that are coupled with a generalised simulated annealing (GSA) algorithm. With the total land available for development estimated using a Markov Chain model, the GSA-CA urban and rural models were developed, respectively, to simulate urban and rural land development from 1991 to 2011, and then to predict their future development to 2041 following vigorous model calibrations. The modelling results illustrate three snapshots of the predicted spatial patterns of urban and rural development in 2021, 2031 and 2041, with moderate growth in both the urban and rural areas over time, but with urban development occurring in a more compact form than rural development. The GSA-CA modelling approach is capable of optimising the CA transition rules and has the potential to be applied to other geographical contexts to support regional planning, decision-making and scenario designation for future land development in cities that have entered the saturation phase of urbanisation.

Is Urban Land Development Driven by Economic Development or Fiscal Revenue Stimuli in China?

Since the reform and opening-up, urban land development in China mainland has been increasing dramatically with significant regional differences. Using the panel data of municipal districts in 246 cities at the prefectural or higher levels in Chinese mainland from 2004 to 2014, based on the analysis of the differences in land development intensity in municipal districts, a model of factors affecting land development is built to verify whether the urban land development is driven by economic development or fiscal revenue from the perspectives of economic development and fiscal revenue. The conclusions are as follows: first, the intensity of land development varies significantly among municipal districts. The difference in the intensity of land development increases with the increase of city scale. The difference in the intensity of land development in central China is lower than that in eastern and western China. Second, the primary factors affecting the intensity of urban land development are economic growth, population urbanization, and population density. Finally, land transfer revenues also drive the land development in cities at the prefectural or higher levels to a considerable extent, which is proposed as “land finance” (local governments rely on the sale of land use rights to obtain extra-budgetary income to maintain local fiscal expenditure) in the literature.

From accessibility improvement to land development: a comparative study on the impacts of Madrid-Seville high-speed rail

This paper studies the impacts of Madrid-Seville High-Speed Rail (HSR) on land-cover change in the five HSR connected cities – Madrid, Ciudad Real, Puertollano, Cordoba, and Seville. The analysis period ranges from 1991 to 2006. The study finds that, in the Madrid-Seville region, the land development process concentrates mostly toward the two largest cities, Madrid and Seville, while other smaller HSR served cities are also benefited. The process of land development in each city varies largely. HSR contributes more to Ciudad Real and Cordoba than to Puertollano, with booming urban development in the former two cities. To study the accessibility impacts of HSR, binary discrete choice models are adopted. The results suggest that, the land development in smaller cities can be mainly explained by the improvement of regional accessibility and population growth. However, to model the urban development process in Madrid and Seville, the inputs with only accessibility and population are not sufficient.

The Research of Collective Construction Land Transference Based on the Small Urban Land Development Characteristics

At present, the phenomenon of rural collective construction land transference widely exists in many cities, including big cities and small and medium-sized cities. Due to the small city's characteristics, the collective land transference management is easier to be ignored. But small and medium-sized cities play an important role in promoting urbanization process with Chinese characteristics. Therefore we must be cautious in dealing with collective construction land transference management of small and medium-sized cities. Most scholars in research give more attentions to big cities. They think transference should be promoted and imposing restrictions on transference is below allowing it. They also think allowing transference can effectively relieve the shortage of land supply, revitalize the land resources, and increase farmers' income, but also can solve the problems such as "small property right". But this conclusion overlooked the differences of large and medium-sized cities and small urban in land use and land resources demand characteristics. Based on small city land development characteristics, its collective construction land transference should adjust measures to local conditions