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Question: Towards Sustainable Urban and Regional Planning: Experiences from the Netherlands

Answer: In the twentieth century, Dutch government has gradually increased its authority in the governance of urban and regional development. During the first half over the century, various regulations enacted urban and regional planning practices at different levels of state, allowing government agencies to interfere in the urbanization process. Since the late 1960s, it became increasingly clear that these practices should take note of environmental considerations as well. Initially, this attention resulted in the enactment of parallel and competing planning practices, for instance, for environmental planning and water management planning. The integration of these practices proved difficult due to opposing cultures of thought between government agencies. Initial attempts to overcome these differences through comprehensive plans turned sour. However, over the last decade and a half, various innovative practices were introduced, indicating that the transition towards environmentally sensitive planning practices is starting to pay off.

This chapter aims to share the Dutch experiences with the integration of environmental considerations in urban and regional planning practices. It will do so through the following research question: What were the main problems with the integration of environmental considerations in Dutch urban and regional planning practices, and how have these been overcome? After this introductory section, the section ‘Dutch Urban and Regional Planning Practices’ will start to answer this question with an introduction to Dutch urban and regional planning. The section ‘Sustainability as Challenge for Spatial Planning’ discusses the emergence of new environmental and water management planning practices in response to growing attention for the environment. The section ‘Bureau Life – How Government Agencies Construct Reality’ discusses the resulting opposing cultures of thought as an explanation for difficulties surrounding the integration of these planning practices. The section ‘Beyond Bureau Life I – The Folly of the Comprehensive Plan’ discusses why comprehensive environmental plans, as an initial solution, did not have the required effects. The rest of the chapter presents two alternative practices to overcome integration problems. The section ‘Beyond Bureau Life II – The Gelre Valley Project’ shows how environmental standards became part of the regional planning process in the Gelre Valley project. And the section ‘Beyond Bureau Life III – Schalkwijk 2000+’ shows that Haarlem municipality applied the so-called Strategy of the two Networks to incorporate environmental considerations in the Schalkwijk neighbourhood plan. Answering the research question, the section ‘Conclusion’ draws conclusions.

(Source: , 22 Sep 2021)

Source Link: https://doi-org.onlinedatabase.librarynet.com.my/10.1108/S1047-004220140000014003