· · · Institutional Repository

Large-scale urban development projects aim to create better places in underused or deteriorated areas. For their realisation, cooperation between planning authorities and market parties is indispensable. This book focuses on the development agreements that these parties close. It follows from the relational contract theory that, as the projects evolve over time, these agreements have to promote relational values such as trust and flexibility. In four interesting cases – Battery Park City and Hudson Yards (both in New York City), Zuidas (Amsterdam) and King’s Cross Regent Quarter (London) – the contents, meaning and function of real-life development agreements of focal projects are studied and criticized. The conclusions have a case-specific as well as a more general character. This book is of value for academics as well as practitioners as It conducts some pioneering work in a field that has not been subject of much research yet.

Promoting mixed-use development is part of policies aimed at enhancing urban quality. Until recently, however, industry and housing have rarely been found together in the same development as there is a long tradition of keeping these functions separate. As part of a compact-city policy, Dutch local authorities are in the process of introducing housing on single-function industrial estates developed after World War II. Local governments are looking for strategies and instruments that will help them to redevelop these sites towards mixed-use areas combining housing and industry. This paper analyzes case studies on the Binckhorst and Plaspoelpolder sites in and around The Hague and the Buiksloterham site in Amsterdam in relation to the following themes: attractiveness of the site as a location for the introduction of housing, the environmental loading caused by combining industry and housing, and municipal strategies for redevelopment of the industrial estates. It was found that traditional amenities such as waterfronts can provide ample potential for housing development; that while there may be plenty of room for housing, much of it will be subject to unacceptable environmental hazards; that a cooperative enforcement style is used to mutual adapt the local interpretation of environmental standards to the interests of the mixed-use areas;; and that in all cases, local government became strongly involved in the property market in order to internalize the external effects of investments in the area.

Product returns are characterized by considerable uncertainty on time and quantity. In the literature on inventory management for product return environments best forecasts of future returns are associated with methods that use the most information regarding product return history. In practice, however, data is often scarce and unreliable, while forecasts based on historical data, reliable or not, are never perfect. In this paper we therefore investigate the impact of imperfect information with respect to the return process on inventory management performance. We show that in the case of imperfect information the most informed method does not necessarily lead to best performance. The results have relevant implications regarding investments in product return information systems.

A multitude of studies has been published on how National Geo Information Infrastructures (NGII), also known as Spatial Data Infrastructures (SDI), should be designed, set up and monitored. Scientific research on day-to-day experiences, on what is really happening in NGIIprojects is hard to find. We propose a narrative approach to elicit sensemaking processes in order to get a better understanding of NGII projects. An in-depth description and analysis on the development of the Dutch Geoportal project is given, which was funded by the Space for Geoinformation Program (SGI), meant to be part of the Dutch NGII. Intensive research was carried out through observing project meetings and conferences, and interviewing key persons, both within and outside the project environment. Out of the research data we identified different kinds of narratives, representing thinking patterns among project participants. Our ethnographic research elicits day-to-day struggles with project goals, technology, and infrastructure. We found that project participants find it hard to distinguish between requirements for infrastructure and innovation. While infrastructures need stable environments with harsh standardization that will last, innovation challenges that with new developments, reaching for something new, the uncontested terrain. We believe that this discrepancy is a cause for serious redefinitions of SDI project goals, assessment rules and results.

According to the popular definition, passive houses have to reach a target energy demand for heating less than 15 kWh per square meter and per year. This criterion is used as a basis for quality assurance procedures and certification of passive house projects. This paper identifies the experiences in several western European countries concerning passive house certification, and hence the control of quality of the design process, the construction process, and the post construction inspection and testing of passive houses. Certification and quality assurance initiatives from Belgium, the Netherlands, France, the U.K. and Ireland are compared with preceding initiatives in Austria, Northern Italy, Switzerland and Germany. It is recognized that with the current state of the emerging passive house market, passive house verification is necessary on a project level, but that it is still difficult to introduce certification of actors and processes in many countries. An open market and competition for certification

This paper discusses house price developments in the Netherlands, specifically focussing on the question whether current house prices in the Dutch owner-occupied market are likely to decrease. We analyse three aspects of the question based on a literature review: (1) whether there is a house price bubble ready to burst; (2) whether house prices will decline in response to the credit crisis that started in 2007; and (3) whether it is likely that house prices will decrease as a result of reforms in the tax treatment of home owners. The outcomes of the two available Dutch models predict that even without fiscal reform (and before any effects of the global financial crisis make themselves felt) prices in the housing market will probably come under pressure in the sense that contrary to the previous decades growth of real prices will be zero. Changing the fiscal treatment of owneroccupiers would cause real house prices to decline over the next years. The timing of such measures may be considered most unfortunate now that the global credit crunch seems to be affecting the Dutch economy as well.

Het maken van plannen door Nederlandse sociale woningverhuurders over de ontwikkeling van hun woningbezit heeft in de laatste twintig jaar een grote vlucht genomen. Een belangrijke achtergrond hiervan is dat het rijk veel van zijn verantwoordelijkheden en financiële risico’s bij deze verhuurders zelf heeft neergelegd. Als gevolg van deze verschuiving hebben sociale verhuurders meer dan ooit te maken met de problematiek van plandoorwerking, een vraagstuk dat in de ruimtelijke planning al sinds jaar en dag in de belangstelling staat. In deze verhandeling, dat gebaseerd is op veldwerk onder enkele grote Nederlandse sociale verhuurders, staat de vraag centraal, in hoeverre de investeringskeuzen van deze verhuurders een weerspiegeling zijn van hun portefeuillebeleid. De literatuur geeft onvoldoende uitsluitsel over wat we op dit punt kunnen verwachten. Aan de ene kant laten vele planningstudies een slechte doorwerking van het beleid zien, toe te schrijven aan bijvoorbeeld tegenstrijdige belangen, miscommunicatie, gewijzigde interpretaties en onvoldoende inspelen op de dagelijkse werkelijkheid. Aan de andere kant hebben de meeste van deze studies betrekking op grote overheidsinstellingen of grote bedrijven, terwijl de sociale-verhuurorganisaties aanmerkelijk kleiner en overzichtelijker zijn. Daarbij komt dat het gaat hier om de interne doorwerking van beleid gaat en niet om de, althans in theorie, lastigere externe doorwerking van beleid naar andere partijen.

Excessive land use regulations aimed at containing urban sprawl have been criticised, because they may overcompensate for the external effects of uncontrolled greenfield development and contribute to stagnation in house building. Taxes on building in green spaces may be an instrument for balancing urban growth and the protection of the landscape. This paper discusses development tax and puts it in the context of other planning instruments. It reviews a recent policy debate in the Netherlands relating to the introduction of an open space tax and the research into this tax . It also investigates the policy process, which resulted in the tax not being introduced. Finally, conclusions are drawn as to whether the taxation of development may be a useful instrument to complement other planning measures.

Sinds de financiële verzelfstandiging van de Nederlandse sociale-huursector in de jaren 80 en 90 van de vorige eeuw hebben woningcorporaties een grotere beleidsverantwoordelijkheid gekregen wat betreft de ontwikkeling van hun woningbestand. Dit heeft geleid tot een verhoogde activiteit in het ontwikkelen van portefeuillebeleid en tot de opkomst van systematische methoden om dit beleid te concretiseren in investeringskeuzen op complex- of woningniveau, zoals renoveren, verkopen, slopen of ‘gewoon’ onderhouden. Dit boek gaat in op de vraag, in hoeverre het ontwikkelde portefeuillebeleid van woningcorporaties is terug te vinden in de uiteindelijke investeringskeuzen. Ook komt aan de orde, welke rol de genoemde methoden daarin spelen. Voor dit boek is veldwerk uitgevoerd onder verschillende corporaties die in de sector qua beleidsontwikkeling tot de voorlopers gerekend kunnen worden. Mede op grond van dit veldwerk toont het boek enkele tekortkomingen in de gangbare modellen voor strategische planning en draagt het verbeteringen daarvoor aan.

O Regime de Arrendamento Urbano aprovado pela Lei n.º 6/2006, de 27 de Fevereiro, permite a actualização extraordinária do valor das rendas. O valor máximo de actualização depende do valor patrimonial tributário e de um coeficiente de conservação. Este coeficiente deve reflectir o estado de conservação do locado e a existência de infra-estruturas básicas. Para determinar o coeficiente de conservação foi desenvolvido no LNEC o "Método de avaliação do estado da conservação de imóveis" (MAEC). O método foi publicado pela Portaria n.º 1192-B/2006, de 3 de Novembro, que aprovou o modelo de ficha de avaliação, definiu os critérios de avaliação e estabeleceu as regras necessárias para a determinação do coeficiente de conservação. As instruções relativas ao preenchimento da ficha de avaliação e ao procedimento de vistoria foram remetidas na Portaria para documento disponibilizado na Internet. Nesta comunicação é analisada a experiência de aplicação dos primeiros dois anos de vigência do MAEC. Apresenta-se uma análise crítica da implementação, identificam-se algumas restrições de aplicação e perspectivam-se possíveis desenvolvimentos futuros.

This paper examines experiences with the diffusion of the passive house concept, applied to the situation of ‘emerging’ countries like Belgium and the Netherlands. Adopter categories considering the passive house concept are defined. A marketing study based on Rogers’ theory of diffusion of innovations highlights the characteristics of actors leading to technological and process innovation. The paper draws conclusions on the preferred role of passive house networks.

This paper gives an account of the successive presidencies of Portugal, Slovenia and France. It asks whether European spatial planning is undergoing a sea change: a transformation caused by the unintentional cumulative impact of pragmatic organisational changes. The paper also invokes the notion of a ‘two-level game’ to characterise the situations in which European planners constantly have to look over their shoulders to how their own national constituencies operate. Against this backdrop, the paper establishes that, albeit under the territorial cohesion flag, there has indeed been a sea change in the institutionalisation, not in a formal but rather in an informal sense. The new arrangements feature semi-permanent working groups with a lifespan extending beyond presidential terms. In addition there is now substantial member state input, with meetings of the National Territorial Cohesion-related Contact Points the functional equivalent of the Committee on Spatial Development from the ESDP era. The professionalism of the whole process, in which one can safely assume that close to one hundred experts from all over Europe have taken part, is clear and particularly so since the Portuguese Presidency where focus was placed on the plans and ideas of the Commission, in particular the Green Paper on Territorial Cohesion, and on territorial cohesion policy as giving strength to cohesion policy as such. This emphasis – other than under the German Presidency – on cohesion policy is not really surprising. Portugal is one of its beneficiaries. Slovenia is the paragon among new member states and one of the chief priorities of its presidency has been to launch the discussion on the Lisbon Strategy – now the umbrella under which EU cohesion policy comes – post-2010. France regards itself – rightly – as a leading light in regional policy and planning: Indeed it practically invented EU cohesion policy. This all makes the renewed focus on EU policy understandable and augurs well for a more cooperative relationship in future between the member states and the Commission in this area.

This paper examines if and how indoor climate systems are important for passive house certification. The research subjects are passive houses in Belgium, occupied by owner-clients. These have received a quality assurance certificate from an independent organization. Through interviews with the owners, and on-site analysis of indoor climate installations in passive houses, the selection of indoor climate systems for passive houses was analyzed and insights were obtained in changes occurring after certification. Also, two houses were analyzed during further visits, including interviews and measurements, to allow detailed performance evaluation of the indoor climate systems. The paper concludes that adaptation of certification procedures is recommended, by looking more closely at the practical implementation of indoor climate systems. The paper further questions the general validity of the scientific basis of the passive house definition.

The energy performance for new houses in the Netherlands increased during the last decade with 45%. A shift from Conventional Mechanical Ventilation (natural inlet and mechanical exhaust or CMV) to balanced flow Heat Recovery Ventilation (HRV) can be seen. Several occupants of the newly constructed neighbourhood of Vathorst in Amersfoort reported health complaints that they relate to HRV. The regional Health Board commissioned a study on health complaints and indoor environmental quality in relation to the ventilation system and other building parameters. 100 dwellings were inspected, divided into a case group of complainers in houses with HRV, a group of similar houses without complainers and a control group in dwellings with CMV. Health complaints occurred more often in dwellings with HRV than with CMV. The quality of the indoor environment was inadequate for the parameters noise, draught, CO2, formaldehyde and high indoor temperatures in summer.

For newly built houses national ambitions prescribe increasing levels of energy performances, even including achieving net zero energy or carbon neutral houses. This is in large contrast with the lack of quality in many building processes. The building regulations, processes and control will have to be reshaped to support these ambitions, taking into account a development of performance guarantees in the building sector. Passive houses have to reach a target energy demand for heating less than 15 kWh/m2a and a total primary energy demand less than 120 kWh/m2a. Quite some examples of houses (and other buildings) in various countries show that it is technically feasible to reach this performance. In most of these countries also some form of quality assurance and certificates for these houses exist. In this paper we describe the possible changes of building processes due to the introduction of the passive house concept, and the urgency of reliable quality assurance to adequately reaching the energy ambitions and to assure quality issues at the same time. We illustrate this with passive house certification schemes from some European countries. This leads to some conclusions about the role and content of passive house certificates in the coming years.