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An academic and policy debate has been running in recent decades on whether and to what extent travel behaviour is influenced by the built environment. This dissertation addresses this influence on daily travel distance, chaining behaviour, car ownership, and car commuting. As cars are the dominant mode of transport, car travel received most attention. The analyses were based on a comprehensive dataset collected in the North Wing of the Randstad in the Netherlands. The study findings indicate that a more compact urban structure reduces car use. But the effects are small. One important lesson is that behavioural mechanisms are never simple but invariably elicit compensation. The challenge facing planners is to design cities and neighbourhoods that make it easier to drive less and are attractive to live in.

Does the neighbourhood in which people live matter for the resourcefulness of their personal network and thus for their opportunities in life? Do residents of a multi-ethnic ‘problem’ area maintain fewer relationships with fellow-residents compared to residents of a homogeneous problem-free neighbourhood? And do ‘diversity-seekers’ who choose to live in a mixed neighbourhood translate their liking for diversity into more mixed networks and more bridging ties? This book brings together key insights from urban studies and network studies in order to understand whether and how spatial segregation matters for personal networks and inequality. By approaching these questions through different urban sociological perspectives, the book engages with current debates on poverty concentration as well as ethnic diversity, gentrification and social capital. The study is based on detailed quantitative and qualitative data on the personal networks of people living in three differently composed neighbourhoods in Rotterdam, the second largest city in the Netherlands.

Like other West European countries, the Netherlands are facing a growing uneasiness about its changing demographics. It is within this context that animated discussions concerning immigrant neighbourhoods dominate. The general opinion is that living in such neighbourhoods hinders the 'integration' of immigrants into Dutch society. This book contributes to the academic and policy debate by not only examining the effects of ethnic concentration, but also by finding out how people are sorted into neighbourhoods. Bringing together different bodies of literature, this book offers a more holistic view of the creation of ethnic residential segregation and its potential significance for individual life chances.

Like other West European countries, the Netherlands are facing a growing uneasiness about its changing demographics. It is within this context that animated discussions concerning immigrant neighbourhoods dominate. The general opinion is that living in such neighbourhoods hinders the 'integration' of immigrants into Dutch society. This book contributes to the academic and policy debate by not only examining the effects of ethnic concentration, but also by finding out how people are sorted into neighbourhoods. Bringing together different bodies of literature, this book offers a more holistic view of the creation of ethnic residential segregation and its potential significance for individual life chances.

The book explores the relationship between the characteristics of the welfare state and the characteristics of the housing system (housing policies, housing outcomes and housing market developments) in different European countries. It consists of a theoretical framework, six published articles and a concluding chapter. All six articles use the welfare state regime theory and typology of Esping-Andersen and/or the housing system typology of Kemeny, or at least some aspects of these, as an explanatory framework. The results of the investigations indicate that there are considerable differences between the various European housing systems. As far as this is concerned, especially the Southern European countries occupy a rather distinct position. For this reason, two articles in the study specifically focus on the Southern European housing system of Spain. The book is relevant for both academics and policy-makers who are interested in international housing and housing policy developments.

The dwelling is a central setting in people’s everyday life. People use their dwelling and residential environment for a large variety of activities and purposes. This study systematically relates activities, settings and meanings to improve the insight into people-environment relations. This is called a meaning structure approach. Over 600 people, living in either a city centre, suburban or rural type of residential environment were asked about their everyday activities and the meanings thereof. The results show that meanings are important for the way in which people use their dwelling and residential environment. The meaning structure approach allows for a high level of aggregation identifying general meanings of the dwelling, such as a place to be together with family and friends. It also allows for a low level of aggregation, for example, using internet at home has for many people become part of everyday life, providing them with easy access to a wide range of information. This illustrates the usefulness of meaning structures as a tool for investigating people-environment relations.

Most Western national governments aim to influence individual travel patterns – at least to some degree – through spatial planning in residential areas. Nevertheless, the extent to which the characteristics of the built environment influence travel behaviour remains the subject of some debate among travel behaviour researchers. This thesis addresses the role of residential-self-selection, an important issue within this debate. Households may not only adjust their travel behaviour to the built environment where they live, but they may also choose a residential location that corresponds to their travel-related attitudes. The empirical analysis in this thesis is based on data collected through an internet survey and a GPS-based survey, both of which were conducted among homeowners in three municipalities in the central Netherlands. The study showed that residential self-selection has some limited effect on the relationship between distances to activity locations and travel mode use and daily kilometres travelled. The results also indicate that the inclusion of attitudes can help to detecting residential self-selection, provided that studies comply with several preconditions, such as the inclusion of the ‘reversed’ influence of behaviour on attitudes.

This research highlights the gap between the official rhetoric and the political reality of democratic decentralisation and bottom-up planning using an indepth study of the metropolitan planning process in Kolkata, India. The key question that I address here is: how do elected officials at different governmental levels, professional planners, and ordinary citizens interact in the process of metropolitan planning, and which players dominate the process? I focus on the dynamic interactions between planners and the operation of the political process that shapes this reality. The empirical material for this case study includes interviews with actors involved in the metropolitan planning process in Kolkata, documents in the form of study reports, master plans, minutes of meetings, and official memos produced by the planning agency and by other organisations and individuals involved with metropolitan planning in Kolkata. Archival data from local and national newspapers were also used to substantiate some of the information gathered from other sources. My analysis of the case illustrates the following: (1) there are differences in the real motives for the state to pursue decentralisation and what it claims to be behind its decentralisation policy; (2) the planning process is unlikely to be truly bottom-up if power is concentrated within any one political party; (3) external funding, either from international agencies or higher levels of government, has the potential to force change in the local and regional structures of decision making so that the voices of ordinary people can be included in public decision making; (4) for the effective implementation of bottom-up approaches to metropolitan planning the planning bureaucracy needs to be independent of the political class; (5) bottom-up planning requires that planning capacity be built from a grassroots level. This requires devolution of both responsibilities and means/resources to carry out those responsibilities to the lowest level of planning; (6) the politicisation of decision making along party lines limits planning from the bottom up. Political parties in Kolkata and West Bengal are hierarchical organisations where members are accountable mainly to those above them. Therefore they are unlikely to become advocates for multiple constituencies and effective agents of change for bottom-up planning processes.

This study discusses ways of measuring and explaining the development of house prices. The goal of the research underpinning this dissertation was to develop a methodological framework for studying these developments. This framework relates, first, to correcting for changes in the composition of swellings and, second, to the fundamentals of the price development. Using the weighted repeat sales method and sale price apparaisal ratio (SPAR) method house price indexes wer developed for the Netherlands. Both the Dutch land registry office and Statistics Netherlands publish the SPAR based house price index monthly. To explain and predict changes in prices a house price model is presented. As suggested in literature on western housingmarkets, the Dutch house price developments can be explained by demand-oriented short-run term variables and a long-run term variable. Using the house price model, this work identifies the fundamental factors in the developmentof house prices, a long-run equilibrium between interest payments and income, and the weak relationship on an aggregated level between house prices and newly built dwellings.

This study combines qualitative and quantitative research methods to explain which factors contribute to a problem-free or problematic functioning of neighbourhoods in general and especially of Dutch neighbourhoods that were built in the first years after World War II. An important part of the book is about the development of measuring instruments. Special attention is given to the development of a risk scale that offers researchers and policymakers the opportunity to distinguish on a metric level between problematic and successful neighbourhoods. This book brings together key insights from Urban Studies and central elements of Behavioural Game Theory. The author applies the notions of strong reciprocity and altruistic punishment in Prisoner’s Dilemmas and Assurance Games to describe and explain the interdependent choices that residents make when they act as producers and maintainers of the social climate in the daily living environment of a problem-free early post-Second World War neighbourhood.

West European housing systems in a comparative perspective gives an overview of the results of almost 20 years of international comparative housing research, carried out at OTB Research Institute for the Built Environment of the Delft University of Technology. Attention is paid to methodological aspects, the development of differences and similarities between housing systems and the viability of international comparative housing theories for analysing the development of the housing system in individual countries. From a methodological point of view, a middle-way approach offers a meaningful methodological basis for international comparative housing research, taking due regard of both differences and similarities between housing systems and parts thereof. Important aspects of a middle way approach are the identification of a key unifying feature for non-uniform phenomena in different countries and the contextualisation of these phenomena in order to understand their place within the housing system. An analysis of the development of differences and similarities between housing systems in various West European countries shows that under the influence of demographic and economic developments, comparable trends can be discerned in the character of housing policies and in developments in the different housing markets. This has not led to convergence of housing systems due to the differing influence that housing traditions and the institutional structure of the housing market have on policy implementation. A final conclusion is that theories that are developed for international comparative housing research, and especially divergence theories, can also be applied to the evaluation of policy strategies in individual countries. The current discussion in the Netherlands about the future development of the Dutch housing system might benefit from the use of these theories.

In hun strategisch voorraadbeleid beschrijven woningcorporaties welke aanpassingen ze in hun woningbezit willen doorvoeren. Tegelijkertijd kan het in de praktijk soms verstandig zijn dat zij van hun beleid afwijken, bijvoorbeeld omdat er nieuwe inzichten zijn, of omdat er beren op de weg komen die je beter kunt mijden. In het proefschrift wordt ingegaan op de vraag hoe het implementatieproces van strategisch voorraadbeleid verloopt. Het bevat uitgebreide casestudies, uitgevoerd bij vier woningcorporaties, waarin meerdere uitvoeringsprojecten van begin tot eind zijn gereconstrueerd. Daarbij is in beeld gebracht welke middelen corporaties gebruiken om beleid en uitvoering met elkaar te verbinden. Ook is gezocht naar de balans tussen enerzijds het uitvoeren van voorgenomen beleid en anderzijds het bewust afwijken van voorgenomen beleid op basis van nieuwe ontwikkelingen en veranderende inzichten. De belangrijkste uitkomsten van deze studie komen samen in een balansmodel, waarmee gereflecteerd kan worden op implementatieprocessen bij woningcorporaties, andere maatschappelijke organisaties en overheden.

Cycling is cheaper, healthier and in urban environments often faster than other transport modes. Nevertheless, even at short distances, many individuals do not cycle. This thesis aims to explain why commuters vary in their decision to bicycle. Results indicate that the individual (day-to-day) choice to commute by bicycle is affected by personal attitudes towards cycling to work, social norms, work situation, weather conditions and trip characteristics. Additionally, this thesis provides evidence that different groups of bicycle commuters exist: non-cyclists, part-time cyclists and full-time cyclists. The mode choice of individuals within these groups (partly) depends on a number of different factors. Non-cyclists seem not to cycle because they consider it impossible, either due to the distance involved, their need to transport goods, the need for a car during office hours, or a negative subjective norm. The decision to cycle among part-time or full-time cyclists is also affected by these factors, but additional factors can be identified. Finally, the day-to-day choice to cycle is based on work characteristics, weather conditions and trip characteristics. Part-time cyclists who cycle only occasionally are encouraged by pleasant weather conditions, while frequent cyclists are found to be discouraged by more practical barriers, such as where they need to work on that day.

Cycling is cheaper, healthier and in urban environments often faster than other transport modes. Nevertheless, even at short distances, many individuals do not cycle. This thesis aims to explain why commuters vary in their decision to bicycle. Results indicate that the individual (day-to-day) choice to commute by bicycle is affected by personal attitudes towards cycling to work, social norms, work situation, weather conditions and trip characteristics. Additionally, this thesis provides evidence that different groups of bicycle commuters exist: non-cyclists, part-time cyclists and full-time cyclists. The mode choice of individuals within these groups (partly) depends on a number of different factors. Non-cyclists seem not to cycle because they consider it impossible, either due to the distance involved, their need to transport goods, the need for a car during office hours, or a negative subjective norm. The decision to cycle among part-time or full-time cyclists is also affected by these factors, but additional factors can be identified. Finally, the day-to-day choice to cycle is based on work characteristics, weather conditions and trip characteristics. Part-time cyclists who cycle only occasionally are encouraged by pleasant weather conditions, while frequent cyclists are found to be discouraged by more practical barriers, such as where they need to work on that day.

In hun strategisch voorraadbeleid beschrijven woningcorporaties welke aanpassingen ze in hun woningbezit willen doorvoeren. Tegelijkertijd kan het in de praktijk soms verstandig zijn dat zij van hun beleid afwijken, bijvoorbeeld omdat er nieuwe inzichten zijn, of omdat er beren op de weg komen die je beter kunt mijden. In het proefschrift wordt ingegaan op de vraag hoe het implementatieproces van strategisch voorraadbeleid verloopt. Het bevat uitgebreide casestudies, uitgevoerd bij vier woningcorporaties, waarin meerdere uitvoeringsprojecten van begin tot eind zijn gereconstrueerd. Daarbij is in beeld gebracht welke middelen corporaties gebruiken om beleid en uitvoering met elkaar te verbinden. Ook is gezocht naar de balans tussen enerzijds het uitvoeren van voorgenomen beleid en anderzijds het bewust afwijken van voorgenomen beleid op basis van nieuwe ontwikkelingen en veranderende inzichten. De belangrijkste uitkomsten van deze studie komen samen in een balansmodel, waarmee gereflecteerd kan worden op implementatieprocessen bij woningcorporaties, andere maatschappelijke organisaties en overheden.