According to current social theory, global economic, political, social-cultural driving forces are reshaping the way we organize our production and consumption. This would result in the dawn of the era of the New Geography. This might explain that in Western Europe the countryside is changing rapidly into an arena in which many different stakeholders compete for the land and the countryside becomes multifunctional in time and space. In this contribution, we will focus on one challenging planning aspect of these dynamics: the combination of an attractive developed (pseudo) countryside, housing development and water-retention in the urbanized Netherlands. Water safety has become an important spatial and economic planning topic since the greenhouse-effect will lead to more water excess in the Netherlands due to more heavy rainfall, riverwater and a rise of the sea-level. Especially in the economic core of the Netherlands, The Randstad-Holland, huge investments seem necessary to protect the people, the built environment and our economy. The challenge is to design an attractive, multifunctional and safe area that is affordable for the state, for developers and the final consumer. Each of these stakeholders makes costs-benefit analyses as a part of a general risk-assessment procedure. This assessment has become important in the Netherlands due to deregulation politics. So, the questions become: what are the positive valued externalities of public investments for private users, how can validly quantify and monetarize them, and finally how can we apply these private excessive gains to reduce the unprofitable public investments. To ex-ante evaluate the externalities of investments models (spatial) models are applied. Especially in spatial and economic planning models are necessary to understand the many recursive rules that exist within economic and spatial systems. The National Institute of Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) is a state agency that develops and uses GIS-based evaluation land-use models to assess risks. It noticed that the appraisal of housing nearby water was lacking in its models. It commissioned the Research Institute for Housing, Urban and Mobility studies to review literature on the methodological aspects of the assumed relationships and to estimate the part-utility/part-valuation of water nearby housing location as a first step to improve its models. This paper presents some of the results of these studies.@en

According to current social theory, global economic, political, social-cultural driving forces are reshaping the way we organize our production and consumption. This would result in the dawn of the era of the New Geography. This might explain that in Western Europe the countryside is changing rapidly into an arena in which many different stakeholders compete for the land and the countryside becomes multifunctional in time and space. In this contribution, we will focus on one challenging aspect of these dynamics: the combination of an attractive developed (pseudo) countryside, housing development and water-retention in the urbanized Netherlands. The challenge is to design an attractive and multifunctional area that is affordable for the state, for developers and the final consumer. Each of these stakeholders makes costs-benefit analyses as a part of a general risk-assessment procedure. This assessment has become important in the Netherlands due to deregulation politics. So, the question becomes: who pays for public amenities with positive and negative spill-over effects? The National Institute of Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) is a state agency that develops and uses GIS-based evaluation models to assess risks. It noticed that the valuation of housing nearby water was lacking in its models. It commissioned the Research Institute for Housing, Urban and Mobility studies to review literature on the methodological aspects of the assumed relationships and to estimate the part-utility/part-valuation of water nearby housing location. This estimation of the monetarized evaluation (valuation in UK-English and appraisal in USA-English, price) by the final users, the housing consumers, is a necessary step in this risk-assessment since the value must at least be equal to the public and private expenditures. We discuss a variety of methodological problems. We also suggest a switch from a market price equilibrium to a choice and preference equilibrium perspective. Using expert interviews and trade-offs of preferences in a multi-criteria/dimensional setting may overcome problems with conventional tools such as contingent valuation and revealed preferences methods (hedonic, travel cost and input output approaches). Accepting that the reality is complex and fuzzy may in fact turn into strength, as the analysis becomes more valid. We also question the vitality of present spatial analytical models. The basic weakness of the GIS-models is that they assume spatial objects to act, instead of regarding these objects as elements of an opportunity-set for stakeholders (agents). Multi-agent-models may seem promising means to combine the best of individual choice modeling and system-analytical GIS-models that link the micro-macro perspective.@en

The role of water in the locational bundle of residential value and choice determinants is multiple. Relevant attributes pertain to water quality, proximity and length of water frontage, view, size of water body, coastal development costs, and costs caused by flooding. They also pertain to different types of water: the sea, lake, river and so on. This is a systematic literature review of the influence of water proximity and use factors on property prices and area attractiveness within a spatial cost-benefit setting. According to the studies that were reviewed the composite effect for water quality, proximity and view generate a price premium up to ca 60% for seaside property, 25% for lakeside property, and up to 40% for a variety of other inland water bodies. In addition, few studies estimate the on-site potential for a coastal area with development restrictions as a net effect of the positive amenity benefits and negative opportunity costs to vary in the range from +21.5 to ¿ 14.5%. On balance these figures point to substantial benefits of water location. However, the price impact of flood risk was quantified separately as up to 22%, and may be deducted from these figures, given a localized tendency for such hazard. Thus, it may be concluded that for the attractiveness potential of a site the environmental externalities play a large role. Furthermore, when allocating housing claims spatially using an operational model where all land uses are covered extra costs to overcome conflict and scarcity situations may arise.@en

Introduction In constructing new dwellings or restructuring existing ones, needs and preferences of households for which these houses are intended, have to be taken into account. Preferences can be measured using conjoint measurement. The goal of this study is to explore whether preferences for dwellings are dependent upon the way in which these dwellings are presented in a conjoint measurement, i.e., using ¿text only¿, using ¿¿text and color photo¿ or using ¿text and black-and-white impression¿. Methods and respondents We developed eight dwelling profiles based on combinations of characteristics of the dwelling and the residential environment. We presented these profiles in three different ways to 28 respondents. Each respondent was asked to rate the 24 profiles and to indicate whether they would want to move to the particular dwelling. After the task, respondents filled out a short questionnaire and were asked to participate in a semi-structured interview about the consistency of their choices. Results For five of the eight profiles, the ratings differed between the three presentation methods. Significant differences in choices were observed for one of the eight profiles only. The inclusion of images in the conjoint analyses led to a number of differences between the models. These findings can be explained by elements on the images that are not systematically varied and thus have a disturbing influence. This conclusion was supported by the post-test interviews and questionnaires; many respondents indicated that they had been influenced by details on the images, such as the color of the brick. Conclusion Respondents seem to be influenced by details on photos and impressions. If images have to be included in a conjoint measurement task, it is of utmost importance to make sure that all potentially disturbing details are cleared away from the photos or impressions.@en