In recent years, the compact city model has gained prominence as a strategy for sustainable urban development, with urban densification at its core. While densification is recognized as a key planning tool, questions remain about how to use it effectively to achieve broader sustainability goals.

This study explores the role of density through the case of Zurich, a global city known for balancing competitiveness with quality of life. Using Campbell's (2007) triangle of conflicts in sustainable urban development, the research evaluates whether built, population, and functional density contribute to balancing the effects of intensified land-use processes, such as the provision of housing, proximity, and mix of uses.

Focusing on Zurich's Aussersihl district, the study analyzes three planning phases: the industrial city, the modernist functional city, and the sustainable city era. By integrating historical and current GIS data with projections for 2040, the findings reveal a transition from mixed-use residential areas to service-based areas. This shift is driven by modernist planning instruments promoting functional separation and de-densification. These approaches may impede sustainability goals, including functional diversity and density of use. The study calls for updated planning instruments and a redefinition of how density is conceptualized and operationalized in urban planning. ... Read more

This article analyzes the acceptance of climate policy measures in the Metropolitan Region of Amsterdam to understand how policy and planning interrelate with private and public interests. While legitimizing climate policy and measures, values can also cause conflict when operationalized locally. By analyzing value conflicts in public discourse, we gain insights into questions of environmental behavior and their influence on the acceptance of climate action. We report on quantitative and qualitative discourse analysis covering 410 articles from Dutch newspapers between 2015 and 2021 in the Metropolitan Region of Amsterdam related to the energy transition, mobility, and urban greening. Our findings show that public discourse mostly remains abstract and detached from local contexts. As experts and politicians dominate the debate, the discourse mainly addresses science- and policy-related arguments, representing the public interest but reflecting only insufficiently private interests and the local (re-)distribution of benefits and burdens. Therefore, we attribute spontaneous protest to the lack of reference to differentiated values at the local level and find the argument of NIMBYism insufficient to explain residents’ opposition. Instead, our findings point to experts’ and decision-makers’ lack of recognition of the local “idea of place” and a community’s identity as an explanation for the sudden emergence of protests. Here, urban design may bridge the gap between policy and planning by translating technical and economic constraints into place-specific designs. ... Read more

Water justice can be a delicate balancing act. Conservation regulations ensure urban areas’ water demands are met, but these may conflict with the water rights of local people living in catchment areas. No metropolis wants to face water shortages, yet prioritising municipalities’ rights over those of local people can result in water injustice. This paper explores water rights and water justice, defining both to show how the latter is achieved by balancing the former. It examines Chengdu’s water catchment area using field observation, interviews, and document analysis and investigates the causes of water conflict through the lens of local culture. The study then outlines a water justice framework involving domestic habits and lifestyle, production of water, and management principles with the aim of providing parity of rights that highlight local cultural factors. The justice criteria outlined here could also be used in other places where power structures disregard local people’s water rights. ... Read more

Urban densification is crucial for sustainable urban growth. Yet, its implementation often leads to local conflicts. To understand the interplay between private and public interests, we analysed media reports on densification policies and projects in Switzerland from 2009 and 2019, a period when Switzerland revised its Spatial Planning Act, limiting land take and promoting densification. Our results reveal a disconnect between private and public interests. Residents and other established stakeholders tend to dominate the public debate. Arguments in the face of impending building often reflect conflicting social values related to distributive justice, such as rising housing costs, loss of identity of place, and erosion of social cohesion. NIMBYism, the “Not In My Backyard” phenomenon, is insufficient to explain criticism or the rejection of urban densification measures. Other factors, such as ecological concerns, have gained impact. Moreover, our study highlights that the Swiss direct democratic instrument of popular initiatives tends to stimulate public debate and, thereby, has the potential to better bridge public interests with the effects of densification policies on residents and communities. ... Read more

This paper examines the tension between political efforts to implement climate goals in urban planning and design and the acceptance of climate adaptation measures at the local level. We hypothesise that, while there is consensus on the desirability of climate goals, the implementation of such concerns can lead to conflicts causing delay or hindrance. We argue that a holistic understanding of the causes and motivations for protests and resistance, often described as NIMBYsm, can help increase acceptance among citizens and inform governance processes. Our analysis focuses on the Amsterdam Metropolitan Area, especially on current initiatives and plans related to energy transition (wind turbines), mobility (traffic and parking restrictions), and urban water and heat management (urban greening). We report on a quantitative and qualitative discourse analysis covering articles from Dutch public media about climate resilience plans and the implementation of climate adaptation measures. Our study covers the period from 2015 to 2020, i.e., from the Paris Climate Agreement to the development of the Environmental Vision and the Climate Neutral Roadmap 2050. The analysis also considers publications of relevant public institutions and administrative bodies on climate goals and implementation strategies. Debates on large-scale environmental measures, such as flood control, tend to focus on public interest and compensation processes. Yet, when discussing climate adaptation measures in cities, private interests, e.g., the protection of ownership, property value, and character of place, often dominate. These arguments often reflect conflicting social values, such as perceived limitations of freedom of choice, but may also be related to a lack of influence in decision-making processes. ... Read more

The concept of “urban forest” (UF) is gaining momentum in urban planning in the context of climate adaptation. Principles from the field of urban forestry are mainstreamed into urban planning, but little is known about effective tools for the successful implementation of new UFs. This article presents explorative research comparing how three cities (Almere, Madrid, and Boston) are dealing with the planning of a UF project, and their alignment with distinct organisational and typological interpretations of a UF. We employed a mixed-methods approach to gain insights into the main goals of the project, their organisational structure, and the employed planning process through the analysis of project documents and expert interviews. Our results point to an effective mainstreaming of environmental questions among stakeholders, but also indicate a poor development of objective criteria for the success of a UF. We note that municipal planners circumvented current internal rigidities and barriers by relying on intermediaries and local academia as providers of external knowledge, or by facilitating experiments. Finally, our results show that there may not be just one UF type to achieve the desired environmental and social goals and overcome implementation barriers. Conversely, each of the governance and organisational models behind the implementation of each type present collaborative and mainstreaming challenges. Therefore, we see an opportunity in further research examining processes and institutions towards the collaborative building of UFs that could bridge gaps between top-down and bottom-up approaches and activate different types of agencies. ... Read more

This article discusses the impact of systems thinking and cybernetics on architectural design by examining the example of the Inter-Action Centre (1970–1977) of British architect Cedric Price. The centre reflects Price’s view of architecture as part of an extensive social and environmental system, or ecology, that influences the inhabitants’ mutual interactions and their relationship with their physical surroundings. Emphasising the link between material resources, technology and individual action, the project design implied a change both in the understanding of architecture and the architect’s role: from the designer of present-day artifacts to the designer of system interventions.

Influenced by the cybernetician Gordon Pask, the systems theorist Buckminster Fuller, and the biologist and town planner Patrick Geddes, Price developed a relational approach in which architecture functions as an instrument of change within a larger system such as the city, neighbourhood or region. Following this approach, space was no longer perceived merely as a container but as the product of social interactions. Accordingly, the architect’s work represents a fundamental change in the conception of space in the arts and sciences during the 1970s, which is essential for understanding today’s design and planning practice. ... Read more

What is seen as just in a society largely depends on public reasoning, which occurs in public debates. This paper analyses public debates around land use and densification in Switzerland and The Netherlands to understand how private and public interests interrelate in the tensions of urban growth. The paper is based on the hypothesis that while a consensus on the desirability of densification may exist in public, its implementation may cause direct tensions on a local level where it affects the quality of the immediate living environment. Therefore, insights into the acceptance of densification at a local level are considered important factors for successfully implementing densification projects. ... Read more

With the revision of the Swiss Spatial Planning Act in 2012 and its implementation 2014, inward settlement development became the main objective of urban design and planning in Switzerland. As Zürich has to cope with a 25% increase in population by 2040, the revision of the city’s building and zoning laws requires a revision of urban densification strategies and the instruments for controlling density and land use. Furthermore, the turn towards inward settlement development opens up a discussion on the social vision of urban design and the ecological and socio-economic consequences of spatial interventions on future quality of life and the inclusiveness of cities. ... Read more