Moving out or living on a mound? Jointly planning a Dutch flood adaptation project

All over the world spatial flood risk management policies are on the rise. This paper analyses the planning process for the Overdiepse polder, a so-called “Room for the River” project in the Netherlands. After high water in the 1990s, the Dutch government changed its flood risk management policy. While before 2000 it leaned heavily on dikes to separate water from land, after that year spatial measures to “let the water flow” were introduced. This required the integration of two formerly separated policy domains: flood risk management and land use planning. In the densely populated and economically highly developed Netherlands, returning space to the river unavoidably impacts on the lives and livelihoods of those who live and work along the rivers. Therefore, such spatial measures to decrease flood risk have to be negotiated with various stakeholders. The planning process towards making the Overdiepse polder suitable for temporary water storage deserves more in-depth analysis. We describe and analyze the development of relationships between key actors in the planning process, with a focus on planning practices rather than on assumptions about the existence of certain types and qualities of relationships. We conclude, among others, that citizen involvement can, under specific socio-political and institutional conditions, build trust among stakeholders and increase local legitimacy for interventions by government agencies. However, it should not be idealized as “self-governance” or assumed to be part of a unidirectional change in water interventions towards new relationships between actors.     

Urban flood resilience,a discursive-institutional analysis of planning practices in the Metropolitan City of Milan

Flood risk is increasing all over the globe due to urbanization and the effects of climate change. Water managers and urban planners try to cope with flood risk by enhancing urban flood resilience. Three main discourses of resilience are engineering, ecological, and socio-ecological resilience. Whereas the discourse of engineering resilience emphasizes the use of flood protection infrastructures, the discourses of ecological and socio-ecological resilience advocate river restoration and spatial strategies to reduce flood risk. In this paper, we investigate which resilience discourse is dominant in the Lambro river basin (Metropolitan City of Milan), and how this discourse has been translated into institutions (rules-in-use) and outcomes, such as flood protection infrastructures or building regulations. Our discursive-institutional analysis is informed by the (politicized) Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework, which highlights the role of discursive, institutional, and contextual factors in explaining the outcomes of strategic interactions within action arenas. It is shown that whereas bottom-up initiatives try to foster socio-ecological resilience, the engineering resilience discourse still dominates within the Lambro river basin because national policies and funds are geared towards hard infrastructure measures.     

British discretion in Dutch planning: Establishing a comparative perspective for regional planning and local development in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom

Regional planning and development is continuing to take an important role in planning agendas throughout Europe. In the United Kingdom (UK), the planning system has been reformed during the last decades, marking a noticeable shift from a development-led towards a more plan-led system. In the Netherlands, strictly regulated growth-control policies have been abandoned to some degree, in favor of more decentralized planning policies featuring negotiated development. Dutch planners have been specifically interested in a more British approach, that is, a more discretionary and development-led type of approach to spatial planning. In this paper, we will discuss current efforts in Dutch regional planning to adopt new principles for planning delivery and will provide a comparative perspective between spatial planning in the UK and the Netherlands. This paper discusses the changing structure of planning delivery in both countries. At the same time, it establishes a framework for identifying critical lessons for Dutch regional planning practice as opposed to planning in the UK. Three characteristics are pivotal for the comparison: (1) the establishment of comprehensive principles for project coordination; (2) options for the settlement of planning gain, packaging interests, and regional redistribution; and (3) the institution for development-oriented planning and discretion for planning decisions. The evidence used is based on a literature review of recent debates in both countries and illustrative cases, including the Dutch ‘Heart of the Heuvelrug’ plan.     

The adaptive efficiency of land use planning measured by the control of urban sprawl. The cases of the Netherlands,Belgium and Poland

The paper aims to position the concept of adaptive efficiency in planning theory, by providing insights on the conditions that explain why land use planning in some institutional contexts is able to adapt and improve more efficiently than in others. This is done by focusing on a specific planning goal: the control of residential sprawl. The paper presents a theoretical framework based on two models, one on the coordinating mechanisms regarding the use of land and one to explain institutional changes. This framework is exploited with empirical case studies where we compare the control of sprawl in the Netherlands, Belgium and Poland. The analysis diagnoses a duality of planning practices. Even though planning failures occur in the Netherlands as well, we provide evidence that Dutch land use planning has been able to efficiently adapt regulatory instruments and collaborative practices to societal changes. By contrast, Belgian and Polish planners face huge difficulties to incorporate new initiatives to control urban sprawl or, in more general terms, to reinforce their influence on land uses.     

A game of give and take: The introduction of multi-layer (water) safety in the Netherlands and Flanders

At the beginning of the 21st century, the Netherlands and Flanders introduced a risk-based approach to flood risk management (FRM), labelled as multi-layer (water) safety. In contrast to a flood defence approach, risk-based management stresses the need to manage both the consequences and probability of a flood. The concept has developed differently in the two countries, as we conclude from a discursive-institutionalist research perspective. The Netherlands is characterised by a high institutionalization of the traditional flood defence discourse and a more closed policy arrangement, whereas in Flanders, the flood defence discourse is less institutionalized and the arrangement is more open. In both countries we see an opening of the arrangement preceding the establishment of multi-layer (water) safety, but at the same time, actors stress different aspects of the concept in order to increase its compatibility with the existing policy arrangement. In the Netherlands, the focus is on probability management, in Flanders on consequence management. In the Netherlands, multi-layer (water) safety as a concept could be established because it stabilises the system in the short-term by reinforcing the importance of flood defence, whereas in Flanders, policymakers were receptive to the concept because it supports a shift of responsibility towards actors outside traditional water management.     

Between the rule of law and the quest for control: Legal certainty in the Dutch planning system

At the heart of every planning system lies the trade-off between flexibility and legal certainty. Every system has a bit of both. Systems such as the English put more emphasis on flexibility, whereas the American and the French seem to value legal certainty more highly. The Netherlands is part of the same Napoleonic legal family as France. However, in the Netherlands, planning practice seems to be more flexible than the general perception of the Dutch planning system. Many developments deviate from the legally binding land-use plan. Therefore, such a plan does not provide much legal certainty. On 1 July 2008, the new Dutch Spatial Planning Act came into effect. One of its most important objectives is instating the land-use plan as the central decision framework. Both the steering and the safeguarding function – the legal certainty – are meant to be strengthened. Therefore, the frequently grant exemptions must be reduced. However, it seems that the ‘erosion’ of the land-use plan has a more fundamental origin in Dutch planning culture. Based on empirical evidence of the use of the previous planning system, this paper states that steering ambitions of Dutch municipalities, rather than the system as such, have caused land-use plans – with their main focus on recording spatial development afterwards – to become overly detailed and easily outdated. The quest for control and the rule of law seem to be antagonists; one can only exist at the expense of the other.     

Negotiating climate change responses: Regional and local perspectives on transport and coastal zone planning in South Sweden

Putting climate change policy-integration into practice is challenged by problems of institutional misfit, due to, inter alia, deficient vertical administrative interplay. While most focus within the field of climate change research has targeted the national–local interplay, less is known about the interface of regional and local perspectives. Here, the aim is to study that interface with a specific focus on the relation between regional and local spatial planning actors, through a case-study of transport and coastal zone management in a Swedish municipality. The article is based on interviews (focus group and single in-depth) and official planning documents. The material reveals a tricky planning situation, replete with conflict. In practice, various institutional frameworks, claims and ambitions collide. The attempts to steer the local spatial planning initiatives from the regional level led to conflicts, which in turn seems to have hampered the overall work for climate change management through spatial planning. Furthermore, there are few traces of prospects of a smooth vertical institutional interplay able to support the overall aims related to integrating climate change mitigation and adaptation in spatial planning.     

Flood risk management in Austria: Analysing the shift in responsibility-sharing between public and private actors from a public stakeholder's perspective

The frequency and magnitude of extreme weather events are expected to increase due to the effects of climate change and socio-economic development. Potentially higher flood risk, hence, triggered debate about a shift in flood risk management from mainly public to increasingly private involvement. So far, public flood mitigation schemes were standard modes to deal with flood hazards in many countries, including Austria. With high implementation and maintenance costs as well as substantial losses remaining, alternative management approaches have increasingly been discussed. This paper analyses the debate on shifting responsibilities in flood risk management from public to private actors and whether or not the current governance arrangement would accommodate this shift in the public-private divide. Based on qualitative research, we explicitly analyse this potential shift from an institutional perspective and not from the perspective of individual homeowners, taking the case study of Dornbirn (Austria) as an example. The results show that, firstly, the current governance arrangement hardly encourages property-level flood risk adaptation measures. Secondly, several factors stabilise the current governance arrangement and prevent a shift in the public-private divide. Although the need for an increased sense of responsibility among private actors seems to be evident among interviewees, strong historical narratives and adaptive expectations lead to a society seeing public authorities to be responsible for flood risk management and trust their expertise as well as the technical flood infrastructure. However, such areas of expertise and law are fragmented and therefore impede a redistribution or enforcement of responsibilities. Furthermore, fixed costs delay a shift in the public-private divide as the traditional engineering approach (i.e. structural measures) is predominant with high investments in the current system but limited investment in risk communication to raise awareness. Yet, a shift towards sharing responsibility might contribute to flood risk management for risks to remain manageable.     

Effect of yield and price risk on conversion from conventional to organic farming*

Although the benefits of organic farming are already well known, the conversion to organic farming does not proceed as the Dutch government expected. In order to investigate the conversion decisions of Dutch arable farms, a discrete stochastic dynamic utility‐efficient programming (DUEP) model is developed with special attention for yield and price risk of conventional, conversion and organic crops. The model maximizes the expected utility of the farmer depending on the farmer’s risk attitude. The DUEP model is an extension of a dynamic linear programming model that maximized the labour income of conversion from conventional to organic farming over a 10 year planning horizon. The DUEP model was used to model a typical farm for the central clay region in the Netherlands. The results show that for a risk‐neutral farmer it is optimal to convert to organic farming. However, for a more risk‐averse farmer it is only optimal to fully convert if policy incentives are applied such as taxes on pesticides or subsidies on conversion, or if the market for the organic products becomes more stable.     

How do planners manage risk in alternative land development models? An institutional analysis of land development in the Netherlands

While risk is a key concern in property development, it tends to be discussed by planners only relative to the effects of regulatory planning on private sector risk. Yet planning encompasses a broad range of activities that go beyond its function of regulating private sector development. Despite active approaches to land development being commonly used across different planning contexts, frameworks for analysing public sector strategies to address risk are rarely discussed. We attempt to redress this deficit by investigating the actions of public sector development actors with regard to risk across three different land development models: public land development, land development by public-private partnership, and land readjustment. Using recent Dutch experience, we conduct an institutional analysis of each land development model in order to highlight the effects of alternative governance structures on risk as a particular transaction attribute, from the perspective of public sector planning. Our findings indicate the importance of highlighting the role of public risk in alternative models of land development where there may be a tendency to adopt institutional arrangements without due regard to this, and point to possible future applications of institutional analysis at the particular, rather than the general, level.     

The quest for a sustainable spatial planning framework in Zimbabwe and Zambia

Over the years, the Zimbabwean and Zambian governments have been facing severe spatial development inequalities. They have therefore put in place various policies and strategies in a bid to ensure equitable spatial development. Spatial planning, which refers to the distribution of land uses and people, not only focuses on the physical aspects of land but also on national economic, environmental and social policies. This paper examines spatial planning frameworks in Zimbabwe and Zambia and how they have influenced spatial planning. The effect of spatial planning frameworks on development reveals a close relationship between spatial plans and spatial planning outcomes. The study shows how changes in institutional and legal frameworks affects development in different sectors of the economy and that a holistic approach to planning promotes sustainable development without neglecting other sectors. The data for the study was drawn primarily from secondary sources through a review of documents such as statutes, local development plans and other statutory instruments. The study found that in order to achieve sustainable spatial planning, there is need for a sustainable framework to guide spatial planning. Sustainable spatial planning frameworks also control and promote spatial development in both Zimbabwe and Zambia. Both institutional and legal frameworks guiding spatial planning should be sustainable for the benefit of future generations.     

“The man,the administration and the counter-discourse”: An analysis of the sudden turn in Dutch nature conservation policy

The Netherlands were at the forefront of European nature conservation policy until recently. For years, a stable ‘social contract’ around Dutch nature conservation existed. To the surprise of many, this stability suddenly disappeared and Dutch nature policy has taken a dramatic shift with changing discourses on nature conservation, the halting of implementation of several key-policies and budget cuts up to 70%. This paper engages with discursive-institutionalism to understand such abrupt institutional changes through emerging ideas and discourses that reshape and undermine existing institutional arrangements. We show how the institutionalization of policy not only engendered but also restricted the impact of critical discourses in the 1990s and 2000s. However, critical discourses eventually played an important role in the sudden turn in nature conservation policy. The rise of a general populist discourse and the economic crisis contributed to the credibility of critical discourses and their translation into popular frames and storylines. Authoritative actors such as a new State Secretary opened up popular media for the critical discourses and contributed to their resonance among larger audiences. As such, the man and his new administration successfully used already existing counter-discourses to de-legitimise nature policy and break down important institutional arrangements at a pace unseen in Dutch politics. Adding a discursive element to institutionalism provides for analytical tools to understand change from both external as well as internal forces. In turn, enriching discourse theory with insights from neo-institutionalism helps to evaluate which ideas and discourses become materialized in policy and practice.     

Switzerland’s transition from flood defence to flood-adapted land use–A policy coordination perspective

This contribution examines Switzerland’s shift towards integrated flood risk management from a policy coordination perspective. The study applies a heuristic framework of policy coordination to explore how adaption needs promoted cross-sectoral policy coordination between hydraulic engineering and land use planning and enhanced coherence in flood policies targeting extreme flood events. To account for the temporal dimension in policy coordination, the article traces Swiss flood policies back to the early 1800s and distinguishes four phases of policy coordination. Across the four periods, the analysis focuses on (a) the drivers of policy coordination, (b) the manifestation of policy coordination in terms of policy frames, goals, instruments and subsystem involvement, and (c) the performance of policy coordination. Complemented by an in-depth case study of cross-sectoral flood policies in the Swiss canton Nidwalden findings show that the coordination between flood and land use policies has primarily been driven by three factors: (i) extreme floods as focusing events, (ii) an increasing problem pressure, and (iii) strategic reorientations in flood and land use policies. Today, flood risk management in Switzerland displays a high degree of sectoral interplay between hydraulic engineering and spatial planning. By fostering flood-adapted land uses Switzerland’s coordinated flood policies reduce the vulnerability to uncertain future changes in flood risk and strengthen the country’s capacities to mitigate damage in extreme floods events.     

A fine-scale spatial analytics of the assessment and mapping of buildings and population at different risk levels of urban flood

Nowadays, urban flooding is becoming a severe issue in most of the developing and developed countries. The growth of the urbanization rate is also increasing, and the United Nations (UN) projected that 68 % of the world’s population would live in urban areas by 2050. People tend to migrate from rural to urban areas, which expose them more vulnerable to urban floods. The flood-related damages and deaths are increasing every year globally. Using the Birmingham city, Alabama (AL), USA as the study area, the objective of this research is to assess potential damage risks due to flood exposure of buildings and population in an urban area. Different social and environmental factors influence urban floods in an urban area. This paper considered elevation, slope, flow accumulation, land-use, soil types, and distance from the river as significant influential factors to urban flooding. The flood risk model hence can be developed by using an integrated GIS and cartrographic approach, in which we assessed and assigned weights to these factors and formed a GIS risk assessment model, which shows the level of flood risks in the floodplain areas of Birmingham and quantifies and maps both commercial buildings, home buildings, and populations’ exposed to flooding risks. This study found that the Valley Creek area is the highest flood risk zone in Birmingham, and about 48.85 percent of Valley Creek’s floodplain area will face very high flood risk. The findings further reveal that total number of 5602 people are living in high and very high flood risk zones in Birmingham that approximates 44.04 % of the total population in this floodplain area. The physical vulnerability is also assessed, and findings suggest that the Valley Creek zone has the highest percentage of residential (i.e., 56.14 %) and commercial (i.e., 75.34 %) buildings located in very high flood risk areas. Our study providing a GIS risk assessment approach to locating and mapping the areas, buildings, and populations from the most to the least at risks with a fine spatical scale for urban flood risk management. The numbers of vulnerable buildings and populations within each risk category are quantified and their distributions are mapped. Therefore, revealing population’s and buildings’ risks and their geographic information, this flood risk assessment can help local governments and communities prepare better to take actions against future urban flood events in Birmingham, and this integrated GIS and cartographic analysis for fine flooding assessments can be applied to other urban areas for flood mitigation and risk management.     

国土空间规划视角下生态空间管制分区的理论思考

研究目的:揭示生态空间的概念内涵与认知局限,探讨面向国土空间规划的生态空间管制分区优化逻辑。研究方法:文献资料法和归纳演绎法。研究结果:(1)生态空间具有实体、功能、管理等多维属性,蕴含了生态系统服务的多样性、生态空间功能的复合性、生态服务价值的人本性三重内涵;(2)生态空间管制分区的认知存在三方面的局限,即价值取向上难以统筹要素、功能与格局,操作模式上忽略社会文化功能的权衡,实施路径上未能建构分级分类体系;(3)国土空间规划对生态空间管制分区提出了底线保障、精细治理、人本服务三个层次需求;(4)生态空间管制分区可遵循以生态功能为研判依据、生态要素为空间载体、分级分类高效管理为落脚点的理论逻辑,建构以功能权衡、要素统筹、分级分类为次序的实施路径。研究结论:深化生态空间的理论认知,厘清国土空间规划对生态空间管制分区的核心需求,优化生态空间管制分区的理论逻辑与实施路径,才能有效地支撑生态文明新时代的空间治理现代化目标。     

Risk management in public land development projects: Comparative case study in Finland,and the Netherlands

Public land development is an approach where the public authority acquires land for development, services the land with public infrastructure, and transfers the serviced building plots to private building developers or self-developing end-users. Motivations to use public land development can be divided to planning goal related motivations and financial motivations. In this paper, we study management of public risks related to the use of public land development by analysing case studies located in Finland and the Netherlands, countries known to have strong tradition in public land development. Our findings indicate that, whereas public land development has efficiencies in managing the risks related to the achievement of public planning goals, the management of the financial risks related to the public land development approach can be remarkably difficult even in countries with wide experience in public land development.     

Water in the city: Green open spaces,land use planning and flood management – An Australian case study

With increasing worldwide recognition of the influence of urban development on the hydrological functions of water, there is growing pressure for urban planning to play a greater role in water resources management. Planning for green open spaces in particular can play an important role, as they support important ecosystem services, including those that assist in flood management. It has been argued that interconnected and strategically planned networks of green open spaces should be planned for early in land use planning and design processes, with consideration of water-related ecosystem values and landscape functions in concert with land development, growth management and physical infrastructure planning. Although there is growing recognition of the importance of green open space planning for water sensitive cities and supportive planning measures, there are few analyses of the actual inclusion of this recognition in plans and strategies, or the presence of related actions and planning mechanisms. This paper addresses this gap by comparatively analysing the approaches taken to regional green open space planning in three Australian capital city-regions. Findings indicate the acknowledgement of relationships between flood regulation and green open space planning and various associated planning mechanisms. However, there is limited explicit integration of flood management and green open spaces planning, and significant on-ground barriers to enabling this integration to occur given the legacy of past planning decisions and the lack of information to support implementation. The paper concludes with recommendations for further research to assist planning for green open spaces as an ally to ecosystem services relating to flood management.     

Spatial development policy: changing roles for local and regional authorities in the Netherlands

Implementation of spatial policy involves intervention in the land market. In the Netherlands local government also acts as a land developer. Due to an increase in activities in the land market by private actors and an increase in the geographical scale of economic and social processes, this practice is under threat. This paper analyses the background and evolution of Dutch spatial development policy during the last ten years, from the perspective of governmental directive function for spatial policy. It focuses on the multi-level governance between local and regional governments and between local government and private actors.     

Historical and critical review of spatial and transport planning in the Netherlands

The spatial and transport planning have geographical, economic and environmental constraints and are closely linked to the social and political conditions of each country as well as are well under the influence of globalization forces. This makes it all a highly complex issue and requires a better understanding of the background and products of policies and the interaction of a number of key determinant factors in policy-making and implementation. Within this large picture, the long-term review of different cases may provide useful discussions for the guidance and reinforcement of policy assessment. Therefore, the primary aim of this study is to critically analyze the planning in the Netherlands through examining the issues of governing structure, spatial policy-making, and transport re-structuring. The leading characteristic of the Netherlands is the scarcity of usable land that has raised high and early awareness on spatial development issues and its connections with natural and environmental protection. The functioning of planning systems, and policy aims and measures within the planning documents since the end of the 1950s, have been reviewed and the key planning concepts have been examined by bringing in general and current discussions on the issues. The success and failure in past policy-making and implementations have been highlighted. The policies of the current spatial and transport planning documents have been evaluated by their main policy titles such as compact city, network of cities and sustainable mobility. There is a general consensus that the Netherlands has been developed into a well planned and organized society and has designed leading policies such as the ABC firm location policy. However, a number of issues such as increasing vehicle kilometres, urban decline and sprawl, and some gaps in policy making remain to be the critical planning challenges.     

Quantifying land-use change impacts on the dynamic evolution of flood vulnerability

Recently, dramatic flood disasters have occurred incrementally in several regions of the world. Land-use change as one of the main affecting factors becomes a key component in flood risk management. This study strives to deal with quantifying how changes in land use to affect the dynamic evolution of flood vulnerability. The floodplains of Wuhan, which are located in the Yangtze River Basin, have been selected as an example. In this paper, we use GIS to gather different historical geometric data as sources of land-use information. By proposing the Simpsons-dominance index and location index to analyze the characteristics of land-use changes, and building a quantitative model to measure flood vulnerability, a series of flood vulnerability maps demonstrate differential flood vulnerability of floodplains of Wuhan in three inundation scenarios and four historical periods. Finally, the non-parametric correlation is used to reveal the interactive effect of land use and flood vulnerability. Based on this study, comprehensive flood disaster management strategies for land-use planning are proposed for government decision-makers to reduce the flood vulnerability of Wuhan in future.