Implications of Urban Development for Travel Demand in the Netherlands

Abstract

The assumption that travel demand is influenced by land use has long been applied in Dutch spatial planning policy. The aim of the present analysis is to explore how far this policy has succeeded in bringing about a compact and mixed spatial structure. Hence, a detailed analysis of the variation and development in the dispersal of urban activities, mix of uses, density, and diversity in urban areas between 1990 and 1996 is provided. It appears that although urban areas are leveling out on the one hand, they are undergoing a process of separation on the other. Although most of the building in the Randstad (the densely populated western part of the Netherlands) is taking place inside the designated urban regions, it is not producing compact monocentric towns; the urban areas are converging more and more, the metropolitan centers are losing their importance, and subcenters and concentrations of services are springing up on the edges of the urban regions. These phenomena confirm the emergence of complex, polycentric urban areas. Suburban sprawl is increasing rapidly in the intermediate zone outside the Randstad, where low-density residential areas, monoenvironments, and business estates are expanding. This region appears to have become the suburban search space for the Randstad. These dual trends will increase the distance between locations and make destinations less easily accessible by bicycle and public transport. Hence, neither the polycentric development inside the Randstad nor the suburban developments outside the Randstad will contribute to the reduction of car use.