Transit-Oriented Development in European Spatial Governance and Planning Systems

Today, the need for innovative sustainable development models is becoming more and more central in the international debate. The integration between land-use and transport in policy-making and planning is crucial for achieving sustainability, and Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) is reported to be one of the possible models, performing this integration. This thesis wants to describe the current trends in applying Transit-Oriented Development strategies, in eight European nations, and it also aims to understand how the Spatial Governance and Planning System (SGPS) of each country could affect, positively and negatively, future implementations of the model. Starting with an overview of today’s sustainability issues and their links with urbanisation and transport, the attention shifts to the TOD’s background, definition, examples, and recognition as a sustainable development model by the international scene. After that, Sweden, Denmark, UK, France, Germany, Netherlands, Italy and Belgium are analysed according to their land-use and transport planning systems and to TOD experiences reported by literature for each nation. The outcome is a comparative analysis, highlighting if Transit-Oriented Development is used as a model in the selected countries and how it is performed. Additionally, the degree of land-use and transport planning integration and the presence of key elements for successful TODs are explored in SGPSs, in order to understand future potentials of this model in the European countries, considered by the research.