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Spatial Planning in Denmark National
data on planning systems Spatial
Planning Denmark Karen Attwell
and Ole Michael Jensen DK The Danish
Planning SystemNATIONAL CONTEXT- DENMARK (Excerpts
from - Greenscom Work Package 8) Statens
Byggeforskningsinstitut, By og Byg - Karen Attwell
and Ole Michael Jensen - March 2002 CONTENTS A NATIONAL
CONTEXT - DENMARK * A 1.1
Presentation of the country. * A 1.2 Summary
of main conclusions * A 2.1 Urban
growth, demography and space * A 2.2 Land use,
economics, green spaces * A 2.3 Mobility
* A
3 Urban growth and green
spaces
* A 3.1 Driving
forces behind spatial development * A 3.2 How do
these trends affect the green spaces * A
4 Government and
governance
* A 4.1
Development of spatial planning * A 4.2
Institutional setting of planning * A 4.3
Environmental awareness * A 4.4 Planning
answers and approaches to current situations
* A 1
Introduction A 1.1
Presentation of the country. Denmark
comprises 43,100 km2, not including the
self-governing regions of Greenland and the Faeroe
Islands. It consists of the peninsula of Jylland,
on the East Coast of which Aarhus is situated, and
406 islands, 81 of that are inhabited. The population
is about 5.3 million. The visual
image of Denmark comprise a mainly hilly,
agricultural landscape and a long coastline, where
rivers, bays and fjords have been the origin of the
majority of Danish cities. Aarhus features it all.
Administratively
Denmark is subdivided in 14 counties, covering a
total of 275 municipalities. The county of Aarhus
comprises 26 municipalities, including the
municipality of Aarhus. Fig. A
1 The
counties Denmark is
divided into 14 counties. Among these the County of
Aarhus. Source: Ministry of Environment and Energy.
(Hartoft-Nielsen, 1995) Fig. A
1.2 The
municipalities Denmark is
further divided into 275 municipalities. Among
these is the municipality of Aarhus. Source:
Ministry of Environment and Energy.
(Hartoft-Nielsen 1995) A 1.2
Summary of main conclusions Danish cities
currently experience a renewed growth after the
recession period of the 1990s, especially in the
cities on the east coasts of the main island and
the peninsula. The reason is not population growth.
In fact the Danish population increases very
slowly. Reasons are e.g. that the population moves
eastward, that decreasing size of households and
thus more dwelling space per person means a growing
demand for housing and that enterprises cluster in
the eastern growth centres. Aarhus is a main growth
centre. Due to high property prizes the cities of
the growth areas have more flats and terrace houses
that other cities, but in general the preferred
kind of housing is single-family, detached houses.
Together with relatively few brownfields and other
sites for urban restructuring and densification
within most cities, this housing preference creates
a demand for urban expansion into the rural zones.
In spite of national policies it is difficult to
provide efficient public transport to the new
developments of the fringe areas. Additionally a
large ratio of the transport is inter-municipal
pendling, so the private car remains the main mode
of person transport and large investments go into
road building. However, many cities and provincial
towns have developed a wide system of bicycle paths
in order to make it more attractive to bicycle over
short distances. Most cities and
towns have a good provision of urban greenspace, so
in spite of some loss of some green areas
densification projects generally do not have a
great negative impact on the visual impression, nor
on the recreational amenities of the existing urban
areas. At the urban fringe the cities and towns
grow into the open agricultural landscape, which
offers few natural features to balance and
structure the growth. Here it is of great
importance that the rural zone is protected from
unplanned urban growth through the Danish planning
legislation. Change of zoning from rural to urban
requires a procedure that involves public
participation and adoption of the changes by the
municipal council. This has largely prevented urban
sprawl around Danish cities. The planning system
comprises urban greenspace as a formal land use.
This means that changing greenspace into another
land use is very difficult and so that urban
greenspace is relatively well protected from
growth. Therefore it is an opportunity for the
Danish municipal administrations to use the
planning system to outline a greenstructure that
comprises future growth areas at the fringe of the
city. This is important, as the agricultural
landscape is mainly inaccessible for recreational
use. Aarhus is a successful example of using this
opportunity to create an optimal balance between
urban growth and green. A 2.1 Urban
growth, demography and space The average
population density in Denmark is 123.7 persons per
km2 (2000), but covers large differences. 85 % of
the population live in urban areas (over 1000
persons). The urban areas cover only 5 % of the
country. Also there are large regional differences
between East and West Denmark and between East
Jylland and West Jylland as well as East
Sjælland, where Copenhagen is situated, and
West Sjælland. There is a recent trend that
economic growth moves eastwards to e.g. Aarhus and
Copenhagen and other urban growth centres and so
does the population (Johansen, 2000). The average
population density in urban areas is 733 persons
per km2. In the rural areas it is only about 21
persons per km2 when including nature areas and
forests. In order to
show the regional differences, the population
density in the municipality of Copenhagen, which is
all urban zone, is 5617.0. In the county of
Copenhagen it is 1166.4, while lowest in the county
of Ringkøbing in West Denmark with only
56.2. The county of Aarhus has 139.7, while the
municipality of Aarhus has 607.6 persons per
km2. The majority of
suburban areas and smaller towns consist of
single-family housing, i.e. 47 % of all Danish
dwellings are single-family houses (detached and
semi-detached). In a study of
urban greenspace the population density in areas
with detached single-family houses were as low as
25 persons per km2 compared with 44 persons in low
density, terrace housing and 109 in apartment block
areas (Attwell, 2001). These numbers may serve only
as examples of relative population density. They do
not compare with the statistical information of
population density presented above, as the latter
build on the total area of the
municipalities. According to
Statistics Denmark (Danmarks Statistik, 2000) the
average for all of the country there were 2.19
persons per dwelling in 2000 compared to 3.01
persons in 1960. Detached, single-family housing
has 2,62 and apartment block areas 1,72,
illustrating that the majority of two parent
families with children live in detached houses (56
% of households have children) while single-parent
families and singles frequently live in apartments.
This does not account for second homes, i.e.
summer-cottages. For a large
number of the population, the single-family house
is considered to be the optimal dwelling. This is
illustrated by the fact that the percentage of
dwellings in this housing category has increased
from 33 % in 1960 to 54 % in 2000, while the
percentage of apartment dwellings have decreased
from 55 to 40 % in the same period of
time. The average
amount of floor space per dwelling has remained
about 118 m2 when comparing 1980 with 1998. The
floor space per person in average, now 54 m2, is
increasing due to fewer persons per dwelling.
However, in reality it is increasing for private
detached houses and decreasing for terrace houses
and apartments, especially in the social housing.
The population
growth from 1999 to 2000 was 0.31 % nationally,
migration from abroad of 0.17 % included. Thus
demand for housing has its main origin in the
changing family structure with more single persons
and more single parents with children living by
themselves. In short the
Danish population increases very slowly, but the
demand for housing keeps increasing due mainly to
the decreasing size of households. This creates an
urban growth pressure. However, there is only a
slight increase in the number of dwellings finished
in the mid 1990s recession time compared with the
current rate, which is a point in the current
political debate about housing shortage. Strangely
the current housing debate does not seem to be
related to the concurrent environmental debate
about densification as part of urban
sustainability, and many cities have large urban
fringe area reserves for development, including
residential development. A 2.2 Land
use, economics, green spaces In Denmark
agriculture is still the dominating land use,
although farming is no longer the main source of
national income. 54 % are in
cultivation. Fig. A
2.1 Land use in
Denmark. Source: Natur- og miljøpolitisk
redegørelse, Ministry of Energy and
Environment. (Miljø- og Energiministeriet,
1999) Another set of
land use data presented by Statistics Denmark
indicates that urban areas, including summer
cottage areas, traffic installations and villages
with more than 1000 inhabitants in rural areas have
more than doubled between 1965 to 1995. This fact
frames the general wish of the former government to
support urban densification. In 1999, the Ministry
of Energy and Environment considered the growth of
urban areas to be modest. However, these
observation covers the regional differences
mentioned above, and the many cities in the mainly
eastern growth regions, including Aarhus, plan
continuous development into the adjacent rural
areas. Growth into the rural zone requires a
planning procedure, that includes public
participation and political adoption of the plans
(see A 4). There is no
national statistical information on the
distribution of land use between the different
urban land use categories. However, a study on a
small and a medium size Danish town showed that the
residential land use is larger (39 and 28 %) than
the industrial (24 % for both towns) and commercial
and mixed commercial/residential land use (4 and 6
%). In fact the total area covered by only detached
single-family houses was seen to be larger or close
to the size of the area covered by industry and
commerce (Attwell, 2000). These numbers
may serve as an illustration for the majority of
Danish towns, but not for Copenhagen and suburbs,
nor for the four other cities of more than 100,000
inhabitants, including Aarhus, which have a higher
population density due to a higher proportion of
multifamily housing. Provision of
greenspace including parks, sports fields,
allotment garden areas, cemeteries and nature areas
comprise large parts of the provincial towns and
suburbs in Denmark. It may amount to 25 % or more
of the total urban area (Attwell, 2000) and range
between more than 100 m2 in the provincial towns
(above 10,000 inhabitants) and less than 5 m2 in
the densest district of Copenhagen,
Vesterbro. The influence
of the municipalities on the detailed planning of
new development especially in the urban fringe
largely depends on the ownership of the land to be
developed. There is no statistical information on
this subject, but the municipal ownership is known
to differ, as the policy on quantity of public land
reserves is a local political decision. However, the
overall planning is independent of ownership and in
the recent years it has been a clear intention of
the Social Democratic/Radical national government
that the area growth of the Danish cities must be
retained. It is still not clear if this policy will
change with the new Liberal/Conservative
government, which was elected in Nov. 2001.
A 2.3
Mobility The Danish
national policy on transport has until now aimed to
establish a new balance between development and
environment based on the principle of sustainable
growth. The national transport statement, Transport
2005, aims to e.g. influence the division of
various means of transport and to improve
alternatives to car transport. At the local level
the municipal plans include transport policies.
Improved conditions for cyclists and pedestrians
and reduction of car traffic in the city centres
are current measures in 1998 (European Commission,
1999). The expenditure of the national transport
sector was DKK 15,000 m for roads and 9,500 million
for public transport, which is less than optimal
from a sustainability point of view. Transport
keeps growing and - in spite of all intentions -
especially transport by private car, but also by
rail. The growth in bus, ferry and plane transport
is stagnating or decreasing. The decrease in ferry
transport is partly due to the two new bridges
built in the last decade, the bridge between the
main islands, Sjælland and Fyn, and the -
less popular - bridge between Denmark and Sweden.
The number of private cars have increased with
about 40 per 1000 inhabitants per decade since 1970
and was in 1998 343 cars per 1000 inhabitants.
Fig. A
2.2 Source:
Statistics Denmark. (Danmarks Statestik
2001) The growth in
transport by private car has increased more than 50
% from 1981 to 1993 (Thost, 1995), half of which is
transport for work/education and shopping. Urban
structure is of major importance. In a study of 22
Nordic cities by P. Næss et al. (1994) it was
found that densely populated urban areas, i.e. low
area consumption per person, a centralized urban
structure with a densely populated centre and low
income were related to a low level of transport.
Results like this has supported a Danish
environmental policy of urban densification. It is
known, however, that choice of residence and job is
more important than travel distance - or travel
time, which seems more important than distance.
Half of the total work-related travel is
inter-municipal pendling. Pendling is known to be
reduced if there is a good balance between jobs and
dwellings in quantity and quality. The other half
of the transport is connected to recreational
activities. Here the importance of the urban
amenities and so of the urban greenstructure seems
to reduce transport, i.e. people travel less if the
immediate surroundings fulfil their recreational
needs (Bech-Danielsen, 1998). Use of bicycle
is - as always - popular in urban districts over
short distances, as it is cheap and convenient with
regard to time (versus street system and parking).
With distances to e.g. shopping of more than 3 km,
the use of bicycles is almost eliminated. Many
Danish towns including Aarhus have developed a
functional network of bicycle paths as an
alternative to using the car for local purposes.
Domestic
transport of goods accounts for about 80 % of the
total freight transport (European Commission,
2000), counting 66 vehicles per 1000 inhabitants in
1999. The stated
political aim to reduce car traffic and so the
emissions of CO2 is counteracted by the growth of
private car ownership and by growing road-born
goods transport. This is especially a problem for
the larger cities and especially for the Copenhagen
region, where congestion during rush hours is a
growing problem. The recent reduction of cars in
the major city centres, which is created by e.g.
high parking prices, reduced parking space,
pedestrian and parking limitations (residents
only), bicycle paths and lanes etc., is visible,
but may also soon be counteracted by growing
ownership. Transport infrastructure influences
large parts of the urban green space by constant
noise, as large green areas are situated by or
close to motorways and as the flat morphology of
most of the country allows noise to carry far. Also
increasing traffic frequently inhibits the physical
access to urban greenspace. Till the 1970s,
urban greenspace was frequently reduced by roads
and related constructions. Today this is only true
of large public transport construction works such
as motorways and railways. The reform of the
planning laws was the reason (see A 4.1 and A
4.2) A
3 Urban growth and green spaces A 3.1
Driving forces behind spatial
development The national
policies for urban development and restructuring
are generally accepted. The Danish Planning Act
largely regulates local initiatives and there is a
wide political understanding that sustainable
development must be the common denominator. However
sustainability is rarely a driving
force. There are
different opinions of how to implement
sustainability. In relation to building it seems
difficult to change the general approach of the
private and semi-public building and construction
sector, which works within a conventional economic
framework and understanding of efficiency: to build
more for less. In case study C 4.3 is it
demonstrated how this approach may be utilized
positively in the development of also greenspace.
In relation to transport it seems difficult to
change the transport patterns of the general
public. A general support to the advantage of
public transport does not reflect in the growing
car ownership and car transport. Public transport
needs to be very effective and flexible to be a
real alternative and bicycles are only a
short-distance alternative. Also, the national
policy of urban densification as an alternative to
urban sprawl is partly counteracted by the fact
that the dream residence of a Danish family is a
detached single-family home, preferably a 1 1/2
storey villa, or a house or farmstead in the
country (Ærø, in press). The 1960-70s
one-storey single-family developments have been a
reasonable alternative to the dream residence - and
still are - especially for young families with
children (Gram-Hanssen and Bech-Danielsen, 2001).
The housing and transport "consumers", i.e. the
local citizens, thus are an important driving
force. The trendy inner city urban environment
seems to be preferred by mainly young people and
singles. The changeing family structure towards
smaller units means that the demand for inner city
housing is high. Thus the urban renewal of the last
decades of inner city districts has been a
well-timed - mainly public - effort with a
successful result, also visually. Public and
semi-private open spaces have frequently been
included in the renewal. Many former service areas
in the blocks of the inner districts have become
urban gardens and added much to the amount of
peridomestic greenspace. Especially the current
urban area-based rehabilitation initiatives have
included a large number of urban greenspace
projects. They are often initiated by local
citizens or citizen groups, which in this way
become a driving force. The purpose is often
embellishment of the area, not recreation, which is
likely due to the good provision of recreational
greenspace in most Danish urban areas. At the fringe
of the city the national Nature Preservation Act
have frequently supported preservation of local
landscapes in urban growth areas. The boards of the
national wide Nature Preservation associations are
frequent actors. Additionally
cities like Aarhus have developed a greenstructure
plan, which has come to guide the future urban
fringe development. A 3.2 How do
these trends affect the green spaces The Planning
Act, the Nature Preservation Act and other Acts do
support the preservation of green areas in and
around urban settlements. Especially the Planning
Act which in the late 1970s initiated the practice
of making Municipal Green Structure Plans as a tool
for planning and public debate of the overall
policy of urban greenspace (Fabricius, 2000).
However, the professional performance of the green
administrations with - or in spite of little -
local political support is seen to be even more
important to the provision and quality of urban
greenspace in Danish towns. Some towns and suburbs
especially in East Denmark, have large royal and
private estates that are open to the public. This
decreases the demand for municipal greenspace.
However, other towns have had few natural amenities
and have still succeeded in striking a balance
between urban growth and public greenspace and in
developing qualities through innovative planning
initiatives and maintenance practices, the result
of which is much valued by the citizens. The local
administrations at large decide on the balance
between growth and green in the new developments.
The result largely depends on a combination of
professional knowledge, political attitude and
economic issues: is greenspace provision a public,
a semi-public or a private responsibility? As
demonstrated in the following cases, C 1 &emdash; C
3, continuity created by high rank professional
staff in the local administrations is found to be
optimal for the long-term results. Things take
time. In a few towns
there is a growing practice of also incorporating
sustainability issues in urban development and
redevelopment related to greenspace (water/rain
water, organic waste, local food production,
transport, local climate etc.), but it is still
rarely known to be part of the adopted urban
policy, (Kristiansen et al., 2001). While the
quantity of urban greenspace is largely decided
administratively and politically as part of a
planning initiative, local citizens may influence
the quality. Directly, they mainly seem to
influence local changes in relation to urban
rehabilitation that are of special personal
interest. However, in combination with professional
staff for the municipal administration this has
been shown to create synergy and optimal - and time
consuming - results. Indirectly, the residents'
choice of housing affect the balance between growth
and green in the urban areas. As a result the large
areas of single-family housing make many Danish
towns look very green. A 4.1
Development of spatial planning Denmark has a
simple spatial planning system based on the
Planning Act, which was part of a planning reform
carried through in the 1970s. Until then,
urban planning built on a number of documents,
which set standards for developments and
constructions. A major point of departure for this
planning period was the physical separation of
functions, which were seen or believed in the
future to create conflicts. It could be dwellings
versus industry or motor vehicle traffic versus
pedestrian and bicycle traffic. The main aim of
the planning reform was to create an operational
system, that could simplify the planning process.
All information should be presented in few
documents, that were easily accessible for also
citizens, developers and other non-administrative
groups. The main area-based documents were the
Regional Plan and The Municipal Pan, which must be
revised every four years. As part of a general
trend leading towards more public influence, the
planning reform introduced public participation,
which at first created a lot of debate as only a
few per cent of the citizens attended. However, a
few per cent was actually a couple of hundred or a
couple of thousand people depending on the size of
the municipality and after a few years this new
approach was fully accepted. A major asset
of the planning reform was that urban greenspace
was made a land use category in itself and thus
could not be used for other purposes without
applying the whole planning procedure. This was a
positive increase in the status of this fragile
part of the urban fabric and helped balancing the
growth and the green. Although the
spatial planning framework of the 1970s is still at
work the focus and the efforts of spatial planning
are currently changing. Integration of functions by
more actively incorporating environmental
considerations, urban rehabilitation and urban
densification, governance, communicative planning
and privatisation are examples of current trends,
which may in the near future ask for an adjustment
of the 1970s planning system to match the changes
in society. A 4.2
Institutional setting of planning The Danish
Planning Act has three main characteristics:
Framework control, decentralisation and public
participation. The state establishes standards, but
delegates' substantial responsibility for achieving
and enforcing these standards to county and
municipal councils. The higher level of plans is
the framework for and must not be contradicted by
the levels below. In matters of national interest
the Minister of Environment can veto planning
proposals, (Hartoft-Nielsen, 1995). Fig. A
4.1 Four levels
characterizing the Danish planning system. Source:
Ministry of Environment and Energy.
(Hartoft-Nielsen, 1995). The Urban and
Rural Zones Act was part of the planning reform of
the 1970s. It divides all territory into urban,
rural and summer-cottage-area zones. The impact of
this Act is that urban development is restricted to
the designated urban zones and consequently urban
sprawl is practically unknown in Denmark
(Fabricius, 2000). Denmark largely owes its visual
appearance of clearly demarcated urban and rural
areas to this Act. The county
councils are responsible for the rural zone
including plans for the rural sector on e.g.
environment, traffic and water. The municipal
councils are responsible for the urban zone and
including all kinds of public urban green spaces
and green elements. The local policies on provision
of greenspace are communicated and debated through
the municipal plan and planning procedure prior to
adoption. It is often described in a Green
Structure Plan, which may comprise the overall
pattern of larger urban landscapes like in Aarhus
or the hierarchy of all public greenspace. Major
changes in land use require that a binding local
plan be provided. Also this very detailed planning
instrument requires public debate. This means that
the public may influence the balance between growth
and green at an overall as well as a detailed
planning level through the required public
participation. However, citizens mainly seem to use
this influence at the detailed level. At the urban
policy level all kinds of residents', sports,
trade, nature protection and other organisations
and only few individuals are seen to represent the
citizens' interests. In order to involve citizens
more directly some municipalities have now
developed procedures and contact measures, which
work so well that the standard participation
procedure almost becomes unnecessary. Aarhus has
been innovative in this way by setting up and
delegating responsibility for contact to local
councils. The local councils are described in B.
4.1. A 4.3
Environmental awareness The Ministry of
Environment was established in 1970 as a
consequence of growing public environmental
awareness and since then the environment has played
an increasing role in the planning and management
of the rural as well as the urban environment.
National and international initiatives have
influenced environmental considerations, but in
spite of local Agenda 21, national policies etc.
environmental issues are still not integrated in
the spatial planning of the municipalities, and
targets of sustainability rarely seem to influence
municipal and local plans. So far major urban
issues have been e.g. reduction of building related
consumption, alternative energy production,
purification of waste water and re-circulation of
refuse, which all influence the quality of the
natural environment. Major rural issues have
evolved around the quality of the aquatic
environment and the reserves of groundwater, which
is the main source of drinking water in Denmark.
The groundwater is threatened by the increased use
of agricultural pesticides that occurred during the
1960s and 70s, the full damage of which is still to
be seen. This problem is currently the reason for
combining afforestation at the urban fringe with
water resource areas like e.g. in Aarhus. The
cultural heritage has also been a growing concern
in both urban and rural areas, but in general it
seems to focus on built historic elements more than
on historic landscapes and green elements. The old
forest areas, which are protected by the Forest
Act, constitute an important part of the national
image &emdash; and the national hymn played at any
soccer event - but are only used much if situated
close to the larger urban centres. Other
semi-natural rural areas are managed and restored
efficiently by the county administrations. They are
taken for granted as places to visit, but hardly
add much to the general environmental awareness.
Urban greenspace is rarely seen as part of the
natural environment, but as a recreational amenity
and an architectural set-off. However, this
currently seems to be changing in the municipal
administrations, which increasingly focus on e.g.
biodiversity, rain water infiltration and "natural
" management with reduced use of chemicals,
irrigation and fuel for transport and reduced grass
mowing in an effort to work with the system and not
only the space. Strangely this does not seem to
have much public interest and sustainability is an
infrequent subject in the media. The Ministry of
Environment is to be reduced considerably by the
new Liberal/Conservative government and it is not
yet clear how this will affect the general
environmental concern. A hope is that the reduction
will cause a revitalised interest. A 4.4
Planning answers and approaches to current
situations Compared to
many other countries, Denmark has a
well-established planning system with a high degree
of public participation. However, it is a top-down
system where administrative members of staff are
the main actors. To adjust to the current trends,
which ask for dialogue, new governance approaches
are seen at the municipal level, sometimes
initiated at national level. Here i.e. the
area-based urban rehabilitation builds on
initiatives and projects, which have been suggested
by local citizens. Attempts to involve the citizens
more directly is seen in some cities, e.g. Aarhus
(B 4.1). The municipal
Green Structure Plan is still an important planning
and communication tool, which illustrates the
current state of affairs. It also serves as an
assessment tool, which makes it possible visually
to assess urban growth in relation to the provision
of public urban green. The Aarhus example shows how
the Green Structure Plan may even become the
framework for further urban growth (see B 3.2).
This more strategic use which improves the status
of the greenstructure is believed to be important
for a qualified dialogue between the different
actors of urban development. However, the Green
Structure Plans are still sectoral plans, which
comprise the mainly public green land use. They
tell more about the recreational opportunities and
the municipal management responsibility than about
the actual greenspace of the total urban
environment in relation to environmental, visual,
biological and other factors, which are
indispensable for a sustainable point of departure
for spatial planning. The frequent environmental
considerations are thus &emdash; good &emdash;
sectoral practices, but still need to be
co-ordinated and made visible to the general public
in order to qualify the dialogue with the citizens.
Already in 1995 the Ministry of Environment and
Energy called this an enormous challenge for
Denmark's cities and towns (Hartoft-Nielsen, 1995,
p.5), a challenge, which has not yet been
met. The Danish
spatial planning system rests on framework control
of the planning hierarchy, on decentralization of
especially the spatial planning and the
environmental responsibilities and on public
participation. The opportunity of public
participation is in practice mainly used at the
level of local plans, which may influence the
single properties or neighbourhoods directly. New
efforts attempt to involve citizens and other
actors in a more direct dialogue about spatial
urban changes. The open rural
landscape, which has been protected from sprawl by
the planning legislation, is an important part of
the national image of Denmark and so are the
forests, but the recreational use is relatively
limited. In fact the rural landscape may influence
the environmental awareness of urbanists negatively
due to pollution problems of mainly the ground
water resources caused by years of intensive use of
artificial fertilizers and pesticides. Nature is
generally perceived as all cultivated and
semi-natural rural areas including the forests and
the coastline, the beaches of which are very much
used in the summer months. The rural areas are
mainly privately owned and inaccessible to the
general public except by road. The public
urban green areas are planned and managed by the
municipal administrations. The local political
interest and coherence of administration influence
the greenspace both quantitatively and
qualitatively. New initiatives show that a strategy
of involving local citizens in the planning process
adds positively to the municipal planning efforts,
but that it is difficult to recruit participants.
The housing associations are other important
greenspace managers, especially in the larger urban
centres, but only the largest associations
demonstrate innovative ideas on management
principles and resident participation. Finally,
large urban areas are single-family housing. The
gardens of which are cared for privately they are
still being built, as this type of residence is
preferred by most families in spite of national
densification policies and derived transport
problems. These areas influence the visual image of
Danish towns, and they are known to have few
problems, but also few residents who involve
themselves in the municipal planning and renewal
efforts. National
data on planning systems To add your own definitions or ideas just email Anne Beer. |
Meetings Background Meetings Background Meetings Background Meetings Background |
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