Bahn.Ville - Promoting a rail oriented urban development approach for urban regions in Germany and France
Overview
Background & policy context:
Taking account of integrated town planning and travel rests at the heart of land use planning. These principles have been the basis for land use planning policy in Germany for many years, although only more recently in France.
The development of conventional rail or urban/periurban light rapid transit provides a new way to develop cities. The choices made in recent years to limit the effects of layered urban development have been different in France and Germany. In Germany, a high level of urban density has been favoured, mostly around points which are well served by public transport, such as stations, thus leading to clustered development, whereas in France, urban planning around main transport arteries has been the norm.
Objectives:
The project's objective was to examine, through current and past experiences in France and Germany, the implementation of regional rail-based transport (tram-train, regional tram, railcars, etc), and the importance of integrating both spatial planning and transport issues to foster sustainable urban and traffic development, especially on the periphery of cities.
Methodology:
The key issues of Bahn.Ville are:
- Analysing impacts and processes by best-practice analysis and case study investigations,
- Developing a summarised representation of the research findings by building an abstract scheme of the interactions,
- Developing recommendations in the form of a handbook and disseminating the findings.
Best Practice and Case Study Investigations:
After the exchange of the state-of-the-art knowledge on planning and development procedures as well as on impact analysis, 10 best-practice examples have been analysed in France and Germany. Four of them have been chosen as case studies:
- Friedrichshafen – Ravensburg – Aulendorf (Bodensee-Oberschwaben-Bahn);
- Bonn – Euskirchen (Voreifel-Bahn);
- Nantes – St. Nazaire; and
- Strasbourg – Molsheim (the future tram-train site).
In these case studies empirical in-depth-investigations have been carried out concerning both processes and impacts using interviews with the stakeholders and surveys.
The impact analysis focuses on :
- BAHN (rail): Impacts of railway improvements on urban development and mobility
- VILLE (city): Impacts of rail oriented urban development on mobility behaviour and rail transport
- '.' (the dot in the name BAHN.VILLE, which signifies a stop): Impacts of station development on intermodality and location development
The analysis at the process level deals with:
- Planning and Co-operation (planning rights, instruments, formal and informal regional co-operation etc);
- Realisation and Financing (internal and external success factors, funding and financial strategies etc); and
- Building a Common Scheme.
The project aims at estimating the effects of the different measures and proceedings on urban development and mobility behaviour. The findings of the empirical work packages are summarised in a scheme of qualitative interactions.
The project also provides guidelines and methodological tools for local authorities and other partners to succeed in rail oriented urban and regional development.
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