Geography, policy or market? New evidence on the measurement and causes of sprawl (and infill) in US metropolitan regions

Kurt Paulsen

Urban Studies, 2014, vol. 51, issue 12, 2629-2645

Abstract: This paper proposes four metrics to measure sprawl in metropolitan regions as marginal changes in land use over time. The metrics (change in urban housing unit density, marginal land consumption per new urban household, housing unit density in newly urbanized areas and percent of new housing units located in previously developed areas) are computed for all 329 metropolitan areas in the continental USA for 1980 and 2000. Regression analysis is used to explain variations in sprawl metrics across metropolitan areas, incorporating variables representing market, geographic and policy factors. Changes in development patterns reflect interactions of market and geographic structures. States with a substantial state role in planning accommodate a higher percentage of new housing units in previously developed areas and with lower marginal land consumption, suggesting that policy can mitigate sprawl development.

Keywords: growth management; land use; metropolitan; sprawl; urbanization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0042098013512874 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:urbstu:v:51:y:2014:i:12:p:2629-2645

DOI: 10.1177/0042098013512874

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Urban Studies from Urban Studies Journal Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().