Valuing the environmental benefits of canals and canal restoration using house prices

Stephen Gibbons, Cong Peng and Cheng Tang

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: This article values the environmental benefits of historic, navigable canals using property values. We improve on standard methods by controlling for microgeographic fixed effects and applying a difference-in-differences method to canal restoration. We find a localized price premium within 100 m, around 5% before the 2008 recession, dropping to 3.4% by 2016. These effects are driven by urban canal-side properties with a direct outlook on the canals or immediate access. These locations are also attractive for developers, with a higher proportion of new-build sales. Our estimates suggest that canals generate land value uplift of £0.8–£0.9 billion in England.

Keywords: canals; waterways; house prices; environment; valuation; revealed preference; UKRI block grant (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q51 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 17 pages
Date: 2021-11-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-env and nep-ure
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Published in Land Economics, 1, November, 2021, 97(4), pp. 858 - 874. ISSN: 0023-7639

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http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/107931/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Valuing the Environmental Benefits of Canals and Canal Restoration Using House Prices (2021)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:107931

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