This document discusses trends in urban sprawl, including that land consumption for built-up areas will increase more rapidly than population growth in most OECD countries from 2000-2050. It also examines how to measure urban sprawl using factors like population density, fragmentation, and dispersion. Finally, it promotes policies to address urban sprawl through the OECD SPINE project, which aims to improve environmental effectiveness and economic efficiency by measuring sprawl and evaluating policies related to topics such as greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution, open space, and transport.

1. Walid Oueslati
GGSD Forum, 09-10 November 2016
Urban Sprawl
Trends and policies

2. Sprawl: what is at stake?
2
Market failures versus policy failures

3. Cities are increasingly sprawling worldwide…but especially in
Europe, Northern America and Oceania

4. 4
Population and built-up area growth rate in OECD countries,
2000-2050
Land consumption for built-up areas will increase more rapidly than the
population in 30 out of 34 OECD countries.
Source: OECD 2015: The Metropolitan Century

5. 1975
Urban development in Paris region

6. 1990
Urban development in Paris region

7. 2000
Urban development in Paris region

8. 2014
Urban development in Paris region

9. 9
Measuring urban sprawl
Urban sprawlPopulation
density
Fragmentation
Composition:
Dispersion - Polycentricity

10. 10
OECD SPINE Project
Policies : environmental effectiveness + economic efficiency
Urban sprawl : measurement and policies
Policy Topics
• GHG emissions
• Air pollution
• Open Space
• Resilience
• Breakthroughs in
transport
Empirical track
Modelling track

11. For more information:
walid.oueslati@oecd.org