Securing public objectives in large-scale urban development : Comparison of public and private land development

Public authorities have a wide range of objectives related to urban development. Usually, they strive to achieve the objectives via land use planning but their involvement in land development can be significant as well. In this paper, we compare how, and to what extent, local authorities can safeguard public objectives through the use of public and private land development by analysing four illustrative cases of land development in two Nordic countries, Finland and Sweden. Our results suggest that public land development appears to bring significant added value for public authorities in respect of achieving both qualitative and economic objectives. On the other hand, to guarantee fair treatment of landowners, it appears important that public authorities have consistent long-term land policies concerning the use of public land development. However, within democratic societies such long-term policies may be infeasible due to short electoral terms.