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Journal of Land Use Science 89
(like ‘conversion of sensitive areas’ or ‘loss of prime agricultural farmland’), but were not
usable due to lack of accurate data.
3.4.5. Implementation
Annex 1 provides detailed information on the implementation of the selected indicators.
Please note that the value domains (= range of values for an indicator) given relate to the
sample processed in this study, not the universal domains.
4. Indicator results
In this section we present the results of our indicator implementation, starting off with an
interpretation of dimension-specific results. The text is accompanied by the visualisation of
all indicators in map format (Figures 3–5) and provides the foundation for the sprawl clusters
on the final map: Germany’s urban sprawl landscape (Section 5, Figure 7).
4.1. The density dimension
Indicator 1 shows mean gross urban density for each of the 10 · 10 km cells in Germany (see
Figure 3). On this scale, urban density mainly reflects the degree of urbanisation, with the
well-known ‘horseshoe’ shape of urban areas – reaching from the Stuttgart Region in the
southwest to the Frankfurt, the Rhine and Ruhr areas further north and then on to the ‘Saxony
triangle’ (Halle – Leipzig – Dresden) in the East – reflected by values higher than 15 people
per hectare urbanised area. The metropolitan areas around Munich, Berlin, and Hamburg are
in the same category, whereas much of the north and northeast of Germany, the northwestern
part of Rhineland-Palatinate as well as some areas in Hesse and Bavaria, have very low
densities (,5 people per hectare). With this basic configuration in mind, indicator 2 (in
Figure 3) shows how urban density has developed between 1996 and 2004. The main and
well-known conclusion is that urban density decreased significantly in the states of former
East Germany and remained fairly constant in states of former West Germany. This effect is
mainly due to the predominant migration patterns observed after the reunification in 1990
and subsequent economic consequences that have motivated – and are still motivating –
many people to move from East to West. However, the results for indicator 9 also show that
decreasing urban density is often accompanied by comparatively large amounts of urban
area being developed, which adds to the magnitude of decline. This is particularly the case in
the states of Brandenburg and Saxony-Anhalt. To some degree these contrasting trends are
caused by initiatives aimed at providing economic opportunities after the reunification, in
many cases leading to large-scale conversion of non-urban land for residential or commercial
functions. However, the third indicator (greenfield development rate) shows that the
uptake of these opportunities is low, at least from a residential point of view. It is here in the
named eastern states that some of the lowest values can be found and areas with less than 5
dwellings per hectare support the notion that there are severe discrepancies between the
amount of new urban area provided and the amount actually used by new residents – or that
the new developments are exceptionally large subdivisions. In addition to Saxony-Anhalt
and Brandenburg, this is also the case in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Schleswig-Holstein,
and some smaller areas of Lower Saxony, Thuringia, and Bavaria. On the other end of the
spectrum, areas where more than 50 dwellings were built on each hectare of new urban area
are likely to experience high demand for real estate, driven by population dynamics and a
general shortage of housing space (Rhine-Ruhr area, Rhine-Main area, Stuttgart Region,