Accessibility instruments for planning practice: A review of European experiences

Although a large body of literature has been produced on the theoretical definitions and measurements of accessibility, the extent to which such indicators are used in planning practice is less clear. This research explores the gap between theory and application by seeking to understand what the new wave of accessibility instruments (AIs) prepared for spatial and transport planning practice purports to offer the users of AIs. Starting from the question of how urban and transport planners are designing AIs, the article analyzes and describes the AIs developed over the last decade (mainly in Europe), offering a structured overview and a clear categorization of how accessibility measures can be applied. The paper identifies AI characteristics, and considers their usability, based on AI developer perceptions.

The institutional design of intra-party democracy through legal instruments: Turkish case

The importance of political parties for contemporary representative democracies is beyond dispute. Despite their significance for state-level democracy, political parties continue to be regarded as oligarchical and to be criticised because of their internal practices. For this reason, intra-party democracy (IPD) warrants in-depth analysis. This thesis investigates IPD in Turkey, primarily from the perspective of participatory democracy, with the purpose of suggesting reforms to the Turkish Political Parties Law (TPPL). Turkish political parties and Turkish party regulation provide an interesting case because there is a significant difference between mature democracies and Turkey regarding IPD regulation. IPD in established democracies has always been regarded as a private concern of parties and has been left unregulated. IPD in Turkey, by contrast, is provided for both by the constitution and the TPPL. Although IPD is a constitutional and legal requirement in Turkey, however, political parties in fact display a high level of non-democratic administration. The main reason is that the TPPL only pays lip service to the idea of IPD and requires no specific measures apart from establishing a party congress with a representative form of democracy. By establishing and holding party congresses, political parties are perceived as conforming to the requirements of IPD under the law. In addition, the contested nature of democracy as a concept has impeded the creation of efficacious legal principles. Thus, the existing party law fails to tackle the lack of IPD within political parties and, for this reason, is in need of reform. Furthermore, almost every Turkish party’s own constitution highlights the importance of IPD and promises IPD. However, these declared commitments to IPD in their constitutions alone, especially in countries where the democratic culture is weak, are unlikely to make much difference in practice. Accordingly, external regulation is necessary to ensure the protection of the rights and interests of the party members with regards to their participation in intra-party decision-making processes. Nevertheless, in spite of a general consensus in favour of reforming the TPPL, a lack of consensus exists as to what kind of reforms should be adopted. This thesis proposes that reforming the TPPL in line with an approach based on participatory democracy could provide better IPD within Turkish political parties, citing as evidence comparative case studies of the participatory practices for policy-making, leadership selection and candidate selection in mature democracies. This thesis also analyses membership registration and the effect of state funding on IPD, which are highly problematic in Turkey and represent impediments to the flourishing of IPD.

Accessibility Instruments In Planning Practice: Bridging The Implementation Gap

Accessibility concepts are increasingly acknowledged as fundamental to understand cities and urban regions. Accordingly, accessibility instruments have been recognised as valuable support tools for land-use and transport planning. However, despite the relatively large number of instruments available in the literature, they are not widely used in planning practice. This paper aims to explore why accessibility instruments are not widely used in planning practice. To this end, we focus our research on perceived user-friendliness and usefulness of accessibility instruments. First, we surveyed some instrument developers, providing an overview of the characteristics of accessibility instruments available and on developers’ perceptions of their user-friendliness in planning practice. Second, we brought together developers and planning practitioners in some local workshops across Europe and Australia, where participants were asked to use insights provided by accessibility instruments for the development of planning strategies. We found that most practitioners are convinced of the usefulness of accessibility instruments in planning practice, as they generate new and relevant insights for planners. Findings suggest that not only user-friendliness problems but mainly organisational barriers and lack of institutionalisation of accessibility instruments, are the main causes of the implementation gap. Thus user-friendliness improvement may provide limited contributions to the successful implementation of accessibility concepts in planning practice. In fact, there seems to be more to gain from the active and continued engagement of instrument developers with planning practitioners and the institutionalisation of accessibility planning.