Study Region


In the future, the tool should primarily be used by practitioners. Therefore, it is essential that the tool takes into account the problems of the prospective users in order to provide appropriate solutions.

Therefore, two research areas were selected as model regions:

  • The County of Harburg  (population of 245,000) located south of  Hamburg in the state of Lower Saxony

  • The County of Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis (population of 280,000) located east of Cologne in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia

In both model regions, the tool-set to be developed was continuingly improved, adapted in close cooperation with the local stakeholders and finally tested in practice.

This procedure ensured two things: On the one hand such projects were evaluated that were regionally relevant in the view of local practitioners. On the other hand, the software tools were modelled to provide a general improvement of the rationality of planning decisions, which can be implemented in different regional settings.