Conflict Resolution in Public Participation GIS for Land Use Planning: A Case Study of Lantau Island, Hong Kong

Based on the principle of sustainable development, land use planning often requires the compromise between economic development and environmental conservation with social justice advocated. Land use planning usually involves a wide range of stakeholders. Given that ideas, values, and attitudes vary among social organizations and people, land use planning inevitably incurs a variety of conflicts. This thesis focuses on extending the decision support capabilities of PPGIS through developing conflict resolution models. The methodology of conflict resolution employed in PPGIS was established. The PPGIS platform was designed. A prototype PPGIS was constructed and tested.;The conflicts in land use planning with public participation are described from the perspective of conflicts among land use types and conflicts among stakeholders. Land use planning is conceived as the process of dealing with conflicts among different land use types through resolving the conflicts among stakeholders. The thought of identifying and resolving conflicts among participants from both value level and specifics levels is proposed and demonstrated in the thesis. The research centers around two important issues of land use planning: land use allocation and specific land use proposal deliberation. A Consensus Building Model was developed to address the conflicts among different stakeholders with competing interests in the process of land use allocation. The model is designed to facilitate stakeholders eliciting preference and improving consensus degree towards the direction of group agreement, if possible. A Spatial Conflict Resolution Strategy is developed to help stakeholders and planners formulate specific land use proposals through an iterative proposal modification process. Stakeholders comment and evaluate proposals. Based on the preference structure and modification suggestions of stakeholders, planners improve the proposals to maximize Group Satisfaction Level and minimize Group Conflict Degree. According to the Service Oriented Architecture, a open PPGIS is designed to utilize the database and analytical tools published on the Internet. Public concerns and opinions collected by the PPGIS together with some spatial analysis functions can be published on the Internet as Web Services as well. The PPGIS platform consists of two parts, public participation Website and Desktop Decision Support System. The Website is designed to help participants understand land use planning context, propose suggestions, exchange opinions, and promote mutual understanding. The Desktop Decision Support System is designed to help planners to analyze stakeholders’ opinions and coordinate stakeholders to build consensus. In the context of Lantau Island land use planning, a PPGIS prototype system was established to implement the concepts and methods of conflict resolution. System testing experiments were conducted among some students to assess usability and identify limitations of the prototype. In light of the study results and limitations, some directions are provided for future research.