Towards proactive land use planning for an autonomous vehicle future

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) have the capacity to change the landscape of fields such as urban planning, transport policy, and travel behaviour, among others. While AVs have the potential to enhance transport supply and operations by allowing better traffic coordination and reducing road traffic accidents, their impacts on the demand for travel and on land use planning are rather complex. The aim of this research is to examine how AVs can gain wider acceptance in the future and what their implications for land use planning will be. To this end, a web-based survey will be conducted targeting inhabitants of Ghent. Additionally, using open-source built environment data obtained/mined from public websites, the impacts of land use characteristics on the interest in, intention to use, and willingness to pay for AVs will be analysed. Predictions will then be made regarding human behavioural responses to an AV future in terms of residential location, work location, and travel behaviour. This research will offer new insights into the public acceptance of AVs and potential changes that AVs could bring to the land use system. Findings will inform urban and transport planners about the methods with which cities can proactively prepare to accommodate this new mode of transport.