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Sustainable development policy is examined for the Belfast Metropolitan Area using a range of linked aggregate and disaggregate models. Energy trade-offs were modelled for both 'stationary' private dwellings and 'mobile' traffic-related energy sources. The research suggests that land-use policies, and in particular corridor-based densification linked to improved public transport, can achieve very significant reductions in mobile energy consumption and modest reductions in stationary energy use linked to residential lay-out design. This would apply to urban areas such as Belfast which exhibit the classic dispersal of population following deindustrialisation. To realise the potential energy savings, sustainable development policy needs to achieve at least the acquiescence of the consumer. Consumers will only support energy-efficient heating systems, improved public transport, densification policies and road charging, if there is some perceived element of financial compensation or other increase in utility for the individual.

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The deployment of zero-emission vehicles has the potential to drastically reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from road transport. The purpose of this study is to provide evidence on, and quantify the factors that influence, the European market for electric and fuel cell car technologies. The paper reports the results of a stated preference survey among 1,248 car owners in France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain and the United Kingdom. The variables that influence powertrain choice are quantified in a nested multinomial logit model. We find that the electric car purchase price continues to be a major deterrent to sales in the surveyed countries. The majority of the respondents considered government incentives as fundamental or important for considering an electric car purchase. Because of the differences in the socio-economic characteristics of consumers in each country, the effectiveness of government incentives may vary across Europe.

Much of the interest in promoting sustainable development in planning for the city-region focuses on the apparently inexorable rise in the demand for car travel and the contribution that certain urban forms and land-use relationships can make to reducing energy consumption. Within this context, policy prescription has increasingly favoured a compact city approach with increasing urban residential densities to address the physical separation of daily activities and the resultant dependency on the private car. This paper aims to outline and evaluate recent efforts to integrate land use and transport policy in the Belfast Metropolitan Area in Northern Ireland. Although considerable progress has been made, this paper underlines the extent of existing car dependency in the metropolitan area and prevailing negative attitudes to public transport, and argues that although there is a rhetorical support for the principles of sustainability and the practice of land-use/transportation integration, this is combined with a selective reluctance to embrace local changes in residential environment or in lifestyle preferences which might facilitate such principles.