Regional and city planning in sardinia (Italy): Conflictual issues analyzed through multicriteria analysis and contingent valuation

Sardinian regional planning is characterized by a deep change that followed the approval of the Regional Landscape Plan (Resolution of the Regional Council of Sardinia n. 36/7 of September 5, 2006, entitled “L.R. n. 8 del 25.11.2004, articolo 1, comma 1. Approvazione del Piano Paesaggistico – Primo ambito omogeneo” [“Regional Law n. 8 of November 25, 2004, artiche 1, paragraph 1. Approval of the Landscape Plan – First homogeneous piece of territory”]). The Regional Landscape Plan (RLP), which is ruled by the National Code of Cultural Heritage and Landscape (CCHL) (National Law Enacted by Decree n. 42/2004, the “Urbani Code” from the last name of the Minister who proposed the law), establishes the directions for future Sardinian regional planning. The actual sectoral, province and city plans, and plans for protected areas, have to be changed in order to follow these directions. The adjustment process could be conflictual since cities, provinces and the administrative offices of protected areas may possibly disagree with the regional administration about the rules established by the RLP. In this view, this paper evaluates and analyzes the degree of consensus of the people living in the city of Sinnai on a planning proposal concerning a portion of the urban fabric. This proposal is consistent with the directions of the RLP. Sinnai is a city located in the coastal area ruled by the RLP. Moreover, it is assessed, based on opinions expressed by the people living in Sinnai, if a future planning scenario consistent with the RLP is preferred to a scenario which follows the actual Masterplan of the city of Sinnai. This paper uses both the Contingent Valuation method (CV) and Multicriteria Analysis (MCA). The CV approach is generally preferred for evaluating people’s willingness to pay for public goods. Multicriteria Analysis is a favorite tool among urban and regional planners. MCA is one of the most popular families of techniques utilized to address complex choice problems. MCA makes it possible to implement decisions that take account of several, often conflicting, points of view. A participative definition of the relative importance (and weights) of the decision criteria is implemented, which could lead to a more-or-less extensive convergence on policy implementation within the city planning processes.