Urban land policies, with an emphasis on undeveloped land Case Study of Riyadh – Saudi Arabia

Riyadh has experienced massive urban growth, it was the fastest growing city in the world between 1970 and 1990 - the population increased by 100% between 1976 and 1987, yet even today much of the urban area remains undeveloped. The need for efficient use of urban land has attracted great interest from both practitioners and academics. Some studies focus on identifying more efficient use by analysing containment tools and increasing densities. Others concentrate on undeveloped land, especially urban-rural fringe and brownfield sites. Although these studies mostly seek to curb sprawl with more efficient use of land, they have crucial knowledge gaps and limitations. They deal with undeveloped land on the basis that there has not initially been a failure in development (urban-rural fringe sites are new areas, while brownfield sites have previously been developed). In fact, a large proportion of urban undeveloped land ‘white land’ can in some urban contexts be bypassed without development - virgin land - which can threaten the efficient use of urban land. In addressing this gap, this study explores and investigates the causes of the emergence and continuing existence of the phenomenon of white land, about which little is known. Using an interpretive epistemology, a single case study of Riyadh and 40 semi-structured interviews and documentation, the data analysis shows three interconnected key categories that can interpret this phenomenon, sociocultural, economic and political. One of the most important findings is that the failure to develop white land can be attributed to non-market factors and interpretive positions (discretion and how it is affected by culture, conflict of interest, power struggles, trust matters, and social ties), where the centralised role of the state can be vital in orienting and allocating the land market, with little influence of market-based considerations. One interesting finding shows urban sprawl and white land are not easily contained by an Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) when there is insufficient consideration of reflecting the UGB in a different built environment; introducing the UGB involves non-market interpretive positions. The main argument is a call for innovating accepted models, which includes the non-market factors explored in this thesis, to re-centre them around an acknowledgement that practices are more diverse than when models were developed