The municipality of Nieuwegein is developing and implementing a digital model of the city. Nieuwegein is a growth center and must respond to the growing housing shortage. Therefore, in 2021, plans were made for 3,000 new homes at 67 locations. Over time, this number grew to 5,100 homes. These plans were submitted separately to the city council. However, the council put a stop to this growth because it questioned whether Nieuwegein could accommodate this expansion in a livable and sustainable way. The council literally said: “stop, mark time.”
This led to the need for a digital model to visualize the impact of growth on the city as a whole. The study “Controlling the Growth of the City” was conducted in collaboration with the SITE-UD agency, based on a digital model of the entire municipality of Nieuwegein. Four main themes were identified: demography and housing, health, sustainability, safety, and livability. Spatial projects (urban development plans) can be loaded into the digital model. These are visualized, but more importantly, their effects are calculated using indicators provided by the municipality of Nieuwegein. The results can be combined with qualitative policy indicators to provide a comprehensive overview.
The report, based on the digital model, demonstrated the conditions under which Nieuwegein can support its growth. It therefore provided the municipality with concrete guidance regarding the requirements developers must meet for their developments. Based on this, the temporary freeze on construction was lifted. The digital model has thus made a tangible contribution to saving time in realizing developments. The digital model also contributes to Nieuwegein’s transition from isolated project development to a more cohesive approach. Furthermore, the digital model provides a common basis for data and calculations. The municipality of Nieuwegein aims for this to contribute to more efficient working and cost savings by having all data and information in a single model instead of having everything calculated separately. This also means potential time savings and faster implementation, which is beneficial for the pressure on housing construction in the region.
In this video you will see a short demo of the digital model of Nieuwegein:
The municipality of Nieuwegein is still at the beginning of an innovative integration of digital technology into its spatial planning policy. The process of broader implementation of the digital model within the municipality of Nieuwegein will begin in 2025.
For more information, see Anton Poelarends’ presentation at the Tygron CoP 2024:
