How Aligned Are Citizen Preferences With the 15‐Minute Cities Paradigm? An International Survey and K‐Means Clustering Study

ABSTRACT

This study investigates how citizens' mobility preferences align with the principles of the 15‐Minute City (15mC), addressing three research questions: what access times and transport modes citizens consider acceptable, whether mobility preference can be clustered, and which services are perceived incompatible with the 15mC. Data were collected through a survey ( n  = 650) covering preferred access times and transport modes for 19 urban services. A K‐means clustering algorithm, applied to more than bootstrapped and politically reweighted samples, identified three profiles. First shows a strong preference for walking to nearby services. Second combines walking and private transport for short distances, reflecting a dual mobility pattern. Third relies predominantly on both private and public motorised transport, particularly for services located more than 15‐min away. The results indicate that Workplaces and Universities are unanimously associated with motorised transport and longer distances, representing a structural contradiction to the 15mC. Services related to care and daily life, such as family homes, malls, and administrative facilities, show more distributions between profiles. These findings highlight car dependency for daily activities and suggest that future research should examine the role of sociodemographic variables, such as income, regional context, or gender, in shaping these patterns, as some responses may reflect current living conditions rather than purely normative preferences. By systematically segmenting citizens' accessibility expectations across a broad range of services and an international sample, this study contributes empirical evidence to inform urban planning practise and enrich academic debates on the feasibility and equity implications of proximity‐based urban models.