Property Rights for the Post-Growth City: Reframing Development in Urban Land Governance

Post-growth planning seeks to meet social needs within ecological limits, yet housing, infrastructure and services often depend on development revenues and property appreciation. This paper examines how property arrangements sustain this dependence and how their reconfiguration might support post-growth urban governance. Drawing together post-growth planning and property-rights scholarship, it develops a framework examining who can authorise changes to land, how benefits from its ownership and use are distributed, who can access and continue using it, and who is responsible for its long-term care. This paper uses illustrations from England and Bulgaria to explore development-funded affordable housing and the coordination of maintenance among individual apartment owners. It advances three propositions: environmental restrictions may reinforce exclusion without measures addressing access and redistribution; public control and land value capture may retain dependence on further development; and long-term care requires responsibilities supported by decision-making powers, funding and accountability. The framework identifies tensions between these objectives and helps assess whether provision can endure when development activity declines. It distinguishes development addressing unmet needs from institutional pressures to generate further development, clarifying how property arrangements can support equitable access and continuing care within ecological limits.