POLICIES TO CONTROL URBAN SPRAWL - PLANNING REGULATIONS OR CHANGES INTHE RULES OF THE GAME

Urban sprawl, fuelled by powerful market forces, is unlikely to be con trolled by macro-scale regional plans or by comprehensive reforms of t he local government map, This paper emphasises two mechanisms that det ermine the 'rules of the game' of local development and public regulat ion of urban sprawl: local government finance and the transfer of land from rural to urban local authorities, Sharing local taxes paid by ne w non-residential property is discussed, in the Israeli context, as a means to reduce overdevelopment of industrial areas in the metropolita n fringes as well as pressures on open space, Complementary regulative measures, where rural local government is separated from urban local government, are based on improved co-ordination between land-use plann ing and decisions on municipal boundary changes.