It has become an impressive and admirable book, the new Area Development Travel Guide 2026. In over 250 pages, this guide tries to capture everything: from force field analyses to the Didam judgment, from participation strategies to land exploitation.
Those who read it immediately understand why building in the Netherlands has become so painfully complicated. But something else also appears between the lines: a sector that is slowly beginning to realize that it has become stuck in its own system logic.
The authors describe that struggle honestly and carefully. For this very reason, the document sometimes reads like a mirror of a system that is making itself increasingly difficult to govern.
No blueprint, but a swamp
The travel guide acknowledges that there is "no blueprint available" for area development "anymore. The process has become an iterative search in a swamp of nitrogen, grid congestion, European regulations, legal procedures and climate adaptation.
What follows is a predictable reflex. The solution is sought in more process architecture, more governance, more assessment frameworks and more cooperation. As if a system that becomes structurally overloaded can be saved by drawing the roadmap in an even more refined way.
The paradox of the soft side
The most striking passage deals with the "soft side" of cooperation. It calls for trust, communication and connecting leadership. Area development is ultimately "people work," according to the authors.
But that is precisely where the legal shoe pinches. How do you build trust within a system that, at the same time, is fully regulated to exclude any form of risk? The government invites professionals to "go on a journey together," while constantly forcing them to treat each other as potential adversaries via Didam procedures, procurement rules and discussions about Article 23.7 of the Environment Act. The system demands cooperation but organizes distrust.
Steering for value instead of profit
At the same time, the travel guide is remarkably honest about where things go wrong financially. Projects get stuck because original landowners count with high speculative land values, while public investments in social tasks only become visible much later. The sector is actually saying here: our way of valuing is part of the problem.
In the end, the solution still lingers in process optimization. While just the opposite seems necessary. Not increasingly complicated customized constructions, but a few clear principles that remove the financial noise from area development:
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- Reële waardering: Reken de grond pas definitief residueel af met de oorspronkelijke grondeigenaar wanneer helder is wat er daadwerkelijk gebouwd kan worden en welke maatschappelijke kwaliteit gewenst is. De basis is de waarde op het moment voordat we het als maatschappij belangrijk vonden de grond een andere bestemming te geven. Niet vooraf speculeren op maximale opbrengsten, maar waarderen op basis van de uiteindelijke gerealiseerde werkelijkheid.
- Focus op kwaliteit: Haal concurrentie op prijs zoveel mogelijk uit selectieprocedures. Wie vooraf duidelijkheid biedt over budgetten of minimale grondbiedingen voorkomt dat kwaliteit wordt verdrongen door opportunisme, speculatie of getouwtrek achteraf. Dan verschuift de vraag fundamenteel. Niet langer: wie biedt financieel het meest? Maar: we kiezen de partij die binnen deze financiële randvoorwaarden de hoogste maatschappelijke waarde en kwaliteit kan realiseren.
- Voorspelbare spelregels: De reiswijzer waarschuwt terecht voor het “Ferrari-Dacia-dilemma”: de neiging om steeds hogere ambities te stapelen zonder heldere financiële en technische randvoorwaarden. Maar juist die voortdurende variatie in lokale eisen, uitzonderingen en afwegingskaders maakt bouwen traag en onvoorspelbaar. Niet ambitie is het probleem, maar versnippering. Wie werkt met uniforme landelijke indicatoren en een voorspelbaar selectiekader maakt schaalbaarheid, standaardisatie en industriële optimalisatie mogelijk. Juist daardoor verdwijnen veel van de vermeende meerkosten bij toekomstbestendig bouwen.
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Lost in the roadmap
It is ironic that we now need hundreds of pages to explain why building a simple street is almost impossible. The travel guide offers an impressive process guide. But as long as we remain trapped in managing complexity rather than simplifying the basics, the construction site will remain empty. Once everything is organized: the participation, the governance, the selection strategies and the legal procedures, we still need to build.
The author about this section
Directions is my way of taking the conversation about renewal in construction a step further. Not by shouting louder, but by looking more sharply. I write about what is going on under the surface: the assumptions, the systems and the choices that determine what we build and why. My ambition is to give direction to a sector that is always in transition, but unintentionally still thinks in old patterns too often. What systems are still holding back a construction that wants to be faster, more affordable and more future-proof?
Jan Willem van de Groep
