Density and the compact city

Abstract

The ‘compact city’ agenda has become commonplace and is often presented as an urban ‘good’ in mainstream urban research, policy, and practice. Haarstad et al.'s intervention aims to bring critical geographical research to this debate, and is a very welcome one. In this response, I reflect on the debates on the compact city, consider its links to research on high density urbanisms, and present some questions for taking this critical urban debate forward.