Urban Planning and Quality of Life: an Approach to the State of the Art of Local Planning in Chile

Regulation changes in urban planning at the local level should have some relation with the quality of urban life in the metropolitan areas of Chile. However, there is no significant evidence in literature to prove this. As a reference, we took 48 communes corresponding to Gran Santiago, Gran Valparaiso, and Gran Concepcion, in a temporal context of full democracy between 1990 and 2013. Based on the review and classification of the modifications made to the communal regulation plans, we analyze by means of statistics which allow comparing the nature of the modifications with the current quality of life profiles of the communes. This provides us with important evidence about how local governments influence this matter through the main instrument of urban planning in Chile.