A multi-agent system to simulate the decision process of stakeholders involved in a land residential project in the Calgary region

The objective of this project is to build a multi-agent system to simulate the decision making process of stakeholders in a residential land development project and the influence of such decisions on land-use resources. The environment over which decisions are made is the Town of Strathmore, Alberta, where competition for land-use resources is increasing as a result of its proximity to the City of Calgary. The stakeholders simulated as agents are the citizens, the town planner and the developer. Interviews were conducted with representatives of each group to gather information about their goals, decision making process and influence. Simulations were performed over 30 years with a one year interval to mimic different land development scenarios. The model generates a series of land-use maps showing the changes in the environment based on the goals and decisions of agents. This model represents a valuable tool to better understand the complex interactions among several stakeholders involved in a land redesignation process and forecast the cumulative impact of their decisions on the environment. Background and Relevance In Alberta, prior to the development of a parcel of land, the land-use designation must be legally changed to allow for the proposed development. Several stakeholders are involved in this process including but not limited to the land owners, the land developers, the citizens, the municipal planners, the utility companies, and the environmental organizations. These stakeholders make decisions by weighing the social need, environmental impact, economic advantages/disadvantages and political support/opposition of a proposed land development. The municipal planner also attempts to fit a proposed land development into future plans that have been developed for the community. Each stakeholder has different opinions on the land development and different goals that he attempts to meet. There is a structure of formal and informal communication between the stakeholders, and the outcome of this complex system is a decision which changes the land-use designation of the parcel. Municipal planners use various tools including historical data and past experiences, statistical analyses of census data, and community economic models to make decision. However, these decisions are still quite often made in the face of uncertainty. Planners do not have the ability to forecast the cumulative effect of many individual decisions made by stakeholders on the environment over which they make their decisions. They need a tool that can model how final environmental patterns and trends emerge from the cumulative effect of complex behaviors and interactions of several individual stakeholders who might have conflicting views. This project has been undertaken to fulfill these requirements through the development of a multi-agent system.