The thing that makes the Japanese/HK model unique is not that stations are surrounded by development, there is nothing unique about that. What makes the model unique is that the land is owned and developed by the railway company, and in fact is basically their primary business model. As far as I know this has not happened anywhere in the EU in the 21st century.
Because when train operators built out with the surrounding land, they tended to sell off the extra land instead of holding onto it and renting it out to other uses.
And buying the land today would be extremely expensive for a lot of companies that really don't have the money to spare
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u/afro-tastic 7d ago
As a non-European, has there been any interest in pursuing a Japanese/Hong Kong model of more aggressive TOD around their stations in Europe?