International audienceLimiting land consumption is an undisputed priority today. In France, numerous laws, regulations and space protection measures (under the town planning and environment codes) govern territorial development to protect land resources and the environment. Yet urbanization at the expense of natural and agricultural areas remains critical, particularly in coastal areas. This article proposes an analysis of spatial planning practices at local level in the French Mediterranean, considering the implementation of spatial planning over time as a marker of the will to manage urban development. After examining features specific to coastal planning legislation and regulations in France, it identifies past and present trajectories of urban planning practices and the development of environmental protection. Four French Mediterranean areas are assessed: the Marseille coast, the Gulf of Aigues-Mortes and the Corsican sites of Balagne and Biguglia

As in many other European countries, urbanisation and urban sprawl along the French Mediterranean coast are a major concern. Understanding this phenomenon requires both multi-level and multidisciplinary approaches. In this perspective, this article presents a framework for the observation and analysis of urban sprawl in the French Mediterranean coastal zone. Developed in the context of a scientific coastal observatory with four contrasting study sites, the framework was designed to structure the observation and analysis of urban sprawl dynamics and their driver variables. Although urban expansion is currently slowing in coastal zones, local exceptions can be found and accounted for by historical urban planning and environmental protection measures, local residential tax policies and contradictory perceptions of coastal zones by residents. Our multidisciplinary initiative is capable of integrating different temporal and spatial scales and has proven relevant in analysing urban sprawl in coastal areas. It shows the need to study coastal areas at finer scales to identify specific dynamics in their local contexts, since these represent the scale at which administrative decisions are made.