In the dissertation research new town-planning bases and methodology of formation of local settlement systems in the conditions of the united territorial communities of Ukraine are considered and offered. The new system of decentralization and local government reform has created new forms of systemic objects of urban planning. The paper offers practical recommendations for their spatial planning, taking into account the legislative and socio-economic prerequisites for the creation of integrated territorial communities as local settlement systems. This approach allows to improve the methodological basis for the formation of settlement systems at the local level, namely the formation of a methodological basis for assessing factors influencing the establishment of common boundaries and strategies of economic development, distribution of functions, solving land relations as individual systems and higher level systems.
The paper identifies a number of negative aspects that need to be considered in the development of urban planning documentation of local settlement systems, namely: the lack of a full information base for the formation of united territorial communities and the strategic development plan; unpredictability and vagueness of intentions in the period of unification and in the future; limited conditions for the development of territorial communities, especially in matters of land, natural resources and economic potential of both individual settlements and the community as a whole; problems with the investment attractiveness of territories for the implementation of new investment projects; different dependence of economic and social nature in the existing system of settlement, the loss of historical identity of a number of settlements, especially in the area of influence of large cities.
In the work, the united territorial community is considered as a local settlement system of local or basic level.
The positive aspects of the formation of local settlement systems in the conditions of united territorial communities are: a) historically formed planning structure of settlements and their economic complex, which provides "sustainable" development of integrated objects; b) "definite role" of settlements in the "General scheme of planning of the territory of Ukraine", as well as in urban planning documentation of the regional level; c) real "independence" of the formed territorial communities in the choice of strategies of the development; d) the possibility of changing the "directions and forms" of economic activity within the economic plan for the development of settlement systems of higher levels; e) "freedom of choice" in the implementation of best practices in the formation of an integrated program of organization and operation of a new type of group form of resettlement - the local system.
Analysis of domestic experience in the formation of systems and the involvement of modern practical results of the formation of new systemic relations and methods of resettlement (Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Croatia, etc.) became the basis for developing conceptual foundations for spatial formation of new types of local resettlement systems. The main potential resource opportunities that will be fundamental in the economic, social and cultural development of new systems have been identified. Substantiated recommendations and proposed schemes-models of schemes of management, culture, recreation and social services as separate systems, and in separate conditions, zones of influence of big cities, resort-recreational areas, zones of transport corridors, agricultural activity, industrial territories, etc.
The paper identifies socio-economic incentives for the development of recreational activities of the system as one of the main, given the significant natural potential of Ukraine. Schemes-models of integrated forms of management, development and formation of local settlement systems are proposed and presented: "agglomeration", "directive", "contractual" and corresponding planning models in the settlement system in new conditions of changes in the administrative structure of the country. The work is a methodological basis for the formation of a strategy for administrative and planning reforms at the district level, which is provided by the general theory of decentralization processes in countries.
