Surviving Between the Trenches: Planning Research,Methodology and Theory of Science

Planning research-understood as research aiming to improve the body of knowledge on which spatial planning is based-includes issues rooted both in the social sciences, natural science and the humanities. Spatial planners need knowledge about the likely consequences of different alternatives of action, as well as understanding of the role of plans and planning processes in the development of society. This is reflected in the two-fold focus of planning research on both substantive and procedural issues. Whereas research on the role of plans and planning processes takes place mainly within a non-positivist social science paradigm, the research aiming to provide planners with the knowledge needed in order to make good plans is often situated in the battlefield between opposing positions within theory of science. Because planning research has both society and the physical as its subject of inquiry, a reflective opinion about the interaction between the physical environment and human actions is crucial. Traditionally, many spatial planners have conceived of this in a quite näive way, assuming that human behaviour can to a high extent be shaped or controlled by manipulating the physical environment. During recent decades, this view has been sharply criticized by anti-positivist scholars, and some theorists point out the great uncertainty, close to impossibility, in predicting human actions, even at an aggregate scale. The latter position has dramatic implications to spatial planning, as it would then be impossible to assess whether a certain physical solution is likely to have positive or negative social and related environmental consequences, e.g. in terms of travelling distances and modal split. Our own position is that the physical environment, along with a number of individual and non-physical structural factors, influences human activities and quality of life. To some extent, this influence can be predicted at an aggregate scale, but not for a particular individual (except those actions rendered impossible by the laws of physics). How strong influence the physical environment exerts, is a question requiring empirical research in order to be answered.     

“Sometimes Climate Adaptation is Politically Correct”: A Case Study of Planners and Politicians Negotiating Climate Adaptation in Waterfront Spatial Planning

Today, spatial planning is expected to deliver climate adaptation and to manage, merge and balance various societal interests and priorities. To what extent proactive shaping of change is enabled by spatial planning practice is less explored. This paper illustrates how the ideals and ambitions of climate adaptation are manifested in waterfront spatial planning via a case study of Norrköping, Sweden. Based on interviews with spatial planners and politicians responsible for strategic urban development planning, our study identifies a divergence in ambitions, approaches and positions. In local development plans, the position taken has less to do with climate risk severity than with an area's perceived political and economic attractiveness. When perceived attractiveness is low, precautionary climate adaptation serves as a pretext not to develop, whereas high perceived attractiveness leads to negotiated pragmatism allowing continued waterfront exploitation. We also identify a fragmentation in spatial planning, with weak interplay between municipal comprehensive planning and local development plans, resulting in ad hoc, case-by-case planning. Furthermore, different planning actors are organizationally compartmentalized, creating unfortunate intra-sectoral silos. We conclude that the integrative, proactive and reflexive potentials of spatial planning to deliver climate adaptation have yet to be realized.     

Regional planning in Brandenburg: Putting traditional approaches to the test

The State of Brandenburg represents one of five states that together make up what was the German Democratic Republic. It is now only 6 years ago when its people demanded and accomplished the abolishion of an entire state that was based on a very extensive system of government planning and control. Since unification in 1990, far‐reaching attempts have been made gradually to transform East German society in all its segments and dimensions with the objective to ‘Westernize’ its structure and functioning. With respect to Brandenburg, this process of adaptation has only recently also extended into the field of regional planning. During the first half of 1994, the establishment of regional planning authorities in all parts of the state was completed. These authorities have been charged with the task of formulating regional development plans as a means of securing and improving the living conditions of their inhabitants.     

Multiple land use planning for living places and investments spaces

Planning is assessed not only based on its ability to improve the living environment through place making, but also based on its role in facilitating investments in the built environment. This paper approaches the combination of these functions as planning for multiple land use. Contracts, rather than plans, are used to bridge these functions. This concept of multiple land use is used to reflect on the contributions in this special issue on regulation of private sector involvement and property market dynamics in urban development. Questions for further research are raised based on the concepts of legitimacy, effectiveness and efficiency. These questions can also be used to assess current planning practice in which private sector investment and place making are combined.     

Impact of planning mandates on local plans: a multi-method assessment

An increasing number of subnational government bodies mandate municipalities to establish a vision for their future development with a local plan. Outside the U.S., few studies have assessed whether these mandates succeed at increasing formal quality, policy focus and implementation of local plans. In addition, the reasons that prompt governments to impose mandates remain unclear. To tackle these issues, we used a multi-method approach combining interviews, plan content analysis and questionnaires to compare mandated and voluntary planning in Switzerland. Our analysis reveals that mandates only have limited impact on local plans. In particular, they do not produce higher quality plans than voluntary planning and do not improve implementation of policies. Our results may imply that (a) planning mandates from subnational governments are ineffective in general or (b) Swiss mandates in particular entail too few requirements and enforcement mechanisms to show a clear effect. Further studies could explore this issue empirically by comparing the characteristics of different planning mandates and assessing their effect on the quality and implementation of local plans. Alternatively, future research efforts could also examine how to find a compromise between mandated and voluntary planning in order to increase local commitment towards plan making.     

基于后现代旅游消费文化理念下规划项目市场门槛探讨——以景区旅游项目为例

随着旅游业的蓬勃发展,旅游消费已成为后现代社会消费行为中的重要组成部分,且旅游消费逐渐形成文化理念,然而,国内外针对旅游项目的研究还未深入到旅游消费文化规律下对规划项目市场门槛的探讨。正是如此,本文试图在后现代旅游消费文化理念下,从旅游项目(类型)市场门槛探讨的基本原理与方法着手,以景区索道项目建设为例对后现代旅游消费文化设施类项目的市场门槛进行预测。     

Seoul,Korea: its concept of culture and nature in heritage planning

This paper explores the concept of heritage as part of sustainable development planning. Heritage is taken to include both the cultural and natural spheres to incorporate people, activities, landscapes, monuments, landmarks, artefacts, and nature. Heritage planning then involves the sustainable development of the cultural and natural environment to prepare for its stewardship, research, and communication for the benefit of society. This perspective leads to broader questions on approaches to heritage planning where the cultural environment is considered specifically within sustainable development planning just as the natural environment is studied separately in specialised disciplines. The paper proposes that in developing resource‐management plans the effects of cultural resources on natural resources, and vice versa, must be integrated and addressed. Seoul, Korea, an historic metropolitan city that has gone through radical political and economic changes, is examined as a case study. It identifies how the city is integrating sustainability of the contextual association of the cultural and natural environment with promotion of economic growth.     

Contested Spaces? The Use of Place Concepts to Communicate Visions for Peri-Urban Areas

In Dutch planning, there has always been an important role for spatial concepts. Their role has arguably changed with the recent decentralization of planning to the regional and local level. At the national level, guiding concepts of a more procedural nature have replaced the more substantive and place-based spatial concepts, leaving more room for regional and local interpretation. At the regional and local level, spatial concepts are still in use, but this seems to be in a more communicative, negotiating and developing role than before. In this paper, we analyse how place concepts are used to exercise power, mobilize recourses and frame meaning over the use of the peri-urban areas, in the changing Dutch planning context. This paper focuses on two competing place concepts for overlapping green urban fringe areas in The Hague Region, which have been promoted by different actor constellations and which represent different visions about the meaning of these peri-urban areas. The case study allows conclusions about the changing role of spatial concepts in Dutch spatial planning.     

The cultural dimension in comparative research: Making sense of development control in France

There is a tendency amongst planners to think of planning systems as phenomena with an independent existence that may be directly compared. Such a view lingers even where the concept of end‐state planning has long been abandoned, and where it is understood that the context for plan‐making and development control is an important factor in comparing systems of different countries. This paper will argue that systems of plans and development control procedures are essentially creatures of the cultures which give rise to them. They are to be understood as expressions of underlying beliefs about the way that decisions ought to be taken for the administration of a country. This paper presents three cases drawn from the author's own experience of research in France as indicative of the approach. The first, a development control case of the extension to a heavy goods vehicle depot, looks at the cultural factors that affected the way the application was determined. The second, concerning the formal development control agreements between state and commune in rural France, hinges on the understanding of the concept of a plan. The third, a consultation procedure in Lyon, is dependent for its explanation on the status of the participants in the procedure. Such an approach implies a mature understanding of the way in which a country works, not merely of its planning system. It implies an ability to communicate in the language of the country being studied. The paper concludes by suggesting that comparative research has important benefits for the understanding of planning in the home country, because of the way in which, if properly done, it questions the assumptions that are made about the nature and purpose of planning.     

Citizen Participation in Planning: Climbing a Ladder?

Certain levels of public access in the process of the statutory land-use planning have been part of Czech planning legislation since the 1970s, but actual citizen participation has become an issue in practice only during the last decade. Currently citizens have a say but their involvement seldom exceeds mere opposition towards active involvement. Their attempts to be heard in the decision-making process is perceived as a nuisance by developers and some local governments as well. Except for the opponents of specific project proposals, most people feel that involvement in the planning process is futile, having little comprehension of how urban and regional planning may actually influence their lives, their property and their local environment. The paper analyses the effects of the pre-1989 powerlessness on the recent changes in the planning process and it reviews the research and opinions of several scholars in this field. The formal planning process, which deals mostly with land use, is often felt to be too narrowly defined and too restrictive, with limited opportunities for citizen involvement. Strategic planning has been introduced by some municipalities in recent years as a less rigid, more flexible and potentially more participatory approach, but also here the trend that copied the accustomed patterns of statutory land-use planning prevailed in the end. Apart from the 'mainstream' planning, alternative, 'informal' planning has emerged, often supported from abroad and organized by non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Although still marginal, it has introduced active planning by citizens. The absence of legal definition and guidance in the case of non-statutory planning allowed greater diversity in the planning method itself. After several years of this experience, however, it has primarily proven just how diverse the concept of citizen participation might be. On the basis of the analysis of the current diversification of planning methods, an attempt is made to draw some conclusions concerning the evolving process of citizen empowerment and participation in Czech planning, as well as to indicate patterns of the changes of the involvement process in the current stage of transformation.     

Urban Indians: Patterns and Transformations

For centuries American Indians have been an object of Western fascination. All too often this fascination has been an invented view of Indian people. This is especially evident with the recent movement of Indians to urban areas within the United States and Canada. Not only has this movement been ignored by society in general but it has also received almost no comment in the geographical literature. In this analysis the complex character of urban Indian communities is sketched, a variety of interpretations of these communities is outlined and the implications for planning and public policy are examined. The recent emergence of Indian organizations provides an innovative alternative for planning and public policy—cultural planning for urban redevelopment.     

Beyond the divide: evaluation in co-evolutionary spatial planning

Spatial developments are becoming increasingly a-linear and dynamic with a wide range of possible actors. The awareness of uncertainty is growing and, therefore, projects need to integrate a high level of flexibility. But simultaneously, there is a growing demand for more informed and well-argued decisions. Predictions from the ‘best estimated model’ are no longer credible nor accepted, being too fragile and uncertain. How can we keep long-lasting, multi-actor projects in permanent transition on track? This expresses an important demand for more integrated evaluation in spatial planning. In this respect, this paper analyses existing theoretical evaluation strategies and how these strategies deal with spatial developments. They are still usually structured along static, generic and circular approaches; in fact, many neglect the dynamic, plural and a-linear realities. Therefore, this paper develops a post-structural evaluation approach for various planning issues and different playing fields of actors, followed by an illustration of the various settings for this approach in a Flemish case. Finally, we discuss how spatial planning and future plans might be evaluated with a dissipative role for evaluation.     

Venturing Into Unknown Territory: The Preparation and Formulation of the Second Benelux Structural Outline

Inherent in transnational planning are obstacles which cause spatial planners to venture into unknown territory. The scale, the issues and the institutional context are significantly different from planning at the national level or below. What does this mean for the role of spatial plan-making, which is the cornerstone of the planning profession? This paper focuses on the role of plans as part of building transnational governance capacity. It does so on the basis of an in-depth case study of the preparation of the Second Benelux Structural Outline (1994–2000). The research material consists of a series of interviews with directly involved planners and administrators, primary sources such as internal reports of the Benelux Economic Union and direct observations by the researcher who attended several meetings of the planning committee. The paper starts with a short discussion of contemporary planning theory through which the formulation of the plan is analysed. Planning as a communicative process and planning as a programming process are central concepts in this analytical framework. The paper proceeds with an analysis of the making of the Second Benelux Structural Outline. A conclusion is that the plan as a communicative tool was not sufficiently developed during the planning process, in spite of the desirability of such a feature in this stage of building transnational governance capacity. The concluding remarks will focus on the ways in which the communicative dimension of future transnational plans can be improved.     

Regional Planning in Queensland's Rangelands: Challenges and Prospects for Biodiversity Conservation

In Australia, the Commonwealth and State governments are increasingly devolving natural resource management (NRM) responsibilities to regional bodies. This move has led to the development of regional NRM plans. Native vegetation and biodiversity conservation, along with soil, pasture and water resources, are key components of the regional NRM plans in Queensland's extensive rangelands. This paper outlines and applies a set of criteria for evaluating the native vegetation and biodiversity content of accredited regional NRM plans for Queensland's rangelands. The evaluation showed considerable variation in the comprehensiveness of the information and knowledge base and management action targets among plans, including the poor articulation of impacts of excessive grazing pressure on biodiversity. The NRM plans lacked effective integration of natural resource, native vegetation and biodiversity conservation targets and actions. Several regions had too many biodiversity targets, many of which were poorly integrated. This is symptomatic of a limited understanding of rangelands as ecological systems and the lack of an integrated planning framework. We conclude regional NRM planning is not a ‘silver bullet’ for biodiversity conservation in the rangelands, but rather, it is the beginning of a long road to address complex, multi‐scale problems at a regional level.     

NORDEN AND THE "SUBSTANTIVE LANDSCAPE": A PERSONAL ACCOUNT

This commentary takes its point of departure in the debate provoked by the landscape theory that Denis Cosgrove presented in his seminal book, Social Formation and Symbolic Landscape (1984), in which he defined landscape in terms of scenic, spatial forms of representation. By unpacking the evolution of the concept of landscape the author proposed an alternative interpretation to Cosgrove's, emphasizing differing conceptions of lawfulness, in which the “substantive” platial landscape was introduced as a counterpoint to the scenic spatial concept. Initially, and for two particular reasons, the substantive landscape became theoretically placed in Norden: first, due to the historical and contemporary territorial/platial connotations of the term in the Nordic realm, and second, because the interest in a substantive landscape has been considerable among Nordic scholars. Today, this interest goes well beyond a Nordic context. In commenting on the contributions in this special issue the paper points at how different engagements with a “substantive landscape” might inform present and future scholarly debate concerning the role and meaning of landscape.     

Sustainable transport planning and the Dublin transportation initiative

The concept of sustainability has become a significant consideration in planning in Europe and the US. At both the international and the national level, urban planners and policymakers have developed a package of policies designed to produce sustainable growth and development. In transport, this has been interpreted to mean that we need to increase accessibility while we reduce mobility by shifting trips from automobile to walking, bicycle or public transport modes. Using this criteria, the latest Dublin transport plan has been found to be only partially effective. Similar to many American transport plans, the DTI has opted for the infrastructure‐related sustainability policies and avoided the less popular economic disincentives.     

Planning at the limit: immigration and post-war Birmingham

It is acknowledged that the post-war period of urban planning has played a significant role in the construction of Britain's cities. The plans themselves and the commentaries on these plans tend to illustrate this phase as predominately involving rehousing, the reorganization of land use and the containment of urban sprawl. Through a close, de-constructive reading of two plans instructive to the rebuilding of the City of Birmingham, this paper suggests that post-war reconstruction cannot be reduced to such domestic, localised issues. Instead, it demonstrates that although planners often elided any mention of immigration and promoted a notion of natural population increase, there remain traces of an uneven relationship with immigration operating at a number of scales in the documentation. The paper elucidates such traces and, in turn, works towards a reassessment of the literature on immigration and the city.     

Resilience in the Light of Climate Change: Useful Approach or Empty Phrase for Spatial Planning?

In the context of adaptation to climate change and spatial planning, the idea of urban and regional resilience has been attracting increasing attention because it recognizes both the given uncertainty of climate change and the complexity of cities and regions. Even if initial attempts have been made to operationalize the concept of resilience, a gap exists between the intense theoretical discussion and the use of resilience thinking in planning practice. On the basis of a discussion of existing attempts that define resilience principles, the authors derive eight principles for urban and regional resilience: diversity, redundancy, flexibility and adaptability, modularity, interdependency, stabilizing and buffering factors, mobility, as well as planning and foresight. Referring to two exploratory studies—the City and Region of Stockholm (Sweden) and the City and Region of Rostock (Germany)—this article aims to explore whether spatial planning already contributes to these principles and so to build resilience. The analysis shows that spatial planning already contributes to urban and regional resilience. Also, the principles, as suggested here, can be used to operationalize the idea of resilience. Prospectively, such principles may support spatial planning to choose adaptation measures and specific objectives and to contribute to urban and regional resilience.     

规划决策民主化:基于城市管治的透视

管治是探索政府、市场、公众等多元力量协调整合的理念与过程。在中国城市发展面临巨大转型的背景下引入、借鉴管治的思维,对促进城市规划健康发展与决策民主化都具有重要的意义。文章介绍了管治的背景、内涵,从管治的角度论述了中国特定发展环境中的城市规划民主决策问题,并辨证地评析了管治的作用。文章认为,中国正在转变的社会经济背景和城市管理的要求,使得管治进入中国有其必然性和必要性。随后文章分别从城市规划存在的整体性体制缺陷、政府的企业化导向、薄弱的公民社会等方面,分别阐述了在中国开展城市规划决策民主化所面临的严峻挑战。在发展转型期,中国城市规划决策的民主化只能是有限目标、有限进度的。文章的基本结论是:城市规划决策民主化是与整体社会经济发展阶段、体制相匹配的一个环节,它的建设与完善取决于整体的社会管治水平。     

隔离与融合:新疆喀纳斯景区旅游规划中的利益博弈

旅游规划是一个地区对于未来旅游业发展的一种项目计划和制度安排,因此,在旅游规划编制以及落实过程中会涉及到各相关利益方的博弈。在我国一些少数民族地区,未被工业化的社会形态和结构成为一种稀缺的吸引物,旅游业成为当地具有较强比较优势的经济产业。但在旅游开发规划中,当地居民的利益诉求往往被忽视。新疆喀纳斯旅游规划应用了居民区与旅游区相隔离的战略,在达到了功能分区的目的的同时也引起了相关利益方之间的利益博弈,引发了我们对于编制旅游规划的程序和实体改革方向的思考。