2010 Space is Luxury, Aalto, July 7-10th

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Beetham Beetham Beetham: Banal Luxury and ‘Quality Places’
(AESOP, 2010) Jefferies, Tom
The UK has seen the longest period of boom in the construction industry since WW2, with continuous growth between 1993 and 2007, a context that dramatically and radically changed following the global financial crisis of 2008-09. The boom was characterised by a revived focus on the city centre as a space where regeneration of post-industrial cities could be catalysed in an environment that saw overt competition between cities to be the best. The boom also coincided with the raising in public consciousness of design as a qualitative and desirable commodity through exposure in popular media and encapsulation of ‘quality’ in political and policy objectives. This in turn has led to the introduction of new areas of built environment focussed policy and guidance aiming to ensure design ‘quality’ that embodies the values of ‘place’ in both urban space and built form. Place intersects the uniqueness of location with culture. This raises the question ‘If each city is different why are new places all so similar?’
Open Access
Book of abstracts : Space is Luxury, 24th AESOP Annual Conference, Aalto University, FInland, July 7-10 2010
(AESOP, 2010) Ilmonen, Mervi; Ache, Peter
Dear Participants! Tervetuloa - Välkommen – Welcome to space is luxury — the 24th AESOP Annual Conference In 2010, the world is clearly one that can be called 'urban'. In relative terms, more than half of the world's population dwells in urban settings — about one billion under 'slum conditions'. Having quality space available equals commanding a 'luxury'! Planning and urban design are key factors in shaping and managing space and generate the wished for quality spaces. The concept of space and concomitantly that of spatial quality includes different meanings and dimensions. Space is physical, including architecture and urban form. Space is also socially constructed through various forms of human interventions. Space is contested and a reason for serious conflicts. Space is presented and space represents. For planning, the management of the competing uses for space requires complex interventions. The making of better places that are valued and have identity is an enduring ambition of planning. And, returning to the start of this brief reflection, the major challenge of spatial planning is to find solutions for a more sustainable urban millennium. Space is expensive and exhaustive, a luxury we cannot afford any longer, if it means excessive use of space in terms of energy inefficiency and traffic pollution. The Centre for Urban and Regional Studies at Aalto University welcomes more than six hundred planning scholars and professionals from all over the world to Finland to discuss the manifold issues of space is luxury and to explore the multitude of related planning issues. As a participant, with this Book of Abstracts you hold one of the many elements in your hands which were produced for this conference with the help or input of a number of people. First of all, we need to mention here the Track Co-Chairs who so effectively worked together and helped us create an event that is stimulating and challenging in its scientific content. Following on to the Track Invitation Texts, the Call for Papers was issued in October 2009. Abstract submission was possible during January 2010. Track Co-Chairs provided an assessment of the abstracts until mid March 2010. LOC checked the outcome and also proposed some re-arrangements to balance out tracks in terms of paper presentations. From April onwards, notifications of acceptance were sent out to authors and we started scheduling tracks and sessions. All of this profited from the invaluable support of our international teams of Track Co-Chairs (see list on following pages).The 24th AESOP Annual Conference generated a huge interest. More than six hundred abstracts were submitted out of which more than five hundred papers were accepted — which finally translated into slightly more than four hundred and fifty abstracts presented in this book. All in all a very laborious process, for which we would like to thank especially Mikko Johansson who was the web master of the conference (and who also became a first time father during the process. Congratulations!). AESOP 2010 was also used to implement new policies towards a higher scientific quality of AESOP conferences. LOC provided for that purpose more detailed prescriptions regarding abstract submission. LOC also followed in part the proposal to introduce different paper categories, anchor papers (having more floor for presentation but also requiring a full draft paper) or distributed papers. This policy received a mixed echo from many sides — a good indication of the interest that the AESOP community has in such issues. Thanks for sharing your many views on the pros and cons of such a policy. It is certain, that AESOP needs to continue its discussion about quality standards in conferences. Last, we would of course like to thank all authors and presenters for their interest in the 24th AESOP Annual Conference. Without your intellectual contributions, without the research work which you do at your home institutions, without your willingness to share, present and discuss this knowledge, such a conference would have not been possible. This book of abstracts has been organized along the sixteen main tracks of the conference. In each section, at the beginning the reader will find the Track Invitation Text that was provided by Track Co-Chairs for the Call for Papers. This will be followed by an alphabetical listing of the abstracts of all those authors, who met the registration deadline of May 31st 2010. At the end of the Book of Abstracts, again an alphabetical list of all authors is provided, which the reader can use to find authors across all tracks. Finally, we would like to thank Marina Johansson, who brought together this Book of Abstracts in a very efficient way. Thank You! Sydämelliset ja Iämpimät kiitoksemme! Mervi Ilmonen & Peter Ache Local Organising Committee
Open Access
Challenges to Rural Planning in Africa: The Case of Three Post-democratic Sub-Saharan African Countries
(AESOP, 2010) Awuor-Hayangah, Rosemary; Ofosu-Kwakye, Yvonne
The fundamental transformation of Africa is largely dependent on new approaches to rural planning and development; However, this remains a major challenge in most African countries. More than 60% of Africa‘s population is classified as rural yet rural planning and development seem to be paid lip-service. Alternatively, rural planning and development initiatives have either failed or lagged behind because of the urban bias of regional planning policies and strategies. The debate on rural planning and development is centered on an expanding body of evidence which supports the notion of rural-urban interdependence towards harmonious regional development outcomes. The derivation of positive outcomes is dependent on existing and emergent policies and strategies which focus on planned interventions to strengthen rural societies and reduce their vulnerability. Ultimately, these policies must be holistic, going beyond ad hoc service and infrastructure provision, and must encompass a series of short, medium and long-term strategies which can aid in the creation of positive and progressive rural spaces and places. This paper will examine the challenges of rural planning in three post-democratic African countries namely, South Africa, Botswana and Kenya with emphasis to spatial planning and evaluate the extent to which their existing polices and strategies have been successful. It concludes by outlining the importance and new approaches to rural planning in Africa. This paper argues that challenges to rural planning in Africa can be overcome through the formulation of holistic policies and strategies which are focused, innovative and have the tendency to produce balanced outcomes.
Open Access
Cognitive skills to deal with the challenge of complexity in planning
(AESOP, 2010) Hemberger, Christoph; Schoenwandt, Walter
Complex problems represent a serious challenge in planning. Planners must make use of incomplete and potentially contradictory information to reach diverse, at times conflicting goals. Nobody can apprehend all of the different variables involved at a glance. Nor is it possible to predict with certainty how they are likely to change in the future. The mental models (i.e. representations of our environment) with which planners operate are therefore prone to errors that inhere in the very process of cognition itself, which only compounds the difficulty that planners face when dealing with complexity. Drawing on foundational insights from planning theory and practice, as well as from cognitive psychology and the interdisciplinary field of complexity theory, this paper seeks to develop and define some key cognitive skills designed to make dealing with complex planning problems easier. Keywords: Cognitive Skills, Mental Models, Complexity
Open Access
Community self-surveys: appropriating a technology of rule
(AESOP, 2010) Watson, Vanessa
The rapid growth of urban populations in cities of the global South, gives rise to major conflicts between those attempting to gain a foothold in urban areas and those attempting to govern these places. This can be conceptualising as a ‘conflict of rationalities’ between techno-managerial and marketized systems of government administration, service provision and planning, and increasingly marginalized urban populations surviving largely under conditions of informality. The ‘interface’ between these conflicting rationalities is frequently a site of struggle the outcomes of which can take various forms and can warp technologies of rule and strategies of ‘improvement’ in various ways. The community self-survey ‘movement’ provides one such example of struggle over a technology of rule which can potentially yield important learning outcomes. The paper explores examples of self-enumeration in shack-dwelling populations in Cape Town (South Africa) where this has been used to engage with the local state.
Open Access
Conceptual Apprenticeship – Heuristic Simplification in Training Planning Students in Negotiation and Argumentatio
(AESOP, 2010) Törnqvist, Anders
Educational experiments 2003-2009 at the Swedish School of Planning, Blekinge Institute of Technology, have tested software and other tools in training students to acquire professional skills in negotiation and argumentation. Results indicate that conceptual models, simplified, yet reflecting professional practice, facilitate learning. They do so by organising student efforts to acquire complex skills, providing immediate feedback and help to interpret teachers‟ hints and corrections. Simple models stimulate student elaboration. Complex models may need simplification and modification of target skills. In both cases improvement of learning outcomes can be observed. Software helps in externalising professional methods, visualising outcomes, and diagnosing student errors. Software also presents operating difficulties and may lead to cognitive overload for some students. Contrary to common opinion in the field, results indicate that one should assume no clear relation between features of different software and learning outcomes. Educational contexts are unavoidably different, which makes comparisons difficult. Modifying conceptual models and target skills, improving learning outcomes, should be seen rather as examples of heuristic simplification and conceptual clarification, supporting conceptual apprenticeship. This can be developed and reliably tested in a specific educational context.
Open Access
Contested Space in Former Colonies: What is the Role of Representations of European Colonial Heritage Outside of Europe?
(AESOP, 2010) Budge, Trevor
The implantation and representation of the European interpretation, use and presentation of space through hundreds of years of colonialization has left a built form legacy in all continents. What do we make of such places in the twenty first century? In one interpretation they represent conquest and imposition, in another they are relics of past glories. International tourism, especially that which is packaged, has generated a third interpretation. These places are physically remote from their European origins but in some apects representative of them. This paper examines four such places; Portuguese religious zeal in Old Goa India; the Dutch fort at Galle in Sri Lanka; the convict settlement at Port Arthur, Tasmania and the goldfields of central Victoria, the last two in Australia and both episodes in British colonialism. These places are survivors of past eras, but they are also communities where people live and work and they are sites of mass tourism. Interpretation of the history of these places is often a conflict between representations of the suffering that took place, the grandeur created by immense wealth and the desire of the tourism industry to present them as curiosities. The representation of place and space has become a commodity as the reasons for the original settlement and development no longer exist. The suggestion is that much of what is being presented as heritage has been conveniently „airbrushed‟.
Open Access
Decreasing land consumption by using PPP in land use management
(AESOP, 2010) Knappik, Magdalena; Renetzki, Peter
The public financed research project “Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) in land use management at the regional level” deals with the high land use in Germany. Between 2005 and 2008 the average daily land use for new settlement and transport-related areas in Germany was up to 115 hectares per day. This high land use has a multitude of economical, ecological and socio-ecological consequences, like loss of space for agriculture, loss of function of ground by sealing, social and geographical disparity or rising cost of settlement structure. By creating a better synchronisation of public and private stakeholders in land use management, the research project forces a revitalisation of brownfields and a reduction of the land consumption. The following paper will discuss the dimension of land use for new settlement and transport related areas in Germany, the different kinds of stakeholders with their often-diverged interests and the main modules of the land use management concept which were developed by the research project.
Open Access
Effects of local cultures on the territorial management of flood risk areas in the bangkok metropolitan region
(AESOP, 2010) Rongwiriyaphanich, Suwanna
This paper examines the applicability and limitations of the proposed analytical framework. The framework was developed to facilitate an analysis of territorial development processes taken culture as an important element shaping planning processes and spatial outcomes. Five main principles underpin the proposed analytical framework are the concept of social-ecological system (Folke et al. 2005), culture-changing dynamics (Gullestrup 2006), Institutional Analysis and Development framework (Ostrom 2005), five dimensions of cultures (Hofstede and Hofstede 2005) and cultural theory (Thompson et al. 1990). The analysis of territorial development of the Bangkok Metropolitan Region, with special emphasis on the impacts of local cultures on policy initiatives and spatial outcomes in relation to flood risk management in the region, is taken as an example for investigation. The analysis shows that despite its potential subjectivity resulted by heuristic interpretation, the proposed analytical framework tends to be a promising approach.
Open Access
Environmental Policy-Making in the Chinese Urban Growth Regime
(AESOP, 2010) Wang, Yan
This paper examines the politics of local environmental policy-making within the wider context of urban governance in contemporary China. Theoretically, the research approach links with the strategic-relational approach to policy-making, which emphasizes the importance of grounding empirical research on a detailed analysis of the various contexts for local action including an understanding of how different actors and organizations interpret their strategically-selective contexts. The analytical framework is based on the conception that the strategic selectivity of local environmental policy-making invariably reflects a set of structural opportunities for or constraints on policy-making, as well as the perception that key actors have of those opportunities or constraints and both of these. The paper thus focus on understanding how local urban authorities and politicians have responded to international, national or regional political pressures, as well as local pressures for or against local urban environmental policy-making. The paper also explores the incentives for and constraints on proactive environmental policy at the urban scale.
Open Access
Exploring potentials of sense-making theory for understanding social processes in a public hearing meeting
(AESOP, 2010) Lyhne, Ivar
This paper has point of departure in a planning process for energy infrastructure in Denmark and focuses on a particular public hearing meeting characterised by trenchant opposition and distrust to the authorities among the public. It points at the need to understand the interaction between authorities and the public, which in the case of energy infrastructure, often is characterised by conflict. A sense-making framework is developed based on Karl E. Weick's theory to investigate how participants at the meeting change their understanding of aspects like other actors' opinions and the infrastructure project. Through interviews and observations it is shown that participants' senses do not change except from a few aspects. The participants at the meeting thus seem stuck in their positions without any interest in being open for other interpretations or arguments. The investigation leads to considerations about the benefit and role of such a public meeting and the importance of trust and openness in the social processes in a public hearing.
Open Access
Harmonious coexistence of housing and manufacturing in industrial areas of Japan
(AESOP, 2010) Takahashi, Akira; Abe, Hirokazu
This paper examines current approaches to and challenges of town design and management in industrial areas with a large number of small and medium size factories in Japan. We focus on a detailed case study on town design and management in the Takaida district of Higashi-Osaka City. In this paper, the term "Harmonious Coexistence of Housing and Manufacturing" is defined as a conceptual aim of achieving sustainable development and building a “compact city” in an area with a mix of housing and workplaces. The preliminary findings of the study revealed that industrial area has decreased 29%, while residential area has increased 34% between 1983 and 2003.and the mixing of residences and factories has progressed A large number of stakeholders has made it difficult to build consensus for a master plan of the district and there is therefore a need of introducing a new mechanism for drawing up the master plan.
Open Access
How to Prevent Communicative Planners from Unwittingly Serving Neo-liberalism?
(AESOP, 2010) Sager, Tore
Communicative planning theory has recently been reproached for facilitating neo-liberal market practices to the disadvantage of broader social interests. The paper comments on this critique and clarifies what neo-liberalism demands from urban planning. Moreover, the paper surveys planning theorists‟ attempts to describe the connection between communicative planning theory and neo-liberalism. The critique of being at the service of neo-liberalism should be addressed in communicative planning theory by bringing procedural and substantive recommendations closer together. It must be made evident that what is required from the plan (the outcome) is grounded in substantive values that are closely associated with the values behind the process design. This is what the value approach sketched in the present paper is meant to do, and by insisting on consistency between the values of process and outcome it offers a way to address the charge that CPT facilitates the progress of neo-liberalist urban development.
Open Access
Identity Politics and Culture-Led Urban Regeneration in Hualien City, Taiwan
(AESOP, 2010) Chen, Yi-ling
Since the 1990s, cities in Taiwan have begun to seek urban development strategies to solve new urban problems. The strategies have produced many new urban places, including revitalization of heritage, reuse of spare space, mega urban projects. The production of these urban new places is related to political decentralization and economic transformation driven by globalization, neo-liberalism, post-Fordism, and post-industry. This research will explore urban change and the political and economic context of urban development strategies of Hualien City— a small tourist city in the east coast of Taiwan, focusing on the period of political democratization and economic liberalization after the 1990s. Localities have become an important arena to mitigate the impact of globalization. The economic base and spatial structure of most places have changed due to the rise of post-Fordism and deindustrialization. Global economic change also affects new discourses of urban development. Neo-liberalism changes previous urban polices that emphasize redistribution and even development to new principles of competitiveness, privatization, entrepreneurship, flexibility, and decentralization. Therefore, local governments play an increasingly important role. The research will explore the following issues: 1. Explore major trends of the world economy, the impacts of these trends on cities of Taiwan, the spatial relations of cities, and the ways Hualien City have responded to these changes. 2. Explore the political economic process of urban policies in Taiwan and urban development in Hualien City. 3. Examine the discourses in the production of new urban places in Hualien City, especially the arguments for and against neo-liberalism (Leitner, Peck and Sheppard, 2007).
Open Access
“Landscape is luxury”: Searching for Images of Sustainability
(AESOP, 2010) Cassatella, Claudia
Landscape can give an expressive form to ecological processes, give a vision for “green” policies and plans, and allow the public at large to understand what is at stake. Because most territorial changes are planned on the basis of various forms of representations and rendering, the power of images has grown more and more. What images of change are planners and designers putting forward? Are these images able to represent innovative scenarios of sustainability? The paper presents some case studies. The landscape is close to the way in which people perceive their own living environment, so it can be a powerful visioning tool for participatory democracy. It is proposed that the landscape debate should be reoriented, from the prevailing attention paid to the identity, as an heritage of the past, to a stronger focus on the “aspirations of the public” (European Landscape Convention) and to the creation of new landscape identities.
Open Access
Living or leaving? Regeneration policies in multi-ethnic contexts in north Italy
(AESOP, 2010) Briata, Paola
The paper examines the regeneration strategies carried out in the last 10-15 years in three multi-ethnic areas in Brescia, Genoa and Turin (North Italy). These cities have all been important industrial centres and, in recent years, the economic restructuring of the post-industrial age has led their leaderships and policy makers to invest in visitor economy. The paper aims at rendering problematic an assumption circulating among academics and planners stating that, in these contexts, regeneration and urban renewal policies have been addressed only at the immigrants’ expulsion from the cities’ more central areas. In fact different approaches could be found in the different cities according to the peculiarities of their development strategies, to the public debate on immigration proposed at local level, as well as to the more or less strategic role given to integration policies of the disadvantaged groups, independently from their national origin.
Open Access
Luxury is…. Space to write : Using tablet pc technology to enhance learning?
(AESOP, 2010) Peel, Deborah; Gunasekera, Sanwara
This project reports on the use of tablet PC technology in the classroom to enhance student learning. It is based on a literature review, action research and reflective practice through the use of peer review. Research suggests that a critical feature of understanding student interaction with in-class materials is whether lecturers/students construct the lecture experience as being based on transmission and receipt of messages or a complex activity that enhances learning through relatively more active and inter-active processes. The empirical study involved two lecturers working with different undergraduate cohorts in lecture contexts within the built environment (quantity surveying and planning). The paper locates the discussion in relation to the use of PowerPoint, presents the two case studies, describes the use of tablet pc technology to increase student engagement, comments on the benefits of peer review in providing constructive feedback, and reflects on the conference theme in terms of the luxury of having pedagogical research space.
Open Access
Macro-regions as concept for European spatial integration? – discussing co-operation strategies in the Baltic sea regions
(AESOP, 2010) Knieling, Joerg; Othengrafen, Frank
The Baltic Sea Region has a long tradition of integrated regional development. For decades economic, social, cultural and ecological concerns have been tackled in a way that serves well as basis for a sustainable future. Nevertheless, global economic competition has become a challenge for the area. Strengthening a region's global competitiveness requires stronger links as well as synchronised and coordinated action between neighbouring regions and countries (transnational arena). This links „globalisation‟ with the concept of „macro-regions‟ which recently has been introduced by the European Commission adopting the Baltic Sea Region as the first model. The macro-region approach is intended to allow both European Union and its Member States to identify common needs and to allocate available resources to strengthen economic and social development and to enable sustainable development. The paper discusses potentials and restrictions of the Baltic Sea Region as a European macro-region.
Open Access
Models, Environment and Manipulation: Power and Knowledge Filtering in the Decision-making process about the Third Limfjord Crossing
(AESOP, 2010) Astrup Andersen, Jeppe; Næss, Petter
Using the Environmental Impact Assessment of the proposed Third Limfjord Crossing in Aalborg, Denmark as an example, this paper discusses how transport models can be designed, consciously or unconsciously, to be imbued with a political program of discrimination, causing forecasting error in transport infrastructure planning. Assuming that traffic growth would be the same regardless of whether or not a new motorway was constructed, the planners in the Limfjord case concluded that intolerable congestion would arise in the absence of increased road capacity. The paper discusses how the zero-alternative was fabricated through unrealistic assumptions of the Limfjord case traffic model about relevant causal mechanisms, and gives an outline of the planning and decision-making process in which the model was used. The paper concludes that a process of knowledge filtering has taken place, where state-of-the-art knowledge about induced and generated travel ended up being dismissed in the political and legal decision-making system.
Open Access
New spaces for the new economy : New patters for the location of advanced services in post-Fordism
(AESOP, 2010) Rocco, Roberto
Previous phases of capitalism produced specific spatial patterns of location and agglomeration of economic activity in different urban contexts around the world. This is particularly true for sophisticated service firms, which used to rely on specific and scarce technical and spatial advantages found almost exclusively in city centres. During the 20th century, the general, albeit uneven expansion and spread of urban technical networks allowed sophisticated services to locate more flexibly. In late capitalism, as Fordism gives way to Post-Fordism, the character of spatial agglomeration of economic activity is bound to change. Knowledgeintensive service industries have a different logic for agglomeration than industrial activities used to have. They still seem to need to agglomerate and cluster, but for different reasons and in completely different ways. This paper reviews current theories on the agglomeration and location of advanced services and investigates the hypothesis that the shift towards a knowledge-based economy and the emphasis on the production, trade and diffusion of knowledge by advanced producer services is triggering specific spatial-structural transformations in cities under globalization. In order to explore this hypothesis, this paper analyses empirical evidence on the location patterns of command activities in the form of advanced producer service firms and transnational firms headquarters in São Paulo, a thriving global city in a rapid growing economy. It analyses the impact of location choices in urban structural transformation; it also explores convergences and divergences in spatial development produced by place-specific conditions. Moreover, it illustrates how governments have acted to provide the spatial conditions for the location and agglomeration of command activities by carrying out large urban projects in partnership with the private sector.