Progress in Planning最新文献

For some time now, many planners have embraced the idea of congestion pricing, an idea that has its origins in the field of transport economics. A positive attitude towards pricing, however, seems to be at odds with values commonly held by planners. To clarify this paradox, we need to thoroughly understand the history and sociology of the idea, and to acquire such understanding, this dialogue discusses the claim that the history of thinking about congestion pricing can best be understood by seeing it as a discursive politics of the market. The current view on congestion and road pricing originated in the 1950s, and there is clearly a link between the dissemination of the idea of congestion pricing and the rise of neoliberal thinking in general, although a different, rather Keynesian, tradition has continued to exist since the early days. The article also presents some criticisms of congestion pricing based on technical, equity as well as normative arguments. Finally, some attention is devoted to the format of the paper, given that it is written as a dialogue.

This interdisciplinary treatise integrates notions from the biological, geographical, sociological, politico-administrative, economic, psychological, futurist, and other scientific literature about the expansion of urban areas by taking the reader through a series of conjectures about the practical upper limits of the size of cities, and centering the discussion around the possibilities for a world-spanning megalopolis or city-planet. It specifically frames urban growth against a survey of known conceptual and logical limits established by previous research in the natural and social sciences, and demonstrates that while there are absolute and practical constraints to the establishment of what the author calls a Pangaean City, they might be overcome by new technologies, innovations in governance, and behavioral adjustments. The author also shows that there are prior, overlapping, or parallel sociopolitical and cultural constraints that govern city size, and that while these are not immutable, they represent sets of actual influences on development of the magnified urban form itself, including its reach beyond physical presence. Finally, while it is shown that a thorough-going planetary urbanization may be physically impossible, the research concludes by suggesting what planners can or should do about such a phenomenon. It further relates the discussion to the rich body of utopian planning literature, where the aspiration for an all-embracing urbanity remains to mirror the panoramic analyses of this paper.

In the UK, there has been a noticeable increase in public space management arrangements based on transfer and contracting-out of managerial responsibilities to organisations outside the public sector, whether in the shape of community or private trusts, tenants organisations, Business Improvement Districts, private companies or voluntary sector organisations. Recent cuts in local authority budgets have accelerated this process. Underpinning it there is an underlying assumption that publicness, however defined, can be guaranteed by means other than public ownership, funding and management, and that public sector ownership and direct control might not be in themselves essential features of spaces that are public. This paper reports on a case study research that investigates the impact on public spaces of the transfer of management away from the public sector. Based on nine case studies of public spaces in London under a variety of different management arrangements, the paper discusses how publicness is affected by the various contractual forms of transfer and what the main implications of this process are for different stakeholders and for the public realm as a whole. The paper suggests that contracted-out management of public space might not necessarily affect publicness negatively. However, it requires judiciously designed accountability mechanisms and clear decisions by all key stakeholders, including local authorities, about whose aspirations will be privileged and how other aspirations should be protected. In a climate of austerity and spending cuts, this requires a different kind of public management and of policy.

Delta cities are increasingly exposed to the risks of climate change, particularly to flooding. As a consequence, a variety of new spatial development visions, strategies, plans and programmes are being developed by city governments in delta regions to address these risks and challenges. Based on a general conceptual framework, this paper examines the nature of visions, strategies, plans and programmes in the delta cities of Hong Kong, Guangzhou and Rotterdam which are highly exposed to flooding and connected through a network of epistemic communities. The paper follows two main lines of inquiry. First, it examines the terms, concepts, and dominant institutional characteristics associated with the development of these visions, strategies, plans and programmes as a way of constructing a conceptual framework for understanding and explaining their connectivity. Second, it explores how and why cities’ spatial plans and governance dynamics are shaping climate adaptation responses. The systematic development of conceptual frameworks and in-depth analyses of varied, representative case studies is needed as their findings have important implications for vulnerability and adaptation to climate change in terms of policy options and cities as the optimal level for adaptation. The paper finds that dominant institutional characteristics critically affect the steering capacity of organisations/agencies (including their coordination capacity) to address climate-related risks. The findings have important implications for vulnerability and adaptation to climate change in cities, in general and delta cities, in particular.

Understanding the nature of power relations has been integral to debates in planning theory and planning practice since the 1960s. Current theoretical approaches to planning and power have evolved to a state of pluralism which impacts upon how planning is conceived of and practiced. We seek to examine power relations and knowledge via a multidisciplinary case study of an energy-from-waste (EfW) development based in South Wales. Centred on a highly contested technology, incineration, this case study incorporates in-depth, longitudinal interview data with social network analysis to build up a picture of competing framings of environmental health risk. In local environmental debates, planners are expected to be able to help resolve competition between conflicting interests and yet, in reality, such conflicts often appear intractable and have long been dubbed wicked problems. This is especially the case for waste management. In our in-depth case study, significant pre-existing power relations existed between the local planning authority (LPA), which was also the lead co-developer in the EfW project, and the local community. In terms of methods, we have been keen to unearth data that allows us to explore the nature of institutional and networked power as it plays out within a community over time. It is our contention that too often the dynamics of power have been underplayed because it is studied as a snapshot rather than over time. Here we have utilised a variety of methods – from key person interviews to social network analysis – to examine the application for development, the operation of the EfW and the closure of the plant – over a ten year time frame. By drawing upon a rich database we can better understand the ways in which, in the case of particularly contentious developments, power relations greatly hampered efforts at public participation. Our nuanced methodological approach reveals empirical evidence for tensions in theoretical approaches to power relations in the planning arena and we can identify how debates can move forward based on a more geographically informed perspective.