The Routledge Handbook of Regional Design 2020045629, 2020045630, 9780367258665, 9780367258672, 9780429290268

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The Routledge Handbook of Regional Design

The Routledge Handbook of Regional Design explores contemporary research, policy, and practice that highlight critical aspects of strategy-​making, planning, and designing for contemporary regions—​including city regions, bioregions, delta regions, and their hybrids. As accelerating urbanization and globalization combine with other forces such as the demand for increasing returns on investment capital, migration, and innovation, they yield cities that are expanding over ever-​larger territories. Moreover, these polycentric city regions themselves are agglomerating with one another to create new territorial mega-​regions.The processes that beget these novel regional forms produce numerous and significant effects, positive and negative, that call for new modes of design and management so that the urban places and the lives and well-​ being of their inhabitants and businesses thrive sustainably into the future. With international case studies from leading scholars and practitioners, this book is an important resource not just for students, researchers, and practitioners of urban planning, but also policy makers, developers, architects, engineers, and anyone interested in the broader issues of urbanism. Michael Neuman is Professor of Sustainable Urbanism at the University of Westminster and Principal of the Michael Neuman Consultancy. He is the multi-​award-​winning author of numerous books, articles, chapters, reports, and plans that have been translated into ten languages. His research and practice span urbanism, planning, design, engineering, sustainability, infrastructure, and governance. He has advised mayors in Europe, the United States, and Australia, the Regional Plan Association of New York, the Barcelona Metropolitan Plan, and other governments and private clients around the world. Wil Zonneveld is Full Professor of Urban and Regional Planning in the Department of Urbanism, Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment, TU Delft. The subject of his 1991 PhD thesis was the conceptualization of space and territory in Dutch regional and national planning. This subject has been addressed many times since then, extending analyses to include transnational and European levels of scale, with a strong emphasis on visualization and connections with governance capacity.

“This book brings together a diversity of chapters dealing with theoretical advances and practical innovations in the newly emerging field of regional design.These chapters cover an exceptionally broad international and thematic range of questions. As the editors and contributors argue, existing political administrations, from the local to the national, are ill-​equipped to deal with the mounting problems of institutional and spatial design in the exploding city-​regions, mega-​regions and bio-​regions of the contemporary world.The book offers many penetrating insights into these problems and offers much new thinking about critical issues of governance. It is destined to be widely read by academics, practitioners and students.” —​Allen J. Scott, Distinguished Research Professor, University of California, Los Angeles “At a time when societies all over the world face major challenges, planning and planners are urged to move beyond the local level. This timely and well-​balanced book combines reflections on the foundation of regional design with carefully selected case studies and considerations for education and governance by leading thinkers and practitioners from around the globe.” —​Louis Albrechts, Emeritus Professor of Planning, KULeuven

The Routledge Handbook of Regional Design

Edited by Michael Neuman and Wil Zonneveld

First published 2021 by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 and by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2021 Taylor & Francis The right of Michael Neuman and Wil Zonneveld to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-​in-​Publication Data Names: Neuman, Michael, 1955– editor. | Zonneveld, Wil, editor. Title: The Routledge handbook of regional design/ edited by Michael Neuman and Wil Zonneveld. Identifiers: LCCN 2020045629 (print) | LCCN 2020045630 (ebook) | ISBN 9780367258665 (hardback) | ISBN 9780367258672 (paperback) | ISBN 9780429290268 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Regional planning. | Sustainable urban development. | City planning–Environmental aspects. Classification: LCC HT391 .R658 2021 (print) | LCC HT391 (ebook) | DDC 307.1/16–dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020045629 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020045630 ISBN: 9780367258665 (hbk) ISBN: 9780367258672 (pbk) ISBN: 9780429290268 (ebk) Typeset in Bembo by Newgen Publishing UK

Contents

List of Contributors viii Foreword by Gary Hack xiv Acknowledgmentsxix PART I

Intellectual Underpinnings and Practices

1

Introduction: The Resurgence of Regional Design Michael Neuman and Wil Zonneveld

3

1 The Emergence of Regional Design: Recovering a Great Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning Tradition Michael Neuman

19

2 European History and Traditions: Revisiting the European Spatial Development Perspective Andreas Faludi

33

3 The Ecological Underpinnings of Regional Design Frederick Steiner

48

4 Contemporary Theory for Regional Design Verena Elisabeth Balz

66

PART II

City Region Case Studies

87

5 Urban Policies and Strategies for Balanced Regional Development in Korea Wang-​Geun  Lee

89

v

Contents

6 Japan’s Linear Megalopolis: Shinkansen High-​speed Rail as the Spine of a 60-​year Mega-​region Evolution Hitomi Nakanishi and Fumitaka Kurauchi 7 Germany’s ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ Stefanie Dühr 8 Can Megalopolis Continue to Thrive? A Profile of the US Northeast Megaregion and its Prospects Robert Yaro 9 The Texas Urban Triangle Megaregion Michael Neuman 10 Designing the New York metropolitan region Tom Wright 11 The Santiago de Chile Metropolitan System: Transformative Tensions and Contradictions Shaping Spatial Planning Roberto Moris and William Siembieda

107 125

140 156 177

194

12 Nairobi Garth Myers

214

13 Design and Governance for the Barcelona City Region Antonio Font

227

14 Regional Planning and Regional Design in Greater Paris Anna Geppert and Xavier Desjardins

247

15 Sydney: Evolution Towards a Tri-​city Metropolitan Region and Beyond Robert Freestone and Simon Pinnegar

263

16 Who Designed the Los Angeles Region? Nature, Profit, Policy, People Tridib Banerjee

284

PART III

Hydraulic, Ecological, and Bioregional Design Case Studies

301

17 The Dutch Deltametropolis Lianne van Duinen

303

18 The Regional Design of Green Infrastructure in the Pearl River Delta Lei Qu and Dongjin Qi

322

vi

Contents

19 Regional Design Stepping into the Sea Sue Kidd and David Shaw

338

20 Bioregional Design: The Design Science of the Future Pliny Fisk

356

PART IV

Education, Management, and Governance 21 Interdisciplinary Pedagogies for Regional Development Challenges: The Re-​coupling of Planning, Design, and the Social Sciences Lukas Gilliard, Remon Rooij, Nadia Alaily-​Mattar,Wil Zonneveld, and Alain Thierstein

375 377

22 Imagining the Region Alfonso Vegara and Juan Luis de las Rivas

394

23 Mapping for Regions Wil Zonneveld

413

24 The Complex Ecology of the City-​Region Willem Salet

428

25 The Futures of Regional Design Michael Neuman and Wil Zonneveld

445

Epilogue by Catherine L. Ross

453

Index457

vii

Contributors

Nadia Alaily-​Mattar is Research and Teaching Associate at the Chair of Urban Development

of the Department of Architecture, Technische Universität München (TUM). Nadia is a trained architect, who graduated at the American University of Beirut (AUB). She has received her Master’s degree in Housing and Urban Regeneration from the London School of Economics and Political Science and her PhD Degree in Planning Studies from the University College of London (UCL). She has worked at the United Nations Economic and Social Commission of Western Asia. Her research interests revolve around star architecture and its media effects, future-​oriented urban planning, urban planning methods, and the role of architecture in urban development. Verena Elisabeth Balz is a researcher with the Chair of Spatial Planning & Strategy, Department of Urbanism, Delft University of Technology, is recipient of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Feodor Lynen research fellowship. The main focus of her research is on the use and performance of regional design-led approaches in planning decision-making. As an initiator and organizer of the AESOP thematic group regional design and other network activities, she is engaged in the building of an international community of researchers with an expertise in this subject. Tridib Banerjee has focused his research, teaching, and writing on the design and planning of the

built environment and related human and social consequences. His publications include Beyond the Neighborhood Unit (with William C. Baer, Plenum, 1984), City Sense and City Design: Writings and Projects of Kevin Lynch (co-​editor Michael Southworth, MIT Press, 1995), Urban Design Downtown: Poetics and Politics of Form (with Anastasia Loukaitou-​Sideris, University of California Press, 1998), Companion to Urban Design and The New Companion to Urban Design (co-​editor Anastasia Loukaitou-​Sideris, Routledge, 2011 and 2019), Urban Design: Critical Concepts in Urban Studies (Edited, four volumes, Routledge, 2014), and In the Images of Development: City Design in the Global South (MIT Press, 2021). Juan Luis de las Rivas Sanz is an Architect and received his PhD from the University of Navarra. He is Full Professor of City Planning and Urban Design in the School of Architecture of the University of Valladolid (Spain), former Director of its Instituto de Urbanística (https:// iuu.uva.es), and chair of the IUU Lab. Visiting Professor in the Politecnico di Milano, the University of Texas at Austin, and other universities, he is an experienced practitioner and author of a large number of specialized writings, including Supercities, with Alfonso Vegara (Fundación Metrópoli, 2016).

viii

Contributors

Xavier Desjardins is Professor of Urban and Regional Planning at Sorbonne Université in

Paris. He is member of Mediations research team and responsible for the Master’s programme in urban planning at Sorbonne University Abu Dhabi. His research themes are mainly focused on mobility and urban planning concepts and methods. In 2020, he co-​published with Martin Vanier and Stépane Cordobès, Repenser l’aménagement du territoire (Rethinking Regional Planning), (Berger Levrault), and published as sole author La planification urbaine (Urban Planning) (Armand Colin). Stefanie Dühr is Research Professor of Urban and Regional Planning at the University of

South Australia, and Deputy Director of UniSA’s Research Centre of the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute (AHURI). Previously she has held academic appointments in the Netherlands, Germany, and the UK. Stefanie is the author of the monograph The Visual Language of Spatial Planning (Routledge, 2007) and co-​author of European Spatial Planning and Territorial Cooperation (Routledge, 2010). Andreas Faludi (1940, Budapest) is Professor Emeritus and guest researcher at Delft University

of Technology. He holds a PhD from Vienna University of Technology. He has also taught at the Oxford Polytechnic (now Oxford Brookes University), the University of Amsterdam, and Radboud University Nijmegen, and been a visiting scholar at universities around the world. His research and publications are on planning theory, and Dutch and European planning. Pliny Fisk III is Co-​Director at the Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems, a 45-​year-​ old 501C3 organization. He is Associate Professor Emeritus at Texas A & M University, having served as Signature Faculty in architecture, landscape architecture, and urban planning. Previously, Pliny was the Bruce Goff Chair for Creative Architecture at the University of Oklahoma, and Herrin Fellow at Mississippi State University. He has been Principal Investigator for Federal contracts from DOE, EPA, HUD, CSA; and advisor to the Gates and MacArthur Foundations. Antonio Font Arellano, Architect (1968), PhD Architect (1977), Architectural School of Barcelona

(ETSAB), is Emeritus Professor of Urbanism at the Polytechnic University of Catalunya (UPC), Barcelona. He is also Former Dean of the School of Architecture of El Vallés, Barcelona, and Director of Urban and Regional Planning Department of the University, and the Master on Urbanism of this university. His awards include the Spanish National Award on Urbanism (1983) and Italian INU Letteratura Urbanistica (2017). He has directed territorial and urban plans, and numerous urban projects. His research work was centered on territorial analysis and projects, especially about the urban region of Barcelona which have been published in several books and articles. Robert Freestone is Professor of Planning in the School of Built Environment at UNSW, Sydney,

Australia. His main research interests are in planning history, metropolitan planning, and urban heritage. He is a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences of Australia, the Planning Institute of Australia, and the Institute of Australian Geographers. His recent books include Designing Australia's Cities: Culture, Commerce and the City Beautiful, 1900–1930 (Taylor and Francis, 2020), Iconic Planned Communities and the Challenge of Change (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019), Planning Metropolitan Australia (Routledge, 2018), and Urban Nation: Australia’s Planning Heritage (CSIRO, 2010). Anna Geppert is Professor of Spatial Planning at the Sorbonne University (France). Her research focuses on planning systems, policies, and cultures. An expert on France, she is also investigating ix

Contributors

European spatial planning and planning education. Past Secretary General (2007–​2011) and President (2016–​2018) of AESOP, distinguished by the RTPI as Planner Woman of Influence (2017), editorialist for disP-​The Planning Review (2019), board member of European Spatial Research and Policy. Her research is published in French, English, Polish, and other languages. Lukas Gilliard has been an Assistant to the CEO at HafenCity Hamburg GmbH since 2018.

Before, he held research, teaching, and administrative positions at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and the HafenCity University Hamburg (HCU). Lukas holds degrees in urban planning as well as urban design, and completed his doctoral dissertation on interdisciplinary higher education in the field of urban development at TUM in 2020. His research and professional interest revolve around interdisciplinarity and its conceptualization in urban governance and higher education, as well as the role of design for interdisciplinary urban development practices. Gary Hack is Dean Emeritus of the School of Design, University of Pennsylvania, and Professor Emeritus of Urban Design at MIT. He has planned urban developments in the US, Canada, and Asia, and led the team that prepared a metropolitan plan for Bangkok, Thailand. He is the author of Site Planning:  International Practice (MIT Press, 2019)  and co-​author of Global City Regions: Their Emerging Forms (Spon, 2000) as well as many other books and articles on urban form. Sue Kidd has recently retired from her position as a Senior Lecturer at the University of Liverpool. She is an academic and chartered town planner with a longstanding interest in integrated approaches to planning. Much of her work has focussed on coastal and marine areas and she has played a leading role in the development of spatial planning theory and practice related to Marine Spatial Planning. Sue has acted as advisor to non-​governmental organizations (NGOs), local and regional authorities, government departments, and the European Union. Fumitaka Kurauchi is Professor in Transport System Design at the Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Gifu University, Japan. He is also a Vice Director of the Center for Infrastructure Asset Management Technology and Research at the Faculty of Engineering, also Gifu University. His research interests include traffic control and operation, traffic and transit modeling, traffic control under emergent situations and transport network reliability analysis. Wang-​Geun Lee is Senior Research Fellow and Urban Research Division Director at the Korea

Research Institute for Human Settlements, Sejong Korea, where he has worked since 1992. He is the author of numerous reports and articles on urban regeneration, planning, and policy, and is an advisor to the national government on regional strategy. Roberto Moris is Professor at the Instituto de Estudios Urbanos y Territoriales, where he is Deputy Director, and the Escuela de Arquitectura (School of Architecture), both at Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. His expertise lies in urban planning and management, urban design, and housing projects. He is also a Researcher at the National Research Center for Integrated Natural Disaster Management. Garth Myers is Director of the Center for Urban & Global Studies and the Paul E. Raether Distinguished Professor of Urban International Studies at Trinity College in Hartford, x

Contributors

Connecticut. He focuses on African urban geography and planning, comparative urbanism, and urban political ecology. He has published seven books and more than 75 book chapters and articles on these themes. Hitomi Nakanishi is Associate Professor in Urban and Regional Planning at the University

of Canberra, Australia. She also holds a visiting appointment at Kagawa University, Japan. Her research involves using multidisciplinary approaches to assessing impacts on quality of life issues from the perspectives of urban/​regional land use, urban form, and infrastructure planning. She is also engaged in research in community disaster risk management. Michael Neuman is Professor of Sustainable Urbanism at the University of Westminster and Principal of the Michael Neuman Consultancy. He is the multi-​award winning author of numerous books, articles, chapters, reports, and plans that have been translated into ten languages. His research and practice span urbanism, planning, design, engineering, sustainability, infrastructure, and governance. He has advised mayors in Europe, the United States, and Australia, the Regional Plan Association of New  York, the Barcelona Metropolitan Plan, and other governments and private clients around the world. Simon Pinnegar is Professor of City Planning and Associate Director of the City Futures Research Centre in the School of Built Environment at UNSW, Sydney, Australia. His interests include strategic spatial planning, city-​region dynamics, and urban renewal and regeneration. In 2020 he became Director of the UNSW Planning Program, having served in that post from 2013 to 2017 and led the development and launch of the new Bachelor and Master of City Planning degrees. Simon is a Visiting Associate Professor at the Greater Sydney Commission since 2017. Prior to UNSW, Simon was Senior Researcher and Analyst at the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in the UK. Dongjin Qi is Associate Professor at the South China University of Technology. Her studies

focus on the international comparison of urban planning systems, planning management, and planning law. She participated in the preparation of Guangdong Province Urban and Rural Planning Regulation (2012), a joint author with Prof. Jianyun Zhou of China’s Urban Planning Law and Regulation System (in Chinese, China Architecture & Building Press, 2006). She is also co-​translator of Town and Country Planning in the UK (14th, Chinese version, Southeast University Press, 2011). Lei Qu is Assistant Professor at Delft University of Technology. She studied in Tsinghua University

in China from 1994 to 1999 (Bachelor of Architecture), and later obtained a Master’s degree and PhD in Urban Planning and Design in the same university (2004). Her work involves teaching in regional design studios and the graduation lab for Master students, supervision of PhD candidates, and research on comparative studies between European and Chinese urban/​ regional development. Remon Rooij is Associate Professor Spatial Planning & Strategy at the Delft University of Technology. He has taught regional design and planning courses and studios since 1998. Remon Rooij is one of Delft’s educational leaders: over the last two decades he has coordinated and developed several curriculums as programme leader, among which MSc Urbanism, BSc Bouwkunde (Architecture and the Built Environment), and MSc MADE (Metropolitan Analysis, Design and Engineering). For the faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment he leads xi

Contributors

the research-​on-​education-​innovation programme. Since 2020, he is the Delft co-leader for the 4TU Centre for Engineering Education. Catherine L.  Ross is a Regents’ Professor and Harry West Professor of City and Regional Planning and Civil and Environmental Engineering and director of the Center for Quality Growth and Regional Development (CQGRD) at Georgia Tech. Dr. Ross is one of the world’s experts on Mega-​regions and sustainability—​bringing together regions and cities on transportation, water, energy, land development, and health creating places that compete in a global world. Her book, Megaregions and Global Competitiveness (Island Press, 2009), is a leading reference on these emerging geographies. Willem Salet is Professor Emeritus of Urban and Regional Planning at the Faculty of Social and

Behavioral Sciences, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands. He chaired the group Urban Planning from 1997 until 2017. He was the Scientific Director of Amsterdam study center for the Metropolitan Environment (AME) 2008–​2013. He was the President of the Association of European Schools of Planning (AESOP) 2008–​2010 and was awarded Honorary Membership of AESOP in 2016. David Shaw is Professor of Planning at the University of Liverpool with a longstanding interest in integrated spatial planning. Prior to moving to Liverpool in 1994, David previously taught at the College of St. Mark and St John (Plymouth), the University of Malawi (Zomba), and the University of Central England (Birmingham). David’s research activities have had a strong focus on spatial planning and he has been a member of several teams exploring spatial planning practices across Europe from both a terrestrial and marine perspective. William Siembieda, AICP is Professor of City and Regional Planning at the California Polytechnic State University, and former department chair there. He is an internationally recognized land use planner, educator, and disaster preparedness planner and manager, with particular expertise in Central and South America. His research covers land use policy, large-​scale land planning and design, strategic planning, feasibility, disaster mitigation planning, and housing finance for low-​income communities. Frederick Steiner is Dean and Paley Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Stuart Weitzman

School of Design, and Co-​executive Director of The Ian L. McHarg Center for Urbanism and Ecology. He served for 15 years as Dean of the School of Architecture at The University of Texas at Austin, and taught at Arizona State University,Washington State University, and the University of Colorado. He has written, edited, or co-​edited 20 books, including Design with Nature Now (Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, 2019). Alain Thierstein is Full Professor for Urban Development at the Department of Architecture, Technische Universität München. He is also affiliated with the consultancy of EBP Schweiz AG, Zurich, as Partner and Senior Consultant in the area of urban and regional economic development. He received his Master’s degree as well as his PhD in Economics from the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland. He is involved in research on urban and metropolitan development; spatial impact of the knowledge economy, in particular the visualization of non-​physical company relationships as well as spatial interaction of locational choices for residence, work, and mobility; and the role of star architecture for repositioning medium-​sized cities. His work is extensively published internationally. xii

Contributors

Lianne van Duinen, PhD, is Project Leader at the Council for the Environment and Infrastructure

(Raad voor de leefomgeving en infrastructuur, Rli), an independent advisory council to the Dutch government and parliament. She has a PhD in urban planning from the University of Amsterdam. Her recent projects at the Rli include advisory reports on housing production, healthy cities, circular economy, and aviation policy. In 2016 she was seconded to the PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency. Alfonso Vegara has a PhD in City and Regional Planning, and degrees in Architecture,

Economics, and Sociology. He is Founder of Fundación Metrópoli and Former President of ISOCARP. He is a Member of the Jury of the Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize, current President of the Jury of European Awards of Planning, and has been an advisor for more than 15 years to the Government of Singapore, as well as of various cities around the world such as Yokohama, México City, Bilbao, Buenos Aires, Kuala Lumpur, Santiago de Chile, Casablanca, Moscow, and Medellín. His ideas and projects have been disseminated through more than 30 books and international conferences. Tom Wright is President and CEO of Regional Plan Association (RPA), the nation’s oldest inde-

pendent metropolitan research, planning, and advocacy organization. RPA’s Fourth Regional Plan was released under Tom’s direction which proposes to reform public sector institutions, modernize transportation systems, address the challenge of climate change, and provide affordable and livable communities. Tom has a Master’s in Urban Planning from Columbia University and a Bachelor’s in History and a Certificate in American Studies from Princeton University. Bob Yaro is Professor of Practice in City & Regional Planning at the University of Pennsylvania,

where he has taught since 2002. Before coming to Penn he was also on the faculties at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He retired as President of Regional Plan Association in 2014 after 25 years leading RPA’s professional staff. He holds a BA in Urban Studies from Wesleyan University and a Master’s in City & Regional Planning from Harvard. Wil Zonneveld is Full Professor of Urban and Regional Planning in the Department of Urbanism, Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment,TU Delft.The subject of his 1991 PhD thesis was the conceptualization of space and territory in Dutch regional and national planning.This subject has been addressed many times since then, extending analyses to include transnational and European levels of scale, with a strong emphasis on visualization and connections with governance capacity. Together with Vincent Nadin he edited The Randstad: A Polycentric Metropolis (Routledge, 2021).

xiii

Foreword Gary Hack

The Plan of Chicago,1 prepared under the direction of Daniel R.  Burnham and Edward H. Bennett and published in 1909, is best remembered for its visionary proposals for the Lake Michigan waterfront, grand boulevards and parkways, a transit loop around the central business district, and a monumental but unrealized civic center. But the frontispiece to the plan offers an even wider vision. A remarkable bird’s eye view illustrates a regional city with circumferential arteries connecting the fast-​g rowing suburban areas, natural corridors taking advantage of streams and waterways to provide green areas around every district, and railways and transit reorganized to serve the burgeoning metropolis. It was designed in the mind’s eye at a time when flying machines had just been invented but still hovered close to the ground. Burnham and Bennett imagined a new form of a designed settlement rooted in ecology, transportation technologies, and social preferences, that was not simply the accidental result of economic forces. Designing a city region has been an aspiration of planners since the industrialization of urban areas in the 19th century caused cities to sprawl beyond their municipal boundaries. Design at the regional scale, however, means much more than making a plan for a future settlement pattern. Governance patterns will need to be reconsidered, boundaries and taxation systems need to be altered, and new mechanisms are required to guide construction and development. As we have learned more about the impacts of urbanization, sustainability has ascended to paramount importance, forcing greater attention to the natural setting of cities, and the larger impacts of urban areas on the planet. Every city region needs to arrive at its regional design by capitalizing on its unique environment, governmental context, and immediate opportunities. The plans and strategies will differ for every city and region. But planners and decision makers can learn a great deal by studying what has been tried elsewhere, from both successes and failures. This volume chronicles how city regions, eco-​regions, and intensive agricultural or resource extraction zones across the globe have tackled regional development issues and arrived at designs for their settlement pattern. It emphasizes regional form: the geographic pattern of urban development, natural areas reserved for recreation and ecological protection, major infrastructure systems, and agricultural protection zones. But these must be understood in their context, including the stage of development of the city region, the prevailing land regime, the distribution of powers and resources among governmental units, and the traditions of raising resources for and managing the construction of infrastructure, among other practicalities. While all these factors vary considerably, city regions across the globe also have many things in common.There are recurring themes in the plans, and the motivations for planning have much in common. xiv

Foreword

Figure P.1  Bird’s-​eye vision for Chicago Source: Burnham and Bennett.

Why Design Regions? The Chicago Merchants Club, a group of progressive business leaders, initiated the Plan of Chicago, following on the city’s success in transforming its image through hosting the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893.2 Boosting a city’s competitive advantages is the most common reason regional designs are undertaken, and ecological protection is the most common reason for non-​urban regions. The realization that cities must be competitive internationally for jobs, people, and tourism has encouraged many cities to project visions for their future. Aligned with this is the understanding that a city is only as strong as its larger urban region. This requires collaboration among cities and towns that once thought of themselves as independent places. Jean Gottman’s important study of urbanization in the Northeast US, Megalopolis,3 extending from Boston to Washington, DC, emphasized how major cities can be specialized, but also interdependent in economic and cultural terms. Having an accepted vision and design for a region also serves several pragmatic purposes. It can guide major infrastructure priorities and decisions—​determining the location and scope of new transit and transport lines, water and wastewater systems, power generation, and public xv

Foreword

facilities—​and ensure that densities of development are adequate to justify such investments. As green infrastructure comes more and more into play, like the Catskill region for forest protection and water management to serve the NYC region (as Tom Wright writes in Chapter 10), then these large-​scale infrastructure systems will be located outside of urban areas area but function as an essential component of the region. This is already occurring with windfarms and solar array farms, for example, in addition to large-​scale water supply and flood management. In many regions, a public investment program is the natural follow-​up of regional planning. Planning can also help assemble the ecological data base for wise decisions on water management, resource protection and disaster preparedness and recovery; and can help in informing decisions on mitigating the effects of climate change.While we often act as if ecology as immutable, contemporary ecologists emphasize that regions are the hybrid result of natural and human factors, each influencing the other. All of these issues can only be addressed if the ecological footprint of the region is the unit of analysis and design.4 Creating a design for a region is ultimately a political activity, an opportunity to marshal support for action by engaging civic leaders and ordinary citizens. Sometimes this is the result of a natural disaster, such as extreme flooding or a severe earthquake, while in other cases the public may be mobilized by the loss of major employers or a general sense that the region is falling behind other areas of its size. Constructing a durable coalition of interests rooted in a vision of the future is an essential prerequisite for action.

Altering the Context to Make Regional Design Possible Regional plans often force political leaders and citizens to face the fact that governance patterns are out of sync with the way a region functions. Historic community boundary lines often remain fixed even as urbanization patterns merge, resulting in a balkanization of services and responsibilities. The Regional Plan Association, a voluntary civic organization supported largely by businesses, has produced four regional plans for the New York region over the past century, dealing with an urban pattern that spreads across three states, encompassing over a thousand local governments and many interstate entities. RPA has a vital role in suggesting policies and planning strategies and advocating their implementation by the local and state government authorities. In the United States, the Federal Government has mandated the creation of metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs), regional government councils that review major infrastructure projects funded nationally, but these entities rarely rise to the level of being able to make proactive plans. The most effective regional planning efforts are enabled by the reorganization of local responsibilities by higher levels of government.5 In some countries, national governments take direct responsibility for development of their largest urban areas, and in others including China, municipalities with responsibilities equivalent to state governments have been created. In the Beijing-​Tianjin-​Hebei region, the national government has mandated coordinated planning for urbanization now encompassing over 60 million residents. In Spain, the responsibility of provincial councils has been enhanced to serve a greater role in carrying out regional development plans. Several Canadian provinces have reshaped governmental boundaries to allow for greater coordination of regional activities. The Toronto metropolitan area is one example, where the regional government structure has been reorganized three times since it was established in 1954, as the city’s population has grown and its urbanized area expanded. The Province of Ontario has, in addition, taken direct action to create the world’s largest greenbelt to limit the spread of Toronto’s settlement, and to protect agriculture and unique environments. In the United States, some states have merged municipalities to create metropolitan governments, and have undertaken other measures to control growth, share taxes across regions, and set aside lands for xvi

Foreword

conservation. In Brazil, much of the success of the Sao Paulo regional strategy stems from state-​ and federal-​level initiatives in creating ecological reserves and parks that encircle the build-​up urban area. Absent such initiatives, it may still make sense to prepare voluntary plans and strategies for regional development as a step along the road to cooperation. Envision Utah was such an effort in the Salt Lake City region, with widespread public engagement leading to a set of policies reframing how growth should occur. The political consensus gained through the planning process accelerated the construction of light rail systems in the city, broke down many barriers to higher densities, and became the touchstone of debates over the city’s character. As Robert Yaro notes (Chapter 8), the first step in regional planning is identifying the extent of urban regions that are interdependent enough to warrant collective planning and design. European efforts to spotlight regional metropolitan clusters, such as “The Blue Banana” in Northwestern Europe, were early steps in identifying the areas where synergies were gained. These efforts became the European Spatial Development Perspective.

Recurring Themes While there are many differences in the geographies and governmental arrangements of large metropolitan areas and multi-​city regions, several preoccupations often characterize the spatial development strategies embodied in plans. One is the issue of density and sprawl, which can cut two ways. For much of the early 20th century, and in many Asian cities today, the question has been how to decant densities and the attendant congestion, in order to make room for open space, amenities, and improved infrastructure. But in many American cities, the issue is just the opposite—​finding ways to increase densities to reduce travel and provide the support for mass transit and walkable environments. New towns programs in many European cities, and more recently in Shanghai and other Chinese cities, have become the preferred solution to creating settlements that are dense enough to support collective infrastructure, but well planned to ensure that there are services and amenities within easy reach. The second issue is determining what areas should be conserved for ecological, agricultural, recreational, and scenic purposes. Greenbelts have been created in dozens of metropolitan regions for all these reasons, although their underlying objective is often to serve as a limit on sprawl and peri-​urban development. In virtually every UK city that has a green belt, there are very contentious debates and conflicts about developing them, and their very future. Similar debates have persisted in the Vancouver metropolitan area in Canada, where an agricultural land reserve was established in 1973 surrounding the urbanized area and has had a profound impact in shaping the pattern of development. In many cities, important lands are frequently reserved along waterfronts and waterways, and serve as a buffer, holding area, or sponge for runoff from extreme storms, or hurricanes. The idea of maintaining green areas surrounding settlements has been a powerful motivator for regional plans, as it was in the Plan of Chicago. Taking advantage of modern transportation technologies is a third recurring theme of regional plans. In the mid-​20th century in US and Europe, plans for new expressways for motorized vehicles became the staple of plans, particularly ring roads to divert vehicles around metropolitan centers for congestion relief.The strategy continues today in rapidly growing cities, with Beijing currently completing its seventh Ring Road. Other cities such as Madrid have abandoned the idea of circumferential roadways in favor of a more ubiquitous grid of high-​capacity arterials. Today mass transit corridors, for rail and roadway vehicles, are planned to serve high-​density development clusters. The introduction of high-​speed rail between cities has led to the need for new stations, often accompanied by new business districts, sometimes on the periphery of the xvii

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city, and in the center of other cities. High-​speed rail has reshaped regional economies, including housing markets, bringing into a city’s orbit smaller cities that were historically more peripheral. A new emphasis on innovation districts has added a fourth common theme to regional development strategies. Many of these are encouraged in declining industrial districts or cities where they have begun to form organically, but in other cities planned high-​tech areas have been fostered in newly developing areas, anchored by educational institutions. Balancing the desired living environments of creative, highly educated workers with the availability of sites is the key formula of success. New districts have also resulted from the new retail and logistics economy, serving large-​scale warehousing and automated goods transfer needs. Sometimes these are located near airports, and in other cases at locations well served by roadways, as in central New Jersey, from which trucks can easily deliver goods to both New York and Philadelphia.

Drawing on Others’ Experiences The chapters of this volume explore in greater depth the many planning ideas and techniques that have been used to design the new regional city, along with the ideas about city form that may be an important springboard for action. Case studies reveal how the circumstances in more than 15 important regions have led to their strategies for urban development and habitat protection. Read these narratives with a critical eye. They are not a template that can be magically transported from place to place. Ask: What was the planning and decision-​making tradition in the city region? Was it a top-​down, or bottom-​up place, or perhaps a hybrid of the two? How did the process help enable consensus to be shaped? How were inevitable conflicts handled? What data seemed to be critical in shaping and justifying the proposals? How were resources mobilized to prepare the plan and carry out its key recommendations? Which of these ideas are likely to have a resonance in the community you are considering? What role did the images presented by planners and designers play in persuading people about the desirable future? The rapid rate of change in cities forces cities to adjust their plans and strategies more frequently than in the past. Few plans will continue to inspire actions as the Plan of Chicago continues to do over a century after its publication. To remain relevant, they must anticipate a future beyond the obvious issues of the times, while providing for tangible actions today. Gary Hack, 2020

Notes 1. Daniel H. Burnham and Edward H. Bennett (1909). Plan of Chicago. Prepared under the direction of The Commercial Club, Chicago. 2. The Merchants Club was a predecessor of and merged with the Commercial Club of Chicago in 1907 and took on the Commercial Club name. It was the Merchants Club that commissioned Burnham’s Plan, even as it was the Commercial Club that published it in 1909. 3. Jean Gottmann (1961). Megalopolis:  The Urbanized Northeast Seaboard of the United States. Twentieth Century Fund. 4. William E. Rees (2006). “Ecological Footprints and Bio-​Capacity: Essential elements in sustainability assessment,” in Jo Dewulf and Herman Van Langenhove (eds.), Renewables-​Based Sustainability Assessment, pp. 143–​158. Chichester, UK: John Wiley and Sons. 5. Tanja A.  Borzel and Thomis Risse, eds. (2016). The Oxford Handbook of Comparative Regionalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

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Acknowledgments

This long journey began in the mid-​1980s with a trip to Carr Lynch Hack and Sandell, to meet with Gary Hack in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Having read Kevin Lynch’s seminal Managing the Sense of a Region, I wanted to see their professional work at the regional scale first hand. I was not disappointed, and went back armed and inspired to continue our work with the New Jersey Office of State Planning’s drafting of the State Plan, Communities of Place. Its cornerstone was what we called the Regional Design System, a regional context for settled places ranging from hamlet to city, connected by infrastructure linkages and surrounded by environs of different characters, from agricultural through forests to low mountains. Abetted by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, our regional design work was transported at that time to New York’s Regional Plan Association, which was preparing its third regional plan. Personal mentors along the way exerted key influences, to whom I  am eternally grateful and greatly indebted. At the regional scale, they include Ian McHarg, Chris Alexander, Hajo Neis, Peter Hall, Manuel Castells, Martin Meyerson, John Epling, Gary Hack, Mike Teitz, and Judy Innes. Colleagues with whom I’ve had the good fortune of collaborating on projects—​ both research and professional—​have also been instrumental in shaping my evolving ideas. They include a number of contributors in this volume, such as Andreas Faludi, Bob Yaro, Tridib Banerjee, Fritz Steiner, Pliny Fisk, Antonio Font, and Alfonso Vegara. Others are Carl Steinitz, Eduardo Mangada, Félix Arias, Albert Serratosa, and Camilla Perrone. The list could go on, as there are a growing number of scholars and practitioners in this rising field. There are others I could name, as well as emblematic regions that have inspired me to think about their character and design, most significantly ones where I have lived and worked: Sydney, Barcelona, Madrid, London, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, San Diego, Philadelphia, the Florida Keys, and central Texas. In my view, place knowledge is the baseline for any practice of design at any scale. “Research by walking,” “being there,” and “local knowledge” have no substitute. Of course, our editor at Routledge, Kate Schell, has been especially supportive. Without her and the entire production team, including Sean Speers, this book would not exist. A  special mention goes to my co-​editor Wil Zonneveld, whose keen insights and knowledge, good humor and friendship, and so much else, has made this book journey—​which evolved from a panel on regional design in AESOP 2015 that we co-​chaired—​memorable and meaningful in many ways. Many thanks, my friend. Michael Neuman, June 2020 When I entered academia as a researcher in the mid-​1980s I did not use “regional design” to describe my interests. It was “conceptualisation of space and territory in regional and national level planning.” Design was something done at Delft University of Technology, not at the xix

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University of Amsterdam, where I did my PhD. With hindsight my research topic was of course regional design as understood in this book. The persons who guided me in taking the first steps in this domain were Hans van der Cammen and Andreas Faludi, my promoter. I still look upon them as key persons in my academic life. With Andreas I started to study spatial planning at the European level, again with an interest in spatial concepts, which in European politics is quite a contentious issue. Conceptualization of space, this time clearly in a context of “design” became reality when I got the opportunity to work in a design group preparing the so called Second Benelux Structural Outline in the mid-​1990s.This group was led by Jef Van den Broeck. Working across spatial scales and connecting politics with design was what happened when we worked on the Benelux Outline and it was Jef Van den Broeck who guided us, an experience one never forgets. For about 20 years now, I am in Delft University of Technology, the last seven years in the Urbanism Department of the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment. Regional design as institutional as well as spatial design is one of the key areas of teaching as well as research. Not all colleagues describe it like this, but I think it is highly appropriate. I cannot remember exactly when and where I  met Michael Neuman. It was probably at one of the AESOP conferences. During our talks we discovered that we have a shared interest in regional design. Out of several of these talks and a joint paper in European Planning Studies eventually came the idea for this book, which had the bold ambition to cover key examples of regional design across all continents, next to a number of theoretical and other ambitions. I leave it up to the reader to decide whether we succeeded. We certainly think there is much more to tell than can be laid down in one single book. I owe Michael a lot. I am particularly impressed by the width of his knowledge and depth of experience in regional design. Next to that it was a great pleasure to work with him! Wil Zonneveld, June 2020 The authors are indebted to the editors and publishers of the following journals and book for permission to reproduce portions of articles previously published. Michael Neuman and Wil Zonneveld, “The Resurgence of Regional Design,” published in European Planning Studies in 2018. Michael Neuman, “Regional Design,” published in Landscape and Urban Planning in 2000. Lianne van Duinen, a revised and updated version of “New Spatial Concepts between Innovation and Lock-​in: The Case of the Deltametropolis,” published in Planning Practice and Research in 2015. Willem Salet, shortened and adapted version of chapter 6 in his book Public Norms and Aspirations (Routledge) in 2018.

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Part I

Intellectual Underpinnings and Practices

Introduction The Resurgence of Regional Design Michael Neuman and Wil Zonneveld

Why Now We all know that the world is changing, profoundly, in front of our eyes. Alvin Toffler’s 1970 landmark Future Shock has become the norm in a world without norms. Institutions crumble, ecosystems collapse, countries burn, pandemics rage, climate and weather patterns are unrecognizable, inequalities surge, and business as usual has led to politics that are unusual.The scale, pace, and scope of change of all types is so dramatic that a statement made a mere 30 years ago by one of the most astute observers of city regions and their “design” seems improbable today as we realize that the very technologies (largely infrastructures) that he referred to have abetted economic and social structures and actions that have been shown to be unsustainable in the deepest sense. Not that a steep rise of population density did not cause difficulties and problems in the past. But these have always been solved, and the succession of these solutions is nothing else than the progress of civilization as usually described in history. (Gottmann and Harper 1990, 221) In large part the statement is implausible today because of the very scale, pace, and scope of urban change that these technologies abetted. For Gottmann, the solutions were “technology and progress,” an intertwined synergy. While sustainable infrastructures offer part of the way out of unsustainable practices, and are an important part of the story of regional design, they are not the only answer. For that we must recognize the new reality of city regions and other types of regions, particularly complex hybrids of regions, and how they affect life, and thus our politics, economics, and more precisely for the readers of this book, planning and design. What this means is that communities and cities, while essential places for the human experience, are not sufficient objects of intervention (policy, planning, design, investment) for us to go forward sustainably. When individual cities reach 30–​40 million and urban agglomerations approach 100 million, and globalization continues almost unchecked, regions, and not just city regions, become increasingly vital domains of action. Regional design, long a backbone for spatial planning, even if under other names, has become topical again for two reasons—​as a key tool for spatial strategy making and as a key 3

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tool in spatial management. This is due to several reasons. New conditions of urbanization that result from the convergence of several factors highlight the need for spatial strategy formation and application at supra-​metropolitan scales. These new conditions include globalization and climate change along with all their impacts, as well as the urban population boom enabled by increased mobility and interconnectivity, along with new infrastructure technologies. These forces driving urbanization today and into the future play out at a new urban scale, which is increasingly encompassed in the city-​region. The solutions to the impacts and problems that these forces cause must be dealt with by urbanism at a scale that matches. Strategic solutions to this scale of urbanism can be denoted as regional design. The case studies analyzed in Part II of this book are of city regions. Regional design is not limited to urban regions, and can be applied to rural, ecological, and hybrid regions. By rural is meant non-​urban areas where agriculture and other natural resource-​ based economic activities such as forestry and tourism occur in a palimpsest of small settlements such as hamlets, villages, and towns. Ecological in this context means that more “natural” and fewer economic activities predominate in the landscape.“An ecoregion is a large unit of land and water typically characterized and delimited by climate, geology, topography, and associations of plants and animals” (Forman 2008, 14). In these regions, environmental protection and conservation are the focus of policy, planning, and design; or should be. Hybrid regions are those that exhibit a mix of characteristics from any of the region types mentioned. All can benefit from practices of regional design as described in Part III of this book, where water management can either be the basis of regional design, or an integrated part of it. That is, regional design is not only terrestrial. Returning to city regions, older factors still provide impetus for regional design. These include those stemming from the problematic impacts of city-​region growth and development that have remained unsolved for generations despite best efforts, such as housing affordability, socio-​spatial inequity, traffic congestion, and air and water pollution, among others. They have city-​region sources and need holistic city-​region wide solutions.These persistent factors also can be, and have been, effectively dealt with by regional design. This is because traditional urban planning, conceived at the neighborhood, district, city, or even metropolitan scale, are inadequate to deal with many pressing urban problems and opportunities today, and into the future. Often the causes of these problems arise at regional and even larger scales (Burger et al. 2017). Moreover, traditional statutory planning in general regulates the use of space, hardly offering a strategic orientation, as it is strictly local in nearly all countries (Ryser and Franchini 2015). Further, in its emphasis on place and zoning, traditional urban planning omits flows and processes (Neuman 2005). Thus, by being strategic, by focusing on the scale that provides critical context for urban planning at local and metropolitan scales, by addressing supra-​urban issues, and by addressing the flows that infrastructures convey, regional design has been re-​emerging in the forefront of spatial planning. Its focus is a bit sharper than spatial planning, as discussed herein. As we will argue, regional design can also be seen as a partial response to the procedural and communicative turn in planning which took place in many countries in the 1980s and 1990s. This “turn” moved planning away from space and territory into the direction of process, collaboration, and negotiation. Regional design takes into account spatial parameters to undertake both analysis (understanding the problematic) and synthesis (formulating spatial solutions) at the regional scale through the use of a wide range of spatial imageries. Its rationale, as evidenced and synthesized from the practice and literature reviewed here, stems from:

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1. The increase in scale and connectivity among neighboring metropolises to form large city regions; 2. The influence of transport, water, energy, telecommunications, and knowledge infrastructures as drivers of regional agglomerations; 3. The multi-​scalar realities of glocal processes and spatial formation; 4. The twin and inter-​ related imperatives of competitiveness and sustainability necessitate larger-​scale, holistic thinking; 5. The multiple levels of governance in concert with other sectors of society that are needed to address intertwined regional and local issues in new ways that traditional government and its planning have not been able to perform. These factors combine and permute to reassert the importance of the regional design of territorial forms and processes, including and especially governance: targeting public and private actors (Salet and Faludi 2000). Case studies herein will refer to ongoing regional design activities across the globe, with a focus on Asia (especially Japan and China), Europe (much of the continent), and North America (particularly the Texas Urban Triangle, Los Angeles, New York, the Northeastern Megalopolis, and the bioregions discussed in Chapter 20. They illustrate the resurgence of regional design, an element of the contemporary take on the broader resurgence of the design dimension in planning (Albrechts, Balducci, and Hillier 2016). Regional design takes place in a setting where an entire range of boundaries has become blurred (Neuman 2014). Being fuzzy at the edges not only relates to space but also to actors as well as to knowledge about spatial dynamics (De Roo and Porter 2016). “The” region is difficult to demarcate—​the fractured functional spaces of daily activity surpass contiguous administrative territories (Friedmann and Weaver 1980). Spaces and places are connected in many different ways, leading to complex, multi-​scalar inter-​relations. The administrative borders of local and regional government no longer match these relations (Neuman 2007). Critically, they no longer can match them. Existing formal (statutory) supra-​local planning does not deliver orientation about the potentialities of space that is strong enough to contend with its domain. One main cause: in many countries, supra-​local intervention is contested. Another: the legal-​administrative arrangements and tools are no longer sufficient, as they were designed decades, even generations ago, to deal with simpler, smaller-​scale circumstances. Regional design has the virtue of clarifying, at least in part, necessary changes in the governance of city-​region development by focusing on strategic spatial characteristics. Strategic ones are selected because they induce growth and shape a region’s form and structure. These strategic matters that in many regional designs are spatially expressed by infrastructure, are thus subject to investments that can spur economic activity and ecological restoration. By contrast, regulation and other development controls are more apt for smaller urban scales such as the municipality and specific projects. It is the larger-​scale and the associated level of complexity—​in terms of governance as well as spatial structure—​which distinguishes regional design from urban design. These are strong claims. Not all agree with them, whether in politics, in academia, or across professional domains. At the outset of the preparation for the third regional plan for New York, Princeton architecture dean and noted urban designer Professor Robert Geddes commented “you can’t design a region.” Yet, after an extensive process of plan development, the New York Regional Plan Association (RPA) did just that. The RPA explicitly employed regional design as the strategic backbone of its 1996 regional plan (Yaro and Hiss 1996). It continues to do so in its most recent plan (RPA 2017, see Chapter 10). To justify these claims and to understand the origins of regional design and its relevance today and into the future, the master strokes in its

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history are presented next. After that we discuss current concepts and practices in regional design and try to answer the question: why a resurgence of regional design? We round off with a brief conclusion. We then continue with a presentation of the structure of the book.

History and Evolution of Regional Design Predecessors to regional design have a long and storied history that goes back to none other than da Vinci. Polymath Leonardo, in one page with several sketches, posited how to arrange spatial elements, both infrastructural and natural, in a settled region (Millon 1994). This was perhaps the first document to outline a proto-​regional design method. In the mid-​nineteenth century, the concepts proposed by Ángel Fernández de los Ríos in his book El Futuro Madrid (1868) offered a detailed vision of the future of both the city of Madrid and its greater region, in terms of a detailed analysis and a synthetic proposal for a regional vision, truly progressive for its time, recognizable to urbanists and regionalists today. His analysis befits a contemporary regional plan based on analytical methods first proposed by Patrick Geddes as “survey before plan” (1915) a half century later. They were given more contemporary ecological expression in Ian McHarg’s landmark book Design with Nature (1969), one century after Fernández de los Ríos. The Spaniard’s comprehensiveness included geologic, demographic, climatic, landscape, architectural, educational, economic, and historic elements, among others, to determine the suitability of urbanization. It is also notable for the central and strategic role accorded to infrastructure, especially transport and water. While virtually unknown outside of Spain, this remarkable book merits translation, as he reached beyond the urban scale of his Spanish contemporary Ildefons Cerdà (Neuman 2000, 2011). It is a striking precedent for McHarg’s “layer” method of suitability analysis, itself a landmark as the basis for GIS (Spirn 2000). In the early twentieth century, regional design thinking was further elaborated in Anglo-​ Saxon thought by Ebenezer Howard, Patrick Geddes, Thomas Adams, Lewis Mumford, Benton MacKaye, and others on both sides of the Atlantic. Their contributions, including the Garden City, as networked in a rural region, by Howard (1898), the Valley Section by Geddes (1915), the Townless Highway by Mumford and MacKaye (1931), the Appalachian Trail by MacKaye (1921), and New  York’s regional plan (RPA 1929), along with the “counterplan” by the Regional Planning Association of America (Regional Planning Association of America 1925) were put in to practice in Europe, North America, and beyond since the 1920s. See also Chapters 1 and 3 of this volume. As regional planning practices evolved, other leading proponents included the Randstad surrounding the Green Heart in the Netherlands in its basic form unveiled as early as 1924 (Faludi and van der Valk 1994), the 1945 Greater London Plan of Patrick Abercrombie, the Tennessee Valley Authority regional planning of the 1930s and 1940s, and the 1939 Gran Madrid Plan of Pedro Bidagor. In the pre-​World War II era, leading practitioners of planning in most European and North American nations were often designers—​architects and landscape architects. They oriented planning, especially when at the regional scale, mostly toward the physical urban environment.That is, regional planning was design oriented, using maps, spatial models, diagrams, and other imageries as main devices to simultaneously express analytical understanding and normative thinking. Pre-​war regional planning was a precursor to regional design. The current resurgence in regional design in Europe can be seen in many countries beyond the Netherlands (Lingua and Balz 2020), which is generally seen as one leader (see for instance Salewski 2012). The example of the 1997 Structure Plan Flanders is one instance that has drawn a lot of attention (Albrechts 1999, Olesen and Albrechts 2017), not only because it is the first plan ever made for the entire Flanders region. Its content is highly characterized by a heavy use 6

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of design tools such as spatial concepts, maps, and images. Looking at its making, in our view it could only acquire such a character through the involvement of regional designers, in particular Van den Broeck, also a leading figure behind the 1996 Benelux Structural Outline, whose content mirrors strongly the Flemish plan (Van den Broeck 1997). Yet for both point and counterpoint to concepts and images as well as design in planning, see Faludi (1996). Across the Atlantic in North America, without the level of trans-​Atlantic dialogue evident in the 1920s due to Robert Adams’s and Werner Hegemann’s efforts (Hegemann and Peets 1922), the resurgence of regional design began with the New Jersey State Plan, that had as its strategic backbone the Regional Design System, articulated in 1989 (New Jersey Office of State Planning 1990). Regional design provided a spatial framework for the policies and strategies of the New Jersey State Plan, Communities of Place. Key principles underlying regional design in the State Plan were a hierarchy of settlements arrayed in a region, connected by infrastructure networks, and buffered by rural and ecological environs (New Jersey State Planning Commission 1992, Center for Urban Policy Research 1992). The regional design strategy of the New Jersey State Plan synthesized, in part, some of the principles in Lynch and Appleyard (1972), McHarg (1969), and Alexander et al. (1977), as applied to the highly urbanized territory of New Jersey. Since then it has been used as a touchstone for the RPA’s third Plan for New York and Environs (Yaro and Hiss 1996), and the subject of several books (Lewis 1996, Kelbaugh 1997, Simmonds and Hack 2000). The above shows that regional design comes under a variety of different names like outline, sketch, scheme, vision, strategy, or even exhibitions like Internationale Bauausstellung (IBA) which in English reads as International Architecture Exhibition, although this does not capture the full German meaning, as an IBA could have an entire region as its subject. The prime example here is the 1989–​1999 IBA Emscher Park, which—​like its name suggests—​lasted for more than ten years. It was meant to experiment with new concepts targeting transformation—​and ecological cleansing—​of a former industrial region. It has inspired regional design exercises across the globe as far away as Australia, in Melbourne 2030, addressing not just the city but the entire region (Kozlowski 2006). The thinking and action behind labels such as the IBA and others mentioned above does not necessarily restrict regional design to a design, plan, or strategy to be created or implemented in the traditional statutory sense. In most cases we know, it is rather a signpost to possible futures, including scenarios, to be created and tested in processes where designers—​although playing a key role—​collaborate with others (Neuman 2016). The “other” could be a government administrator, a representative of industry or an NGO, a resident, and so forth. Regional design also can take place via a design competition, especially in cases where there is great uncertainty about how to manage pressing issues (Bisker, Chester, and Eisenberg 2015, National Infrastructure Commission 2017a, 2017b). Another significant example is “Rebuild by Design,” a design exercise initiated after Hurricane Sandy hit the northeast of the USA in 2012. As its namesake website indicates, it “convenes a mix of sectors—​including government, business, non-​profit, and community organizations—​to gain a better understanding of how overlapping environmental and human-​made vulnerabilities leave cities and regions at risk.” While regional designers are not explicitly mentioned, a Dutch water envoy—​himself an urban designer—​has been highly influential framing the search for strategies to deal with flood management as a design competition (Ovink and Boeijenga 2018, Bisker, Chester, and Eisenberg 2015). Other examples of trans-​Atlantic dialogue include mega-​region planning in the United States in the ten mega-​regions under the joint auspices of the New York RPA, America 2050, and several universities (Lang and Knox 2009, Ross 2009). It is also occurring as a response to 7

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climate change-​induced severe storms such as those in the New Orleans/​Mississippi River delta, New York (White 2015), and Houston. What all these examples have in common is that regional design is not just physical design.1 Design as an activity is an active verb meaning a process of “creating.” The process of regional design, when conducted well, creates governance capacity. Designers and other professionals with the capacity to design can play a vital role in these processes for an important reason: at the regional scale, novel governance institutions, structures, processes, and means must be created. Regional governance processes are designed, as are regional governance institutions in which they are embedded.This is an emergent and critical role for regional design as a process. Regional designers, when organized and acting in such a way, enable their expertise to manifest itself, for instance through the creation of design studios (Balz and Zonneveld 2015), charrettes, or competitions. Regional design—​at least in the examples mentioned—​is also connected to politics. This aspect of regional design is explored in each of the case study chapters and in the final section’s chapters. Political and therefore governance success is not guaranteed, though, in large part due to the complexity and conflicts attending politics and governance. The design of regions, by its very nature, crosses administrative boundaries. Scores and, often, hundreds of organizations can be engaged. Inevitably, it results in conflict and disagreement, entrenched as they are in existing institutions and their values, interests, and actions. This entrenchment is known as path dependence. The role of design thus straddles the contested terrain of cultures and personal politics that are embedded in governance institutions. To be effective, it must strike a balance between the needs of new policies and practices specifically designed for the task of regional governance, and existing ones enshrined in old and often inflexible levels and sectors of government that are not regional and were not established to deal with regional issues.

Current Concepts and Practices in Regional Design Settlements and their planning get played out in the landscape in built form. In a region of any type, its spatial components are organized into networks. In this sense, regional design can be seen as network urbanism (Dupuy 1991) at the regional scale. In the human built environment, key components at the regional scale include settlements, infrastructure linkages/​networks, and the hybrid spaces in-​between the settlements that the infrastructure networks traverse.Therefore, any responsible approach to regional planning is realized by design of the physical network aspects of the built environment, along with socio-​economic and governance aspects. While this is well settled in cities at the urban scale through long-​established practices of urban design and physical urban planning, at the regional scale the physical components have tended to be less integrated through strategic and holistic design. This has been due to the infrequent existence of well-​established governance conditions that support a strategic and holistic approach on regional levels. In this void, there has emerged an emphasis on planning processes, procedures, and consensus-​building which frequently leads to less than desirable outcomes, and ultimately may even lead to what some call “negotiated nonsense” (De Bruijn and Ten Heuvelhof 1999, van de Riet 2003). This is the downside of communicative and collaborative approaches in planning practice and literature: a lack of attention toward the content of plans and planning, conveyed through images (Neuman 1996, Zonneveld 2005a) and “storytelling” (Throgmorton 1996, 2003). Regional design is the practice of guiding human settlement in a region by shaping the size, function, location, and inter-​relations of settlements; as well as the connective tissue among these 8

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settlements (infrastructure networks) and the relation of those settlements to their environs. Regional design thus guides the flow of human activities related to settlements via the infrastructure linkages among them. (We emphasize that we employ throughout a broad understanding of what constitutes “infrastructure.”) In so doing, regional design addresses the integration of settlements and infrastructure networks with ecological patterns to attain the greatest degree of sustainability available. Finally, regionally design recently also touches upon flood management in large-​scale water systems—​r iver basins and delta and coastal areas—​in relation to land use and patterns of metropolitan development (see Part III of this book). The imperative for regional-​ scale flood management has been bolstered by catastrophic damage caused by severe storms, and corresponding efforts at recovery and at building future resilience and mitigation. In sum, regional design concerns the physical design of a region which includes all sorts of non-​physical connectivities made possible through physical infrastructure. As such it provides a context for urban and community design. To a certain extent regional design is to a region as urban design is to a city and architectural design is to a building. Regional design focuses on the spatial—​that is, physical design, which is visualized by maps, physical plans, and designs.As such, regional design is related to and at the same time distinguished from 1) spatial planning (as practiced in Europe), 2) strategic planning, 3) spatial strategies, and 4) strategic spatial planning. For example, spatial strategies can be merely a collection of regional spatial objectives, or regional-​scale mega-​projects like, for instance, the 2050 regional development plan for the Stockholm region. This class of planning documents do not necessarily have the fully integrative ambition intrinsically connected to regional spatial structure and the imaginative, forward looking ambition which regional design has. Our focus on regional design combines strategic (therefore selective) and integrative (therefore systemic) components (see also Alaily-​Mattar, Thierstein, and Förster 2014). The tension among these components accounts for the complexity of urban regions today, where transformative ambitions are situated in a dynamic setting of governance with its real-​life actors and their contestations in attempting to solve persistent and wicked problems. The practices of regional design have become increasingly sophisticated with the advances in geographic, modeling, computational, and visualization technologies and methods. The importance of regional design in these times can be found in the imperatives stemming from the impacts of new infrastructures and technologies, emergent socio-​spatial-​economic processes, dramatic evolution in spatial governance and the proliferation of stakeholders, and the increasing urgency of addressing climate change, natural disasters, and refugee and migrant movements, among others. Regional design consciously considers the spatial nature of settlement patterns in a region. Four aspects of settlement patterns are most pertinent (strategic) at the regional scale:2 1. Settlement location, size, function, and their inter-​relations within a determined region; 2. Infrastructure networks in all their varied forms that link the flows among settlements within a region and to other settlements and regions; 3. The environs, understood as the lands and water bodies outside the settlements, which the infrastructure networks traverse; 4. The institutions, which govern regional analysis, planning, design, and development. These four components combine to demarcate the intellectual territory of regional design in the spatial sense. In addition to this spatial aspect, the governance of regional design starts with institutional design at the regional level that brings actors together and assigns rights and responsibilities through legal and institutional apparati. This is the constitutional aspect of governance. 9

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The ongoing management of the development of the region is another function of regional governance which, due to the networked nature of contemporary city regions, ought to take shape as “network governance” (Hajer and Versteeg 2005). In this case, regional design, besides being a key element of regional spatial planning, can be a stimulus for the establishment of regional governance capacity. Regional design, as conceived by civil society actors in addition to professionals, is thus a disruptive force vis-​à-​vis established governing institutions of traditional land use and spatial planning. This formulation will be familiar to planners and designers of spaces and places—​the spatial and territorial realms. Yet what about processes and flows, and their relation to places? Any coherent and integrated approach to regional design needs to consider the complexities of glocal process of placemaking that address simultaneously these aspects of contemporary city regions and their design and governance: Multi-​scale—​referring to spatial dimensions of territory; Multi-​level—​referring to the layers of government; Multi-​function—​referring to the substantive domains; Multi-​flow—​referring to processes, their fluxes, and the conduits that convey them; Multi-​sector—​referring to the sectors of society; Multi-​disciplinary—​referring to the professions engaged; Multi-​actor—​referring to the multitude of actors which have or demand a stake. One source of the disruptiveness of regional design stems from its stance as a design discipline. Design disciplines for the built environment typically take into account the physical form of a given region, yet to be comprehensive and thus disruptive, they must take into account the fluxes generated by natural, social, and economic processes in and through the region. These fluxes are always carried through infrastructures, an integral and strategic part of regional design. Another source of the disruptive nature of regional design is its intellectual history, spanning the professions of architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, engineering, planning, geography, and sociology. This intellectual diversity impinges on its practice. For example, nowadays in the Netherlands, it has been common, though not universal, that landscape architects are those who lead in the design of the region, which results in the emphasis on land, landscape, and water; that is, ecological factors (De Jonge 2009). In the United States, it tends to be urban designers and urban planners, and in Spain and Italy it is architect-​planners. Yet, regardless of the histories of the intellectual development of regional design as practiced in different countries, its multiple demands nowadays lead to disruptive practices that are at the same time cross-​, inter-​, trans-​, and multi-​disciplinary; leading to new conceptions of territory, new visions of the future, and new practices to attain them. The Dutch practice mentioned above can also be seen as “hydraulic” regional design—​ managing water at a regional scale. The long history in the Netherlands in the management of polders such as the Zuiderzee (its historic name) is now being exported around the world, to Southern Louisiana, the Pearl River Delta, and New York, to name a few. In the Netherlands, hydraulic engineers drew up the water plans, except for the urban aspects.Villages and towns were drawn up by urban and landscape designers.Yet the dominance of engineers in the past leads to contemporary questions for further analysis, including how did that combination of professions work together? How were they brought together? To what extent were engineers effective in designing the synthetic frame in which other specialist disciplines/​professions contributed? How has their role changed in the face of the contemporary contributions by landscape architects? Were any professions missing or subordinate to the extent of not being consequential? How did

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the emergent practice of “working with water” break out of the civil-​engineering straight jacket of “fighting against water” (see for instance Meyer, Bobbink, and Nijhuis 2010). The Dutch experience provides one lens through which to consider the renaissance of regional design in many regions of the world. These regional efforts have often been spurred by responses to large-​scale disasters, many of them water-​related (flooding due to severe storms, for example). Their responses focused on adaptation, resilience, and preparedness for future calamities. What better “substrate”—​water—​to weave together regional territories, and what better “substance”—​water again—​to understand and deal with the temporal flows that these devastating natural events occasion? More recently these questions have stimulated a new wave of design thinking about spatial structure on supra-​local levels (Sijmons et al. 2014, Kidd and Shaw 2013).

The Design of Regional Governance The inter-​ related issues confronting contemporary city regions, as disparate as transport, pollution, climate change, land conversion, housing affordability, infrastructure finance, economic and social disparities/​inequities, knowledge creation, digitalization, and disaster response, along with others, have strong regional and global causes and implications. A critical characteristic of these types of problems is that they are no longer merely local in origin and effect. They have supra-​local, and in fact, multi-​scalar causes, interactions, and impacts. Inter-​local planning and design are no longer sufficient, not even at the metropolitan level. Yet on the other end of the spectrum, national and international policies and programs are typically a-​spatial. Thus they are not specific to/​adapted for local and regional conditions. This shortcoming has led to many problems in the in-​between realm of regional governance. Regional design is one framework for practices at a range of scales, not only regional, that can remedy the shortcomings stated above. For example, in Europe, regional design could inform the practices that implement policy and strategy in “macro-​regions” and cross-​border regions (see below). Regional design is able to respond to these conditions and issues by focusing analysis and synthetic solutions—​the main components of design—​on intermediate scales often overlooked by both national and local/​metropolitan planning and governance entities. It provides a responsive method to the trends that shape the contemporary urban formations known as the city-​ region (Neuman and Hull 2011). Regional issues, between local and national, imply revisioning and reforming institutions of governance for three key components of regional design: urban development for the settlements, environmental and rural management for the environs, and infrastructure management for the physical networks that link the settlements. In order to attain effective governance for regional design across these three components entails collaborative, consensus seeking, and inter-​and multi-​jurisdictional practices among and within levels of governance. Yet the size of contemporary regions, larger than the past due to increases in population as well as in economic, social, and political interactions, means that many regions cross political borders, including national ones. This makes governance more difficult due to the complexity of the inter-​jurisdictional matters that arise from cross-​border issues. Cross-​border policy is a common topic in the European Union, yet is not unique to Europe. Cross-​border planning, design, and governance are becoming more prominent because the size of regions increases as activities become more interconnected. This is due in part to information and communications technologies, more rapid travel speeds, growing volumes of trade, tourism, and migration, and so on. A  new term—​“macro-​regions”—​has been put in use in the European Union (EU) that reflects this increase in scale. Macro-​regions are transnational 11

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regions that encompass several countries that are connected by a common geophysical feature such as a sea, river, or mountain range. They are intended for the development of “macro-​region strategies” that supplement national policy and legislation (European Commission 2016). These functional regions tend to be larger than past regional planning and design approaches, and have received their conceptual start from the establishment of the North Sea Commission in 1989. The first strategy to be finalized targeted the Baltic Sea Region (Stead 2014).3 Cross-​border, transnational planning has been initiated in Europe. They can be traced back to the origins of spatial planning in the Netherlands, Germany, and France, and its transference to the EU in 1980s and 1990s. Regional and supra-​regional concepts like urban networks, polycentricity and metropolitan regions have been “uploaded” (scaled up) from these countries in European-​wide discourses and documents like the 1999 European Spatial Development Perspective (Faludi and Waterhout 2002) and transnational visions from the late 1990s (Zonneveld 2005a, b). Subsequently they have been “downloaded” back in national and sub-​national planning (Faludi 2003a, b; Cotella and Janin Rivolin 2011). In the past two decades, European planning addressed entirely new scales—​cross-​border, transnational, and even continental. This started stimulating regional design approaches that parlayed their inherent creativity and innovation in intervening in these very large territories, which heretofore was virtually unknown. Spatial structures needed to be unveiled at these levels, and related policy agendas had to be identified. An entire new visual language emerged, often highly metaphorical, in images and vocabulary like Finger Plan, Corridor, Red Octopus, Archipelago, Pentagon, Blue Banana and Bunch of Grapes, and so on (Dühr 2007, Dühr and Zonneveld 2012, see also Chapter 23). Where regional design is accompanied by complementary institutional design of regional governance, together they can fill the gaps in contemporary spatial planning by developing more effective regional laws, policies, and integrative processes; if not full-​ blown regional institutions. These can enable the establishment and implementation of development and financial mechanisms for infrastructure investment, which in turn can lessen regional inequalities, and for protection of regional land resources. While it may be useful in select places to establish regional government, as in Spain and Italy, it is not necessary and can be difficult. Legal and policy instruments at the regional scale include tax reform for land and other real property, transfer of development rights schemes including development rights banks, impact fees, and related mechanisms for infrastructure finance, land banking, and regional value capture schemes to spread the costs and the benefits of new development and redevelopment. This illustrative sample (not a definitive list) can be put into place by a range of inter-​institutional contractual agreements that entail creative institutional designs. Regional design prompts a reallocation of the capacities of governance institutions, and the rights and responsibilities of constituent institutions (levels of government) incident on the region. Regional design in this sense—​as a form of informal interstitial planning—​becomes a matter of creating and enhancing institutional capacity. (For an early example of U.S.  cases and theory, see Innes et al. 1994.) Yet what is more important to note for the design of regional governance is the spatial dimensions of regions, that is, their place-​based nature that is defined by specific regional characteristics such as identity, language, culture, geography, and so on. Being place-​based differs from the typically a-​spatial nature of national and international policy. When considering regional design and institutional design together in this way, we witness a sort of yin-​yang. One cannot prosper without the other. They are different sides of the same coin.

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Institutional design ⇄ regional design

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This implies a sort of spatial-​institutional isomorphism in which the current structure and future design of the spatial region corresponds with the architecture of its governance institutions (Neuman 2007). Just as regional design is a form of large-​scale network urbanism (Dupuy 1991), regional governance is a form of networked governance (Hajer and Versteeg 2005, Hajer 2010). However, we must be careful in using this isomorphism analogy, in that isomorphism focuses only on the spatial, and not the processes and flows that shape the form(s) of a region and its governance.

Conclusion As we can appreciate, the challenges that face contemporary city regions can seem daunting.The problems are complex, multi-​layered, and intertwined; all with spatial and processual ramifications at the regional scale. Furthermore, they exert important impacts on actions and conditions at other scales of territory and levels of government. Yet this level of complexity does more than merely illustrate the limitations and inadequacies of levels of government up to a millennium old—​municipalities, shires, counties; and even the more recent provinces and nation-​states (see also Faludi 2013). Regional design is a field which is ripe for bold action at scales that match those of the phenomena which we seek to manage. A conservative approach would counsel known agents like municipalities, and known actions like zoning. Yet new fields of play are veritable institutional blank slates that can spawn new solutions less fettered by past blinders. As Clifford Geertz once wrote, “the more orderly and straightforward a particular course of action looks, the more it seems ill-​advised” (Geertz 1983, 6). While his phrase applied to the complexity of local cultures, we can apply it to the complexity of governance cultures. Regional networks of governing institutions can seem not to be orderly, yet we can see that they are indispensable. Communities in metropolises and city regions are where most people spend the vast majority of their lives residing, working, commuting, and recreating. They go a long way in satisfying many human needs. The regional context and its design are necessary conditions for analyzing and solving these local and metropolitan problems, made more apparent as the metropolis is expanding and evolving to the qualitatively different polycentric city-​region. Regional design provides a means to enhance the practices of planning and designing. While there are numerous critics of current approaches to solving urban problems, planners and designers using the proper tools can improve the human urban condition. If we succumb to our critics who suggest that planning is a marginal enterprise in the neoliberal era of global society, not only do we overlook the evidence of significant urban achievement in the last decades. We may fall into the trap Samuel Johnson noted when he stated:  “Nothing will even be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.” Regional design provides an evolving toolbox that helps planners, designers, and policy makers overcome a number of objections to the limits of both local and national planning. This toolkit contains intellectual tools including theoretical frameworks and principles, as well as broadening of design thinking to address institutional matters in addition to spatial issues. It also contains practical tools including design methods of how to think about the design of spaces and flows at the regional scale, and how to design/​redesign governance institutions and processes at the regional scale and their interactions with other institutions at other scales.

Outline of the Book The book is organized in four Parts. Part I, introduced by Gary Hack’s forward, covers the intellectual and practice foundations of regional design, including historical precedents. Part II 13

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presents case studies of contemporary city regions and megalopolises from around the world. Yet regional design not only related to city regions. Part III consists of case studies on deltaic, ecological, and bioregional design, including integrated water and land (marine and territorial) design. Taken together, the case study chapters touch each inhabited continent. Part IV offers an overview of current and future challenges and opportunities through chapters on the role of images (in particular maps), education, management, and governance.This Part is crowned by an epilogue by Catherine L. Ross. At the regional scale, data, especially spatial data and maps, overtake direct experience in observing and understanding regions and their characteristics. We can contrast the regional scale with local scale. At the local scale, we get to know a place on foot, talking to people, community members, “research by walking.” The regional scale is different, more akin to “research by driving and flying.” We use planes, helicopters, drones, and remote sensing, including satellites. This has critical implications for the planning, designing, policy making, and politics of regions. New vocabularies are being created based on new data and new technologies of observation and recording. Part I  The editors open the volume by examining the resurgence of regional design in recent years in a global overview of thinking and practices. Neuman follows by tracing historical roots and precedents going back to the nineteenth century in Europe and the United States. In Chapter 2, eminent scholar Andreas Faludi portrays the recent European experience, stressing the EU’s roles. Frederick Steiner traces the ecological foundations of regional design in Chapter 3. This part concludes with Verena Balz’s exposition of the theory underlying regional design, including the relationships of spatial form and governance. Part II This part contains the city-​region and mega-​region case studies, spanning the globe. Wang-​Guen Lee starts off with a case study of Korea, focusing on the Seoul metropolitan region yet expanding to include national regional policy. Hitomi Nakanishi and Fumitaka Kurauchi analyze in Chapter 6 the Japanese Linear Megalopolis whose spine is the Shinkansen high-​speed rail network that has fundamentally shifted spatial and economic realities in Japan over the last 60 years. Stefanie Dühr’s Chapter 7 on Germany’s European Metropolitan regions gives particular attention to top-​down and bottom-​up influences in region design using the examples of Berlin/​Brandenburg (monocentric) and Rhine-​Ruhr (polycentric). Robert Yaro, former President of New York’s RPA and a leader in megapolitan planning, presents the Northeastern U.S.  corridor megalopolis in all its complexity. In another American mega-​region, Michael Neuman highlights an analysis of the Texas Urban Triangle, of 25  million inhabitants across 58,000 square miles (150,000 km2), employing a multi-​factor GIS-​based analysis based on Ian McHarg’s suitability method. In Chapter 10, current RPA President Tom Wright gives a first-​ hand account of the post-​1995 designing of the New  York region, including a sketch of its century-​old history. Roberto Moris and William Siembieda follow with a chapter on metropolitan planning and design in Santiago de Chile, whose story represents a command and control approach used since its Spanish colonial origins. Chapter 12 is the illuminating case of Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, by American scholar and African specialist Garth Myers, in a British colonial setting. Back in Europe, architect-​planner-​scholar Antonio Font delves deeply into the metro region of his hometown Barcelona, tracing its illustrious planning and design history while focusing on contemporary times. Anna Geppert and Xavier Desjardins show in Chapter 14 the distinctive approach that Paris has taken to regional design, where ambitious, design-​led regional approaches have competed with a long history of more traditional regional planning. Historian Robert Freestone and planning scholar Simon Pinnegar tackle the case of Sydney, Australia by giving a historical overview of a century of metropolitan planning while focusing on the present, with its current model of a “metropolis of three cities.” Urban design scholar Tridib Banerjee 14

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closes this part of the book by presenting the intriguing Los Angeles, California situation. He answers his question of “Who designed the Los Angeles region?” with a contentious palimpsest of actions driven by profit and politics, exploiting nature and people. Part III This part contains the eco-​region and hybrid ecological-​urban case studies from three continents. In Chapter 17 on the Dutch Delta Metropolis, Dutch scholar Lianne van Duinen points to regional design as a framework comprised of inter-​connectivities among multiple transport networks, such as roads, rails, canals, rivers, airports, and seaports, reinforced by telecommunications networks. In the evolution in regional design and policy that was signaled by the change from Randstad through Delta Metropolis to the current South and North Wing, and back again to the Randstad.This case study focuses on the role of images and names in the evolution of institutional design. Mapping and visualization played important roles in this debate. The next chapter by Lei Qu and Dongjin Qi about the complex megalopolis of the Pearl River Delta in southern China, encompassing megacities such as Hong Kong, Shenzhen, Dongguan, Guangzhou, Foshan, and Macau, clocks in at about 100 million inhabitants in a large and sensitive estuary, complicating trade-​offs between massive, explosive urban growth and the environment. In Chapter 19 on the integration of water (marine) and land (terrestrial) design, Sue Kidd and David Shaw show that land and water ecosystems must be woven together to form both a coherent and inspiring policy narrative, as well as a sound evidentiary basis for policy. Ecological planning and design pioneer Pliny Fisk’s chapter about bioregional design draws on several examples that illustrate that bioregional approaches that integrate ecology and urbanity are essential for the successful prosecution of regional design, echoing Fritz Steiner’s theoretical contribution at the outset. Part IV In Chapter 21 on teaching regional design, Lukas Gilliard and his European colleagues provide a road map and a reflection on the type of pedagogy needed, radically different from the typical curriculum on offer. In a provocative chapter titled Imagining the Region, Alfonso Vegara and Juan Luis de las Rivas suggest through their global experiences in creating “intelligent territories,” that their visualization—​a sort of spatial marketing—​has inspired city regions to creatively consider connections outside the territories normally associated with a metropolis in order to open new horizons. In Chapter 23, Mapping for Regions, Wil Zonneveld takes this a step further in the theoretical realm by analyzing the visualization of places (spatial) and flows (time) via the use of technologies such as GIS, apps, big data and analytics, and infographics. His work reveals that the map of the region is an essential component in policy dialogues about regional design, and conversely, that regional design is a tool to delineate and express a region’s image/​vision. Indeed, in more than several chapters we could observe the role of images in the conception of regional futures and the practice of regional design. Yet without institutions to implement these visions and designs, much of these efforts would go to naught. Thus, Willem Salet’s contribution in Chapter 24 is essential, while uncovering the paradox of governing flows through governing places by examining the institutions of multi-​ scalar and multi-​level regional governance. He finds that regions evince a “complex institutional ecology” not dissimilar from complex spatial ecologies, that must be grappled with to attain beneficial outcomes through institutional design at not only the regional scale, but other levels of government that act upon the region.To put these issues into perspective,Vaclav Havel (in the words of his biographer) noted the role of images. Symbols in politics can be very powerful simplifiers, amplifiers and energizers, offering shortcuts through otherwise complex and intractable problems, provided that they are universally understood. Without this understanding, the amplifying capacity of symbols works in exactly the opposite way. (Zantovsky 2014, 350–​351) 15

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To conclude,Wil Zonneveld and Michael Neuman paint possible futures of regional design, and implications for going forward. Practitioner-​academic Catherine L. Ross closes with her epilogue that compiles an action program of how to practice regional design today.

Notes 1. Many more examples can be cited. In Europe alone, see the European regional policy, the “Region Urbaine” policies in France, the Ghent Canal Area, the Öresund Region in Denmark and Sweden, the Milanese Città di Città, and the Limmat Valley in Switzerland. 2. A more complete exegesis can be found in Neuman (2000). 3. As of this writing, there are four designated macro-​region strategies in the EU: Baltic Sea Region (2009), Danube River Region (2010), Adriatic and Ionian Sea Region (2014), and the Alpine Region (2015). http://​ec.europa.eu/​regional_​policy/​en/​policy/​cooperation/​macro-​regional-​strategies/​ (accessed June 10, 2020).

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Faludi, A. (2013) Territorial cohesion, territorialism, territoriality, and soft planning:  A critical review. Environment and Planning A, 45(6), 1302–​17. Faludi, A. and Van der Valk, A. (1994). Rule and Order:  Dutch Planning Doctrine in the Twentieth Century. Dordrecht/​Boston/​London: Kluwer Academic Publishers. Faludi, A. and Waterhout, B. (2002). The Making of the European Spatial Development Perspective. London: Routledge. Fernández de los Ríos, Á. (1868). El futuro de Madrid: Paseos mentales por la capital de España tal y cual debe dejarla trasformada la revolución. Madrid: Biblioteca Universal Económica [Republished 1989, with a forward by Antonio Bonet Correa]. Forman, R. T.  T. (2008). Urban Regions:  Ecology and Planning beyond the City. Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press. Friedmann, J. and Weaver, C. (1980). Territory and Function:  The Evolution of Regional Planning. Berkeley: University of California Press. Geddes, P. (1915). Cities in Evolution. London: Williams and Norgate. Geertz, C. (1983). Local Knowledge: Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology. New York: Basic Books. Gottmann, J. and Harper, R. (eds.) (1990). Since Megalopolis:  The Urban Writings of Jean Gottmann. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Hajer, M. A. (2010). Authoritative Governance:  Policy Making in the Age of Mediatization. Oxford:  Oxford University Press. Hajer, M. and Versteeg, W. (2005). Performing governance through networks. European Political Science, 4(3),  340–​7. Hegemann, W. and Peets, E. (1922). The American Vitruvius:  An Architects’ Handbook of Civic Art. New York: Architectural Book Publishing. Howard, E. (1898). To-​morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform. London: Swan Sonnenschein. Innes, J., Gruber, J., Neuman, M., and Thompson, R. (1994). Coordinating Growth and Environmental Management through Consensus Building. Report to the California Policy Seminar, Berkeley, California. Permalink https://​escholarship.org/​uc/​item/​6tg1s896 (accessed May 24, 2020). Kelbaugh, D. (1997). Common Place:  Toward Neighborhood and Regional Design. Seattle:  University of Washington Press. Kidd, S. and Shaw, D. (2013). Reconceptualising territoriality and spatial planning: insights from the sea. Planning Theory & Practice, 14(2), 180–​97. Kozlowski, M. (2006). The emergence of urban design in regional and metropolitan planning:  The Australian context. Australian Planner, 43(1), 36–​41. Lang, R. and Knox, P. (2009).The new metropolis: Rethinking megalopolis. Regional Studies, 43(6), 789–​802. Lewis, P. (1996). Tomorrow by Design: A Regional Design Process for Sustainability. New York: Wiley. Lingua,V. and Balz,V. (eds.) (2020). Shaping Regional Futures: Designing and Visioning in Governance Rescaling. Cham, Switzerland: Springer. Lynch, K. and Appleyard, D. (1972). Managing the Sense of a Region. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. MacKaye, B. (1921). An Appalachian trail: A project in regional planning. Journal of the American Institute of Architects, 9, 325‒30. October. McHarg, I. (1969). Design with Nature. New York: Doubleday/​Natural History Press. Meyer, H., Bobbink, I., and Nijhuis, S. (eds.) (2010). Delta Urbanism: The Netherlands. Chicago: American Planning Association. Millon, H. A. (1994). The Renaissance from Brunelleschi to Michelangelo:  The Representation of Architecture. Milan: Bompiani. Mumford, L. and MacKaye, B. (1931). The townless highway. The Nation, 163 (July). National Infrastructure Commission (NCI). (2017a). The Cambridge to Oxford Connection: Ideas Competition. London: NCI. National Infrastructure Commission (NCI). (2017b). Partnering for Prosperity: A New Deal for the Cambridge-​ Milton Keynes-​Oxford Arc. London: NCI. Neuman, M. (1996). Images as institution builders: Metropolitan planning in Madrid. European Planning Studies, 4(3), 293–​312. Neuman, M. (2000). Regional design: Recovering a landscape architecture and urban planning tradition. Landscape and Urban Planning, 47(3–​4), 115–​28. Neuman, M. (2005). The compact city fallacy. Journal of Planning Education and Research, 25(1), 11–​26. Neuman, M. (2007). Multi-​scalar large institutional networks in regional planning. Planning Theory and Practice, 8(3), 319–​44. 17

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Neuman, M. (2011). Ildefons Cerdà and the future of spatial planning: The network urbanism of a city planning pioneer. Town Planning Review, 82(2), 117–​43. Neuman, M. (2014). Rethinking borders. In:  Steele, W., Alizadeh, T., and Eslami-​Andargoli, L. (eds.). Planning Across Borders. London: Routledge, 15–​30. Neuman, M. (2016). Teaching collaborative and interdisciplinary service-​based urban design and planning studios. Journal of Urban Design, 21(5): 596–​615. Neuman, M. and Hull, A. (eds.) (2011). The Futures of the City Region. London: Routledge. New Jersey Office of State Planning. (1990). The Regional Design System. Trenton: New Jersey Office of State Planning. New Jersey State Planning Commission. (1992). Communities of Place: The New Jersey State Development and Redevelopment Plan. Trenton: New Jersey State Planning Commission. Olesen, K. and Albrechts, L. (2017). Changing Planning Discourses and Practice:  The Flanders Structure Plan; Kristian Olesen in conversation with Louis Albrechts. AESOP Young Academics Booklet Series C: Exploring Place matters in Planning; Booklet 1. Ovink, H. and Boeijenga, J. (2018). Too Big—​Rebuild by Design: A Transformative Approach to Climate Change. Rotterdam: nai010 publishers. Regional Plan Association. (1929). Regional Plan for New  York and Environs. New  York:  Regional Plan Association. Regional Plan Association. (2017). The Fourth Regional Plan:  Making the Region Work for All of Us. New York: Regional Plan Association. Regional Planning Association of America. (1925). Survey Graphic 7 (May): entire issue. Ross, C. (2009). Megaregions: Planning for Global Competitiveness. Washington, DC: Island Press. Ryser, J. and Franchini, T. (eds.) (2015). International Manual of Planning Practice. The Hague: International Society of City and Regional Planners ISOCARP. Salet, W. and Faludi, A. (2000). Three approaches to strategic spatial planning. In: Salet, W. and Faludi, A. (eds.) The Revival of Strategic Spatial Planning. Amsterdam:  Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, 267–​80. Salewski, C. (2012). Dutch New Worlds: Scenarios in Physical Planning and Design in the Netherlands, 1970–​2000. Rotterdam: 010 Publishers. Sijmons, D., Hugtenburg, J., Feddes, F., and Van Hoorn, A. (eds.) (2014). Landscape and Energy: Designing Transition. Rotterdam: nai010 publishers. Simmonds, R. and Hack, G. (eds.) (2000). Global City Regions:  Their Emerging Forms. Washington, DC: Spon Press. Spirn, A. W. (2000). Ian McHarg, landscape architecture, and environmentalism: Ideas and methods in context. In: Conan, M. (ed.), Environmentalism in Landscape Architecture. Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library, 97–​114. Stead, D. (2014). European integration and spatial rescaling in the Baltic Region: Soft spaces, soft Planning and soft security. European Planning Studies, 22(4), 680–​93. Throgmorton, J. A. (1996). Planning as Persuasive Storytelling: The Rhetorical Construction of Chicago’s Electric Future. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Throgmorton, J. A. (2003). Planning as persuasive storytelling in a global-​scale web of relations. Planning Theory, 2(2), 125–​51. Van de Riet, O. A. W. T. (2003). Policy Analysis in a Multi-​actor Policy Settings:  Navigating between Negotiated Nonsense & Superfluous Knowledge. Delft: Eburon. Van den Broeck, J. (1997). The spatial development perspective for the Benelux. Built Environment, 23(1),  14–​26. White, J. T. (2015). Future directions in urban design as public policy: Reassessing best practice principles for design review and development management. Journal of Urban Design, 20(3), 325–​48. Yaro, R. and Hiss, T. (1996). A Region at Risk. New York: Regional Plan Association. Zantovsky, M. (2014). Havel: A Life. New York: Grove Press. Zonneveld, W. (2005a). Multiple visioning:  New ways of constructing transnational spatial visions. Environment & Planning C, 23(1), 41–​62. Zonneveld,W. (2005b). Expansive spatial planning: The new European transnational spatial visions. European Planning Studies, 13(1), 137–​55.

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1 The Emergence of Regional Design Recovering a Great Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning Tradition1 Michael Neuman

Once and again, regional design is at the forefront in large-​scale landscape architecture and urban planning. Regional design is among a select set of ideas and practices, along with sustainability, consensus-​building, and resilience, that have been leading the way to a new conception of professional practice. What regional design has come to be, and what import it has, comprise the subjects of this book. “Once and again” for two reasons. First, regional design was regional planning, from the turn of the past century through World War II. Thereafter came an extended period in which both landscape architecture and city planning were practiced at either such a small scale—​garden and site design—​or with such a policy and regulatory orientation that traditional physical planning and urban design were essentially lost. We have witnessed a rebirth of physical design both in practice and the academy, spurred on by neo-​traditional community planning and neo-​urbanism. Neo-​traditionalism and neo-​ urbanism began in the 1980s as enterprises that used small communities and neighborhoods as their typical scale. Later, this scale grew to large towns. They were built in the exurbs and inner-​ city areas, in addition to the suburban locales that were the sites, by and large, of their genesis. Nonetheless, the scale remains at the individual community level. An early exception was the book The Next American Metropolis (Calthorpe 1993). When we couple the small-​scale acts of new community formation with a regional context and the powerful external forces that shape urban growth, we begin to see the imperative for regional design. The emergence of city region economies as dominant nodes in a global economy that is increasingly based on knowledge and service sectors has been a leading indicator of the context and forces for quite a while (Castells 2010, Scott 2019, Markusen 1987, Jacobs 1984). Jean Gottmann, a perceptive geographer often ahead of his time, observed in the early 1970s that the accessibility to a central place in modern society must be described not only in terms of relations with the surrounding country or ‘hinterland’, but also in terms of the network of relations with other central places, even if they are located in the antipodes,

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prefiguring Sassen’s global city and Castells’ network society by two decades (Gottmann 1974, 26–​7, Sassen 1991, Castells 2010 (1996)). City regions are enabled by the high-​tech digital revolution in computers, telecommunications, and information systems that network a region as never before. Add to this an explosion in mobility, both national and international in terms of migration, global business, and tourism, and intra-​regional in terms of increased vehicle ownership and usage, and we see that conditions now are not the ones that gave rise to the limited social critique that spawned new urbanism two generations ago. Regional design has resurfaced by necessity to cope with these new realities. Regional design shapes the physical form of regions. It takes a regional perspective in guiding the arrangement of human settlements, preferably in communities of scales that vary from hamlet and village to metropolis. Regional design strives to connect these communities by transport, communication, and other links into regional networks. Keeping the fringes or environs of the communities relatively sparsely settled is another aim. Communities, the links among them, and their environs are the three key physical components of regions that are the objects of regional design. The regional design of today is a far cry from the earliest conceptions of Patrick Geddes and Ebenezer Howard, Frederick Law Olmsted and Peter Kropotkin. These founding fathers based their analyses on the conditions of their day, quite different from today.Times were simpler, cities smaller, technology less pervasive and complex, and the lines between urban and rural more sharply defined. Their insights and theories were informed by the then-​emergent disciplines of sociology and geography, and they translated their understanding into physical form and design. Thus, they focused their considerable energies on the physical form of the region, and the interaction of nature, understood as rural, non-​urban environments; with cities, understood as a cultural manifestation much different from nature. Kropotkin discussed this at length in his masterpiece, Fields, Factories and Workshops, as did Ebenezer Howard in To-​morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform, and Patrick Geddes in Cities in Evolution.

The Sources of Regional Design We can trace the sources of post-​1970s regional design in the United States to two related trends. One is longstanding critique of urban sprawl. The other is the basic response opened up by this critique, the renewal of physical planning at the neighborhood and community level.When early social critiques of sprawl in the United States, such as William Whyte’s article “Urban Sprawl,” John Cheever’s novel Bullet Park, and even Joni Mitchell’s song Big Yellow Taxi and Pete Seeger’s song Little Boxes raised public consciousness to the extent that politicians were motivated to act. The earliest professional response, in the 1960s and 1970s, was growth management. While growth management did attempt to guide the location, form, and timing of growth, it did so using various legal mechanisms, such as performance zoning, tier systems, impact and development fees, environmental regulations, transferable development rights, land-​banking, and so on. Growth management through the 1980s did not rely on design as a tool. Exceptions, of course, occurred in the names of Ian McHarg and Ed Bacon, though they did not explicitly espouse growth management. McHarg’s book, Design with Nature, caused an international sensation and revolutionized the way landscape architecture and regional planning were taught. His approach used a design method that integrated, on a regional scale, environmental and other principal factors as determinants of where and how much development the land was able to support. The method identified the capacities of natural systems to absorb the impacts of human activities (McHarg 1969). Ed Bacon, whose career as Planning Director for the City of Philadelphia spanned four decades, and whose plan for the City of Brotherly Love got him on 20

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the cover of Time magazine, is perhaps best known for his book, The Design of Cities. This book describes how to direct and redirect growth within cities. This distinguished it from the mainstream of growth management, which had rural and suburban foci (Bacon 1967). Another exception was Kevin Lynch, whose lifelong work dealt with the design and form of cities. His major book about the regional scale was Managing the Sense of a Region (Lynch and Appleyard 1972). Yet Lynch did not focus on regional design, and only used the term once, in passing and without further explication, in all his voluminous writings (Lynch 1995). McHarg, Lynch, and Bacon inspired contemporary regional design. Each, in his own way, practiced a form of it in his professional work. Yet none had the complete, synthetic, comprehensive planning and design approach laid out by the founding fathers of regional planning –​ Olmsted, Geddes, and Howard more than a century ago. In between the two groups were significant examples of regional design in practice, notably the New  York Regional Plan Association’s (NYRPA) ten-​volume 1929–​1930 Plan for New  York and Environs and Patrick Abercrombie’s 1944 Greater London Plan. Continental cases followed, including the “Finger Plan” for Copenhagen and The Randstad (Ring City) Plan for urban Holland. Another compelling episode of regional design was the counter-​plan to the 1929 NYRPA plan, produced by a group of New York and New Jersey architects, planners, and intellectuals led by Lewis Mumford, and organized under the name of the Regional Plan Association of America. For an account, see Sussman’s Planning the Fourth Migration: The Neglected Vision of the Regional Planning Association of America (Sussman 1976).

Regional Design in Outline As an act of foresight and planning, regional design organizes growth, development, and redevelopment in and around existing and planned central places. There are several broad goals that can be attained using good regional design:  the efficient provision of basic public and commercial services (infrastructure and utilities, goods movement and communications); the protection of rural lands and sensitive natural environments; the support of agriculture, ranching, and other rural economic activities; and the redevelopment and revitalization of cities and other communities. As indicated above, regional design is an antidote to the post-​World War II sprawl pattern of development. The cumulative impacts of sprawl have had profound and pervasive effects on our communities and our lives. These far-​reaching impacts can be better managed using regional design, practitioners and politicians alike believe. Regional cooperation in guiding the ongoing development and redevelopment of communities of place is the thrust. Effective regional design can also allow for these benefits: • More sensitive consideration of existing resources and historic settlement patterns; • More equitable distribution of the benefits and costs of growth, both geographically and demographically; • More full-​service communities with a better geographic balance of jobs and housing, in which people can live, work, play, and feel a strong sense of belonging; and • Lower taxes, through the more efficient provision of public facilities and services, and lower social service and environmental protection costs. Regional design is the arrangement of human settlements in harmony with the regional landscape. It considers the way a system of places—​cities, towns, and villages—​is connected via infrastructure—​roads, transit, utilities, and communications pathways ‒ and cushioned from each 21

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other by large landscapes that allow the settlements to “breathe”—​river corridors, farmlands, parks, marshes, and other open spaces. This triad of central places, infrastructure linkages, and open spaces or environs provides the conceptual bulwark that shores up regional design. Regional design is the intentional act of shaping the physical form of human settlement patterns in geographic regions. It is a strategy to accommodate growth by providing a physical framework to determine or guide the most beneficial location, function, scale, and inter-​relationships of communities within a region. Regional design is a strategy that sets the course for action that guides and provides a framework for smaller scale decisions. Regional design is to community development and urbanism as urban design is to architecture. Just as all architects should be fluent in urban design, all urban designers and urbanists should be fluent with regional design. This strategic function of regional design distinguishes it from urban and regional planning, apart from its focus on physical form. Regional design is a potent strategy that can portray a vital vision of what a region can look like, and how to achieve it. This vision does not need to be singular. Regional design can produce several scenarios of the future, and array the impacts and benefits in order to better assess them in determining courses of action. Settlement and community development are local, and not regional in nature. People choose to live and work in places largely due to local characteristics. Nonetheless, all communities exist within a region and are influenced by it. Climate, topography, geography, culture, and economic patterns are, nowadays, regional phenomena. Whether an individual, in the course of choosing where and how to live, or a planning and design professional, in the course of shaping places to live; both intuitively and intentionally factor in regional features in their decision-​making. Thus, the next sections consider the regional aspects of regional design.

What is a Region? A region may be defined in many ways. From a territorial and spatial planning perspective, it is a contiguous territory that its inhabitants relate to through their activities. An urban region is where one lives and carries out most recurring activities (Friedmann and Weaver 1979). There are many types of regions. The differences in type depend on the activities that occur in them. Spatial planners work with housing regions, labor-​market regions, commuting regions, watershed regions, air quality regions, natural regions (ecosystems), geologic regions, and retail market regions, among others. Outside of planning there are various economic, political, and geographic regions. The geographic extent of the activities and physical characteristics that define the region demarcate its geographic extent, including terrestrial and aquatic areas. In defining regions suitably for design and planning purposes, one must consider the object of planning. While communities are often the objects of planning, it is important to look at the region as well. As communities exist within a region, their form and character are influenced by their region. Different types of regions affect their communities in different ways. Region types also exert their particular influences on the inter-​relationships of communities in a region, as well as the linkages that connect them and the environs that buffer them.

Types of Regions The distribution of people in a region, represented by their homes and workplaces, is characterized by the settlement pattern. Three types of regional settlement patterns are metropolitan, corridor, and rural. Listed below are general descriptions of these three types, several hybrids among them, and a new form that some call a mega-​city region. 22

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A Region is a Network of Components Whether metropolitan, corridor, or rural, a region is a network of central place communities which are connected by transport and communication linkages and surrounded by less intensely settled land. The three key physical components of regions are central places, linkages, and environs. Central places are communities of place that serve an outlying region. Linkages which connect communities may be transport links, communications channels, utilities, and infrastructure. Environs are the lands outside of central places. The intentional arrangement of these three physical components forms the foundation for regional design.

Metropolitan Regions Metropolitan areas are densely populated. Their buildings, roads, and spaces are bound together in a tightly woven “urban fabric.”They exhibit a greater diversity than corridor and rural regions. Metro areas possess a greater variety of jobs, housing options, educational and cultural opportunities, and a broader mix of people than other regions. Their economies are strongly linked to national and international economies. The focal point of a metropolitan area, in terms of concentration of activities, is usually one or more large central cities. However, the importance that central cities have has been weakening. In some cases there may be more than one downtown within a metro area. Another important characteristic of metropolitan regions is the relationship of their suburbs to their central cities. Historically, close-​in suburbs served as the bedrooms to their urban workplaces. More recently, suburbs have been oriented outward, toward other suburbs, or toward exurban and rural areas. Their links to the central city have also weakened, thus weakening the city and the entire metro area.While metro areas exert a distant reach, far beyond the contiguous built-​up area, for regional design purposes, a metropolitan region consists of the densely settled, contiguous areas.

Corridor Regions Corridor regions are areas surrounding linear transportation routes. Key communities are oriented along and bound together by the major transit corridor. Linear corridor regions typically extend from one metropolitan area to another, crossing suburbs and rural lands along the way. The focal point of this type of region is not a point at all. Rather, it is the transportation corridor that is the focal axis, or spine, of the region. A corridor region is anchored at either end by a city, or in the case of a short and small-​scale rural corridor, a town. Corridor regions can vary in scale and form from the Boston-​Washington Megalopolis to a highway linking two medium-​sized cities. Some corridor regions can also form arcs or loops, and can be defined by the outermost ring roads that circle large metropolises, some of which have two or even three rings. London, Madrid, and Houston are examples of three-​r ing cities. The lands in corridor regions reflect the wide range of settlement patterns of the areas they encompass. A  well-​known New Jersey USA corridor—​Princeton/​Route One—​has evolved during its history along the range of corridor types. Early on, discrete central place communities—​ Trenton, Princeton, New Brunswick—​were situated along the corridor and surrounded by open rural lands. More recently, the land between these communities has been developed. This development has been variously described as scattered, leapfrog, commercial strip, or sprawl. Land in a corridor region often forms a haphazard set of development patterns with disparate uses. Development is not interconnected to form a rich mosaic, as in a metropolitan region. Corridor region growth in the last few decades has occurred in rapid spurts. Nearby central places 23

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are connected by the corridor axis, and do not exhibit the rich articulation of connections in a well-​ developed metropolitan region. Much recent development in corridor regions has been weakly connected to its environs as well. These haphazard patterns result in offices that abut farmlands, and housing that is not near employment, commerce, and services. This new settlement pattern in corridor regions has precluded the formation of communities as they were formerly understood.

Rural Regions Rural regions typically consist of a system of towns, villages, and hamlets surrounded by open lands. The forests, farms, marshes, ranches, and other open lands that make up the environs surrounding rural settled places have fewer transport, utility, or communications lines crossing them. Settlement is concentrated in rural communities, and is sparse in the environs. An exemplary rural region is agricultural. It possesses large, contiguous tracts of farmland. It is peppered with rural communities. It is loosely crossed by two lane country roads, and occasionally, wider highways. A largely intact rural region has not suffered incursions by sprawl or a proliferation of linkages. Another type of rural region can be even more distant from urban centers. These may be called ecological or natural regions, although strictly speaking, those two terms can be misleading in this context. Terminology aside, North American examples of this sort of region include the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, the Everglades in Florida, and the New Jersey Pine Barrens.

Hybrid Regions Just as the once-​sharp edge between town and country has dissolved in sprawl, once-​distinct region types such as rural and metropolitan have dissolved into each other as well. At an extreme scale, a megalopolis, as described by geographer Jean Gottmann, is a linear corridor multi-​ metropolitan region. The original North American megalopolis stretched from Boston to Washington, encompassing ten states, 400 miles, and 50 million people. The Los Angeles-​San Diego-​Tijuana megalopolis is a corridor-​based Southern California megalopolis. A European corridor megalopolis is along the Rhine River in Germany, extending from Stuttgart to Dortmund. Like corridor regions, a megalopolis is anchored by two large cities or metropolises at either end (Gottmann 1961). Rural corridor regions tend to be more rectilinear than a metropolitan corridor region.They tend to follow geographic terrain such as river valleys. Classic examples include the Burgundy Valley in France or the Central Valley in California. The size of cities and towns in the rural corridors tend to be smaller than in urban corridor regions and megalopolises. This, however, is changing. In California’s Central Valley, population is projected to increase by ten million persons over the next 25 years. Once rural, now many high technology firms locate in the Central Valley to flee the skyrocketing land prices and costs of living in the San Francisco and Los Angeles areas. Other large-​scale multi-​metropolis regions follow the form of natural features such as bays. Tokyo, Yokohama, and Yokosuka ring Tokyo Bay, Japan with well over 35 million people. San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland ring San Francisco Bay with seven million. New mega-​cities sprawl in all directions over the landscape, covering 10,000 square miles or more. These giants, such as Mexico City, Sao Paolo, Buenos Aires, and Los Angeles can have 15–​20 million people or more. New types of mega-​cities are emerging, such as the triangular Houston-​Dallas-​Austin-​San Antonio multi-​plex in Texas, USA.This exploding region has over 13 million people spread over 57,500 square miles. San Antonio, Houston, and Dallas rank second, fourth, and fifth, respectively, among the fastest growing U.S. cities with populations exceeding one million, and Austin ranks 24

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as the third fastest growing U.S. city over 500,000. Dallas alone has grown at an average annual rate of over four percent from 1970 to the present (Ellis 1999). A characteristic that distinguishes new mega-​cities from older metropolises is population density and land and resource consumption. Los Angeles, Buenos Aires, and Sao Paolo have metropolis-​wide average population densities of about 2,000 per square mile. Compare that to Paris, London, New York, or Tokyo. Even the suburbs of New York, such as Hoboken, Union City, and Seacaucus have densities of 40,000 per square mile—​20 times more than the average in new mega-​cities. The implications for regional design are vast.

Communities of Place Communities of place are the cornerstones of regional design. To enhance the rich diversity of communities that pepper mature regions, and to create new communities, the regional design strategy organizes growth in and adjacent to existing and planned central places. In these places public and commercial services can be provided most efficiently. A regional design strategy also leverages existing links among communities. Communities of place are the focal points for settlement in regional design. One challenge facing established communities is to assure that their community character and identity are maintained as growth occurs. Regional design strives to provide for variety in the size and location of central places in order to achieve diversity and affordability in housing, public services, jobs, and quality environments. An element of regional design is the hierarchy of central places, which form a continuum from large cities to small hamlets. Specifically, a hierarchy of five central places consists of cities, regional or corridor centers, towns, villages, and hamlets. The size of a central place depends on the size of the region it serves. Small communities of place, such as neighborhoods, hamlets, and villages, serve a small area. Towns and corridor centers serve larger areas. Urban centers serve a metropolitan region, along with parts of outlying corridor and rural regions. From a planning and design point of view, physical features of communities of place are: • • • •

Compact development rather than low-​density or dispersed development; An inter-​related mixture of uses rather than single uses; A discernable core or central area that serves as a focus for activities; and Well-​defined boundaries, with the edges of communities preferably defined by open spaces.

These features and others allow a host of benefits to accrue: a sense of identity and belonging to a place; a rich perceptual experience; better access to jobs and services; more efficient provision of infrastructure; a heterogeneous community; increased social interaction; and increased community involvement by its citizens and businesspeople.

The Hierarchy of Communities of Place The hierarchy of central place communities forms a continuum from the largest settlements, urban centers, to the smallest, hamlets. They are described below.

Cities Cities are historic centers of government, industry, commerce, residence, and culture. These municipalities were built at high densities with a reliance on public transportation. They contain 25

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a significant number of jobs and households as well as a massive investment in public facilities and access to multiple transportation systems. Large-​scale activities occur in cities. They are repositories of major industrial concerns, corporate headquarters, medical centers, universities, government complexes, convention centers, museums, and other large institutions and facilities.These major activities occur in cities because of their central location within a large service region and their accessibility as the hub in a full-​ service transportation network.

Regional or Corridor Centers These centers exist outside of metro areas. Corridor centers are located along major transportation corridors. They are large, multi-​purpose settlements that absorb growth that would otherwise spill out into the countryside. They are accessible places that accommodate a significant number of employees and offer a diverse range of housing, shopping, services, and recreation. Corridor and regional centers are compact settlements with defined boundaries. Regional and corridor centers contain a mixture of uses at a smaller scale than those of a city do. Examples include day care, post office, schools, library, and other municipal services, hospital or medical clinic, hotels, a variety of retail and department stores as well as restaurants, supermarkets, professional offices, and banks. They are linked to corridor regions and urban centers by public transportation.

Towns Towns are the primary centers for growth that occurs in suburban and rural areas. They have a compact form, a distinct building design vocabulary, a central green, square, or common, and main street. Town cores contain retail, service, and office uses as well as community and service facilities. The core usually has an inter-​modal transportation stop or center. Towns are residential communities with all of the commercial and civic functions commonly needed on a daily basis, including supermarkets, grade schools, and a post office. They also serve people living in outlying areas. A town is composed of several neighborhoods which are within a short distance from the core. Neighborhoods have a lesser range of housing types and densities than regional centers or cities. Some apartments and offices may be freestanding or located above smaller shops in the center of town. Some or all of the following are found in towns: day care, post office, lower schools and perhaps middle and upper schools, fire police and other municipal services, as well as corner and convenience stores, cafes, restaurants, retail stores, supermarkets, banks, and professional offices. They include a town square and other public and private community meeting places and spaces.

Villages Villages are small settlements, typically less than 1,000 inhabitants, which accommodate small-​ scale structures and activities.They are intimate residential communities that offer the most basic employment, services, and shopping for their inhabitants, as well as for those living in nearby rural and exurban areas.Villages are less dense than towns, with less employment and fewer services. They are characterized by compact form, basic services within the village core, a distinct building design vocabulary, and a community focus (village green or commons, perhaps) that is

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defined by buildings. Larger villages may be served by inter-​community transit. Some community and social facilities are present. The periphery of the village is typically no more than a one-​quarter-​mile walk from the end of the commercial spine, village center, or main street. The highest density housing is located in the center, with the lower density on the outskirts. Housing and offices may be located above shops. A village is identifiable in the landscape by open spaces that surround it. Village facilities include day care, a post office, corner stores, cafes, a restaurant, a bank, and perhaps some offices. Their centers are bound together by village green or common, and have a defined nucleus and identifiable edges.

Hamlets Hamlets are the smallest scale rural settlements.These communities are primarily residential, and are even smaller than villages, with perhaps just a few homes and shops at a crossroads. Hamlets have a distinctive identity, and often possess a defined public space. A  hamlet has a compact nucleus with an intentional meeting place such as a green, tavern, day care, café, or post office, which distinguishes it from the standard residence-​only suburban subdivision in form, use, and character. Hamlets have their own building design vocabulary. Streets form a composite network. They are identifiable in the landscape as distinct settlements and are surrounded by open lands.

Linkages Linkages connect the communities of a region together into a network. They are pathways for people, goods, services, information, and energy to circulate about a region. This circulatory system may consist of transport links—​roads, rails, bikeways, bridges and tunnels, rivers, and air routes. Or communications conduits—​phones, computers, radio, television, facsimile, and emerging combinations. They may be functional or utility links—​water supply, sewers, power, solid waste. Links can also be environmental—​greenways, waterways, wildlife corridors, scenic corridors, beaches. These categories and lists are far from exhaustive. There are also economic, cultural, and historic linkages—​markets, houses of worship, school systems, professional associations, family ties, and the like. Linkages within a community serve a purpose similar to links among communities. While at a different scale, they bind the various functions of the community together. They are conduits to or for activities by which the residents come together.

Linkage Density and Capacity Different region types have different “densities” of linkages. Linkages in metropolitan regions are the most dense. The linkage “fabric” of streets and public transport, communication lines, and utilities is woven tightly. Rural region linkages are the least dense. They resemble a loose web with more space between strands. The density of corridor region linkages falls somewhere in between that of rural and metropolitan links, and tend to be linear. Keeping these arteries unclogged is vital to the health of the whole region. Providing for adequate capacity and managing its flow is one key to regional design. A  carrying capacity approach to establish linkage capacity, similar to that used for development, can be an effective tool to manage regional growth. Acceptable levels of service need to be established and maintained on conduits between central places.

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Combining Linkages In regional design, when connecting communities of place, consideration is given to combining rights-​of-​way into shared, multiple-​use rights-​of-​way. Functional linkages, especially utilities, are co-​located along existing transport or utility rights-​of-​way.The sharing of linkage rights-​of-​way saves acquisition and upkeep costs, keeps open lands intact, minimizes aesthetic disruption, and decreases the environmental consequences of their development. This approach builds on the “common carrier” notion used in telecommunications.

Growth-​leading Linkages Taken together, transportation, water, and wastewater disposal are “growth-​leading” infrastructure. All three need to exist in adequate capacity as a pre-​condition for community-​scale growth. Used wisely, growth-​leading infrastructure can be an effective growth management technique. Managing this infrastructure through the combined application of community service boundaries, impact fees, adequate capital facilities requirements, and timing and sequencing enables municipalities to get a grip on growth and its costs. In order to foster community growth at sustainable levels, the scale of infrastructure should match the community it serves. For example, sewage disposal methods should vary according to settlement size. On-​site systems are appropriate for small, low-​density hamlets and villages if soil and other hydro-​geologic conditions permit, and for sparse development dispersed in the rural environs. Regional sewer systems are more appropriate for large towns, regional centers, and metropolitan areas. Mid-​range community sewage disposal systems are viable for compact villages and small towns.

Environs The lands between central places exert a profound and pervasive influence on the communities they contain. The geography, demography, and natural resources of a region affect the size, function, and location of the settlements that mark its landscape. In order to plan effectively for central places, it is necessary to plan at the same time for the lands that surround them. The reciprocal relation between a place and its environs must be considered during planning and development. Environs differ from the central places by having less intense settlement than the central place itself.The less dense environ serves to define the “place” of the community and mark its borders. Activities ancillary to and supportive of the central places occur in the environs, such as high value agriculture, natural resource extraction, recreation, and other activities that require large tracts of land.

Metropolitan Environs Metropolitan regions are mosaics. They are made up of cities with their central business districts and neighborhoods, adjoining suburbs, parks, and transport, river and other corridors. Metropolitan environs are the extensions of their central and edge cities. The reach of their urban centers extends to encompass the activities that feed the economy of their region. Urban centers, both central business districts and edge cities, are the hubs for the linkages through which the region is interconnected.

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Corridor Environs Corridor environs are a relatively new phenomenon in the landscape. The primary impetus for corridor growth has been the massive highway construction beginning after World War II. Early corridor regions were based on passenger and freight railroad lines.These highways and rail lines extended radii out from the central cities into the open countryside or along coastlines. Couples with direct access to economic centers via prime transportation links, these corridors became the loci of unprecedented growth. Corridor growth was so rapid and complete that it connected areas that were formerly considered hinterlands to the metropolitan region. As a result of booming growth, services were unable to keep pace. Leapfrog development, not respecting prior community settlement form, ensued. Accordingly, contemporary corridor environs mostly are comprised of single-​use, poorly connected developments that are scattered loosely among open or partly developed lands.

Rural Environs Rural environs are those open farm and natural lands which have remained mostly intact in the face of sprawl. The predominant settlements are rural towns, villages, and hamlets that dot an otherwise open landscape. Economic activities in the past were tied to the land or its natural resources. Recently, housing and office/​research campuses for urban and corridor-​housed workers have been located in them, scattered about in low-​r ise buildings on sites with low floor area ratios. In the past, natural features and agriculture have formed the character of rural lands. Land and water were resilient enough to sustain sparse, primarily residential, development without damage to the environment. Certain features of the rural landscape had inherent capacities that were not exceeded, so that low levels of growth were sustained over time. These features included indigenous water supply, soils, slopes and other geologic features, the rural road network, and the prevailing rural character. Now that has changed, as many types of infrastructure at urban intensities have spread throughout the countryside, often irrevocably changing its rural character. Changing this growth pattern is one of the more difficult challenges for regional design.

The State of the Art There have been several advances to regional design since its rebirth in the late 1980s with the New Jersey State Plan. It is instructive to note that these advances have come at the hands of practitioners, not academics. It is also noteworthy that innovations have occurred in the metropolitan realm, orchestrated by both non-​governmental and governmental regional entities. This part of my exegesis concentrates on the United States, with some examples from Europe. Precursors to a fully articulated regional design program were manifest in the 1980s. Taking cues from Kevin Lynch’s pioneering work in San Diego, the interdisciplinary design firm Carr Lynch Hack and Sandell undertook several regional design projects for American clients (Lynch and Appleyard 1972). Much of this work was led by Gary Hack, former dean at the University of Pennsylvania. Robert Yaro and a group of collaborators in Massachusetts prepared a design manual titled Dealing with Change in the Connecticut River Valley in rural New England (Yaro, et al. 1988). The Portland metropolitan area began its studies and plans that became the predecessors to the Portland Metropolitan Plan of the 1990s.

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Regional design as conceived in this article was developed by the New Jersey Office of State Planning. It constituted a Regional System Advisory Committee composed of 20 scholars, practitioners, and special interest group representatives. The physical framework for regional design as outlined herein is taken from the document produced by the Office of State Planning for the Committee, of which I was the primary author (New Jersey Office of State Planning 1990). Shortly thereafter, the Regional Plan Association of New York embarked on its third regional plan. At the outset of its journey, it engaged in a three-​day colloquium and design charette to establish a strategy for its plan. Some 25 national leaders in the field were gathered by Bob Yaro, then Executive Director of the RPA, including Peter Calthorpe, Tom Cooke, Robert Stern, and myself. The group was chaired by Robert Geddes, founder of the design firm GBQC and then Dean of Architecture at Princeton University. On the first day, after I  shared my vision of regional design, fresh off the New Jersey front, Dean Geddes interjected that “a region can not be designed.” That comment notwithstanding, at the conclusion of the three-​day charette, regional design emerged as the operative framework for the plan-​to-​be. The plan, adopted in 1996, reflects an extraordinary synthesis of thousands of collaborators in a regional civic milieu over a five-​year period (Yaro and Hiss 1996). It is through intensive region-wide collaboration in a defined institutional context that distinguishes regional design from architectural design or urban design. The scale of the latter two permits an individual designer to be the identified “author.” The scale and complexity of regions today mitigate against such single authorship, even though the earliest regional plans and designs in the U.S. had been authored by individuals, such as the New York State Plan in 1926 by Henry Wright and the Appalachian Trail plan of the same era by Benton MacKaye. Even the first Regional Plan for New York and Environs was implemented nearly single-​handedly by Robert Moses. In 1991 the National Endowment for the Arts awarded a grant to the New Jersey Office of State Planning to further develop regional design and prepare a film about it. It was co-​produced with the Regional Plan Association of New York. After this grant and the New Jersey State and New York Regional Plans came, in rapid succession, the new Regional Design Committee of the Boston Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA), the reforming and renaming of the national AIA Committee on Urban Design to Regional and Urban Design, and numerous books and articles on the subject (Lewis 1996, Kelbaugh 1997, Thompson and Steiner 1997). Regional design has become a fixture in the imagination and practice of planning and design professionals nationwide. In Europe, especially in the southern countries with long traditions of urban planning being done exclusively by architects, such as Spain and Italy, regional design also has had a renaissance. Madrid’s regional government, the Communidad Autónoma de Madrid, prepared a regional design plan in the 1990s called the Plan Regional de Estratégia Territorial—​a somewhat confusing double pleonasm which translates as the Regional Plan of Territorial Strategy (Neuman 1995, 1996).

Implications of the Regional Design Imperative Today, mobility and choice are two tenets that the fortunate among us live by. This is especially evident in periods of economic wealth and abundance. “Press one for more options” is much more than a recorded prompt; it is a near mantra for the affluent. What does this mean for regional design and its practitioners? Add to the mix dual-​income households, individuals who work more than one job, the rise of home-​based work and free-​lance and temporary labor, and the panoply of portable digital telecommunications technology, of which cellular phones and mobile phones are just the tip of 30

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the iceberg, and we get a sense of just how different metro regions are today compared to just 20 years ago, much less a century ago when regional design first appeared as a professional practice. In an era when globetrotting executives and professionals can spend more time in planes, airports, and cars than at home or office, how does this affect the shape of a region? Global cities such as New York, London, and Tokyo are in many ways more connected to each other, and to financial command centers in cities such as Los Angeles, Paris, Hong Kong, and Sao Paolo than they are to their own states and provinces.The very sense of what is a region is shifting rapidly in this global context. Amidst these massive movements, the players at the regional design table come and go as befits their strategies. For many of them, especially recent arrivals steeped in global business and political affairs rather than city planning, regional design occupies an ancillary portion of their thinking, if at all. This means that to effectuate regional design, institutional design becomes paramount. Europeans have an advantage over North Americans in regional institutional design because many countries on the continent have provincial and/​or regional governments that can and do coordinate and execute regional planning.There are few cases in North America where effective regional governance and planning have established track records. Among the few, Toronto, San Diego, Portland, Minneapolis-​St. Paul, Lake Tahoe, and the New Jersey Pinelands stand out. Each has taken a dramatically different tack to institutional design and to regional design. While explaining and exploring institutional design is beyond the scope of this article, when it is contemporaneous with regional design, the latter has a better chance to be effective. Regional design is becoming the next frontier for planning and design professionals. When coupled with institutional design, regional design can move from frontier to franchise.

Note 1. This chapter is an expanded and updated version of Neuman’s “Regional Design” published in Landscape and Urban Planning, 47, 115–​28, 2000.

References Bacon, E. (1967). Design of Cities. New York: Viking. Burnham, D. and Bennett, E. (1993) (1909). The Plan of Chicago. Edited by Charles Moore. New York: Princeton Architectural Press. Calthorpe, P. (1993). The Next American Metropolis. New York: Princeton Architectural Press. Castells, M. (2010). The Rise of the Network Society, 2nd Edition. Chichester: Wiley-​Blackwell. Cheever, J. (1969). Bullet Park. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. Ellis, C. (1999). Megacities: Emergence and Issues of the Texas Urban Triangle. Unpublished manuscript. Friedmann, J. and Weaver, C. (1979). Territory and Function: The Evolution of Regional Planning. London: Edward Arnold. Garreau, J. (1991). Edge Cities: Life on the Frontier. New York: Doubleday. Geddes, P. (1915). Cities in Evolution. London: Williams and Norgate. Gottman, J. (1961). Megalopolis: The Urbanized Northeastern Seaboard of the United States. New York: Twentieth Century Fund. Gottmann, J. (1974). The Evolution of Urban Centrality: Orientations for Research Research Papers 8, School of Geography, Oxford: Oxford University. Hall, P. (1988). Cities of Tomorrow: An Intellectual History of Urban Planning and Design in the Twentieth Century. Oxford and New York: Basil Blackwell. Healey, P., Khakee, A., Motte, A., and Needham, B. (eds.) (1997). Making Strategic Spatial Plans: Innovation in Europe. London: University College London Press. Hough, M. (1990). Out of Place: Restoring Identity to the Regional Landscape. New Haven: Yale University Press. Howard, E. (1898). To-​morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform. London: Swan Sonnenschein. Jacobs, J. (1984). Cities and the Wealth of Nations: Principles of Economic Life. New York: Random House. 31

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Kelbaugh, D. (1997). Common Place:  Toward Neighborhood and Regional Design. Seattle:  University of Washington Press. Kramer, R. (1996). Organizing for Global Competitiveness:  The European Regional Design. New  York:  The Conference Board. Kropotkin, P. (1913). Fields, Factories and Workshops: Or Industry Combined with Agriculture and Brain Work with Manual Work. New York: G.B. Putnam’s Sons. Lewis, P. (1996). Tomorrow by Design:  A Regional Design Process for Sustainability. New  York:  John Wiley & Sons. Lynch, K. (1962). Site Planning. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Lynch, K. (1995). City Sense and City Design Writings and Projects of Kevin Lynch. Edited by Tridib Banerjee and Michael Southworth. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Lynch, K. and Appleyard, D. (1972). Managing the Sense of a Region. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Markusen, A. (1987). Regions: The Economics and Politics of Territory. Totowa, NJ: Rowan and Littlefield. McHarg, I. (1969). Design with Nature. Garden City, NY: Doubleday/​Natural History Press. Mitchell, J. (1970). “Big Yellow Taxi.” Ladies of the Canyon. New York: Reprise Records. Neuman, M. (1996). Images as institution builders: Metropolitan planning in Madrid. European Planning Studies, 4(3), 293–​312; also in Healey, P., Khakee, A., Motte, A., and Needham, B. (eds.) (1997), Making Strategic Spatial Plans: Innovation in Europe. London: University College London Press. Neuman, M. (1995). La Imagen y La Ciudad. Ciudad y Territorio, III(104), 377–​94. New Jersey Office of State Planning. (1990). The Regional Design System. Trenton: The New Jersey Office of State Planning. New Jersey State Planning Commission. (1992). Communities of Place: The New Jersey State Development and Redevelopment Plan. Trenton: New Jersey State Planning Commission. Philadelphia City Planning Commission. (1960). Comprehensive Plan: The Physical Development Plan for the City of Philadelphia. Philadelphia City Planning Commission. Draft. Ed Bacon’s rendering of Philadelphia is in the 1963 version. San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG). (1994). Regional Growth Management Strategy. San Diego: SANDAG. Sassen, S. (1991). The Global City: New York, London,Tokyo. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Saxenian, A. (1994). Regional Advantage: Culture and Competition in Silicon Valley and Route 128. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Scott, A. (2019). City-​regions reconsidered. Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space, 51(3), 554–​80. Sussman, C. (ed.) (1976). Planning the Fourth Migration: The Neglected Vision of the Regional Planning Association of America. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Thompson, G. and Steiner, F. (1997). Ecological Design and Planning. New York: John Wiley. Whyte,W. (1957). Urban sprawl. In: The Exploding Metropolis. Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, 115–​39. Yaro, R. and Hiss, T. (1996). A Region at Risk. New York: Regional Plan Association. Yaro, R., Arendt, R., Dodson, H., and Brabec, E. (1988). Dealing with Change in the Connecticut River Valley: A Design Manual for Conservation and Development. Cambridge, MA: Lincoln Institute for Land Policy.

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2 European History and Traditions Revisiting the European Spatial Development Perspective Andreas Faludi

Introduction This chapter is about spatial planning at scales up to that of the European Union (EU). More in particular, it is about the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) of the 1990s, the closest to a regional design for the EU territory. However, contrary to what one might expect, it was not of the EU. Rather, it was of member states wanting to get a handle on EU policies relevant to the development of their territories. Their concern was to prevent such policies where they hit the ground to be at cross-​purposes with each other. More generally speaking, they wanted to bend EU policies to suit their preferences. In this roundabout way, although not of the EU, the ESDP was about EU matters. However, rather than formulating a truly joint vision, each member state looked after its own interests. So, with polycentric development the only recommendation with potential resonance in terms of regional design at the EU scale, when adopted in 1999 as a spatial strategy, the ESDP fell short of expectations.To rebalance the situation more in favor of a truly joint approach, an EU shared competence for “territorial cohesion” was introduced. However, by the time this came to pass—​2009—​the emphasis had shifted away from one overall strategy to initiatives of various types and at various scales.Taken together, they form a “cloud” of, often overlapping schemes. This seems symptomatic for the very nature of the EU as a diffuse construct. Which points to the fact that anything about the EU can be—​and often is—​controversial. Which also applies to whether a regional design at the scale of the EU would be desirable, indeed, admissible. But I had better divulge my prejudices up front: I am critical of the role of member states in European integration. Having said this, I am not for an all-​powerful EU—​the European super-​state which many paint on the wall—​either. Supra-​national polities merely replicate national units on a higher scale (Elkins 1995). Increasing the scale of thinking and acting is not his way of thinking, nor is it mine. In fact, he says, even if the process of globalization were to encompass a world government and worldwide free trade, it would be a less radical change … than what I have suggested is under way—​the demise of territory as the sole basis of political units and the consequent decline of all-​purpose political units, especially nations. (Elkins 1995, 28) 33

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Elkins goes on to say that “we have not yet witnessed the transition away from the assumptions that a nation-​state must have territory and that the territory should be contiguous, continuous, and exclusive” (Elkins 1995, 22–​3). There are others of the same persuasion. Thus, Treitschke (2006, 27) foresees a future, post-​ Westphalian post-​modern system. Which would not mean the end of territoriality, famously defined by Sack (1986, 19) as “the attempt … to affect, influence, or control people, phenomena, and relationships, by delimiting and asserting control over a geographical area.” What it would mean is the end of the state monopoly on the exercise of territoriality. Which is only to the best. Known for coining the term multi-​level governance, Marks (1992, 223) says after all that the ideal type of a state “rooted in the monopolistic control of the legitimate means of coercion within some given territory, reveals less and less about the realities of political power and decisionmaking in Western Europe.” None of this was clear to me when we were researching The Making of the European Spatial Development Perspective (Faludi and Waterhout 2002). What we did realize was that always seeing European matters through the lens of the nation-​state was unhelpful. But we did not get further than exulting the role of networking and mutual learning through the formation of a multitude of cross-​national working groups. For a long time, this remained my mantra: The “learning machine” according to the way that I described European planning (Faludi 2008) would lead to more positive attitudes towards integration. Later, I would say that the “Europeanisation” of planning through learning might eventually lead to it becoming part of the European policy-​ making state: its “EUropeanisation” (Faludi 2014). But it also began to dawn on me that, even if we did allow it to work as intended—​which we do not—​the EU would remain the type of all-​purpose territorial political unit which Elkins criticizes. This was the message of my critique of The Poverty of Territorialism (Faludi 2018), written before I had come across Elkins. Now, the end of territorialism need not mean the end of regional design as an activity. Far from it! Territories no longer being contiguous, continuous, and exclusive—​see once more the epitaph above—​merely means that there can be no overall masterplans. But stakeholders in development would still produce design schemes to support their deliberations and actions. Since stakeholders come in various shapes and sizes, their schemes between them form a cloud of designs, none of them superior to the others, but together enriching the dialogue about spatial development will be the argument of this chapter. So much for a position reached after studying European spatial planning for, give-​and-​take, a quarter of a century. Wishing to learn about alternative views to mine, one can do no better than turn to Richard H. (Dick) Williams’ classic European Spatial Policy and Planning.With others, when it came out I  took his work as a pioneer in matters of European planning as a guide. Observing that spatial policies were linked to issues “concerning powers of EU institutions, EMU, sovereignty, the rhetoric of a Europe of regions and eastward enlargement,” Williams (1996, 264) saw a challenge to our imagination. He averred that European integration required “not only new governmental structures and physical infrastructure but also mental maps … It is necessary for policy-​makers to learn to think European” (Williams 1996, 265). This meant conceptualizing a continental-​scale jurisdiction and planning subject. If so, EU-​level spatial planning could result in some masterplan for its common territory. But if the EU were no continental jurisdiction, then what? Answering this question I  leave for later. Recognizing early on that such a jurisdiction would be a tall order, when studying its making, I was still expecting more agreement among the makers of the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP; CEC 1999) than I found. True, the document concerned the common territory of the, initially 12 and eventually 15, EU member states at the time of its making. Was this, their common territory, like that of a putative 34

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federal state? If so, thinking in terms of some regional design—​a kind of masterplan—​might have been appropriate.This would mean the planners’ task being to conceptualize the shape and exploring the potentials of the common territory. In fact, the makers of the ESDP were more concerned with who owned that joint territory. Were not they, the member states, the true owners? Or was the owner the European Union, then still styled the European Community? If the latter, then the European Commission as its executive arm might have a say over it. See here the issue. After setting the scene, I first specify the crucial distinction between regional design for a territory on the one hand and a cloud of designs for overlapping spaces on the other. Then I expose the lack of success of the ESDP in presenting anything like a regional design for the territory of the EU. This I follow by an account of the attempts of the European Commission to launch a new concept, territorial cohesion. It would justify pursuing a common EU policy, was the thought. But due to circumstances—​territorial cohesion becoming part of the ill-​fated attempt to agree on a “Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe”—​the legislative process was unduly long. Momentum got lost. Instead of one overall territorial cohesion strategy that could have taken the place of the ESDP led by the member states, we can discern the cloud of designs I alluded to. This cloud covers the EU territory in disorderly fashion, leaving here and there gaps in its coverage.

EU-​level Regional Design Before showing that in terms of Neuman and Zonneveld (2018; see also their introduction to this volume), EU spatial planning is no example of regional design taking the shape of a masterplan, I discuss what, according to these authors, regional design is meant to be: A way of dealing with—​amongst others—​housing affordability, social-​spatial inequity, traffic congestion, and air and water pollution at above the urban scale, a fact turning many of the issues involved into national and international matters. Pertinent regions crossing “political borders, including national ones … makes governance more difficult” (Neuman and Zonneveld 2018, 9). Which is why conventional planning scales and approaches reflecting the extant government hierarchy prove inadequate. So with statutory planning, the two authors say, and because such planning omits flows. One more reason is that, bound by the powers of some territorial authority, the reach of statutory planning ends at the borders. Hope must therefore be vested in regional governance. It is, or should be, better able to deal with borders becoming blurred, losing some, if not all their significance as dividers.This blurring of borders is central to European integration. Cross-​border and transnational planning initiatives “can be traced back to the origins of spatial planning in the Netherlands, Germany and France, and its transference to the EU in the 1980s and 1990s” (Neuman and Zonneveld 2018, 10). Indeed, a small band of planners from these countries has been germane also to the story below. But note that about EU-​level regional design, in their paper the present editors are more optimistic than I am: Where regional design is accompanied by complementary designs of regional governance, together they can fill the gaps in contemporary spatial planning by developing more effective regional laws, policies and integrative processes; if not full-​blown regional institutions.These can enable the establishment and implementation of development and financial mechanisms for infrastructure investment, which in turn lessen regional inequalities, and for protection of regional land resources. While it may be useful in selected planes to establish regional government, it is not necessary. (Neuman and Zonneveld 2018, 10) 35

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So, while not strictly necessary, full-​ blown regional institutions—​ regional governments—​ make regional design easier. Unfortunately, this has proved illusory. We should think rather in terms of governance, the authors say. Quoting me in Faludi (2013) where I discuss multi-​level governance—​including the work of Gary Marks quoted above—​they see the level of complexity as illustrating the inadequacies of thinking exclusively in terms of governmental levels. So, paraphrasing Geertz (1983), Neuman and Zonneveld (2018, 11) conclude: “Regional networks of governing institutions can seem not to be orderly, yet we can see that they are indispensable.” Surely, this wisdom has not been applied in the ESDP process of the 1990s. Rather, its makers, as much as its distractors, have seen the ESDP as a kind of regional design for a putative EU territory. What they have not done, therefore, is conceive of it—​see above—​as the formation of a governance network with a disorderly outcome as a true reflection of existing complexity. Instead, its makers have been looking for bringing order into spatial development by means of some macro-​level regional design, or masterplan. Whilst this was the case, they could also not help thinking of it as a potential instrument of EU government. And because they rejected the thought, the planners from the member states decided on doing a scheme of their own, inter-​ governmentally, as the saying went.Which carried within it the seeds of failure.The next section gives a very brief account of the story.

The ESDP: No Masterplan1 Had the EU owned its territory, it could of course have ventured to make a masterplan of sorts. But its members were sovereign states. Could “Brussels” interfere with their decisions concerning land use and development? For this, the EU would have needed what is called a competence, EU jargon for a legal mandate. If so, the European Commission as its executive arm could submit proposals for the Council of Minister’s approval. But there was no clause in the treaty referring to spatial planning. As the Germans pointed out, this meant that the EU had no business in it. True, the Treaty of Maastricht then in force said: “The Union shall be served by a single institutional framework which shall ensure the consistency (the French text talks about cohérence‒AF) and the continuity of the activities carried out.” This might be construed to mean in the least the duty to have some strategy for—​or vision of—​its joint territory. This to ensure the consistency, or—​following the French text—​the coherence of relevant EU policies. The Commission made the same point, but without invoking this treaty clause. It did not need to. As a highly professional organization, striving for consistency and continuity of its actions was in its blood, so to say. However, the Commission is also large and diverse. Consistency and continuity need to be watched. Who is responsible? Theoretically, the College of Commissioners, but of course only in general terms. Prior to its regular weekly meetings, their political cabinets and top Commission officials engage in a flurry of activities to smooth out issues arising. But this form of coordination is political rather than technical.The directorates-​general—​not the same in number as the Commissioners—​are also a diverse group, with each dealing with different lobby organizations and national ministries as their interlocutors. Predictably, they do not always see eye to eye. More, there are “space-​blind” versus “space-​based” approaches (McCann 2015). The latter seems to ask for no less than a form of spatial planning. Under the former, such planning is anathema. The reference point as far as European spatial planning is concerned was what until not long ago was called the directorate-​general for Regional Policy. (Currently, it goes by the name of directorate-​general for Regional and Urban Policy.) Watching over the consistency and continuity of policies relating to the EU’s regions, it would need all the support it could get in dealing with, what in planning jargon are called the sectors: for example, transport, environment, and 36

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agriculture, all of them impacting on spatial development at whatever scale. If the directorate-​ general for Regional Policy were to undertake the coordination of these policy, member states could hardly object on grounds of a lack of competences. After all, these sectors pursue ongoing EU policies foreseen in the EU treaties, having—​often inadequate, but this is a different matter—​ budgets at their disposal. The directorate-​general for Regional Policy might even have hoped for planners from the member states to ask for some overall EU strategy safeguarding the consistency and continuity of relevant EU policies. Such might have been the reasoning of the Commission’s point man on the matter, French career official Jean-​Charles Leygues, in office during the 1990s until when he, and other top officials from the “old” member states, made room for colleagues from the new ones in the mid-​2000s. Why mention his being French? Because the Commission’s style of thinking, more in particular that of the directorate-​general for Regional Policy at the time, was French. Also, as a member of the cabinet of Jacques Delors, French President of the European Commission from 1985–​1995, Leygues had helped shape the EU’s new—​French-​style—​regional policy, working as it did—​and does—​with medium-​term financial contracts. Taking charge of the very EU regional policy which he had helped shaping, Leygues may have thought of something like the ESDP as a scheme for managing the much enhanced European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) targeting the less developed regions (but not only those). In fact, a select few national planners were quietly suggesting precisely that. But when it came to involving representatives from all (initially 12) member states in forming a Committee on Spatial Development (CSD), they were not doing so on the Commission’s terms. Thus, they were not willing to become what is called a so-​called Comitology group of experts working for the Commission, Comitology being EU jargon for the large number of groups meeting routinely and at the pleasure of the Commission to advise on EU policy. The story of the refusal of the planners from the member states to do so has been told before.2 Instead of working as a Comitology group, the CSD gave advice to national ministers on matters of joint planning. It was the CSD that also proposed formulating the ESDP, something which took them from 1993 when the plan to do so was hedged until 1999, during which period the Commission supported the CSD through paying, for instance, the costs of traveling of its member and translation costs. Conceivably, the Commission did this because it expected eventually to be granted its due role as initiator of EU policy. This is how one might also read the fact that, two years into the preparation of the ESDP, and probably on Leygues’ instigation, the then Regional Policy Commissioner Monika Wulf-​ Mathies (1995) proposed a method of analysis and co-​ordination for policies having an impact on the territory making it possible to define the adjustments inherent to the envisaged exercise of coordination and of coherence … Within the usual framework of partnership … [the Commission ‒ AF] will proceed to an operational implementation through its structural policies. Note the term coherence as in the (French version of) the Maastricht Treaty. Clearly, the Commission sees its business as ensuring consistency and continuity of EU policies. But consider also that, even if by that one were to understand an authoritative statement on the future of spatial development, then a scheme of this kind would hardly amount to a master plan.The concern of the directorate-​general Regional Policy was more focused on what, next to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), was the EU’s most important investment policy, what has once been EU regional policy and is now going under the flag of cohesion policy. 37

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Cohesion policy is closer to French-​ style aménagement du territoire—​ the term to be explained—​than to spatial planning German and Dutch-​style with more affinity with regional design. Aménagement du territoire works through targeting state investments directly to regions. So, not only was the point man, Jean-​Charles Leygues, French, so were the procedures for administering EU regional policy. In fact, they have a cunning resemblance to the Contrats de plan État-​région: multi-​annual agreements between the central government and the regions with which aménagement du territoire works. At national level, France has in fact never engaged in spatial planning. It rather works with general ideas concerning the distribution of economic activity throughout the Hexagon, so-​ called because of the idealized shape of the French territory. Based on the evocative notion, still reverberating with the gilets jaunes demonstrating against the Parisian elites in 2019, of the capital region sucking the periphery empty (see Gravier 1947, Paris et le desert français), aménagement du territoire targets regional investments so as to rebalance the French territory. Which reflects commitment to égalité républicaine, territorializing one of the battle cries of the French Revolution: Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité. Transposing égalité républicaine onto the EU level, the third Cohesion Report published under Michel Barnier—​of whom more below—​thus stated that people “should not be disadvantaged by where they happen to live or work in the Union” (CEC 2004, 27). But there was some meeting of minds between French and German planners. Through his contacts, the then Délégué—​the appointee of the national government to the Délegation à l’àmenagement du territoire et à l’action régionale (Datar, the French planning agency)—​Jean-​Louis Guigou knew about the spatial planning principles for the development of the reunited Federal Republic of Germany (for literature in English see Harrison and Growe 2014). These principles referred to urban development, environment and land use, transport, European integration, as well as the ways of promoting and controlling spatial development. Having learned about them, he was proposing something similar for France (Guigou 1995). But a real synthesis of German and French thinking never came to pass, neither in France where in 2002 there was a change of government with Guigou leaving his post, nor on EU level where national planners had taken charge of the ESDP. These national planners wished above all to influence EU policies as they related to space. The implication seemed that, just as Leygues must have had in mind, EU policies should fit into some overall scheme.True, but national planners had a different kind of scheme in mind.That of Leygue—​see above—​was built on abstract notions of territorial equity and administrative logic. The trademark of spatial planners mainly, as they were, from north-​west Europe, was managing spatial development by means of plans for the territories for which they were responsible, plans that could ultimately have served as the basis for controlling the use of land. Land-​use control was of course a matter firstly for local authorities. In some countries like Germany and the Netherlands overall schemes at regional level existed. Few planners had experience with planning at the national level though, let alone thought about the EU. In this respect, the Dutch, the Danish and the Germans were exceptions. And they had ambitions to apply their relevant skills at EU level.The Dutch had mooted the idea even whilst the European Community was still tooling up (Zonneveld 2018).There was also general sympathy for European integration. But soon the idea gained ground that EU policies should be bent more towards meeting national preferences. The Germans more than anybody else insisted on European spatial planning being a matter of collaboration between member states. During the preparation of the Treaty of Amsterdam, the Germans would go still further, taking the—​unsuccessful—​initiative to formally require EU policies to heed scheme like the ESDP prepared by the member states. They proposed for the CSD to become a working group 38

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under the Council of Ministers. But the Council of Ministers cannot take legislative initiatives. That’s the privilege of the Commission. Which is why it had wanted to form a Comitology group working on its terms. As the reader knows however, the CSD had refused to become one such, hence its status in a legal limbo. The initiative, based on German practices of formulating EU policies from the bottom-​ up, thus died in its tracks. Formally speaking, the ESDP was continuing to be prepared by the ministers responsible for spatial planning. Sometimes their meetings were misrepresented as informal “Councils of Ministers.” Informal Councils of Ministers are formations of the Council of Minister proper meeting (at the invitation of the member state holding the rotating presidency) away from either Brussels or Luxembourg City, its two official seats. If so, Councils of Ministers cannot take formal decisions, hence their designation as informal. Anyhow, since the member states themselves had insisted that spatial planning was no EU business, the Council of Ministers was never in the picture. The ministers meeting on matters of European planning were thus in a legal limbo, and so was the CSD. When it eventually appeared, so was the “intergovernmental” ESDP. In fact, of course, the ESD had been prepared, not by the ministers but by national planners on the CSD. And there was always cooperation with Commission officials. The ESDP itself culminated in a list of no less than 60 “policy aims and options” which was all member states could agree on. So, the ESDP was a long way off from any kind of regional design—​let alone a masterplan—​for the joint territory of the member states, coinciding, as it was, with the EU territory. As it says something about the desired pattern of cities across the European territory, only one of the “policy aims and options,” polycentric development as a concept had potential resonance in some form of regional design for the EU. For the rest, representing the member states, planners were thinking, not about the joint territory, but about their own national territories in a European context. Where planners seemed willing to look beyond national interests, they could be called to order during preliminary internal deliberations. This happened to a Dutch planner willing to talk about the position of the Port of Rotterdam. Considering the Dutch position of a trading nation, relevant ministries were in no mood to even consider whether other ports were better placed to receive the flow of goods from the Far East. France had yet another concern. That country saw the center of gravity in an EU expanding towards Central and Eastern Europe shifting towards Germany. The latter country in turn was absorbed by trying to integrate the former German Democratic Republic. Austria feared its Alpine valleys coming under yet more pressure from heavy goods traffic. Not for the first time, Italy drew attention to the plight of its Mezzogiorno, peripheral as it was to the European core. In fact, Sweden and Finland, too, played this card. To illustrate the unwillingness to consider the EU territory as such, when the Dutch were preparing the first 1997 draft of the ESDP, they marked the core of Europe on a map around the mouth of the River Rhine. But Spain, seconded by Finland, insisted that this draft map “discriminated” against them. Never mind that both owed their preferential treatment under EU regional policy to their respective positions away from the European core: that core was not to be shown on the map. Which nipped the prospect of a European regional scheme in the bud. Instead of maps usually associated with regional design, the policy principles of the ESDP are illustrated by means of icons visualizing basic ideas but without any reference to concrete areas. Apart from some analytical maps which appeared in the appendix, any other sorts of maps were simply out of the question. It follows that the final version of the ESDP no longer represented anything like a planning scheme for Europe. In its pretence at regional design, the intergovernmental ESDP had failed. 39

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Figure 2.1  European macro-​regions

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Sensitivity to their peripherality being shown on maps apart, major recipients of the Structural Funds, Greece, Italy, Spain, and Portugal, had some more concerns. They were apprehensive of an ESDP spearheaded, as it was, by north-​west Europeans leading to yet more conditions being imposed on their use of the structural funds. Moreover, planning systems and policies throughout Europe were very different, as shown in the so-​called Compendium of Planning Systems and Policies (CEC 1997) and confirmed by the recent COMPASS project funded by ESPON: the European Spatial Planning Observation Network pointing out the obvious, namely that spatial planning broadly conceived was ubiquitous in Europe: “Territorial governance and spatial planning systems in Europe are diverse. Their characteristics reflect the differences in planning traditions in Europe arising from their administrative, legal and cultural roots” (ESPON 2018, 77). Another problem was the relation with, in particular EU regional policy. As mentioned, French planning—​aménagement du territoire—​was similar—​or rather the other way around: EU regional policy was modeled on French thinking and practices. In this respect, the contrast with Germany was stark. German planning was about Raumordnung, literally the ordering of space, ultimately through statutory planning.Which required a form of regional design, but always with a view to using such statutory instruments as were available for influencing land-​use decisions. Regional policy as against this was the province of economic ministries, both at federal as well as at the level of the 16 German Länder. Potentially, land-​use planners interfered with economic policy, so the relation was an adversary one. And the economics ministries of the Länder, under the leadership of the federal one, were not at all amused by their planning colleagues working on the European scale.They did not like EU competition policy restricting their ability to promote regional development. It meant that they could promote only such developments which conformed to the EU’s own policies. Where subsidies were found to be excessive, like some funds for Volkswagen building factories in the former German Democratic Republic, the Commission revoked them. So, to repeat, the ESDP did not amount to much in terms of regional design. It was not specific enough to ensure consistency and continuity of EU policies. No sooner than it was out, in 1999, the Commission ceased its mainly logistic support for the work of the CSD. It took another initiative, to be discussed next, of floating territorial cohesion as a new EU competence.

Territorial Cohesion: Waning Ambitions The ESDP ended in a flurry of activities intended to feed into an expected follow-​up. But the Commission’s withdrawal of support put a damper on this. Two parallel streams of activity, each eventually gaining Commission support, gathered steam: (1) Adding another string to the bow of the Community Initiative “Interreg” to generate experience in, and hopefully enthusiasm for, transnational planning, while Interreg so far had just stimulated cross-​border cooperation, which is a few spatial scales down the ladder; (2) The European Spatial Planning Observation Network (ESPON), already mentioned for having produced COMPASS. As the name suggests, its role was providing the—​sorely needed—​evidence base for European spatial planning. Soon, both initiatives became part of the budding policy to promote territorial cohesion as the new, third string next to economic and social cohesion to the bow of EU cohesion policy. What had united national planners before had been their felt need—​perhaps against their professional opinions suggesting to them to pursue spatial relations wherever it takes them—​to ringfence national territories. This is like the current debate about handling Chinese overtures for European states to sign up to the Chinese “Belt and Road” initiative. Surely, this would warrant a common policy, including in the very least large-​scale transnational planning of logistics infrastructure. However, the states cannot resist offers to become gateways for Chinese designs on 41

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trade and political influence, implying that they were following more narrow national agendas. Like joint declarations concerning how to meet this new geo-​political challenge, the ESDP of 20 years ago was an expression of hope. As such, the ESDP was thus overtaken by the European Commission pursuing the new French discourse in terms of territorial cohesion (Faludi 2006, 2007, 2009).The occasion for this was the successor of Wulf-​Mathies as Regional Commissioner, Michel Barnier being appointed in 1999, only later to become the EU’s front man negotiating the exit of the United Kingdom from the EU. As Husson (2000) reports, as the French minister for European affairs, Barnier had already been made aware of territorial cohesion in the Treaty of Amsterdam where it had been introduced, once again on French instigation (Milstein 2015, 41). Then the purpose had been shielding so-​called Services of General Economic Interest (like mail delivery or public transport) in remote areas from the vigor of EU competition policy. Just to illustrate French concerns on the matter, as a member of the political cabinet of then Competition Commissioner, Frits Bolkestein from the Netherlands, Derk-​Jan Eppink (2007) writes about a chief of La Poste visiting him to extoll the importance of his services in delivering pension payments in rural France. Next, the French lobbied for a much more prominent position for territorial cohesion in the European treaty under preparation. Responsible for Regional Policy, Michel Barnier would have worked closely with Jean-​Charles Leygues, then deputy-​director general. Representing the Commission in deliberations on the future of Europe, Barnier was responsible also for territorial cohesion being included—​apparently without much opposition (Zonneveld and Waterhout 2007)—​in the Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe. With Leygues likely his ghost writer, Barnier (2004) would also argue that sectoral policies should fit into some overall scheme. And, whilst washing its hands of the ESDP, the Commission continued to invoke polycentric development. So, we may infer continuity of thinking. Leygues even appears to have perceived an opportunity for something like the ESDP in the form of a scheme guiding relevant EU policies, much as the policies of the member states. The occasion for proposing such came when the Commission prepared the White Paper on European Governance (CEC 2001), grappling, as it did, with how to manage something as complex as a union of, at the time, 15 member states. The White Paper dutifully praised the ESDP. However, and likely already with the prospect of an EU competence for territorial cohesion in mind, by this time a working group of the Commission services had proposed replacing the ESDP with a scheme of the Commission. Published in a volume of recommendations from the Commission service, Working Group 4c (2002, 314) dubbed this would-​be replacement of the ESDP the “European scheme of reference for sustainable development and economic, social and territorial cohesion.” The rapporteur was the same Jean-​Charles Leygues who had been trying to cajole the member states to let the Commission play a more active role in the preparation of the ESDP. Planners were beginning to consider the very real prospect of the EU acquiring a competence for territorial cohesion. Its position in the proposed Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe was a prominent one. It was one of the EU’s—​from now on ambitiously called the Union—​key objectives. Henceforth, territorial cohesion would thus sit alongside economic and social cohesion in the treaty. Importantly, it was, however, to be a shared competence; which at least means that the Commission would be entitled to make relevant proposals for the Council of Ministers’—​and the European Parliament’s—​approval. However, their approval remained necessary for those proposals becoming EU law, either in the form of directives or regulations. So, member states would still have vetoes. Anyhow, the French—​what else?—​rapporteur to the European Parliament on the matter of territorial cohesion expected great things from it becoming part of the EU treaty. For the benefit 42

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of his compatriots, he said that territorial cohesion amounted to nothing else than aménagement du territoire (Guellec 2005). True, if it were to opt for taking relevant initiatives in the matter, territorial cohesion in the EU treaty would give the Commission a role way beyond that of a technical secretariat in the ESDP process. The fact of the matter is that the Commission would never take such an initiative. But the expectation at the time was that it surely would. And there was perhaps a sense of relief, also amongst planners other than the French who had been behind this initiative. Previously, the lack of a competence for spatial planning had clouded the issues. Now, the issue of a competence for, if not spatial planning, then at least for something perhaps much more relevant to the Commission’s concerns and policies would be put to rest. At long last, there might therefore be more coordination of EU policies with spatial impacts. The hope for such had been one of the driving forces behind the making of the ESDP. Planners from the member states could also expect their own positions vis-​à-​vis the sectors in their own countries to strengthen. By common consent, the first round of ESPON projects starting in 2002 had as one of its priorities documenting the spatial impact of various sector policies. Results were eagerly awaited to be able to make a better case for spatial planning, if only under the territorial cohesion flag. In parentheses, ESPON quickly forgot its original mission of serving European spatial planning. Its official name is now European Territorial Observatory Network, with no reference to spatial planning. It only must have seemed prudent to retain the acronym ESPON, a reminder of its roots in a discourse couched in terms of European spatial planning. For the Commission, too, European spatial planning has become a forbidden word. Its competence in the matter—​such as it finally is since 2009—​is for territorial cohesion, which it claims is different from spatial planning. So, in fact, the Commission repudiates the ESDP, including its own role in assisting with its preparation. For all this to come to pass took the best part of a decade. The initial focus was on a presumptive EU policy concerning territorial cohesion to be made possible by the inclusion of a relevant clause in the “Treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe.” Keen as always, the French convened a conference including the new member states on the first working day of their accession in 2004. In the margins—​I was allowed to attend their lunch—​directors-​general responsible for spatial planning/​territorial cohesion of the, now EU 25, met, by which time the Dutch had already decided to convene yet another informal meeting, now of ministers responsible for territorial cohesion. The mood amongst the planning community was positive. The journals Planning Theory and Practice,3 Town and Country Planning,4 and Town Planning Review5 devoted special sections or whole issues to this new concept of territorial cohesion. The tenor—​even in the eyes of German experts who had been ever so reluctant before (Ritter 2009)—​was that territorial cohesion in the EU treaty would settle the competence issue in favor of a common approach. In 2005, only days before the French and Dutch referenda would sink the prospects of the European constitution (with territorial cohesion in it) being ratified, another ministerial meeting in Luxembourg decided to prepare a new document dubbed “Territorial Agenda.” Whilst the replacement of the constitutional treaty was anxiously awaited, more or less the same national planners as had been involved in the ESDP alongside colleagues from the new member states worked on what became the “Territorial Agenda of the European Union.” It was adopted under the German Presidency in May 2007. By that time there was a good prospect for the long-​awaited replacement, what eventually became the 2009 Treaty of Lisbon, to come on the books. But the hope that territorial cohesion would reinvigorate the ESDP process proved to be ill-​founded. Priorities shifted towards enhancing competitiveness. To promote smart, sustainable, and inclusive growth, the successor from 2010 of the so-​called “Lisbon Strategy” of 2000, 43

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called “Europe 2020,” focuses on key sectors with little attention to territory, let alone territorial cohesion. An update of the Territorial Agenda, called the Territorial Agenda 2020, was tagging on to such themes, but the effort largely evaporated. Whether the intention of the German Presidency of 2020 to resume the initiative will bear fruit remains to be seen. Regardless, true to form, ESPON is providing the necessary evidence base (ESPON, 2020). It is unlikely to give attention to anything like regional design on the EU scale. Presumably, it will outline a complex process, but whether member states will buy into this remains to be seen. Generally, interest in matters of spatial planning/​territorial cohesion policy seems to be waning. So, the extant shared competence for territorial cohesion notwithstanding, at the scale of the EU, urban and metropolitan development and regional design take a backseat. Regional-​ economic development has moved to center stage. This the more so since the EU is on the defensive. It has to prove in as concrete terms as possible the value of European integration. Which has become acute in the face of the onslaught of the refugee crisis and also of the populist backlash against European integration.

Conclusions: A Design Cloud Meanwhile, there have been developments unrelated to the Territorial Agenda. As mentioned, in a deliberate effort to foster transnational planning, halfway through the ESDP process, the so-​ called Interreg Community Initiative on transnational cooperation had been launched already in the late-​1990s. The first round of programs produced scenarios for various parts of Europe (ESPON 2006). Next, ESPON developed long-​term scenarios (ESPON 2014). Together, they can be denominated as a cloud of regional design exercises. All this had been augmented by, so far, four so-​called macro-​regional strategies (Gänzle et al. 2018; Gänzle and Mirtl 2019) for the Baltic Sea Region, the Danube Region, the Alpine Region, and the Adriatic and Ionic Sea Region.6 The European Parliament, Directorate-​General for Internal Policies (2015) of the European Parliament, includes a further five not officially adopted, as those four have, by the European Council. In terms of follow-​up actions, albeit of a more diffuse and indirect nature, the longer-​term effect of the ESDP can thus count as a success. Is this all the ESDP and territorial cohesion policy have to show for themselves: overlapping arenas for cooperation, from cross-​border to macro-​regional, some extending beyond EU borders, along with the development of large-​scale regional scenarios? It seems so. If not anything like one overall regional design for the EU, nor specific regional designs for the designated macro-​regions, then this does amount to the regional design cloud already mentioned. This chapter has embedded this unfolding story in a discourse about the role of territory in thinking about the current and future EU makeup. Which reminds of Zonneveld having said already before the Territorial Agenda that European planning should help unravel Europe’s territorial structure and develop some spatial vision, whilst avoiding the misconception that this would result in a master plan. Instead, “a new visual language must be created that allows various interpretations, comparable with how written texts often function.Visioning, visualization, and scenario-​building will have to become priorities in the years ahead” (Zonneveld 2007, 206). At that time, I myself proposed to think about European spatial planning, rather than as the production of a definite strategy as an arena for discussing partial and overlapping scenarios (Faludi 2005, 2007). In “The Poverty of Territorialism” (Faludi 2018), I talk about the creation of such arenas as meta-​planning; meta-​design if you wish. To this end, the initiatives sketched in this chapter are useful. But the struggle with “space-​blind” EU policy sectors continues. One notices in Interreg, much as in the macro-​regional strategies, the

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emphasis shifting towards concrete, measurable results in meeting key EU objectives like competitiveness, employment, and sustainability. So be it.This chapter has shown that regional design on the EU and/​or multi-​or transnational scales has been no outstanding success, which is also true for a putative policy to promote territorial cohesion. But the above suggests a more positive spin to this: rather than a regional design in the conventional sense of the term, the outcome has been the cloud of designs mentioned. As befits clouds, it is in flux. Reflecting the true nature of a networked world, it seems reasonable also to bring our expectations for the future in line with the reality of the EU, which is itself a diffuse construct. This is unlike what the declared Euro-​federalist Dick Williams has hoped for in the 1990s. His hopes have inspired the first generation of researchers into European spatial planning, including myself at the time. Maybe we should also conclude that, what David Elkins in the epitaph to this paper suggests for the future, namely a transition away from nation-​states with territories which are contiguous, continuous, and exclusive, is no longer an expectation but a shrewd analysis of the present. Likewise, the radical change which he prophesizes—​the demise of territory as the sole basis of all-​purpose political units—​could well be under way under our eyes. But this requires us to recognize this uncomfortable truth, uncomfortable because it requires a radical rethink, not only of planning, but of the institutions of governance.

Notes 1. “No Masterplan” has been the subtitle of our book about the ESDP: Andreas Faludi and Bas Waterhout (2002) Making the European Spatial Development Perspective: No Masterplan, Routledge, London. 2. See note 1. 3. Section ‘Interface,’Volume 6, pp. 389–​413. 4. Guest editors Stefanie Dühr and Vincent Nadin, The European spatial planning agenda and the UK. Town Planning Review, 74(3) (March 2005). 5. Guest editor Andreas Faludi, Territorial Cohesion: An Unidentified Political Objective? Town Planning Review, 76(1). 6. See https://​ec.europa.eu/​regional_​policy/​en/​policy/​cooperation/​macro-​regional-​strategies/​.

References Barnier, M. (2004). “Preface,” Innovative City and Business Regions, Structural Change in Europe No. 3. Bollschweil: Hagbarth. Commission of the European Communities (CEC) (1997). The EU Compendium of Spatial Planning Systems and Policies. Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Commission of the European Communities (CEC) (1999). European Spatial Development Perspective: Towards Balanced and Sustainable Development of the Territory of the EU. Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Commission of the European Communities (CEC) (2001). European Governance:  A White Paper. Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Commission of the European Communities (CEC) (2004). A New Partnership for Cohesion:  Convergence, Competitiveness, Cooperation  –​Third Report on Economic and Social Cohesion. Luxembourg:  Office for Official Publications of the European Communities. Dühr, S., Colomb, C., and Nadin,V. (2010). European Spatial Planning and Territorial Cooperation. London and New York: Routledge. Elkins, D. J. (1995). Beyond Sovereignty: Territory and Political Economy in the Twenty-​First Century. Toronto, Buffalo, London: University of Toronto Press. Eppink, D.-​ J. (2007). Europese Mandarijnen – Achter de schermen van de Europese Commissie [European Mandarins: At the backstage of the European Commission]. Tielt: Lannoo.

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ESPON (2006). Spatial Visions and Scenarios –​Thematic Study of INTERREG and ESPON activities. www. espon.eu/​sites/​default/​files/​attachments/​final_​report_​nov2006.pdf (accessed 12/​12/​2020). ESPON (2014). ET2050 -​Territorial Scenarios and Visions for Europe. www.espon.eu/​programme/​projects/​ espon-​2013/​applied-​research/​et2050-​territorial-​scenarios-​and-​visions-​europe (accessed 12/​12/​2020). ESPON (2018). COMPASS –​Comparative Analysis of Territorial Governance and Spatial Planning Systems in Europe. www.espon.eu/​sites/​default/​files/​attachments/​1.%20COMPASS_​Final_​Report.pdf (accessed 12/​12/​2020). ESPON (2020). European Territorial Reference Framework. www.espon.eu/​european-​territorial-​reference-​ framework (accessed 12/​12/​2020). European Parliament, Directorate-​ General for Internal Policies (2015). New Role of Macro Regions in European Territorial Cooperation. Strasbourg: Publication Office. doi: 10.2861/​06284. Faludi, A. (2005). Polycentric territorial cohesion policy. In:  Faludi, A. (ed.), Territorial Cohesion: An Unidentified Political Objective (Special Issue). Town Planning Review, 76(1), 107–​118. Faludi, A. (2006). From European spatial development to territorial cohesion policy. Regional Studies, 40(6), 667–​678. Faludi, A. (2007). Now more than ever: The Open Method of Coordination in EU territorial cohesion policy. European Spatial Research and Policy, 14(1), 11–​24. Faludi, A. (ed.) (2007). Territorial Cohesion and the European Model of Society. Cambridge, MA:  Lincoln Institute of Land Policy. Faludi, A.  (2008). The learning machine:  European integration in the planning mirror. Environment and Planning A, 40(6), 1470‒84. Faludi, A. (2009). A turning point in the development of European spatial planning? The “Territorial Agenda of the European Union” and the “First Action Programme.” Progress in Planning, 71 (2009), 1–​42. Faludi, A. (2013). Territorial cohesion, territorialism, territoriality, and soft planning:  A critical review. Environment and Planning A, 45(6), 1302–​1317. doi:10.1068/​a45299. Faludi, A.  (2014). EUropeanisation or Europeanisation of spatial planning? Planning Theory and Practice, 15(2), 155‒69. Faludi, A. (2018). The Poverty of Territorialism:  A Neo-​ Medieval View of Europe and European Planning. Cheltenham, UK, Northampton, MA: Edgar Elgar. Faludi, A.  and Waterhout, B.  (2002). Making the European Spatial Development Perspective:  No Masterplan. Routledge, London. Gänzle, S., Stead, D., Sielker, F., and Chilla,T. (2018). Macro-​regional strategies, cohesion policy and regional cooperation in the European Union: Towards a research agenda. Political Studies Review, 17(2), 161–​174. Gänzle, S.  and Mirtl, J.  (2019). Experimentalist governance beyond European Territorial Cooperation and cohesion policy:  macro-​regional strategies of the European Union (EU) as emerging “regional institutions”? Journal of European Integration, 41(2), 239‒56. Geertz, C. (1983). Local Knowledge: Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology. New York: Basic Books. Gravier, J. F. (1947). Paris et le désert français. Flammarion: Paris. Guellec, A. (2005). The Role of Territorial Cohesion in Regional Development, Own Initiative Report, www.europarl.europa.eu/ ​ s ides/ ​ g etDoc.do?pubRef=- ​ / / ​ E P// ​ T EXT+REPORT+A6- ​ 2 005-​ 0251+0+DOC+XML+V0//​EN&language=GA (accessed 12/​12/​2020). Guigou, J. L. (1995). Une ambition pour le territoire: Aménager l’espace et le temps, Paris: Datar/​éditions de l’aube. Harrison, J. and Growe, A. (2014). From places to flows? Planning for the new “regional world” in Germany. European Urban and Regional Studies, 21(1), 21–​41. Husson C. (2002). L’Europe sans territoire. Essai sur le concept de cohésion territoriale. Paris: DATAR/​Éditions de l’Aube. Marks, G. (1992). Structural policy in the European Community. In:  Sbragia, A.M. (ed.), Euro-​ Politics: Institutions and Policymaking in the “New” European Community. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institute, 191–​224. McCann, P. (2015). The Regional and Urban Policy of the European Union: Cohesion, Result-​Orientation and Smart Specialisation. Cheltenham, UK: Edgar Elgar. Milstein, A. (2015). The legal aspects of SGI. In:  Fassmann, H., Rauhut, D., Marques da Costa, E., and Humer, A. (eds.), Services of General Interest and Territorial Cohesion:  European Perspectives and National Insights.Vienna: Vienna University Press, 27–​47. Neuman, M. and Zonneveld, W.A.M. (2018). The resurgence of regional design. European Planning Studies, 26(7), 1297–1311 DOI: 10.1080/​09654313.2018.1464127.

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Ritter, E.-​ H. (2009). Europäische Raumentwicklungspolitiek:  Inhalte, Akteure, Verfahren, Organisation. Detmold: Dorothea Rohn. Sack, R.D. (1986). Human Territoriality: Its Theory and History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Teschke, B. (2006). The metamorphoses of European territoriality. In: Burgess, M. and Vollaard, H. (eds.), State Territoriality and European Integration. London and New York: Routledge, 37–​67. Williams, R.H. (1996) European Union Spatial Policy and Planning. London: Chapman Publishing. Working Group 4c (2002). Multi-​level governance: linking and networking the various regional and local levels. In:  European Governance:  Preparatory Work for the White Paper. Luxembourg:  Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 279–​325. Wulf-​Mathies (1995). The European Dimension of Spatial Planning. Paper presented at the informal meeting of ministers responsible for spatial planning, Madrid, 1 December. Zonneveld, W. (2007). Unravelling Europe’s spatial structure through spatial visioning. In: Faludi, A. (ed.) Territorial Cohesion and the European Model of Society. Cambridge, MA: Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, 191–​208. Zonneveld, W. (2018). CRONWE:  First attempts to institutionalize European spatial planning. Planning Perspectives, 33(4) 523–​542. Zonneveld,W. and Waterhout, B. (2005).Visions on territorial cohesion. In Faludi, A. (ed.), Territorial cohesion (special issue), Town Planning Review. 76(1),  15–​27.

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3 The Ecological Underpinnings of Regional Design Frederick Steiner

Prelude: Regional Design Before Ecology Regions are large areas distinguished by common cultural, political, physical, and /​or ecological characteristics and processes. Design involves the conception of positive futures. Perhaps the most ambitious and successful plan for political regional design on a vast scale was Thomas Jefferson’s Northwest Ordinances (1784, 1785, 1787). Inspired by the European Enlightenment and classical proportion, his approach was efficient and, large rivers and lakes aside, oblivious to natural features and processes. As a result of Jefferson’s vision, the Old Northwest Territories from Ohio to Minnesota were divided into a giant, rectangular grid system of square townships (Figure 3.1). The land division system would subsequently be employed in other territories as the United States expanded westwards. In 1870, it was adapted for land division in the Canadian West  too. The American explorer and geologist John Wesley Powell saw the cultural and environmental weaknesses of Jefferson’s grid and, based on his careful observations of indigenous and Mormon settlements, proposed a dramatic alternate. Native people as well as the Latter Day Saints adapted their land uses to the water drainage systems that occurred naturally. Such adaptation is essential in lands with little rainfall. In 1878, Major Powell, who had lost his right arm during the Civil War, presented a strategy to the U.S. Senate for settling the arid region of the American West based on watersheds (Figure 3.2). Powell’s vision was more geological and hydrological than ecological, although the word “ecology” (Ökologie) had already been minted by the German biologist Ernst Haeckel in 1866 to describe the reciprocal relationships among organisms and between living creatures and their environments. The ecosystem concept would evolve to describe the spatial occurrence of those interactions and their processes. The great American landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, Sr. also advanced regionalism through his park and parkway plans for Brooklyn and Buffalo. With his protégé Charles Eliot, their planning for the Boston Metropolitan Park System, called the “Emerald Necklace,” is clearly proto-​ecological. This system of parks connected by parkways and water resulted from a massive effort to clean up marshy areas and control floods in and around Boston. In addition

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Figure 3.1  Land division system resulting from the Northwest Ordinances

to clean water and flood management, the Emerald Necklace provides recreational and open space amenities for the Boston region (Figure 3.3). Even before his work with Olmsted, Eliot, the son of Harvard’s president, organized his classmates to study the botany, geology, meteorology, marine life, ornithology, and entomology of Mount Desert Island in Maine in the 1880s. His approach had similarities to the regional surveys subsequently advocated by Patrick Geddes, Lewis Mumford, and Ian McHarg. Meanwhile, the New World influenced the Old. The Englishman Ebenezer Howard worked in Chicago as a reporter where he became fascinated by Olmsted’s planned community, Riverside. Two miles (3 km) west of Chicago, Riverside is connected to the city by rail and was designed by Olmsted and his English-​born partner Calvert Vaux in 1869 along the Des Plaines River. Howard returned to England where he initiated the garden city movement, a response to urban crowding and congestion that resulted from the Industrial Revolution. Howard’s regional vision was for a series of small new cities surrounded by rural, agricultural belts. This idea was pursued by architects, town planners, and businessmen who built the new towns such as Letchworth and Welwyn in Britain. Although truncated versions of Howard’s more ambitious visions, these garden towns had a global impact including design and planning in many countries. For instance, in The Netherlands the new towns and villages of the IJsselmeer polders display clear garden city design concepts. As we will explore further, Howard’s ideas continued to impact regional planning and design, as did Olmsted’s, as awareness about ecology expanded, influencing especially landscapes architects such as Martha Brookes Hutcheson, Jens Jensen, and Wilhelm Miller (Thoren 2018).

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Figure 3.2  John Wesley Powell’s Arid Lands Map for the American West

Origins: Designing with Nature Charles Darwin fundamentally redefined how we see the world, including our views of regions and design. The Scottish biologist, sociologist, and town planner Patrick Geddes was influenced by Darwin through Thomas Huxley, his teacher at the Royal College of Mines in London, 50

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Figure 3.3  Frederick Law Olmsted and Charle Eliot’s Emerald Necklace, Boston, Massachusetts

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Figure 3.4  Patrick Geddes valley section

who observed organisms participate in their own evolution. With his long beard, the Dundee Professor Geddes posited that humans are engaged in our own evolution through planning. Geddes’ view of regions derived from the French geographer and anarchist Jacques Élisée Reclus as well as the French sociologist Frédéric Le Play. Reclus developed the field of social geography and advanced ideas about climatic and economic regions. His studies emphasized economic populations in their natural boundaries of mountain and valley systems and water (Steele 2003). Reclus’s reading of Darwin “did not emphasise the evolution of the fittest through tooth and claw individualism but the value of ‘solidarity,’ … through the association of spontaneous, co-​ordinated forces …” (Steele 2003, http://​refractions.plusloin.org/​spip.php?article352). Geddes’ “valley section” is a clear adaptation from Reclus as well as the German Alexander von Humboldt’s earlier transects (see Wulf 2015) (Figure  3.4). Likewise, Geddes’ emphasis on civics was developed from Reclus’ views of coordinated group action. Thus, their views departed from “environmental determinism” in their emphasis on “the role of human agency, especially cultural activity” (Steele 2003, http://​ refractions.plusloin.org/​spip.php?article352).Their approach was ecological in their emphasis on interactions and processes beyond just physical conditions of the surroundings. Lewis Mumford and Benton MacKaye furthered Geddes’ regionalism. They were part of the Regional Planning Association of America (RPAA), organized by the architect Clarence Stein in 1923. Mumford and MacKaye advanced ecology in regional planning and design in several ways. A forester and planner, MacKaye promoted the concept of the Appalachian Trail and wrote two books on regionalism (1928, 1969). MacKaye viewed the Appalachian Trail as a project for regional development that would enhance recreation, housing, and community architecture. He expanded Olmsted and Eliot’s Emerald Necklace to the outer reaches of metropolitan Boston through his Bay Circuit plan undertaken for the Trustees of Public Reservations in 1927. The proposed Bay Circuit was a 120-​mile (193-​km) semicircle around Boston. To illustrate his case, MacKaye used Geddes-​inspired panorama, transects with key geographic features including hills, rivers, and ponds. MacKaye’s 1940 article “Regional Planning and Ecology” provides a clear, succinct statement about how ecology, especially human ecology, relates to regionalism and regional planning. He declared:  “Regional planning in short is applied to human ecology” (1940, 351). MacKaye’s friend Lewis Mumford was one of the most influential American urbanists and design critics of the 20th century. Patrick Geddes was his intellectual role model. Mumford 52

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adapted his mentor’s method for understanding places through regional surveys, that is, inventories of the environmental, social, and economic processes in a place. Geddes and Mumford viewed the survey as a step before action; a basis for shaping the physical form as the region (Neuman 2000). They advocated diagnosis before treatment so that the strengths of a region could be reinforced and the ills that a region suffered would determine the appropriate design remedies. For Mumford, regions were grounded in the land, which he observed had been taken for granted especially in the United States. In 1927, he wrote: “For more than a century we have founded cities and built up industries and opened up new areas for trade and agriculture without paying attention to the land itself ” (Mumford 1927, 277). Like Geddes, Mumford advocated surveys as a means to reveal the special ecological conditions and processes of a region in order to create forward-​looking visions for human development. Mumford declared: When we acquire the regional outlook … we think of the regional as a whole, and we realize that in each geographic area a certain balance of natural resources and human institutions is possible, for one finest development of the land and the people. … In this recognition of natural diversities lies one vital and unifying element in the regionalist movement. (1927, 279–​80) Mumford, MacKaye, and their RPAA colleagues moved from theory to action during Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal of the 1930s. For instance, they influenced the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), perhaps the best example of regional design in the United States in the 20th century. The TVA helped transform a vast region through energy power production, flood control and reforestation, economic development, and environmental stewardship. The RPAA group also impacted New Deal housing policy as well as the greenbelt new towns and, furthermore, many other design and planning theorists who followed (Miller 1981, Alanen and Eden 1987). Beyond the United States, these ideas influenced international planning, such as the rebuilding of Europe after the devastating impacts of the Second World War. Mumford, specifically, encouraged the Scottish-​American landscape architect and planner Ian McHarg (who was involved in post-​ World War planning in the United Kingdom in the early 1950s). Mumford wrote the Introduction for McHarg’s landmark book Design with Nature, declaring that the “mixture of scientific insight and constructive environmental design, that this book makes its unique contribution” (1969, viii). Mumford noted that the preposition “with” in the title “implies human cooperation and biological partnership” (McHarg 1969, viii). In Design with Nature, McHarg presented a theory and a method to apply ecological knowledge in design. The resulting designs would then reflect regional ecological systems and processes. His work in the Potomac River Basin and metropolitan Washington, DC was employed by McHarg to illustrate the approach in Design with Nature. His firm—​Wallace, McHarg, Roberts, and Todd (WMRT)—​worked with an American Institute of Architects task force on a regional vision for the Potomac (Potomac Planning Task Force 1967) (Figure 3.5). Its report’s subtitle captured much about the ethos of the time and McHarg’s regional-​based strategy, that is “a report on its [the Potomac River Basin] imperiled future and a guide for its orderly development.” In his Introduction, Secretary of Interior Steward L. Udall observed: “The Potomac is many things: it is a river, a watershed, a landscape, a hinterland” (Potomac Planning Task Force 1967, 5). McHarg’s team sought to bring order to those many things through ecology, regionalism, design, and planning. In addition to professional projects from WMRT, McHarg drew on his landscape architecture studios at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) for examples in Design with Nature. For many 53

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Figure 3.5  Potomac River Basin plan; Wallace, McHarg, Roberts, and Todd

years, McHarg focused on the vast Delaware River Basin from its New York headwaters to its Atlantic Ocean mouth between the states of New Jersey and Delaware in his academic studio. It is clear that the Delaware work informed the Potomac planning and vice versa. As documented in Design with Nature, McHarg used map overlays to represent specific phenomena, an established technique in landscape architecture since Olmsted and Eliot in the late 19th century, to identify opportunities and constraints for development and conservation. McHarg suggested organizing maps about the natural and social environment in a sequential manner from the oldest elements (rocks, terrain, and climate) to the youngest (plants, animals, people) in what he called a “layer cake” (a precursor to contemporary Geographic Information Systems or GIS) (Figure 3.6). This organization produced a slice in time based on the best existing information about a region’s climate, geology, physiography, hydrology, soils, vegetation, wildlife, and land use. McHarg and his colleagues used diagrams and other graphic devices to illustrate the process embodied in each of these layers. 54

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Figure 3.6  Ian McHarg’s layer-​cake diagram

One of McHarg’s contributions to regional surveys was the more explicit use of ecology. Like Geddes, McHarg was influenced by Darwin. As Geddes’ understanding was enhanced by Huxley, McHarg’s was by Lawrence Henderson, the Harvard physiologist, philosopher, and sociologist, who wrote about the importance of biocentric qualities of environments in determining fitness for life. For McHarg, regional surveys were organized as ecological inventories which led to the identification of the fittest places for specific land uses as well as dangerous areas to settle. He called this process a suitability analysis, that is, a determination of the prospects for potential, specific land uses and design strategies based on ecological interactions and processes. His method was adapted for environmental impact assessments that arose in the United States after the enactment of the National Environmental Policy Act in 1970 and spread around the world. 55

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After the publication of Design with Nature, McHarg and WMRT were engaged in several regional plans, most notably those for the Twin Cities of Minnesota and the Front Range of Colorado. WMRT also undertook the regional ecological analysis that helped identify the location of the new capital city of Nigeria, Abuja. Similar work continued in the Penn studios and through the Center for Ecological Design and Planning. For instance, McHarg’s colleague Narendra Juneja coordinated the ecological inventory and suitability analysis for Medford, New Jersey (1974). The Medford study laid the foundation for the influential and successful New Jersey Pinelands National Reserve. Established by the U.S. Congress in 1978, the reserve encompasses over one million acres (404,686 ha) of a rich patchwork of farms, villages, wetlands, and forests, including the Pine Barrens (McPhee 1967).The plan helps protect rich groundwater resources, preserve valuable farmlands, and maintain a scenic landscape adjacent to the metropolitan regions of New York City and Philadelphia. Meanwhile, McHarg sought to refine the understanding of human ecology, recruiting anthropologists and ethnographers to his department at Penn, joining faculty from design, planning, ecology, soil science, geology, and resource economics (Cohen 2019). In some ways, McHarg was creating an approach to study places and regions akin to the French Annales School. Founded by Lucien Febvre and Marc Bloch in the early 20th century, these historians focused on the everyday lives of ordinary people, in contrast to the “big man” approach. Annales scholars built on insights from anthropology and geography to understand how people inhabit places through time. For McHarg, the ecology of humans was essential to understand regionally in order to make appropriate designs and plans. Human ecology involves the ways social structures adapt to the qualities of the environment and various human groups and other organisms (Steiner 2002). As McHarg advanced regionalism in landscape architecture, Kenneth Frampton (1983) played a similar role in architecture. The British-​born, long-​time Columbia faculty member, Frampton was a central figure in the postmodern design movement. Similar to Mumford, he advocated that buildings should respect and respond to their geographical context. Frampton observed:  “Critical Regionalism necessarily involves a more directly dialectical relation with nature than the more abstract, formal traditions of modern avant-​garde architecture allowed” (1983, 26). As with modernism, the style of postmodern architecture displays more interests in form than direct relationships with nature.

Advances: New Ecological Regionalism at the Turn of the Century From the final decades of the 20th century into the early 21st, ecology continued to impact regionalism and design in many ways. Some ideas, like greenways, represented clear continuations from the past; other notions, such as landscape urbanism, while linked to precedent, offer fresh perspectives. Greenways are an extension of Olmsted’s parkway system plans as well as his and Eliot’s Emerald Necklace.They can also trace their heritage to England’s Green Belts (influenced by Howard’s garden cities) and elsewhere in Europe, notably Vienna and Kraków, where parks replaced fortifications around cities. A greenway is a linear corridor or a network of protected areas “that are planned, designed, and managed for multiple purposes including ecological, recreational, cultural, aesthetic, and other purposes compatible with the concept of sustainable land use” (Ahern 1995, 134). During the late 20th century, the National Park Service (NPS) Rivers,Trails, and Conservation Program became a leading advocate of greenways in the United States. The foci of these efforts were on river and heritage corridors and as well as Rails-​to-​Trails programs, where abandoned railroad right-​of-​ways are transformed into biking and hiking paths. 56

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Figure 3.7  Richard Forman’s landscape ecology diagram

With the rise of landscape ecology (Forman and Godron 1986), the greenway approach become even more connected with ecology (Ahern 1995, 2002). Landscape ecology is the study of interactions among the temporal and spatial aspects of landscape and the organisms within it. Led by the American ecologist Richard Forman and the French biologist Michel Godron, the landscape approach focuses on patterns such as patches, matrixes, corridors, barriers, and mosaics (Figure 3.7). Jack Ahern advocated that the greenway is an effective planning strategy, noting that the “patch and corridor” spatial concept from landscape ecology “includes corridors and stepping stones to connect isolated patches and thus help to counter the effect of fragmentation” (1995, 131). This approach benefits both people and wildlife. As Forman advanced landscape ecology, other ecologists focused in biophysical interactions and processes in cities. Traditionally, ecological theory has been based largely on patterns and process in non-​urban and less human-​dominated environments. In 1997, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) changed this by establishing two urban Long-​ Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites in Baltimore and Phoenix (Grimm et al. 2000). These two LTERs in biophysically different city-​regions emphasized the need to integrate social and ecological methods and concepts to produce new urban theory. The LTER teams moved from ecology in 57

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the city towards ecology of the city (Pickett et al. 2016). Especially the Baltimore LTER, led by Steward Pickett of the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies, engaged designers and undertook work to influence regional design (Grove et al. 2015). The Baltimore LTER has an urban design working group at Parsons New School that has focused on the Gwynns Falls Watershed. Even before the NSF LTERs, McHarg was teaching a course “Ecology of the City” beginning in 1963 and, later, two of his former students Anne Whiston Spirn (1985) and Michael Hough (1984) pioneered the application of regional ecological understanding in urban design. Spirn had worked with McHarg at WMRT on regional-​scale projects like the Front Range of Colorado. She was interested in making explicit link between natural processes—​air, the earth, water, and living organisms—​and cities. Spirn laid out an approach to both understand urban ecosystems and use that knowledge in design. Hough came to North America after architecture studies in Edinburgh, Scotland, and spent much of his career in Toronto. Like Spirn, he sought to connect natural processes to city form through design. As landscape and urban ecology continued to advance, new ideas about regions, such as bioregions, ecoregions, and megaregions emerged. Bioregions and ecoregions are interrelated designations of large geographical territories. Both are defined by combinations of climate, geology, hydrology, plants, and animals. The World Wildlife Fund identifies bioregions as areas larger than ecoregions. Robert Bailey, a geographer with the U.S. Forest Service, undertook detailed mapping and definitions of ecoregions for North America and the world (Bailey 2014). Meanwhile, megaregions concern economic, transportation, and demographic processes more than ecology. The concept evolved from Geddes, Mumford, and others but gained broad appeal, especially among academics as a result of the French geographer Jean Gottman’s 1961 Megalopolis:  The Urbanized Northeast Seaboard of the United States. Conglomerations of metropolitan areas have recognized in policy by the European Union since its 1999 European Spatial Development Perspective and have also been explored in China and Japan (Dewar and Epstein 2007). In England, for example, the Northern Powerhouse is a megaregional strategy linking the metropolitan areas of Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool, and Sheffield through transportation. In between, the Peak District National Park encompasses 555 square miles (1,438 km2) and forms a “green heart” similar to the Randstad in The Netherlands and the Pinelands in New Jersey. In 2004, Robert Yaro of the Regional Plan Association (RPA), urban design Professor Jonathan Barnett, and Armando Carbonell of the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy taught a Penn city and regional planning studio to explore the future of the United States. The studio identified ten megaregions where the bulk of the population and economic growth would occur through the 21st century. European concepts about megaregions, such as the French “Blue Banana” proved especially influential. Subsequently, RPA furthered the idea with 11 megaregions through its America 2050 initiative (Dewar and Epstein 2007). In addition to advocating alternative transportation options, especially high-​speed rail, and urban patterns, RPA also advanced conservation measures for large landscapes, in the 13-​state Northeast Megaregion.The RPA team forged strong connections with European and Asian planners and scholars to advance ideas about megaregions. Elsewhere in the United States, parallel interest in regionalism was occurring in diverse places with a particular focus on scenario planning. Scenarios attempt to write “history of the future” (Hirschhorn 1980, 172). Peter Calthorpe is a leader in the New Urbanist movement with a strong interest in ecological design (see Calthorpe and Van der Ryn 1986); while John Fregonese was an influential Oregon planner, having directed planning for the Portland Metro regional government. Together, they led several regional futures plans beginning with Envision Utah in 1997. Calthrope and Fregonese developed four scenarios for the rapidly growing Salt Lake City metropolitan region between the Wasatch Mountain Range and the Great Salt Lake. They used GIS technology coupled with extensive public participation and design acumen to develop the 58

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scenarios. The first scenario projected growth to continue in its current pattern, the second depended on state and local governments adhering to their existing plans, the third focused on more walkable communities and open space protection, and the final on even more focused growth, more open space and agricultural protection, and expanded transit. Envision Utah has been successful in enhancing regional planning and design in and around Salt Lake City and resulted in Fregonese and Calthorpe becoming involved in similar regional visioning efforts for Chicago; Austin, Texas; coastal Louisiana; and other regions. Former Harvard landscape architecture professor Carl Steinitz is a GIS pioneer. As noted previously, his colleague Richard Forman led the development of landscape ecology. Together, Steinitz and Forman with a team of other landscape architects, planners, and scientists from Harvard, Utah State University, the U.S. National Biological Service, the U.S. Forest Service, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and The Nature Conservancy, conducted a two-​year study of alternative biodiversity futures for the region of the Camp Pendleton Marine Base in California (Steinitz et al. 1996). Many military bases have become valuable havens for wildlife and plants. Steinitz, Forman, and their team explored how rapid urban growth between Los Angeles and San Diego might impact biodiversity in the region. They developed six possible futures for the region, all of which accommodated projected population growth. One scenario illustrated the build out of existing local and regional plans. The others explored other design possibilities to balance development and conservation (Steinitz et al. 1996). Their scenarios used concepts from landscape ecology, such as corridors, and employed GIS maps to illustrate possible futures. Meanwhile in Western Australia, Richard Weller (2008a, 2009) laid out seven scenarios for the future of rapidly growing Perth (Figure 3.8). The region is facing escalating suburban sprawl

Figure 3.8  Richard Weller’s Perth scenario based on Ebenezer Howard’s garden cities 59

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and dwindling water supplies. Weller’s approach was grounded both in McHargian sieve mapping analysis as well as design culture. For instance, in addition to basing one model scenario on Ebenezer Howard’s garden city ideas, others were derived from Le Corbusier’s Radiant City and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Broadacre City. By focusing equally on urban form as well as landscape suitability, Weller presented these scenarios as a manifestation of the landscape urbanist discourse emerging at the time. Influenced especially by Dutch design, Charles Waldheim, who advanced the term landscape urbanism, drew on McHarg’s approach for regional analysis. Waldheim was joined by others to further the landscape urbanism idea including James Corner, Nina-​Marie Lister, Richard Weller, Chris Reed, and Mohsen Mostafavi. Their age-​of-​cities idea, with clear Geddes-​Mumford-​ McHarg echoes, is for the design of the landscape, rather than buildings and roads, to be the fundamental determinant of urbanism (Weller 2008b). Of this group, especially Corner with his firm, Field Operations, is designing highly impactful projects such as the Freshkills Park, on the site of a massive landfill in Staten Island, to serve the metropolitan New York City region. The Freshkills design is derived from an understanding of regional ecological processes. In addition, the design uses time, change, and process as key drivers for the park’s evolution.

Promise and Prospect: Ecology, Regionalism, and Design in the Anthropocene We are now an urban planet with most people in the world currently living in city-​regions. We are also in the Anthropocene, the geological age where humanity has become a dominant force of nature. Regional design informed by wisdom from ecology through humanism has become a necessity. Some methods and ideas from the past continue to evolve such as regional ecological surveys and environmental impact assessments and some have new terminology, for instance, greenways have been broadened and are referred to as green or ecological infrastructure. GIS technologies continue to advance and are enhanced by three-​dimensional modeling and robotics to enhance the capabilities of designers and planners to undertake surveys and to conceive designs. These techniques contribute to an emerging field called geodesign, led by Steinitz and Jack Dangermond (Steiner and Shearer 2016). Geodesign is a team-​based approach involving large areas, such as regions, and complex issues that employ the powers of digital computing, algorithmic processes, and communications technologies (Ervin 2013). As GIS has led to geodesign, greenways and green belts are the foundation for green and ecological infrastructure, an approach to water management that protects, restores, and/​or mimics the natural hydrologic cycle much the way Olmsted and Eliot’s Emerald Necklace approached water management for the metropolitan Boston in the late 19th century. Green infrastructure is a multifunctional open space network (Rouse and Bunster-​Ossa 2013). Ecological infrastructure addresses a broader agenda than water management, as has been promoted through green infrastructure by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and others. The more expansive term encompasses water management and goes beyond to address naturally functioning ecosystems that deliver valuable services to people and other species including climate regulation, soil development, and disaster risk reduction. Ecological infrastructure is based on the emerging ecosystem services concept. Ecosystem services account for the benefits humans receive from nature (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment 2005). The idea is to make transparent and account for what is too often taken for granted. Ecosystems support our existence and provide the materials we eat and drink and use to build our habitat. In addition, ecosystems regulate fundamental processes, such as carbon sequestration and waste decomposition, while supplying recreational and educational benefits. Ecosystem services 60

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Figure 3.9  Kongjian Yu’s ecological security plan for China

hold the potential to strengthen and expand the ecological underpinnings of regional design, because many can be measured to illustrate the consequences of protecting and enhancing them. In China, Kongjian Yu (2014) pulled together the many threads of thought about ecology in regionalism, design, and planning for his national security plan for the People’s Republic of China (Figure  3.9). The influences of Steinitz, Forman, and McHarg are apparent in his approach and his advocacy for ecological security. Yu and his team (from Peking University and Turenscape) identified critical landscape structures for safeguarding ecological and cultural processes nationwide. In the process, a wide range of ecosystem functions essential for sustaining human society could be secured.They also applied their approach to the regional and city scales. In planning for Beijing, for instance,Yu and colleagues used scenarios and ecosystem services to advance ecological infrastructure (Yu, Wang, and Li 2011). One of the more imaginative rethinking of past ideas is Laurel McSherry and Rob Holmes’ update of John Wesley Powell’s proposal for the arid lands of the American West (https://​ aridlands.org/​ d iscover/​ v ideo/​ d rylands-​ d esign-​ c onference-​ l aurel-​ m csherry-​ a nd-​ robert-​ holmes-​drylands-​design).Their regionalist scheme won the 2011 Arid Lands Institute’s Drylands Design Competition, which sought policy recommendations to address Western water scarcity. The landscape architecture educators McSherry and Holmes expanded Powell’s vision to the whole lower 48 states and proposed 86 drainage-​basin-​based commonwealths (Holmes 2012, Lokman 2016) (Figure 3.10). They used a careful analysis to provide a framework for improved 61

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Figure 3.10  Laurel McSherry and Rob Holmes’ Commonwealth drainage-​basin approach for the United States

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regional water management. McSherry and Holmes used the U.S. Geological Survey’s second-​ order watershed units as “a first-​pass at aligning political geography with the movement of water” (Holmes 2012).The 86 commonwealths were further organized into 19 territories. For instance, Austin conveniently remains the capital of the proposed Texas Gulf Territory. McSherry and Holmes also created 36 trans-​national commonwealths along the U.S.‒Canada and U.S.–​Mexico borders. Instead of walls, they envision hydrological and ecological connectivity between nations. McSherry and Holmes’ decentralized “Commonwealth Approach” refocused water management at the regional scale: “localized, place-​specific, and less energy-​intensive” (Holmes 2012). The Commonwealth Approach shares much in common with Pope Francis’s call for an earth ministry grounded in human ecology in his 2015 Laudato Si’. The Pope identified climate as a “common good” and the “human roots of the ecological crisis.” Furthermore, he advocated “integral ecology” as the appropriate response. He wrote: “Human ecology is inseparable from the notion of the common good, a central and unifying principle of social ethics” (Pope Francis 2015, 104). The Pope’s recognition of our common home has parallels with China President Xi Jinping’s call to build a “Beautiful China” with a clean environment and his pledge to fix toxic levels of air, water, and soil pollution for the public good.

Conclusions Even before the field was named and developed, ecology played a role in regional design. As ecology has advanced, regionalists have been attracted to the knowledge generated by it to inform design and planning. The challenges of urban growth and climate change in the Anthropocene underscores the urgency and importance of an ecological underpinning for design. Ecologically grounded design enables us to be more resilient, that is, to recover, to bounce back, from disaster. Furthermore, it can help us avoid or lessen the impacts of disasters.The health professions have a long interest in resilience. In medicine, resilience refers to how we respond to stress, grief, and trauma in healthy ways. Resilience helps individuals to prepare for and recover from life’s challenges. In 1948, the World Health Organization (WHO) defined health as a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-​being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. WHO updated the definition in 1984 as “the extent to which an individual or group is able to realize aspirations and satisfy needs and to change or cope with environment.” Health, according to the WHO, is a positive concept, emphasizing social and personal resources, as well as physical capacities. As a result, health is related to our ability to recover from injury and, thus, is related to our resilience. Health is integral to the design and planning professions. In the United States, licensure in architecture and landscape architecture rests on the ability to protect public health, safety, and welfare. In addition, the legal justification for city and regional planning is built on the capability of plans to ensure the public health, safety, and welfare. The legal foundations for the design professions in other nations are also related to public health and safety. Architecture and related design fields have a long association with health. Some 20 centuries ago, the Roman Marco Vitruvius Pollio wrote in On Architecture: the architect should … have a knowledge of the study of medicine on account of the questions of climates, air, the healthiness and unhealthiness of sites, and the use of different waters. For without these considerations the healthiness of a dwelling cannot be assured. (1934, c­hapter 1, Section 10)

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We certainly should follow Vitruvius’ guidance for dwellings and, in the Anthropocene, extend that wisdom to landscapes, regions, nations, and our planet. Increasingly, we have vast ecological information available about where we live. We should act based on ecology with thoughtful resilience-​oriented and nature-​based designs. In the process, we can heal the harms of the past, and go beyond, to prevent future environmental calamity and to design healthier regions.

Acknowledgments The encouragement of Michael Neuman and the suggestions on the paper from Richard Weller and Billy Fleming were especially helpful. I thank Laurent Corroyer for introducing me to the link between Rectus and Geddes. Kait Ellis helped with the word processing for which I am grateful.

References Ahern, J. (1995). Greenways as a planning strategy. Landscape and Urban Planning, 33, 131–​155. Ahern, J. (2002). Greenways as Strategic Landscape Planning:  Theory and Application. Wageningen, The Netherlands: Wageningen University. Alanen, A. R. and Eden, J. A. (1987). Main Street Ready-​Made:  The New Deal Community of Greendale, Wisconsin. Madison: The State Historical Society of Wisconsin. Bailey, R. G.  (2014). Ecoregions:  The Ecosystem Geography of the Oceans and Continents (second edition). New York: Springer. Calthorpe, P. and Van der Ryn, S. (1986). Sustainable Communities: A New Design Syntheses for Cities, Suburbs and Towns. San Francisco: Sierra Club Books. Cohen, W. (2019). Ecohumanism and Ecological Culture:  The Educational Legacy of Lewis Mumford and Ian McHarg. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. Dewar, M. and Epstein, D. (2007). Planning for “megaregions” in the United States. Journal of the American Planning Association, 22(2), 108–​124. Ervin, S. (2013). What makes it “geodesign”? The Field (August 22). Forman, R. T. T. and Godron, M. (1986). Landscape Ecology. New York: Wiley. Frampton, K. (1983). Towards a critical regionalism: Six points for an architecture of resistance. In: Foster, H. (ed.), Anti-​Aesthetic. Essays on Postmodern Culture. Seattle: Bay Press. Gottman, J. (1961). Megalopolis:  The Urbanized Northeast Seaboard of the United States. New  York:  The Twentieth Century Fund. Grimm, N. B., Grove, J. M., Pickett, S. T. A., and Redman, C. L. (2000). Integrated approaches to long-​term studies of the urban ecological system: urban ecological systems present multiple challenges to ecologists: Pervasive human impact and extreme heterogeneity of cities, and the need to integrate social and ecological approaches, concepts, and theory. AIBS Bulletin, 50 (7), 571–​584. Grove, J. M., Cadenasso, M. L., Pickett, S. T. A., Machlis, G. E., Burch, Jr., W. R., and Ogden, L. A. (2015). The Baltimore School of Urban Ecology: Space, Scale, and Time for the Study of Cities. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Hirschhorn, L. (1980). Scenario writing:  A developmental approach. Journal of the American Planning Association, 46(2), 172–​183. Holmes, R. (2012). The Commonwealth approach. Mammoth (July 31). Hough, M. (1984). City Form and Natural Process: Towards a New Urban Vernacular. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold. Juneja, N. (1974). Medford: Performance Requirements for the Maintenance of Social Values Presented by Natural Environment of Medford Township, NJ. Philadelphia: Center for Ecological Design and Planning, University of Pennsylvania. Lokman, K. (2016). Dam[ned] landscapes: Envisioning fluid geographies. Journal of Architecture Education, 70 (1), 6–​12. MacKaye, B. (1940). Regional planning and ecology. Ecological Monographs, 10(3), 349–​353. MacKaye, B. (1928). The New Exploration: A Philosophy of Regional Planning. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company. 64

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MacKaye, B. (1969). Expedition Nine: A Return to a Region. Washington DC: The Wilderness Society. McHarg, I. L. (1969). Design with Nature. Garden City, NY: Natural History Press. McPhee, J. (1967). The Pine Barrens. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. (2005). Ecosystems and Human Well-​ Being:  Synthesis. Washington, DC: Island Press. Miller, Z. L. (1981). Suburb: Neighborhood and Community in Forest Park, Ohio, 1935–​1976. Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press. Mumford, L. (1927). Regionalism and irregionalism. The Sociological Review, 19(4), 277–​288. Neuman, M. (2000). Regional design: Recovering a great landscape architecture and urban planning tradition. Landscape and Urban Planning, 47, 115–​128. Pickett, S. T. A., Cadenasso, M. L., Childers, D. L., McDonnell, M. J., and Zhou,W. (2016). Evolution and future of urban ecological science: Ecology in, of, and for the city. Ecosystem Health and Sustainability, 2(7), doi:10.1002/ehs2.1229. Pope Francis. (2015). Encyclical Letter Laudato Si’ of the Holy Father Francis on the Care of our Common Home. Vatican City: The Vatican. Potomac Planning Task Force. (1967). The Potomac: A Report on Its Imperiled Future and a Guide for its Orderly Development. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. Rouse, D. C. and Bunster-​Ossa, I. (2013). Green Infrastructure:  A Landscape Approach. Chicago:  American Planning Association. Spirn, A. W. (1985). The Granite Garden: Urban Nature and Human Design. New York: Basic Books. Steele, T. (2003). Élisée Reclus and Patrick Geddes: Geographies of the mind, the regional study in the global vision. Refractions, 4. http://​refractions.plusloin.org/​spip.php?article352 Steiner, F. R. (2002). Human Ecology: Following Nature’s Lead. Washington, DC: Island Press. Steiner, F. R. and Shearer, A. W. (eds.) (2016). Geodesign-​changing the world, changing design (special issue). Landscape and Urban Planning 156, 1–​128. Steinitz, C., Binford, M., Cote, P., Edwards, T., Jr., Ervin, S., Forman, R. T.  T., Johnson, C., Kiester, R., Mouat, D., Olson, D., Shearer, A., Toth, R., and Wills, R. (1996). Biodiversity and Landscape Planning:  Alternative Futures for the Region of Camp Pendleton, California. Cambridge, MA:  Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Thoren, R. (2018). Dreaming true. Places Journal (November). Yu, K. (2014). Reinvent the good earth: National ecological security plan, China. In: Ndubisi, F.O. (ed.), The Ecological Design and Planning Reader, Washington, DC: Island Press, pp. 446–​469. Yu, K., Wang, S., and Li, D. (2011). The negative approach to urban growth planning of Beijing, China. Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, 54 (9), 1209–​1236. Vitruvius Pollio, M. (1934). On Architecture, Frank Granger, editor and translator. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Weller, R. (2008a). Planning by design: Landscape architectural scenarios for rapidly growing city. Journal of Landscape Architecture (Autumn), 6–​16. Weller, R. (2008b). Landscape (sub) urbanism in theory and practice. Landscape Journal, 27 (2), 255–​278. Weller, R. (2009). Boomtown 2050:  Scenarios for a Rapidly Growing City. Perth, Western Australia:  UWA Publishing. Wulf, A. (2015). The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt’s New World. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

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4 Contemporary Theory for Regional Design Verena Elisabeth Balz

Introduction This chapter presents an outline for contemporary theory regarding regional design. Its focus is the nexus between regional design as spatial design –​its most customary practice –​and regional design as governance design for effective regional design-​led spatial planning approaches. This is especially complicated for at least two reasons. First, few city regions or other types of regions have a dedicated level of government, or even a (legal) institutional arrangement to govern a region. Second is that the region is a relatively new spatial planning entity, less than a century old. Over the recent decade, there has been much experimentation regarding the potential political scope of regional governance, without any conclusive outcomes. Compared to millennia-​old municipalities, or centuries-​old nation-​states, whose constitutions specify quite clearly the influence of government action by, for example, courts, legislatures, and executive bodies, a regional field of action remains undefined. Complicating this is the often lacking synchrony between spatial development and territorial-​based institutions. This chapter draws on an analysis of regional design practices that have occurred in the Netherlands since the late 1980s. Design for the purpose of planning was not a new practice in this country by then. On the contrary, to imagine solutions for particular areas and to discuss these for the purpose of planning has been a long-​standing tradition that can be traced back to the emergence of modern urban planning in the 19th and early 20th centuries, not just in the Netherlands but also across more European and other nations. However, expectations concerning the performance of design in Dutch planning and governance has increased in recent years. Design came to be seen as a practice that not only improves the spatial and technical quality of plans, but also enhances planning innovation, clarifies political agendas, forges societal alliances, and raises the efficiency of planning through timely consideration of conflicts that planning may cause in societal and political domains. Inspired by these expectations concerning governance, regional design underwent a process of institutionalization in Dutch national planning since the 1990s. The practice became repetitively used and was formally embedded in planning procedures. It is from this course of events theoretical propositions are drawn in this chapter. These take the shape of principles that can guide regional

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design practices and research, especially with regard to governance, not only in the Netherlands but possibly elsewhere as well. We believe that despite more varied expectations and institutionalization in the Netherlands and elsewhere, interrelations between regional design and spatial planning are still not fully understood. As a result, the performance of regional design is difficult to predict and consequently, often disappointing.Therefore, theory has sought recently to conceptualize interrelations between regional design and spatial planning (Balz 2019). This theory aims at an enhanced explanation and prediction of performance.The question this chapter seeks to answer is as follows: how do the interrelations between regional design and spatial planning influence the performance of regional design, in particular in relation to governance? Answers to this question were sought through case study research. First, through an in-​depth case study, key performance parameters of regional design were analyzed (Balz and Schrijnen 2009, Balz and Zonneveld 2015). Second, in multiple case studies analysis (Balz 2018, Balz and Zonneveld 2018, Balz and Zonneveld 2019), the contextual determinants of these parameters were investigated. These case studies are not presented in this chapter. The reader is referred to the literature mentioned above as this chapter focuses on theoretical implications.

Key Performance Parameters of Regional Design in the Realm of Spatial Planning There are multiple expectations concerning the performance of regional design in spatial planning decision-​making. This section presents the most important performance parameters based on a first round of case study research as mentioned in the introduction. The first sub-​section summarizes theoretical notions that were found to be the most relevant for explaining different performances. The second sub-​section presents the key performance parameters that were identified during theory formation and case study analysis.

Facilitating Attention to Geographies in Spatial Planning Prohibitive and restrictive land-​use control, embodied in statutory planning frameworks and exercised by government, has long been the primary means of planning in the Netherlands and elsewhere. In the 1980s, when development started to agglomerate in regions with privileged positions in expanding economic networks, this form of planning came to stand under critique though (Klosterman 1985, Sager 2011,Waterhout et al. 2013). It was seen to “stifle entrepreneurial initiative, impede innovation, and impose unnecessary financial and administrative burdens on the economy” (Klosterman 1985, 2). A change in planning style set in, “a shift away from distributive policies, welfare considerations, and direct service provision toward more market-​oriented and market-​dependent approaches aimed at pursuing economic growth and competitive restructuring” (Waterhout, Othengrafen, and Sykes 2013, 143, referring to Swyngedouw, Moulaert, and Rodriguez 2002).A higher appreciation of market forces unlocked planning reforms across Europe, leading to a range of approaches that were commonly called spatial planning (Albrechts, Healey, and Kunzmann 2003, Allmendinger and Haughton 2010, Faludi 2010, Healey 2006, Nadin 2007, Needham 1988, Schön 2005,Waterhout 2008). Spatial planning approaches differ across countries with different planning systems and cultures (Commission of the European Communities (CEC) 1997, Nadin and Stead 2008, Waterhout 2008). They also share characteristics: Compared with previous regulatory land-​use planning approaches, [spatial planning] is distinctive for:  encouraging long-​term strategic visions; providing the spatial dimension to

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improved integration across a range of sectoral plans and activity; supporting “balanced” approaches to sustainable development; and improving engagement with stakeholders and the public. (Allmendinger and Haughton 2010, 803) Spatial planning is expected to pay particular attention to spatial development, in comparison to regulatory planning (Albrechts, Healey, and Kunzmann 2003, Albrechts 2004, Allmendinger and Haughton 2009a, 2010, Faludi 2010, Healey 2004, 2006, Nadin 2007, Needham 1988, Schön 2005, Tewdwr-​Jones, Gallent, and Morphet 2010). In theoretical terms, this recognition has caused a search for an increased understanding of how such attention is facilitated in spatial planning decision-​making. One strand of investigation focuses on the use of geographic imagery. It brings to the foreground that spatial representations, in words and images, are meaningful and purposefully employed by plan actors to inform the behavior of other, related actors (Davoudi 2012, Davoudi and Strange 2008, Dühr 2003, 2004, 2006, Faludi 1996, Graham and Healey 1999, Jensen and Richardson 2003, Neuman 1996, Thierstein and Förster 2008, Van Duinen 2004, Förster 2009). Davoudi (2012, 438), referring to Fischler (1995, 23), notes that the term “representation,” “differs from a positivist understanding of visualization as a communication system. It emphasizes the interdependence between: ‘the symbolic structure that frame what is being said, written and shown during planning processes and the political structures that frame interactions during those’.” The recognition that spatial planning draws on shared spatial imageries has led to the question how attention to spatial development is facilitated in spatial planning decision-​ making. “Framing” is a key concept here. A “frame” is a “perspective from which an amorphous, ill-​defined, problematic situation can be made sense of and acted on” (Rein and Schön 1993, 146). When geographies are used for the framing of policy argumentation, they reassert the “cognitive and normative expectations of … actors by shaping and promoting a common worldview as well as developing adequate solutions to sequencing problems, that is, the predictable ordering of various actions, policies, or processes over time” (Jessop 2001, 1231). Such expectations are particularly articulated through spatial concepts. These concepts resemble discourse (Van Duinen 2004), as “an ensemble of ideas, concepts, and categories through which meaning is given to social and physical phenomena, and which is produced and reproduced through an identifiable set of practices” (Hajer and Versteeg 2005, 175). Building upon existing notions on the use of concepts in spatial planning (Davoudi 2003, 2012, Davoudi et al. 2018, Gualini and Majoor 2007, Hagens 2010, Healey 2004, Markusen 1999, Richardson and Jensen 2003, Van Duinen 2004, Zonneveld 1991, Zonneveld 1989, Zonneveld and Verwest 2005), analysis has brought to the foreground that spatial concepts, when used as framing devices, have several dimensions. In an analytical dimension, a spatial concept explains spatial development by providing knowledge on how unplanned individual action affects development. In a normative dimension, a concept is a metaphor for desirable spatial structures and is also a guiding principle to achieve a policy goal. In an organizational dimension of concepts, prevailing territorial control is reflected. In conjunction, these dimensions allow for the composition of arguments on what, why, and how to plan.They establish a fourth, discursive dimension in which spatial representations of regional design proposals, composed of corresponding logics, operate. Among design scholars, there is broad agreement that design is an argumentative practice, oriented toward the improvement of the built environment (Hillier and Leaman 1974, Rittel 1987, Schön 1988, 1983). Design also has a holistic orientation. It is an attempt at establishing a comprehensive understanding of spatial development, an explorative search for integral solutions that consider dependencies among parts. Designers “work with models as means of vicarious perception and manipulation. Sketches, cardboard models, diagrams and 68

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mathematical models, and the most flexible of them all, speech, serve as media to support the imagination” (Rittel 1987, 1). To argue for change, the designer imagines design solutions but simultaneously envisions the world around him or her. The latter is a process of abstraction that leads to the recognition of types:  simplifications of real, material settings, sited between highly general, abstract categories and highly specific ones (Schön 1988, Hillier and Leaman 1974, Caliskan 2012). Such simplification is instrumental in design:  “By invoking a type, a designer can see how a possible design move might be matched or mismatched to a situation” (Schön 1988, 183). Conclusions drawn during iterative design processes can be twofold. First, the testing of solutions against abstract perceptions of real-​world settings (the “design world,” Schön 1992, 3) may lead to the modification of a design solution. Second, it may also lead to a changing appreciation of this “design world.” When assuming that spatial concepts constitute such a “spatial planning world,” interrelations between regional design and spatial planning come to the foreground.

Performance of Regional Design in a Discursive Dimension of Planning Concepts The above notions on design, in combination with notions on how spatial development is considered in the realm of spatial planning (outlined in Table 4.1), have led to a first position concerning interrelations between regional design and spatial planning frameworks. In this position, regional design as an argumentative practice, performs in a discursive dimension of spatial concepts. In order to identify ways how plans influence decision-​making, Faludi and Korthals Altes (1994, 405) distinguish a “technocratic” from a “sociocratic” way of planning. In technocratic planning, government safeguards the public interest by means of a ready-​made plan. In a sociocratic approach, the views of other actors are considered: “[a]‌uthorities are not the only ones called upon to act in the ‘public interest’ and not above other actors either.This leaves room for negotiations” (Faludi and Van der Valk 1994, 405). In technocratic planning, the influence of plans is judged upon the “conformance” between implemented planning decisions and the earlier onward determined plans. In a sociocratic way of planning, the “performance” of plans is in the outcome of negotiation and deliberation: in agreement among actors, and the change of mind that the formation of such consent requires. When taking this definition of performance as a starting point, a set of key performance parameters of regional design in the realm of spatial planning can be distinguished. • Regional design assists in the building of spatial planning rationales. When regional design operates in a discursive sort of way, it assists in the structuring of existing reservoirs of meaning, in the face of a particular spatial problem. Such structuring of knowledge, values, and norms ‒ the building of argument, story lines and narratives ‒ gains considerable attention in literature about regional design (Hajer, Reijndorp and Feddes 2006, Hajer, van ‘T Klooster, and Grijzen 2010,Van Dijk 2011). In the realm of spatial planning, structuring corresponds to its objective “to articulate a more coherent spatial logic for land-​use regulation, resource protection, and investments in regeneration and infrastructure” (Albrechts, Healey, and Kunzmann 2003, 113). In planning as well as design persuasive logics are associated with learning. • Regional design challenges or refines spatial planning rationales. As highlighted above, design theorists argue that design ‒ the testing of solutions against simplified abstractions of the built environment ‒ may be a process of elaboration or discovery. When assuming that design practice is framed by spatial concepts, the practice may be used to refine these concepts through deducing solutions from an institutionalized repertoire of meanings. Conversely, a hypothetical or imagined design solution may help the designer to uncover new aspects of a ‘spatial planning 69

Verena Elisabeth Balz Table 4.1  Theoretical notions used to identify key performances of regional design in the realm of spatial planning Design theory Design is an argumentative practice. •  Design has a normative orientation towards change (Caliskan 2012, Hillier and Leaman 1974, and improvement. Lawson 2009, Rittel 1987, Schön 1983, •  Design has a holistic orientation. It is concerned Schönwandt and Grunau 2003, Cross 2004, about wholes and interdependencies among parts. Van Aken 2005) •  In a context of uncertainty, design is exploratory. Instead of following a linear problem –​solution logics, argumentation evolves during iterations, repetitive rounds in which solutions are developed, comprehended, reflected upon, and adapted. •  Design follows a process of “conjecture and refutation.” The building of argument involves creativity and ingenuity, luck, and also doubt. Designers work with representation. • Designers work with representations of the built environment to support the imagination.

(Lawson 2009, Rittel 1987)

Abstract representations of the built environment are used to test design solutions. •  To argue for change, the designer imagines (Caliskan 2012, Hillier and Leaman 1974, design solutions but simultaneously imagines the Schön 1988) world around him or her. The latter is a process of abstraction that leads to the recognition of types: simplifications of real, material settings, sited between highly general, abstract categories, and highly specific ones. •  Simplifications of real, material settings are used to test solutions. •  Testing may lead to adaptations of solutions or to a changing appreciation of environments. Planning theory Planning has a normative orientation. •  Planning has a normative orientation. It seeks to sustain environmental resources, to distribute these in an even and fair way, to temper unintended external effects that stem from individual or group action, and to improve the information base for democratic decision-​making.

(Klosterman 1985)

Spatial planning pays particular attention to spatial development. •  Spatial planning is oriented towards the long-​ (Albrechts, Healey, and Kunzmann 2003, term, the integration of sectoral plans and activity, Albrechts 2004, Allmendinger and Haughton and the involvement of stakeholders in planning 2010, Faludi 2010, Healey 2004, 2006, decision-​making. Nadin, 2007, Needham 1988, Schön 2005, •  Compared to other (regulatory) planning Tewdwr-​Jones, Gallent, and Morphet 2010) approaches, spatial planning pays particular attention to spatial development.

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Contemporary Theory Table 4.1  Cont. Spatial representations are geographic imagery that is purposefully used by plan actors. •  Spatial representations, in word and image, are (Davoudi 2012, Davoudi and Strange 2008, socially constructed perceptions of the built Dühr 2003, 2004, 2006, Faludi 1996, environment. Graham and Healey 1999, Jensen and •  Spatial representations are expressions of what Richardson 2003, Neuman 1996, Thierstein different actors find important and what they are and Förster 2008, Van Duinen 2004, Förster willing to neglect. 2009) •  Spatial representations have agency, they are purposefully employed by plan actors to inform the behaviour of other, related actors. •  Spatial representations draw on repertoires of existing symbols. The use of spatial representations has an analytical, normative and/​or organizational logic. •  1) When representations have an analytical logic, (Dühr 2004, Förster 2009, Van Duinen 2004) they depict spatial development and are associated with (invariable) scientific knowledge about material spatial settings and practices. •  2) When representations have a normative logic, they portray desirable planning outcomes and are associated with political values. •  3) When representations have an organisational logic they show a territory and are associated with forms of territorial management. Spatial concepts are institutionalized perceptions of geographies. •  Spatial concepts are perceptions of geographies that (Davoudi 2003, 2012, Davoudi et al. 2018, are used for the purpose of planning. Gualini and Majoor 2007, Hagens 2010, •  A frame is “a perspective from which an amorphous, Healey 2004, Markusen 1999, Richardson ill-​defined, problematic situation can be made sense and Jensen 2003, Van Duinen 2004, of and acted on” (Rein and Schön 1993, 146). Zonneveld 1991, 1989, Zonneveld and Spatial concepts are geographic frames. Verwest 2005) •  Spatial concepts resemble discourse as “an ensemble of ideas, concepts, and categories through which meaning is given to social and physical phenomena, and which is produced and reproduced through an identifiable set of practices” (Hajer and Versteeg 2005).’ Spatial concepts are composed of an analytical, normative, and an organizational dimension. •  1) In their analytical dimension spatial concepts (Davoudi 2003, Markusen 1999, Van der Valk provide a reservoir of analytical knowledge. 2002, Van Duinen 2004, Zonneveld 1991) •  2) In their normative dimension spatial concepts incorporate a reservoir of political values. •  3) In their organizational dimension concepts incorporate a reservoir of policy measures that can take effect in territories. •  Through being composed of these dimensions, spatial concepts allow for the construction of spatial planning rationales. (continued)

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Verena Elisabeth Balz Table 4.1  Cont. Performance of plans is in their impact on decision-​making. •  The conformance of plans is in their effective (Faludi 1987, Faludi 2000, Faludi and Korthals implementation. Altes 1994, Mastop and Faludi 1997, •  The performance of plans is in their impact on Needham 1988) decision-​making. Performances are in learning and/​ or a change of minds of actors. Source: Balz (2019).

world’. Design practice is then inductive: it is used to challenge or enrich prevailing spatial concepts and the array of rationales that these incorporate. • Key performance parameters stem from matches and mismatches in analytical, political, and organizational dimensions. A more detailed set of performances can be presumed through the distinction of logics of spatial representations and dimensions of spatial concepts. According to these, design may be a form of analytical reasoning (referring to the analytical foundation of concepts), a form of political action (referring to the normative planning agendas that concepts imply), or a form of organizational reasoning (referring to forms of territorial action and control concepts suggest). In this context, performances of regional design in the realm of spatial planning are varied. Design contributes to the spatial and technical quality of plans, it clarifies political options, as well as enhances territorial management. The analytical framework explains these different performances by the matches and mismatches that designs produce in the context of premediated perceptions of geographies that frame policy argumentation. Depending on these congruencies, design proposals refine or challenge the analytical foundation of spatial concepts, the normative agendas that they incorporate, or the policy-​making that they suggest for territories.

Aspects of Spatial Planning Frameworks that Influence the Performances of Regional Design In design theory, design practice appears to be “a relatively simple set of operations carried out on highly complex structures, which are themselves simplified by ‘theories’ and modes of representation,” as Hillier and Leaman (1974, 4) note. These scholars argue that, if a design method is to be improved, a sophisticated understanding of these theories and modes is more important than an understanding of the practices themselves. In the previous section we have identified key performances of regional design in the realm of spatial planning based on a first round of case study analysis (see Balz 2019). This analysis shows that the planning context of regional design ‒​in particular spatial concepts that frame spatial planning decision-​making ‒ is a crucial determinant. Therefore, how planning frameworks influence regional design practice was investigated through a second multiple case studies analysis. The questions addressed were:  what aspects of spatial planning frameworks influence the performances of regional design, and how can these aspects of spatial planning frameworks be analyzed? Below, theoretical notions that were found to be most relevant for answering these questions are summarized first. In the following sub-​section, influential aspects of frameworks, deduced from theories and confirmed by case study analysis, are presented. A third sub-​section summarizes additional results from this case study.

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Regional Design as a Rule-​Building Practice As emphasized above, design is an argumentative practice. To argue for change, the designer imagines design solutions but simultaneously imagines the world around him or her. Simplifications of real, material settings, situated between highly general, abstract categories and highly specific ones are used to test imagined design solutions (Caliskan 2012, Hillier and Leaman 1974, Schön 1988, 1992). Such testing leads to the recognition of matches and mismatches: the designer learns how well certain design solutions fit particular settings. Conclusions drawn from testing can lead to the modification of a design solution or to a changing appreciation of the “design world” (Schön 1992, 3). Another design product ‒ often overseen in practice ‒ is in the interdependencies between solutions and their perceived context. From the testing of solutions against types, rules are deducted: “As rules of law are derived from judicial precedents, …, so design rules are derived from types, and may be subjected to test and criticism by reference to them” (Schön 1988, 183). Design scholars emphasize that design thrives on rich knowledge about a particular situation, constituting what Rittel (1987, 5)  calls “epistemic freedom” (see also Caliskan 2012). In the context of such freedom, design solutions are derived from the argumentation on how a design solution functions within its context. However, any sort of argument is inevitably incomplete. The designer considers a broad body of knowledge from a variety of fields, decides upon paths to go, and thereby leaves others unexplored. “[T]‌here are no logical or epistemological constraints or rules which would prescribe which of the various meaningful steps to take next” (Rittel 1987, 5). Epistemic freedom facilitates creativity, “ingenuity, and luck” in design argumentation, as Caliskan (2012, 279) argues, referring to Popper (1957, 7). However, design scholars also note that overly abundant freedom produces doubt and that this, in turn, leads to a search for constraints that diminish available choices and, thus, the responsibility for solutions that a designer holds (Cross 2004). These notions imply that the abundance of choices built into premediated simplifications of material settings is an important condition of design. The performance of plans is defined as the impact that plans have on decision-​making: in learning and in changing the mind of actors. The related decision-​centered evaluation approach is associated with a broader “argumentative turn” in planning theory and practice (Forester and Fischer 1993, 1). Through this turn, plans are regarded as tools that not fully determine planning output, but as temporary, malleable compromises between actors: a “drifting cloud” (Friedmann and Gross 1965, 39), or “a fleeting summary of current knowledge, expectations and goals” (Faludi and Korthals Altes 1994, 405). Planning approaches related to this turn ‒ including collaborative, communicative, and participative approaches, among others (e.g. Forester 1980, Friedmann 1969, Healey 1997, 1999) ‒ share a concern about the quality of decision-​making, a reliance on an interpretative rather than a positivist premise, and a social-​constructionist perspective, in which “the social and political life under investigation is embedded in a web of social meanings produced and reproduced through discursive practices” (Fischer 2007, 101). All approaches embrace pluralism by recognizing different world views that exist in societies. All acknowledge conflict that results from such diversity, and emphasize a need for communication, collaboration, and negotiation. All also recognize a need for “framing” in policy argumentation. Frames involve what is likewise called a “field of choice” (Faludi and Korthals Altes 1994, Friend and Jessop 2013), “a field of argument” (Dryzek 1993, Fischer 2007) or “a field of positions” (Rittel 1987). Such frames define core values and outline norms to allow for the consideration of competing arguments and the making of strategic choices, without letting arguments go astray (Dryzek 1993).

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Choices built into flexible frames are required in argumentative planning. More broadly, they are also an important determinant of planning approaches. As is the case in argumentative planning, a high degree of flexibility in planning guidance is positively associated with negotiation, collaboration, and governance, as shown in distinctions between, for instance, “indicative” and “imperative” planning (Faludi and Korthals Altes 1994), between “development-​led” and “plan-​ led” planning (Buitelaar, Galle, and Sorel 2011, Munoz 2010) and, more broadly, between planning approaches that provide for either “discretion” or “certainty” (Tewdwr-​Jones 1999). In the realm of spatial planning, flexibility of planning frameworks is also associated with a particular attention to the geographies of regions and areas. In this realm, flexibility is required to facilitate a recognition of diverse spatial circumstances and the making of strategic locational choices. Faludi (1987) and Needham (1988) theorized the emergence of spatial planning in the Netherlands. They noted that a form of planning that allocates planning resources to some areas while others are omitted, requires negotiable relations between what they call a “spatial order” (autonomous spatial development, driven by social action) and “spatial ordering” (intervening in spatial development). They argue that too definite relations would neglect the spatial and organizational particularities of local situations and cause conflict between actors. Allmendinger and Haughton (2010) investigated spatial planning in the context of a “regional gap,” characterized by softly defined planning guidance. They observed that such flexibility contributes to the “tempering of national and local concerns” during the formation of strategies to address real problems, in particular spatial situations “on the ground.” They (and others) conclude that a certain level of softness built into premediated territorial conceptions allows for their adaptation to distinct spatial circumstances (Allmendinger and Haughton 2009b, Allmendinger, Haughton, and Shepherd 2016, Brenner 2004, Faludi 2013, Hincks, Deas, and Haughton 2017). That the softness –​or ambiguity ‒ of geographies plays a role in spatial planning is also recognized by scholars who investigate spatial concepts (Davoudi 2003, Davoudi et al. 2018, Markusen 1999). These scholars note that concepts have a more or less fuzzy analytical foundation ‒ they rely on a select and detailed empirical evidence base or on a landscape of theories ‒ and incorporate more or less clearly defined normative values ‒ broad agendas, or operational goals. Analysis shows that these attributes are transformed while concepts are employed by actors with an interest in a particular situation. Depending on specific spatial circumstances, political preferences as well as territorial interests, concepts are used as a descriptive and analytical tool or as a prescriptive and normative agenda (Davoudi 2003).

Regional Design as a Form of Discretion Discretion is, in popular terms, “the art of suiting action to particular circumstances” (The Rt Hon Lord Scarman 1981, 103). It evolves in the context of predefined rules, and is concerned with “making choices between courses of action” in specific situations (Booth 2007, 131). Discretionary action is a search for “leeway in the interpretation of fact and the application of precedent to particular cases” (Booth 2007, 129). It not only aims at the application but also at an improvement of generally applicable rules through a judgment of their implications for particular situations. Regional design assists in the building of spatial planning rationales by either challenging or refining spatial concepts, as was argued above. The notion of regional design as a rule-​building practice, and the importance of choices for design and spatial planning, as well as the use of spatial concepts imply that regional design practices closely resemble discretionary action. Such practices, when used in spatial planning, seek to proactively qualify spatial planning decisions by means of imagined, place-​based solutions. The equation between regional design and discretionary action allows for a further detailing of the interrelations between regional 74

Contemporary Theory Table 4.2  Theoretical notions used to identify aspects of spatial planning frameworks that influence regional design Design theory Design involves rule-​making. •  During design processes simplifications of real, (Caliskan 2012, Schön 1988) material settings are used to test design solutions. From of the testing of imagined solutions against abstract perceptions of the built environment, rules are deducted: “[a]‌s rules of law are derived from judicial precedents, … so design rules are derived from types, and may be subjected to test and criticism by reference to them” (Schön 1988, 183). “Epistemic freedom” influences design practice. •  Design argumentation thrives on epistemic freedom, (Caliskan 2012, Rittel 1987). constituted by rich knowledge about a particular situation. This freedom constitutes the creativity of design processes. •  In the context of such freedom, design solutions are derived from argumentation on how a design solution functions within its context but argument is inevitably incomplete. •  Overly abundant choices turn design into a practice of doubt. Doubt causes pragmatic behaviour: searches for acknowledged constraints that limit choices and release the designer from responsibility. Planning theory Choices built into “frames” facilitate involvement in argumentative planning. •  Argumentative planning relies on an interpretative (Dryzek 1993, Faludi 1987, 2000, Faludi premise, and a social constructionist perspective. and Korthals Altes 1994, Fischer 1995, •  In argumentative planning different world views Forester 1980, Forester and Fischer 1993, that exist in societies are acknowledged. A need for Friedmann 1969, Hajer 1995, Healey, communication, and negotiation is deduced from this 1997, 1999, Innes and Booher 2003, diversity. Mastop and Faludi 1997, Needham 1988, •  A frame is “a perspective from which an amorphous, Rein and Schön 1993, Throgmorton 1993, ill-​defined, problematic situation can be made sense 2003, Tewdwr-​Jones 1999) of and acted on” (Rein and Schön 1993, 146). Frames are required for the consideration of competing arguments in policy argumentation. •  The amount of choices built into frames determines the planning-​audience bandwidth for political consent and thus the quality of democratic decisions. The flexibility of planning frameworks is an important determinant of planning. •  Planning frameworks incorporate degrees of flexibility. (Buitelaar, Galle, and Sorel 2011, Faludi •  A high degree of flexibility is positively associated with and Korthals Altes 1994, Munoz 2010, negotiation, collaboration and governance. Tewdwr-​Jones 1999) •  A low degree of flexibility is positively associated with certainty and the predictability of planning outcomes. (continued)

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Verena Elisabeth Balz Table 4.2  Cont. Choices built into spatial planning frameworks allow for the recognition of spatial diversity. •  The flexibility of spatial planning frameworks facilitates (Allmendinger and Haughton 2009b, a recognition of spatial diversity. Allmendinger and Haughton 2010, •  The amount of choices built into frameworks Brenner 2004, Faludi 1987, 2013, influences strategic spatial selectivity: the making of Needham 1988) strategic locational choices. •  A high degree of flexibility (“softness”) is positively associated with the responsiveness of planning to real problems “on the ground.” Spatial concepts have different degrees of ambiguity. •  Spatial concepts have a more or less fuzzy analytical (Davoudi 2006, Markusen 1999, Davoudi foundation. et al. 2018) •  Spatial concepts incorporate more or less clearly defined values (broad agendas or operational goals). •  Spatial concepts embody more or less soft territories and forms of territorial control. Discretion seeks to qualify rules through assessing their implications for particular situations. •  Discretion is a form of decision-​making that evolves (Booth 1996, 2007, Buitelaar and Sorel in the context of predefined rules. In this context, 2010, Tewdwr-​Jones 1999) discretionary action is a search for “leeway in the interpretation of fact and the application of precedent to particular cases” (Booth, 2007, 129). •  Discretion is “the art of suiting action to particular circumstances” (The Rt Hon Lord Scarman (1981, 103)). It seeks to qualify rules through assessing their implications for particular situations. •  Discretion requires flexibility; room for interpretation in rules provides for the possibility of making a choice between courses of action. •  Discretion has organisational/​institutional implications, as it defines “who decides and with what degrees of freedom, about the way in which the system legitimates the power to act” (Booth 1996, 132). Source: Balz (2019).

design and spatial planning. It brings a set of four aspects of spatial planning frameworks to the foreground as plausible determinants of the performance of regional design (see Table 4.2 for an overview of the theoretical foundations). • Room for interpretation is a determinant of regional design. Design scholars note that epistemic freedom, built into preconceived types of environments, matters for design argumentation. Planning scholars with an interest in decision-​making emphasize the flexibility of planning frameworks as an important determinant of decision-​making in strategic spatial planning. Spatial concepts involve a degree of ambiguity to allow for their interpretation “on the ground.” In discretion, room for interpretation ‒ the choices that premediated rules incorporate ‒ is a central issue. Without these choices, discretionary action can, by definition, not evolve 76

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(Booth 2007).Taking this as a point departure, it can first be argued that the choices built into premediated spatial concepts are an important context for design. In regional design practice, room for interpretations can be embodied in a variety of types of “frames.” It can sit in broadly defined institutionalized spatial concepts, with which designers are expected to work, or in the more detailed geographies that concrete regional design commissions pose. In whatever form room for interpretation is presented, it requires attention as a determinant of regional design performance. • Room for interpretation determines if regional design is pragmatic or evolves as a form of advocacy. Choices for action built into rules are required for discretion. Their abundance determines how discretion evolves, as scholars who have investigated discretion in the realm of (spatial) planning have noted (e.g. Booth 1996, 2007, Buitelaar and Sorel 2010, Tewdwr-​Jones 1999). These scholars argue that discretionary action, when evolving in the context of multiple choices, likely leads to a refinement of rules. Conversely, such action likely leads to the challenging of rules when it evolves in the context of few choices. Design theorists argue that design ‒ the testing of solutions against simplified abstractions of the built environment ‒ may be a process of elaboration or of discovery. On the grounds of these notions, it can be assumed that the room for interpretation that designers are provided with, determines if design will likely be deductive ‒ elaborating premediated geographies ‒ or be inductive ‒ discovering new or new features of geographies. In more fundamental terms, these notions imply that regional design, depending on premediated choices and constraints, either evolves as pragmatic behavior or as a form of advocacy. • Room for interpretation informs collaboration and governance in regional design. It is common to describe governance arrangements as social bodies that involve intricate networks, composed of multiple and multi-​level, horizontal and vertical relations among public, private, and civil actors (e.g. in Ansell 2000, Booth 2005, Hooghe and Marks 2001, Jessop 2004). Arrangements form temporary political entities, which continuously re-​constitute themselves while demands for governing arise from above, below or beside (Ansell 2000, Jessop 2001, 2004). The involvement of governance arrangements in spatial planning has different purposes. Inclusion may follow a collaborative rationale; governance in this case is justified by a recognition and appreciation of plurality, and aspires to good democratic decision-​making (Healey 2003, Innes and Booher 2003). Another governance rationale is related to “governing”: the resolution of societal problems that occur in particular situations (Mayntz 2004). In this more politically motivated involvement of actors, the recognition of distinct problems and the operationalization of planning in the face of these problems play an important role. Mayntz (2004) notes that these two governance rationales co-​exist in planning practice. However, other authors argue that the strategic selectivity, which is required for the recognition of problems in particular areas, is likely to produce conflict and thus may stand in the way of harmonious collaboration (Brenner 2004, Friend and Jessop 2013, Jessop 2001). That the two governance rationales are not easy to combine is recognized by scholars of discretion. They make a distinction between discretion by means of collaborative policy argumentation, and by means of more confrontational processes. They argue that the former process is likely to occur in the context of softly defined policy guidance where discretion is largely pragmatic. The latter process is likely to occur in the context of rigid law or regulation where discretion is a form of advocacy (Tewdwr-​Jones 1999, Booth 2002, 2007). Scholars with a particular focus on regional design often appreciate its collaborative nature (Kempenaar 2017, Van Dijk 2011, De Jonge 2009). Empirical analysis shows (Balz 2019) that the employment of regional design in spatial planning decision-​making is frequently 77

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motivated by the inclusion of multiple actors. The equivalence between regional design and discretionary action implies, however, that collaboration requires careful considerations. The notions indicate that governance in regional design practice differs depending on room for interpretation in premediated rules: collaborating actors are either united by broadly defined, shared perceptions of the built environment, or are separated by more narrowly and, therefore, more operationally defined perceptions. In reality networked actor constellations in regional design practice may be difficult to unravel. However, unraveling is required to identify possibly hidden political agendas, overly pragmatic behavior, or unaccountable ways to influence decision-​making procedures (see e.g. Allmendinger and Haughton 2009a, Jessop 2004). Such unraveling is also required to predict and assess the performances of regional design in the realm of cooperation. • Distances between actors with different roles in regional design qualify the performance of regional design in spatial planning decision-​making. An equivalence between regional design and discretion not only leads to a distinction in the governance rationales of regional design practices but also implies a need to distinguish roles in their conduct. In discretion, the ones who hold responsibility for premediated rules, who seek to bend these rules, and who judge if such search has indeed built sufficient argumentation for rule-​revision need to be separated carefully, in order to guarantee accountability and legitimacy. One implication of a similar division of actors in regional design lies in the power that is attributed to the design commissioner: the actor who frames design tasks and, in this way, provides room for interpretation or epistemic freedom. By formulating problem definitions, policy agendas or design briefs, the commissioner predetermines the outcomes and performance. Room for interpretation in preconceived rules also determines the relations between commissioners and the “authors” of design proposals –​those who engage in the making of design proposals. In a pragmatic use of regional design both commissioners and authors, are united by shared spatial imaginaries.When design is used for advocacy, it will be more likely that these actors are divided. An equivalence between regional design and discretion finally stresses a need for discernible judgment. In discretion, there is a distinction between discretionary action –​the constitution of precedent, or the interpretation of rules on the ground –​and discretionary control: the assessment whether discretionary action should lead to rule reform. For the qualification of discretion in organizational terms, a distance between those who compose a “court of appeal” and those who seek exemption is essential. In regional design practice, actors who judge whether a design proposal is a relevant interpretation of premediated spatial planning rationales or a negligible incident need to be independent from both, commissioners and authors of design, to be able to come to sound conclusions.

Additional Theoretical Considerations The theoretical considerations presented above are strongly connected to the results of empirical case study research (Balz 2019). A second set of theoretical considerations can be proposed which are more loosely grounded in research but nevertheless focus on important aspects of regional design. • Creativity in regional design. Design scholars note that design in the context of abundant epistemic freedom or a broad room for interpretation produces creative solutions but also doubt that leads to a search for constraints limiting the number of available choices:

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What the designer knows, believes, fears, desires enters his reasoning at every step of the process, affects his use of epistemic freedom. He will -​of course -​commit himself to those positions which matches his beliefs, convictions, preferences, and values, unless he is persuaded or convinced by someone else or his own insight. (Rittel 1987, 6) Empirical analyses reveal pragmatic behavior in regional design practices, in particular, when these evolve in the context of ambiguous spatial planning frameworks and complex governance settings. In planning literature, overly pragmatic behavior in such settings is associated with a wish to sustain existing political agendas and power structures (see for instance Allmendinger and Haughton 2009a). It is therefore argued that design practice needs to carefully consider the multiple implications of epistemic freedom. • “Assemblage-​thinking” in regional design. The analytical framework presented here relies on the assumption that regional design includes the building of spatial planning rationales. How such rationales evolve receives attention by a number of planning scholars. Observation of urbanism approaches reminded them of “assemblage-​thinking,” where planning is the outcome of rather spontaneous association of occurring action on the ground with generally applicable frameworks (Allmendinger, Haughton, and Shepherd 2016, Brenner, Madden, and Wachsmuth 2011, Cochrane 2012, Jones 2009, Massey 2011, Allmendinger and Haughton 2009a). Our research has focused on the matches and mismatches that regional design proposals produce in the context of spatial planning frameworks. These analyses indicate that resulting decisions were often not based upon carefully constructed rationales but indeed the product of spontaneous, reflexive responses, which are difficult to objectively explain (Balz 2019). • Meta-​governance in regional design. Meta-​governance, as defined by Jessop (2004), is an attempt to control planning decisions not by means of deliberating substantive issues but by controlling decision-​making procedures. Such control involves measures that “deploy … organizational intelligence and information,” “provide rules for participation,” “organize negotiations,” and install a “court of appeal” (idem, 13). The engagement of the Dutch national government in regional design practice appears to have been motivated by such attempts at times. It can therefore be concluded that the concept of “meta-​governance” is relevant for a deeper understanding of regional design in the realm of spatial planning. • Values and norms of regional design professionals. In discretionary practice, multiple forms of discretionary control exist. Booth (2007, 136)  makes a distinction between controls that are “external to the administration and the political decision-​making process” (including elections, judicial review, and public participation) and “internal controls” (including negotiation within administrations). By referring to Adler and Asquith (1981, 13), Booth also points at controls that are “exercised through professional affiliation” and “by reference to ‘esoteric professional knowledge’ ” (Booth 2007, 136). He notes that professional organizations, when they engage in discretionary control, claim to have special expertise, and distinguish themselves through a “code of conduct,” ethical principles and core values (idem, 139). Empirical analysis of regional design practice in Dutch national planning has identified such core values and norms of regional design professionals, for instance in their continuing referencing to “spatial quality” and consistent use of imagery. It can therefore be assumed that the self-​ conception of the professional community has informed regional design practice and its performances.

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Reflections on Research for Regional Design While most regional design approaches to decision-​making have been directed to city regions ‒ as many of the case studies in this book reflect ‒ others have addressed non-​urban regions, historically involving attention to agriculture, ecological, water, and landscape development. Regional design practices focusing on either urban or non-​urban themes show some important differences. While urban regional designs usually rely on knowledge from the disciplines associated with urban studies (emphasizing regions as a “setting for social practice” or a structure that accommodates “socio-​economic functional relations,” as Paasi (2000, 5) argues), designs with a non-​urban scope draw more strongly on knowledge from the discipline of landscape architecture. The latter discipline emphasizes a morphological and evolutionary perception of regions; one where they are perceived as an “object” or a “living organism” (Paasi 2000, 4). Also the values and norms to which designs with a concern about urban and non-​urban systems refer are often different. In Dutch national planning since the 1980s there has been, for example, a much greater appreciation of “spatial quality” in landscape designs. However, distinctions of regional designs by their main theme can shift over time. Recently, in response to climate crises, a range of regional design practices refer for instance to “urban metabolism” and “circular economy” concepts. These depict urban regions as natural organisms. In organizational terms they have inspired planning approaches that support evolutionary, transitional change, adaptability, and resilience. Such conceptual transformations demonstrate a need for research on regional design that regards changing thematic occupations as processes that require explanation through overarching theoretical notions. The theoretical notions presented in this chapter are strongly inspired by a social-​ constructionist perspective. Schön (1988, 183) argues that the idea of design worlds is inconsistent with an objectivist point of view, according to which things are what they are independent of our ways of seeing them. … From a constructionist perspective, the seeming objectivity of a consensual design world is not a given but an achievement, a product of the work of communicative inquiry. Similar notions concern decisions that are the outcome of policy argumentation in the realm of spatial planning. The term “region,” for example, is always contested in practice, and is the result of a communicative policy discourse that engage negotiated disciplinary, managerial, and political stances (Jones and Paasi 2013, Paasi 2000, 2010, 2012, Amin 2004). Applying a social-​ constructionist perspective means that knowledge that stems from studying the tangible form of the built environment becomes less relevant. The analytical and theoretical frameworks presented in this chapter have the objective to identify matches as well as mismatches between spatial rationales in design proposals and spatial concepts. It could distinguish 1) spatial concepts by their analytical, normative, and organizational dimensions and their degree of ambiguity, and 2) spatial representations by their analytical, normative, and organizational logics.While images of spatial representation are paramount, Dühr (2005) argues that there is no benchmark to analyze policy text and graphic expression in conjunction. In the absence of such analytical criteria, ambiguities, naturally interwoven in planning rationales, are difficult to unravel. Last but not least, it can be challenging to identify performance parameters which result from actors changing their minds. A  variety of ways to detect such change is elaborated in planning literature. Change is seen to become apparent through, for instance, shifting levels in policy argumentation (Fischer 1995, 2007), the way information moves from one policy-​making arena to another and triggers learning (e.g. Nadin and Stead 2008, Colomb 2007), in different 80

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language, rhetoric, and drama (Throgmorton 1993, 2003), the formation of discourse coalitions, and discourse institutionalization (Hajer 1995, 2002, 2006). Although each of these performance parameters is associated with its own methodological prescriptions, in practice, it remains difficult to trace them, as they often remain implicit, and are spread out over time. A final critical remark concerns the interrelations between regional design and spatial planning frameworks. Regional design has a holistic and strategic orientation; it considers multiple interdependencies between different parts of the regional environment in relation to key elements such as infrastructures. Spatial planning strives for comprehensiveness:  the integration of sectoral plans and activities as well as the consideration of interests of multiple actors often across different levels of scale. In reality, interrelations between distinct regional design practices and spatial planning frameworks are therefore composed of a multitude of matches and mismatches between regional design and spatial planning rationales. Thus, practices trigger a multitude of performances at the same time. In a period of nascent interrelations among levels of government and other institutions as they grapple with the complexity and novelty of regional design, these varied approaches evince a high degree of experimentation where no single, established governance model exists. Thus, opportunities abound. In these circumstances, a comprehensive understanding of interrelations between regional design and spatial planning should consider matches and mismatches that regional design proposals produce, particularly in the realm of institutions and politics.

Conclusion: Directions for Further Research Regional design practices differ in their spatial scope and scale, have different relations to institutionalized spatial planning frameworks, and involve various actors with various roles, values, and interests. Efforts to understand these practices as one unified approach that performs in the realm of spatial planning therefore seem vain. However, this chapter and the underlying research seek to make progress in understanding by detailing propositions concerning interrelations between regional design practice and spatial planning frameworks. Regional design commonly emerges from discretionary attempts to mediate between generally accepted spatial planning rules and strategies to solve problems in particular situations. The outline for contemporary theory that was developed for the analysis of such mediation and discussed in this chapter, is based on a combination of planning and design theory. A search for similarities among theories has resulted in the recognition that the built environment itself is their most important common denominator. The model recognizes spatial concepts as institutionalized geographic ideas or spatial imaginaries that hold reservoirs of meaning. Regional design assembles a selection of notions from these reservoirs for a distinct purpose in a particular place. Concepts and design both have agency in constructing perceptions of the built environment. To understand how geographic perceptions transform requires a deeper understanding of who is involved in such transformation. The theory presented here argues that design is a form of discretionary action. This stance enhances attention to the institutional settings of regional design. Allmendinger and Haughton (2010, 807) argue that the tempering of national and local concerns … highlights the importance of professional discretion and the role of the planning policy community as a force for change within modern governance, working alongside and as an integral part of diverse policy networks and coalitions, working from existing institutional and governance practices and cultures to create new ones. 81

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Scholars in discretion also highlight the importance of professional organizations in rule-​ building. They note that these organizations influence decisions through the values and norms they pursue. Thus, it is proposed that the role of the regional design practices in spatial planning decision-​making requires deeper understanding.The practical knowledge available in the professional field of regional design is a somewhat underused reservoir for such understanding. In Dutch planning, there is a tradition of finding political consent, which has led to a broad variety of argumentative and collaborative planning practices, including regional design. A rich Dutch design experience found an expression in multiple organizations that exercise, support, or control regional design. Repeated practices also led to conventions in the use of regional design. For example, it is broadly understood that a design proposal is not necessarily made to be implemented; that it may just portray a brief moment in decision-​making, meant to perpetuate reflection. Regional design is used also in other nations. As planning systems and cultures differ in countries, so may their design institutions. A comparative perspective on these institutions may lead to a deeper understanding of not just the regional design practices themselves, but also of how spatial development finds attention in spatial planning elsewhere. Faludi (2013, 1312) notes that territory can no longer be understood as a fixed entity enveloping all major aspects of social and political life but rather as the object of negotiation and compromise, open to multiple and contested interpretations. … Spatial planning is then about inserting imaginative visions into the on-​going reconstruction of the spatial fabric of life, including the plurality of territories which this implies. An implicit and important proposition developed here is that flexibility, in the form of ambiguous geographies, influences the creativity of planning approaches and thus, their ability to transgress preconceived, seemingly fixed perceptions of spatial organization. This proposition is inspired by design theory where design is described as a process of elaboration and of discovery. Although many planning efforts include an expectation about creative solutions and innovation on the ground, ways to accommodate creativity in planning gains only marginal attention in planning theory and research. This calls for improved methodologies to assess degrees of ambiguity of geographies or, more broadly, the flexibility (or softness) of spatial planning and governance frameworks. This proposition also calls for a broader integration of planning and design theory.

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Part II

City Region Case Studies

5 Urban Policies and Strategies for Balanced Regional Development in Korea Wang-​Geun  Lee

Introduction How to enhance city competitiveness in the context of globalization, localization, and the knowledge-​based economy is becoming an increasingly important issue. Korea is no exception to these trends. Each individual city, rather than the nation, has emerged as a leading subject to improve national competitiveness. Though the ultimate goal, that all cities strive for, can be identical, the basic strategies and approaches for improving city competitiveness can be different because all cities and regions have grown in different historic, social, economic, and cultural backgrounds. As a practical strategy, some cities want to improve their education systems to produce a competitive work force. Others can set their strategies for improving the quality of life to attract international investment and competitive firms. The purpose of this chapter is to introduce the direction of urban policy and key strategies for balanced regional development in Korea. First, the study will start with a review of the characteristics of urbanization and urban development policy in Korea during the last five decades. Second, basic policy directions that guide the “competitive city” will be analyzed, including a review of the attempts to balance regional development in the 2000s by President Roh Mu-​Hyun. Finally, a regional design based on four key urban development strategies to make internationally competitive cities at the national level will be explained and analyzed. These four strategies, each of which comprises a new city, are the New Multi-​Functional Administrative City (Sejong City), the Innovation City, the Enterprise City, and Livable City/​ Community Making.

Urbanization and Urban Policy in Korea Korea suffered from such bitter historic experiences as Japanese colonization, the division of the Korean Peninsula, and the Korean War from 1910s to the early 1950s. The majority of common men and the policymakers of central government unanimously agreed that an economic policy to overcome dreadful poverty should become the foremost national policy agenda. Central government in the 1960s decided to adopt the strategy of “Choice and Concentration.” The government intentionally carried out an unbalanced regional growth policy to achieve rapid economic growth within a short term. Under that economic development policy, central 89

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Figure 5.1  Regions by the SMA readjustment plan (2006–​2020) Source: NGII 2017.

government’s investment naturally had been concentrated in the Seoul Metropolitan Area (SMA). The SMA is a national capital region and includes Seoul City, Incheon city, and Gyeonggi-​do (see Figure 5.1). Seoul, compared to other cities in Korea, had a relatively excellent infrastructure and human resources. Consequently, the SMA has successfully carried out its role as a powerful engine for rapid economic growth and enjoyed the benefits of an agglomeration economy and economy of scale at the same time. Though concentrated investment in the SMA has contributed to total job creation and rapid economic growth, the concentration also accelerated the unwanted side effects. These side effects include land speculation, urban sprawl, overcrowding, and increasing regional disparity among Korean regions because of the extraordinary concentration of population, capital, and political power in Seoul. In the process of structural change from traditional manufacturing to a knowledge-​based economy, generally high technology firms have either been created in the SMA or moved into the SMA because it is easy to secure high-​quality human resources, information, and direct access to a large consumer market with a relatively high disposable income. Meanwhile, the less 90

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developed regions in Korea fell behind Seoul in the investment priorities of the national government and private enterprise alike, thus losing the human resources that can contribute to regional development. As a consequence, these regions outside the SMA experienced a decline in the relative amount of investment continuously during this period. Political power, which is concentrated in Seoul, became one of the concentration factors as well. Because Seoul has carried out its role as a national capital for more than 600 years, the capital city has been the center of attention for urban matters in both popular and policy thinking because of its high social, economic, and cultural value. Korea was ruled by military clique from 1961 to the late 1980s, after a coup. The military government’s policy was focused on anti-​communism and on rapid economic growth and the tradition of local self-​government was superseded by central government for a long time.Though the current “Local Government Act” was revived in 1988 after a pro-​democracy movement, and mayoral elections began again in 1995, the policies and decision-​making processes of central government closely influenced the overall activities of individuals and firms compared to the economic scale until now. In addition, because policies are rapidly changing in Korea, people and firms want to respond efficiently while staying within a close spatial range of policymakers. People who want to attain social or economic success in their life have showed a strong will that they should go to Seoul. Many of the leading universities that are essential to attain high social and economic status are concentrated in Seoul as well. Though lots of students came from other regions for education, most of those who graduated from universities in the SMA have settled down in the area, and they made their families or spouses migrate into the SMA. The SMA’s population percentage of the national total population increased from 20.8 percent in 1960 to 35.5 percent in 1980 and 46.3 percent in 2000, respectively. In 2005, 48.1  percent of Korea’s population was concentrated in the SMA capital region, which is much higher than in Japan (32 percent), in France (19 percent), and in England (12 percent) in the same year.The Korea National Statistical Office (KNSO) in 2005 forecasted that the population percentage of SMA compared to the total nation will be more than a half in 2011, and that this population concentration trend will not change in the near future.Though the date ended up being eight years after the forecasted time, the Korea National Statistical Office (2019) estimated that the population percentage of the SMA in August 2019 increased to 50.0 percent of the national population. As a result, external diseconomies by overcrowding, such as housing shortages, increases in housing prices, traffic congestion, and environmental pollution have become more serious problems than before.

Table 5.1  Spatial concentration of the SMA Indicators

Unit

%

Year

Area Population Central administration Head offices of public enterprises Head offices of the 100 largest enterprises Top 20 universities Foreign firms Software firms Venture firms and R&D institutions

km Persons No. of agencies No. of offices No. of offices No. of universities No. of firms Persons No. of firms and institutions

11.8 48.1 78.7 83.2 91 65 75 92 70

2005 2000 2000 2000 2001 2000 2005 2000

2

Source: Park and Kim (2002); KNSO (2005); Lee (2005).

91

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The Korea National Statistical Office defined the Diffusion Ration of Housing according to the following mathematical formula: (No. of houses/​No. of general households) X 100. In 2005, Diffusion Ratio of Housing in Seoul City and the SMA were 89.7 percent and 96.8 percent respectively, and the percentages are much lower than that of national mean, 105.9 percent (KNSO 2005). Also, traffic conditions and environmental pollution of the SMA were getting worse. Mean traffic speed in Seoul’s CBD decreased from 30 km/​h in 1980 to 15.3 km/​h in 2006. And in 2005, the cost of traffic congestion in the SMA amounted to 12.9 billion US dollars and accounted for 54.2 percent of total national congestion costs. Most ozone warnings occurred in the SMA. Moreover, 11,127 people in the SMA died of diseases caused by harmful aerosols in 2003 (Lee 2005).

Basic Directions for Balanced Regional Development and Competitive Cities The central government made great efforts to accomplish balanced national territory development after the 1970s. Former President Park Chung-​Hee (1917–​1979) announced a temporary administrative capital in Chung Cheong region to mitigate over-​crowing in the SMA and to strengthen national defense. The Chung Cheong region includes Daejeon city, Chung Cheong Nam-​do, and Chung Cheong Buk-​do (Figure 5.1). Seoul, the capital of the Republic of Korea, is located within the long-​range artillery of the North Korea Army. President Park Chung-​Hee thought it could be a serious threat in national security and wanted to relocate the administrative capital to a safe place. But the plan was canceled because of his unexpected death. The Korean government also prepared for a growth control act to reduce the concentration of the population and industries in the SMA by enacting the “Seoul Metropolitan Area Readjustment Planning Act” in 1982. According to the Act and its implementing ordinance, the SMA was divided into three regions, and defined their characters and boundaries (National Geography Information Institute 2017). First, the designated Overcrowding Restriction Region is a region with overcrowding, or expected to be overcrowded and in need of readjustment or relocation of facilities. The Growth Control Region is a region that accommodate relocated people or facilities from the Overcrowding Restriction Region. In this way, the location of industries and urban development are carefully managed. The Nature Conservation Region is a region where the natural environment, such as green space and clean water resources, needs to be conserved (see Figure 5.1). Boundaries of the regions did not change at all for a period of 37 years because the interests of stakeholders were very complex, and thus they failed to reach a new agreement. The basic direction for balanced national territorial development was determined by former President Roh Mu-​Hyun (1946–​2009). During his campaign in December 2002, Roh Mu-​ Hyun promised to the populace the construction of a New Administrative Capital to mitigate the negative impacts occurring in the SMA, and to change the national spatial policy’s paradigm from centralization to decentralization of power coupled with regional specialization. After winning the presidential election, the central government tried to transform the basic direction of territorial development from the old model focused on centralization and concentration to the new model based on decentralization and deconcentration. The new policy paradigm had focused on overcoming the problems arising from the over-​ concentration and overcrowding of the SMA and the resulting stagnation of other regions.These problems included weakened national competitiveness and growing conflicts between the SMA and other regions. The intent of the policy was to reduce these conflicts and to increase competitiveness. Thus, the new policy paradigm was intended to be a kind of win-​win strategy, by which the SMA and other regions could prosper together. To overcome the negative influence 92

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arising from the centralization of government power and spatial concentration of the economy and people into the SMA, the central government tried to strengthen the self-​autonomy of local and regional governments. The final goal of the government was for local and regional governments to implement and maintain self-​sustained growth to the greatest extent possible, within their own capabilities. Balanced development of the national territory envisions the conditions in which people can enjoy a basic quality of life wherever they live. It also means that city competitiveness can be maximized through the enhanced potential of regional development that offers opportunities for advancement to every city and citizen. The goal of balanced regional development is to realize a society where every region can prosper yet maintain their distinctive characteristics, at least theoretically. For that purpose, the development strategies of regional specialization that can utilize the comparative advantages and growth potentials of different cities were articulated. The key principles for self-​sustained localization, which were announced in June 2003, were summarized as the following three basic principles. First, the governance system of the nation should be transformed from centralized to a decentralized structure. In addition, a comprehensive approach for localization has to be implemented to settle the problems created by unbalanced regional development, including the decentralization of central government’s power, balanced development of the national territory, and the construction of a new multi-​functional administrative city. Second, a Regional Innovation System (RIS) should be established for self-​sustained localization (local development), and that regional economies in Korea advance toward innovation-​led economies. Third, priority should be placed on the promotion of other regions, with the planned growth management of the SMA as the basis for the balanced national development of the two.The practical strategies to implement these basic directions are represented by the four new cities: The New Multi-​Functional Administrative City, the Innovation City, the Enterprise City, and Livable City/​Community Making.

Four Key Strategies for Balanced Regional Development New Multi-​Functional Administrative City (NMAC) During President Roh’s campaign, the Chung Cheong region was determined as a broad site for a New Administrative Capital (NAC) (see Figure 5.2). The Presidential Committee on the Administrative Capital Relocation (PCACR) began a site survey of the Chung Cheong region and selected Youngi-​Gongju region as the final site (see Figure 5.3). However, the construction of an NAC became an impossible plan because of a final decision by the Constitutional Court on 21 October 2004. “Representatives for constitutional petition against administrative capital relocation” submitted a petition for nullity of “special act for construction of new administrative capital.” The government made an alternative plan for the continuous operation of the policy of the balanced development of the national land while observing the decision of the Constitutional Court. The governing party and opposition party in the National Assembly compromised in the wake of the decision, and agreed to the establishment of New Multi-​Functional Administrative City (NMAC) instead of building an NAC. As a result, the NMAC was planned to accommodate a population of around 500,000 and required a land area of about 75.2 square kilometers. The site was selected in a region that was removed from existing cities to prevent a possible conurbation. It was planned to be constructed as a self-​sustained city. Until 2030, the total projected construction cost of about 48 billion US 93

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Figure 5.2  Bird’s-​eye view of the NMAC Source: MACCA 2006.

dollars would have been required. In the midst of this, the government’s expenditure on government buildings, public facilities, and regional transportation facilities was estimated at 11.9 billion US dollars.1 President Roh Mu-​Hyun requested of the central government administration that the construction of the New Multi-​Functional Administrative Capital should be a historic project. He thought that the NMAC must not only guide in balanced regional development but also become an attractive global leading city. He ordered the Presidential Office, “Cheong Wa Dae,” to implement the construction of the NMAC, instead of the Ministry of Construction and Transportation. Cheong Wa Dae is the Korean presidential residence, and is called the “Blue House,” like the “White House” in the United States. Roles were divided among various organizations. The policy director to the President played the role of project general manager. The Presidential Committee on the Multi-​Functional Administrative City Construction (PCMACC) was installed under the control of the President to review important policies. The Presidential Committee was made up of 30 members comprising the ministers concerned and non-​official professionals. The Presidential Committee is operated by a co-​chairman system comprised of the Prime Minister and the senior professional staff.The supporting Task Force Team (TFT) was also organized and is made up of officials, many of whom are urban planners in public organizations. The Multi-​functional Administrative City Construction Agency (MACCA) was established to carry out this city building program. 94

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Thus, the previous government body was replaced by a new government organization, the Multi-​functional Administrative City Construction (MACC) Agency, in January 2006 in accordance with the “Special Act on the Administrative City Construction.”The MACC Agency changed its name to the National Agency for Administrative City Construction (NAACC) and enlarged its number of employees and roles. At present, the NAACC has more than 155 employees including Administrator, Vice Administrator, four bureaus, 12 divisions, and other team members. The employees are from a variety of central and local governments in order to facilitate the mutual cooperation and mediation of various fields and levels of government. The construction of the NMAC will be completed in four stages; preparation, planning, construction, and relocation (MOCT 2006b). At the first, preparation stage, the “Special Act for the Establishment of the New Multi-​functional Administrative City in Yeongi & Gongju” was legislated, enacted in 2005. This law includes the contents on legal organization, financial supplement method, construction process, and measures preventing land speculation and sprawl. Second, consolidation of the promotion system for NMAC was prepared. A  presidential committee and a promotion office under the President were created in the Central Government Complex. The promotion office has been filled with officials who were dispatched from other central government departments, with planning professionals, and with public agency employees. Specialized sub-​committees were organized. Third, the site for construction, the site’s peripheral area, and the project’s operator were determined. The construction site is the area that was purchased to construct an administrative city (see Figure  5.3). The National Agency for Multi-​ functional Administrative City Construction (MACC) was established as the new capital’s construction agency in January 2006. A final site was selected through the mutual comparison of four alternative sites. At the planning stage, the central government organized the special accounts for regional infrastructure construction, established the Multi-​functional Administrative City Construction Agency (MACCA), and started the international urban ideas competition for basic concepts in early 2005. The master plan and development plan for construction including spatial structure, land use, transportation, infrastructure, and so forth were prepared in 2006. In 2005, the Korea Land Corporation, a public development and management company founded in 1974, commenced an ownership compensation service for lands that were taken, and compensation for this land was completed in the same year. At the construction stage, the ground preparation and the construction of infrastructures, such as public buildings and roads, started. According to a successive (sequential) approach, until 2020, the planning area is slated to have a population of around 300,000 inhabitants. That projected population will be expected to grow by 500,000 additional inhabitants by 2030.Thus, the total population within the Sejong City boundary is anticipated to increase to 800,000 inhabitants by 2030. During the relocation stage, from 2012 onwards, ministries of central government have been relocated in stages, and government officials and their families had been moved into the NMAC. According to an order from the President in office Moon Jae-​In, two government ministries in the SMA relocated to the NMAC (Sejong City) in 2019: the Ministry of Interior and Safety and the Ministry of Science and ICT. At present, 12 out of 16 ministries have moved into the NMAC. Fourteen research institutes funded by the central government that were located in the SMA also started to relocate into the NMAC. These institutes started to move from 2014 onwards, and now have completely moved the NMAC. The total number of researchers who were moved by 2019 was calculated to be approximately 3,000. At present, people think Sejong city is a boomtown. After it was launched in 2012 as a “Special Self-​governing City,” it has experienced notable growth in population and status.The population 95

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Figure 5.3  Location of the new multi-​functional administrative city Source: MOCT 2006b.

within its city boundary increased approximately three times between the years 2012 to 2019, from 115,388 to 335,826 (Sejong City 2019). Meanwhile, there are numerous vacancies in commercial buildings all over city. The public agency Korea Land & Housing Corporation wants to maximize development profit and has supplied an excessive commercial area, according to some. Increasing the vacancy rate of the commercial area and office buildings by oversupply has caused mass complaints from merchants and protests by the building owners and storekeepers. The Construction of Sejong City originally had a goal to achieve balanced national territorial development. But it has served as a strong “black hole” that attracts populations from adjoining cities including Gongju city, Chenogju city, and Daejeon city. Sejong City is also strengthening its dominant power in the commercial sphere. For example, Costco Wholesale corporation attracted consumers from adjoining cities after opening in September 2018. As a result, the gross sales index in Sejong City increased, though it has decreased in neighboring cities.

Innovation City Central government also propelled a grand plan for a new “Innovation City” to facilitate smart growth of the SMA as well as the self-​sustained growth of other regions that are falling behind 96

Urban Policies and Strategies in Korea Table 5.2  Timetable for the NMAC (Sejong City) Construction Stage

Period

Major Action plan

Preparation

2003 ∼ 2005

Planning

March 2005 ∼ March 2007

Construction Relocation

Late 2007 ∼ 2030 2012 ~ 2030

-​  Enactment on “Special act for Establishment of the NMAC in Yeongi & Gongju area” (2005) -​  Consolidation of the Promotion system (March‒December 2005) -​  Designation of site, peripheral area, and project operator (May 2005) -​  Prepared for Establishment of the Special Accounts (March‒December 2005) -​  Commencing a compensation service by land taking (December 2005) -​  Establishment of the NMAC Construction Agency (January 2006) -​  Establishment of the Master and Development Plan (May 2005‒December 2006) -​  Establishment of the Enforcement (September 2005‒March 2007) -​  Construction of the City and Central Government buildings -​  Relocation of Government Organizations and People (beginning 2012) -​  Completion of city construction (2030)

Source: PCMACC and MACCA (2006).

Table 5.3  Public agencies types targeted for relocation Type

Organization

Government-​Invested Organization

Government-​Supported Organization

Corporation

Total

No

67

26

53

29

175

Source: MOCT (2012).

relative to the SMA, in comparison. Construction of the Innovation City had been linked with the relocation plan of public agencies in the SMA. According to the original relocation plan of the central government, 175 of 346 public agencies in the SMA had been selected to be relocated to Innovation Cities by 2012.The number of public agencies finally decreased from 175 to 153 in the relocation process because some public agencies were merged or abolished. The Innovation Cities have been positioned as regional nodes in a dynamic and creative regional economy in the innovation-​driven society. The construction plan has been implemented in connection with the development of key regional industries and the creation of innovative industrial clusters. Central government hoped to provide a playground in which each regional stakeholder, whether a firm, university, institute, or public organization, plays its role to create regional innovation systems. Central government prepared several measures to support employees of relocated agencies. The measures are divided into four parts (see Table 5.4). At first, public agencies had been planned to be relocated in 12 regions or metropolitan areas across the country outside the SMA and Daejeon City, where Daedeok Science Town and the 97

Wang-Geun Lee Table 5.4  Measures to support employees of relocated agencies Sector

Measures to support

Housing

-  Give priority to buy pre-​sell housing and to move into rental hosing -​  Provide long-​term housing loan of low interest rate -​  Support construction of boarding house for singles -​  Extend permission period for owning two houses per household -​  Reduce acquisition and registration taxes when buying a house -​  Attract specialized high schools, special-​purpose -​  Support measures to improve the educational system of existing schools prior to others -​  Support the children of employees in relocated agencies to be transferred to local schools -​  Establish plans for school construction and early education demand -​  Create good business environment and well-​being living environment -​  Support installment of basic facilities up to the level of industrial complex -​  Provide relocation allowance and moving expense -​  Allow voluntary retirement and honorary retirement for employees who are unable to move to local areas -​  Provide unemployment allowance for a relocated employee’s spouse -​  Provide one-​stop service to search jobs for a relocated employee’s spouse -​  Provide financial support for the undergraduate students whose parents work in relocate public agencies -​  Support transfer of a relocated employee’s spouse working in a public agency prior to others

Educational environment

Residential environment

Financial support

Source: MOCT (2012).

third Government Complex are located. Chungcheongnam-​do was excluded from the relocation target because of Sejong City. Gwangju city and Jeollanam-​do agreed to select a single site and construct together. The location of ten Innovation Cities have finally been determined and are under construction in regions or metropolitan areas in keeping with regional industrial characteristics.2 On April 2006, the MOCT announced that they had established a detailed “Blueprint for the Innovation City,” and that they delivered it to all regional and local governments in order for them follow it as a guideline for their own plans (2006a). According to the Blueprint, the target number of population for an individual Innovation City was set to range between 20,000 to 50,000 by the year 2020. The land area for accommodating this target population and its related urban functions ranged from 1.65 to 8.25 square kilometers. Central government divided the Innovation Cities into four types in order to link with regional industry and to construct as a city with unique regional characteristics (MOCT 2012). The first city development type is the “innovation hub city.”This type aimed to connect relocated public agencies with regional strategic industry. The second type is the “specialized city with regional theme.” This type aimed to make a “regional and industrial brand” by using landmarks and unique images. The third type is the “environmentally friendly green city.” This type hopes to preserve the natural environment and to secure biological diversity and ecosystem function. 98

Urban Policies and Strategies in Korea Table 5.5  Timetable for Innovation City construction Period

Major Action plan

2005

-​  Announcement for the relocation plan of public institutions in SMA (June 24) -​  Decision of guidelines for Site Selection of Innovation City by The Presidential Committee on Balanced National Development (PCBND) (July 27) -​  Prepared for Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) by Central government, Regional government, and Public Institutions (August) -​  Establishment of the Special Committee for Location Selection of Innovation City (August) -​  Completion of Location Selection (December) -​  Announced for “Blueprint for the Innovation City” (April) -​  Commencing Master plans by each regional government -​  Commencing City construction by regional or local government -​  Completion of public agencies relocation (2,500‒4,000 employees) -​  Completion of Innovation City construction –​target date

2006 Late 2007 2012 2020

Source: PCBND (2006).

Figure 5.4  Location and industries of the Innovation Cities Source: MOCT 2012.

The final type is the “educational and cultural city.” This type aimed to create a good educational environment by upgrading educational conditions and cultural diversity (see Table 5.5 and Figure 5.4). The central government decided to put all matters regarding their development under each regional government’s charge. Then, each of the regional governments were to calculate the required amount of land for the various respective land uses, such as residential, institutional (for innovation clusters), commercial, and reserved areas. In the successive rounds of implementation, reasonable supportive programs such as high-​quality housing, good educational environment, 99

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relocation allowance, and moving expenses were offered to persuade public institutions and employees that relocated to the Innovation City. The central government, throughout the construction of the Innovation Cities, has anticipated the enhancement of the Regional Innovation System (RIS), qualitative upgrading of local education, tax increases, activation of the local economy, and the local relocation of private firms. Cooke, Urangda, and Etxebarria (1998) define the RIS as a system in which firms and other organizations are systematically engaged in the interactive learning through an institutional milieu characterized by embeddedness. The RIS encourages the rapid diffusion of knowledge, skills, and best practice within a geographic area larger than a city, but smaller than a nation (Wikipedia 2017). Central government ordered all public agencies to dispose of existing office buildings and leave the SMA without exception: 152 of 153 public agencies in the SMA were moved into Innovation Cities by February 2019 (NAACC 2019). After commencing construction in late 2007, the Innovation Cities have been displaying their appearance as new towns. The development of basic infrastructures, such as roads, utilities, and buildings for public agencies, are completed. High-​r ise apartments are built or under construction. As their populations grow, shopping centers, restaurants, and community centers are emerging slowly. Local taxes such as real estate acquisition tax, enrollment tax, and automobile tax are increasing over time. The employment of university graduates in Innovation Cities is gradually increasing, due to a local employment quota system. The evaluation of the Innovation City program varies according to different people. Until now, anecdotally some agency employees living in an Innovation City did not assimilate as citizens. They moved to Innovation Cities alone and return to the SMA every weekend to be with their families. Because they think that the educational condition of Innovation Cities is relatively poorer than that of the SMA, they choose not to bring their children to the Innovation Cities. While Innovation City construction focused on the relocation of public agencies, the original goal of balanced regional design was not achieved. The main agents, including public agencies, universities, and private firms, did not produce a positive feedback loop and thus failed to create an internal growth engine (The Government of the Republic of Korea 2018b). Like other projects, local and regional governments heavily depended on the funding of central government and showed a passive attitude regarding their contributions to infrastructure investment. As the size of the central government’s budget diminished, affiliated city construction was also delayed. President Mun Jae-​In, who previously served as the chief secretary of President Roh Mu-​ Hyun, thought that Innovation City construction could be a very effective measure for balanced regional development. Central government’s activities and power regarding the relocation of private firms are limited, and government influence is gradually diminishing. President Mun Jae-​In ordered ministries to prepare for the second relocation of public agencies in the SMA under the name Innovation City Season 2 (ROK 2018b). As a vision for implementation, the Government proposed these Innovation Cities to be a new growth motor for balanced national development. Yet, many regional and local governments competed for these funds to attract public agencies as fiercely as they had in the past.

Enterprise City Discussion of the denominated Enterprise City was initiated when the Federation of Korean Industries (FKI) suggested the construction of the Enterprise City, whose proposal the Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MOCT) accepted positively.The “Special Act on Enterprise 100

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City Development (SAECD)” was enacted into law on December 31, 2004 and became effective on May 1 2005. While the NMAC and the Innovation City are led by central government and the public sector, an Enterprise City is a city whose development was led by private sector developers with the purpose of primarily hosting economic activities, including manufacturing, tourism, and leisure industries. The SAECD defined the term “Enterprise City” as a city which is developed by private enterprises to serve the main functions such as housing, education, medical services, culture, and so on, for the industrial sites and economic activities. In addition to its main functions, an Enterprise City has other functions such as residential, educational, commercial, and cultural functions which at the same time enable it to be a more complete and thus self-​sustaining city. But there were several negative opinions on the Enterprise City construction by private firms alone, without significant public investment or involvement. First, the benefit (profit) can be monopolized by a few major firms having plentiful funds. Second, the Enterprise City could be a city for a limited few, from the privileged class, and not for all citizens because public services can be supplied by private firms and thus controlled by them, including limiting access to a broader public. Third, people worried about environmental pollution because the city’s construction by private firms could possibly be focused on profits and productivity at the expense of the environment. To prevent these problems and facilitate investment by private firms, the central government legislated construction guidelines, including site and development requirements, designation criteria, investment promotion, and public interests. For example, the following supports were given to protect the developers and to promote investment. 1. Limited land taking rights, 2. Support in financing (ceiling on total investment removed), 3. Issuance of land redemption bonds, 4. Special treatment in the installation of school, hospital, and sports facilities, 5. Site preparation and housing supply exceptions outside of speculative areas, and 6. Exemption/​reduction of taxes and fees. To support implementation, the Special Act on Enterprise City Development specifies in Article 8, in the section titled Estimation of Development Gains and Free Grants, and so on: If “the estimated development gains exceed proper development gains prescribed by Presidential Decree” … “the Minister may have the project developer construct within a certain period of time” … and “within the development area in the range of budget not exceeding the excess gains” (NAACC 2018). Enterprise cities under the SAECD were divided into four types or categories depending on their main functions: Industry/​Trade, Knowledge-​based, Tourism/​Leisure, and Innovative Hub. Their dimensions and government supports are different, depending on city types (see Table 5.6). The Ministry of Construction and Transport proposed guidelines including detailed characteristics of each type, and asked private enterprise to apply as a developer of city construction for government approval. But the Innovative Hub type was deleted in the revised “Special Act on Enterprise City Development” on May 27, 2009 because no private enterprise applied. Six areas ‒ Muan, Muju, Wonju, Chungju, Taean, and Yeongam/​Haenam ‒ were selected as Enterprise Cities in the year 2006.The number of designated cities can be changed.Throughout the construction of the Enterprise Cities, central government expected private investment to be promoted. The government further expected the creation of employment and balanced national development by building them in comparatively underdeveloped areas.This is a form of regional design via a national economic development policy that is oriented toward decentralization from 101

Wang-Geun Lee Table 5.6  Types of Enterprise Cities Type

Industry/​Trade

Main function

Industry and trade Minimum total area 5 km2 Land use rate for main 40% or more purpose among useable land Direct land use area 30% or more by developer among land for main purpose Site Muan

Knowledge-​based

Tourism/​Leisure

Innovative Hub

Science-​park (R&D) 3.3 km2 30% or more

Tourism, leisure, culture 6.6 km2 50% or more

Public agencies 3.3 km2 30% or more

20% or more

50% or more

30% or more

Wonju, Chungju

Muju, Taean, Yeongam/​Haenam

Source: MOCT (2006a).

Table 5.7  Summary on six Enterprise Cities City

Summary

Muan

Area: 40.26km2, Period: 2007–2011, Population: 54,000 Facilities: Korea/​China Science & Technology Park, Air transport logistics park and Korea's Agricultural Cooperative Logistics Co., industrial park for executing advanced technology projects, health & rehabilitation/​treatment & recuperative spas, international tourism complex around the lake district, industrial park for domestic manufacturers, etc. Area: 7.672 km2, Period: 2007–2017, Population: 10,000 Facilities: Tourism/​leisure facilities, water park, golf course, condominiums, residential homes, auxiliary facilities, industrial and research facilities, communal facilities, medical well-​being center Area: 5.311 km2, Period: 2007–2012, Population: 25,000 Facilities: Knowledge-​based industry, health and bio industries, medical equipments R&D center, residential, public, communal and auxiliary facilities Area: 7.013 km2, Period: 2007‒2011, Population: 20,200 Facilities: R&D park, industrial sites, residential homes, commercial facilities, schools, hospitals, parks, public open squares, etc. Area: 14.6 km2, Period: 2006–2011, Population: 15,000 Facilities: Theme park, eco park, golf course, international business complex, residential homes Area: 33 km2, Period: 2008–2012, Population: 150,000 Facilities: Theme park, marina, Formula 1 race track, hotels, golf course, casino, residential homes, schools, etc.

Muju

Wonju

Chungju

Taean

Yeongam /​ Haenam

Source: MOCT (2006a).

the Seoul Metropolitan Area and toward the creation of selected new cities that are strategically dispersed throughout the national territory. Also, the progress of Enterprise City projects differs from city to city.Two of the six Enterprise City projects, Muju and Muan, were canceled because private companies finally abandoned their development business participation. In the case of Muan, it failed to attract investment from big 102

Urban Policies and Strategies in Korea

Figure 5.5  Location and progress of the Enterprise Cities Source: MOCT 2012, Chungju city 2019, JS Mirae Industry Company 2019, Wonju enterprise city corporation 2019.

investor, China. Yeongam/​Haenam Enterprise City construction has been a very slow undertaking, given that it expected the creation 190,000 new jobs. Wonju Enterprise City, on the contrary, was expected to finish site construction in late 2019, though it is far behind schedule (Wonju Enterprise City Corporation 2019). Some private firms bought land in the construction site but they hesitated to move to the Enterprise City because public agencies and the commercial district was not developed yet. Taean Enterprise City postponed its site construction period from 2011 to 2020 at first, and then again to 2025 (JS Mirae Industry Company 2019). At present, only six golf courses are running. Chungju Enterprise City will finish site construction in the late 2020 (see Figure 5.5) (Chungju City 2019). The most important factor in the implementation of an Enterprise City is the distance from the city of Seoul.The SMA, especially Seoul City, is the largest consumer market and population center, and people in the SMA want to stay within its commuting area and economic region. Private development firms in Korea think that the nearer they are to the city of Seoul, the higher the business potential.

Livable City/​Community Making While the previous three programs aimed at dealing with the issues surrounding the SMA’s congestion with the intent to balance regional growth, the Livable City/​Community Making policy has an objective to change the urban paradigm from the city’s quantitative and physical growth into the qualitative improvement of its living environment. There were similar recent global paradigms of urban planning such as “Smart Growth” and “New Urbanism” in the United States, the “Compact City” and “Urban Village” in the European Union, and “Machizukuri” in Japan. 103

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According to a multinational business consulting group, Mercer Human Resource Consulting Group (MHRC), Seoul City was rated the 89th most desirable place to live among 214 cities worldwide in 2006. It was a shocking fact to the people and policymakers in Korea. Each city was measured on factors such as personal safety, the environment, housing conditions, and the level of public services such as health, education, and mass transit. One effect of this survey was to motivate the central government and other stakeholders to improve living conditions in both Seoul and other cities. Complicating matters of urban livability and sustainability, the urbanization rate of Korea reached 91.82  percent in 2016, a very high percentage for a nation. Meanwhile, population growth has been dropping rapidly because of a low fertility rate and ageing. As a consequence, a main concern of people changed, with the new focus on quality of life, and thus urban policies that made cities more livable. The next step for cities will be investment in relatively decayed cities to bring about the revival of both socioeconomic and physical conditions through citizen participation. Livable City/​Community Making as of this writing is being implemented under the name of “Urban Regeneration New Deal.” The former two Presidents, Lee Myung-​Bak and Park Geun-​Hye, had continued their efforts in urban regeneration projects, but the projects did not show notable results. President Moon Jae-​In, during his campaign, promised to the people that a total of 46.5 billion US dollars would be spent over a five-​year period. Central government announced in March 2018 the roadmap for an “Urban Regeneration New Deal.” The roadmap is an action plan, specifying goals to be achieved. For example, incubating space for start-​ups will be built in some 100 areas in order to promote business start-​ups (see Table 5.8).

Table 5.8  Projects and their details of urban regeneration new deal Projects

Details

Promote start-​ups Foster economic organizations for city regeneration Expand national housing and urban fund Turn old downtowns into innovation hubs Promote regeneration programs specialized for each region Increase the urban regeneration capacity of each region Build a regional governance system

Create 100 incubating spaces in the next five years Provide support to 250 social enterprises for the five years and start redevelopment of buildings and infrastructure Provide direct support for projects and expand the number of beneficiaries Create 100 facilities that include startup space and government support centers Provide supports to 100 designated region with unique backgrounds, such as history and culture Expand the number of colleges with urban renewal programs to 200 in the next five years Construct 300 urban regeneration support centers in the next five years Construct 100 public housing and shopping centers

Minimize the side effects of gentrification Promote projects led by regional authorities Organize a regulatory framework and policies for urban regeneration

Hand over the authority to select and manage projects to local governments by 2022 Designate certain areas as special districts for urban regeneration, along with other policies

Source: The Government of ROK (2018a); Kim, Tae-​Yoon and Choi, Hyung-​Jo (2018).

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Conclusions This study reviewed the recent urban development policies and projects to enhance balanced regional design in Korea.These policies and projects closely reflect the present weaknesses of and imminent threats to Korea’s cities. At present, compared to Korea’s economic power and stage of urbanization, it was evaluated that the competitiveness of cities and their quality of life in Korea were relatively low, according to international standards. Generally, the goals and vision of a regional policy pursued by a nation or a city-​region can be changed according to the growth stages of the national economy, along with the overall condition of any city. Rapid economic growth and investment efficiency in the early stage of economic development was seen in Korea post-​1960, with its attendant impacts. Naturally, these can be changed into goals of a higher level, such as regional equity, environmental preservation, and quality of life. National urban policies in Korea are changing from enhancing the competitiveness of a specific city or metropolitan area into more balanced regional development, environmental preservation, and enhanced quality of life. Of course, it is not easy work to accomplish the three goals at the same time. So, central government has prepared several grand national projects, namely the NMAC, the Innovation City, the Enterprise City and the Livable City/​Community. Today, urban policies and strategies for balanced regional development continue to be developed in the Republic of Korea. President Moon Jae-​In became the President on May 9 2017, and his plans are proceeding under other titles, such as “Innovation City Season 2,” “Urban Regeneration New Deal,” and “Livelihood Social Overhead Capital.” If these plans are accomplished on schedule, then despite the ageing of the population and lower economic growth, the city competitiveness of Korea in the future could be improved. Korean government officials and planners have been recognized for making speedy decisions and a record of strong implementation in regional design for a long time. But these characteristics are being challenged by a lower economic growth rate and the uncertain global situation. The people who are worrying about an economic recession want land use and planning regulations to be more lax in the Seoul Metropolitan Area, even as the result will be a concentration of further growth in the SMA.This would run counter to several decades of central government policy and its implementation. It remains to be seen how these regional design forces will play out in the future.

Notes 1. Calculated the Korean won–​US dollar exchange rate as 950 won per dollar at that time. 2. The final nominated areas are as follows; Busan, Daegu, Naju (Gwangju city, Jeollanam-​do), Ulsan, Wonju (Gangwon-​do), Jincheon/​Eumseong (Chungcheongbuk-​do), Jeonju/​Wanju (Jeollabuk-​do), Gimcheon (Gyeongsangbuk-​do), Jinju (Gyeongsangnam-​do), and Seogwipo (Jeju-​do).

References Chungju City. (2019). “Good, Chungju!!” Chungju Enterprise City (www.chungju.go.kr/​www/​contents. do?key=573). Cooke, P., Urangda, M. G., and Etxebarria, G. (1998). Regional systems of innovation: An evolutionary perspective. Environment and Planning A, 30, 1563–​84. JS Mirae Industry Company. (2019). La Tierra (www.taeanec.com/​). Kim,T.-​Y. and Choi, H.-​J. (29 March 2018). Moon’s “New Deal” will revitalize cities. Korea JoongAng Daily. (http://​koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/​news/​article/​article.aspx?aid=3046217).

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Korea National Statistical Office (KNSO). (2019). Internal Migration Statistics. (http://​meta.narastat.kr/​ metasvc/​svc/​SvcMetaDcDtaPopup.do?orgId=101&confmNo=101015&kosisYn=Y). Korea National Statistical Office (KNSO). (2005). Population Concentration Trends in Seoul Metropolitan Area. Lee, K.-​B. (2005). Assessment of the self-​sustained localization strategy and policy directions in Korea. In KCESRI-​OECD Joint Seminar on Korean Economic Issues. Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MOCT). (2012). Relocation of Public Agencies (http://​ innocity.molit.go.kr/​v2/​eng/​submain.jsp?sidx=106&stype=1) Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MOCT). (2006a.) Enterprise City. Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MOCT). (2006b.) Master Plan for Construction of Multi-​ Functional Administrative City. National Agency for Administrative City Construction (NAACC). (2019). Organization. (www.naacc. go.kr/​english/​about/​organ.jsp?menu_​id=organ) National Agency for Administrative City Construction (NAACC). (2018). We Archive, 2030 Happy City (www.happycity2030.or.kr/​) National Geography Information Institute. (2017). The National Atlas of Korea Ⅲ (http://​nationalatlas. ngii.go.kr/​pages/​page_​527.php?) Park, Y.-​ H. and Kim, C.-​ H. (2002). Locational Analysis and Spatial Reorganization Strategies of Central Management Functions in Korea, Seoul: KRIHS 2002–​6. Presidential Committee on Multi-​Functional Administration City Construction (PCMACC) and Multi-​ Functional Administrative City Construction Agency (MACCA). (2006). International urban ideas competition for the new multi-​functional administrative city in the Republic of Korea. Sejong City. (2019). Sejong City statistics (www.sejong.go.kr/​stat.do). The Government of the Republic of Korea (ROK). (2019). Special Act on Enterprise City Development (SAECD). The Government of the Republic of Korea (ROK). (2018a). Urban Regeneration New Deal roadmap for changing my life. The Government of the Republic of Korea (ROK). (2018b). Innovation City Season 2 promotion plan. The Presidential Committee on Balanced National Development (PCBND). (2006). Main Policies (www. balance.go.kr/​eng/​html/​greeting.htm). Wikipedia. Regional innovation system (https://​en.wikipedia.org/​wiki/​Regional_​innovation_​system), accessed July 19, 2019. Wonju Enterprise City Corporation. (2019).Together for Your Better Future (www.wonjuec.co.kr/​) www. happycity2030.or.kr.

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6 Japan’s Linear Megalopolis Shinkansen High-​speed Rail as the Spine of a 60-​year Mega-​region Evolution Hitomi Nakanishi and Fumitaka Kurauchi

Introduction During the 20th century, Japan became one of the richest, most urbanized countries, evolving from rural origins to a more westernized society (Sorensen 2002).The current urban structure of Japan had formed by the end of the Edo era (1603–​1868), resulting in rapid population growth and development in the main metropolitan areas, collectively known as the Pacific belt, before the Second World War (Taniguchi 1984, Sorensen 2002). During the Edo era, the ‘Gokaido’ road system was established. The system was comprised of five roads that crossed important points, which enabled traffic control (Snorrason 2017). One of the ‘Gokaido’ is Tokaido, connecting today’s Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka. As the urban population continued to grow, the Tokaido corridor connecting Tokyo and Osaka emerged as a major growth centre (Taniguchi 1984). Hence, infrastructure development advanced along this corridor. The first railway was opened between Tokyo and Yokohama in 1872. Since then, Japan’s railway network has continued to grow through both public and private funding. The railway became a popular mode of transportation in the Taisho era (1912–​1926), when private cars were still not publicly available (Suda 2011). After World War Ⅱ, Japan achieved rapid recovery and economic growth. The main driver was the Shinkansen, a bullet (high speed) railway connecting major cities along the Tokaido corridor. The regional planning and development of Japan’s urban infrastructure after World War Ⅱ was led by the national government under the National Development Plan, until the mid-​1980s. The Comprehensive National Land Development Law enacted in 1950 (updated as the National Spatial Planning Act of 2005) set the national policy for land development in post-​war Japan. The national government identified priority areas, with the main goals of balanced allocation of economic opportunities and development, and lessening of overcrowding, particularly in the major cities (see Economic Development of Japan Led by Infrastructure Planning). Infrastructure expansion was created under the national policy. This included road and railway development, with expressways and high-​speed rail as key components. Many intra-​urban railway networks (e.g. subways) were operated by private companies in most cities. However, the high-​speed rail network was nationally owned and operated until the restructuring of the Japanese National Railways (JNR)1 in the 1980s, similar to other nationally owned businesses (e.g. the postal service and telecommunications).2 The JNR was responsible for the management and operation 107

Hitomi Nakanishi and Fumitaka Kurauchi

of its network and services, including local JNR lines and high-​speed rail. The infrastructure of the high-​speed railway network was most affected by national politics and the economy, given its mass transit mode. This chapter explores Japan’s regional development based on the linear megalopolis and transport infrastructure. It examines the infrastructure-​driven development of Japan since the beginnings of 19th-​century modernization and the role of the Shinkansen high-​speed rail network. The contribution of the Shinkansen to Japan’s growth is discussed, as well as the development prospects and emerging role of the superconducting maglev (SCMAGLEV).

Economic Development of Japan Led by Infrastructure Planning At the beginning of the Meiji Era (Meiji 5, 1872), the population of Japan was around 33 million (Toyo Keizai Inc. 1927). By 1935, Japan’s population had increased to 69 million (The National Statistics Center 2007). Before the Edo era, the capital city was Kyoto, and the Kyoto–​Osaka region was the centre of the Japanese economy and politics. The country’s population was concentrated in this region and the surrounding areas. When the national capital was moved to Edo (Tokyo) in the early 17th century, the need to connect Kyoto, Osaka, and Edo emerged for passenger travel and logistics. Most Japanese cities formed during the Edo era, before the peak of the European Industrial Revolution in the 1880s (in the middle of the Meiji era) (Kikuchi 1987). During the Meiji era (1868–​1912), there were four industrial zones: Tokyo–​Yokohama, Osaka–​Kobe, Nagoya, and Kitakyushu–​Fukuoka. Accordingly, the transportation of people and goods was promoted along corridors connecting these zones (Suda 2011). However, the unique topography of Japan was a barrier to accessibility. Honshu Island, where Tokyo and the Shinkansen cities are located, as most of Japan, is hilly and mountainous, except for coastal urban areas that made up a mere 30 percent of the land. Thus, travel then was limited to that by foot or on horseback. Marine transportation was important for logistics (Chida and Davies 2013). Despite this, the traffic flow in the Gokaido (see the start of this chapter) increased during the Edo era. After modernization and the Japanese Industrial Revolution, railway transportation was considered to be ‘growth-​leading’ infrastructure for effectively managing expansion (Neuman 2000). The first railway plan was made in 1869. The plan included the development of a major line connecting Tokyo and Kyoto and branch lines running between Tokyo–​Yokohama, Kyoto–​Kobe, and Lake Biwa–​Tsuruga (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism 2012) along the main corridor known as the ‘Tokaido.’3 Following this plan, the first railway opened between Shinbashi and Yokohama in December 1872. It took 20 years for the Tokaido line to begin operation after the beginnings of the first railway. With the First World War, Japan’s economy grew dramatically, resulting in an increase in heavy industry and a greater need for freight transportation (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure,Transport and Tourism 2012). The national railway was expanded in response to these needs. Along with this, the populations of large cities in Japan continued to expand.The Kanto Earthquake in 1923 and the world financial crisis in 1929 caused the Japanese economy to fall into depression, which affected the growth of cities. In 1938, the National Mobilisation Law was issued when Japan entered World War II. Under this law, the railway network was used as important infrastructure for military transport and related purposes (Oikawa 2016). As a consequence, passenger transport decreased dramatically during this time, with the exception of providing mass evacuation to rural areas if needed. Although not achieved, a railway connecting Tokyo and Shimonoseki (the west end of the

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mainland) by broad-​gauge4 train was planned during wartime (Oikawa 2019). The purpose was to enhance the transportation capacity of this corridor. Additionally, the route between Tokyo and Shimonoseki connected important military bases (e.g. the naval bases of Kure and Yokohama). This railway was designed to extend to the Asian continent by creating a tunnel in the Korea Strait. However, the plan was withdrawn due to the worsening war situation and a lack of resources.5 Air raids during the war significantly damaged the railway network. This, in addition to a lack of resources, affected railway service after the war.The transportation capacity of the railway was below 10 percent that of the pre-​war period (Oikawa 2019). Additionally, there were many accidents due to the low level of maintenance. Needless to say, post-​war Japan was focused on rebuilding its industry and the economy. In 1948, a recovery plan for the national railway network was created and integrated into development efforts that prioritized economic, social, and cultural aspects and the appropriate allocation of industry and social services (Yamada 1994). Five Comprehensive National Development Plans (see Table 6.1) were developed in the following four decades. Japan’s economy recovered well, as evidenced by the rapid population growth and urbanization around the main industrial zones. Both road and rail infrastructure were invested in intensively along the Tokaido corridor connecting the four major cities (Yamada 1994). In 1963, the ‘Meishin Expressway’ (running between Nagoya and Kobe) was opened. A year later, in 1964, the ‘Tokaido Shinkansen’ (between Tokyo and Osaka) began operation. The Shinkansen played a pivotal role in the growth of Japan. However, it triggered an over-​ concentration of industry and population in major cities with Shinkansen stops (e.g. Tokyo,

Table 6.1  National development plans of Japan Plan (year)

Main theme

Comprehensive National Development Plan (1962) New Comprehensive National Development Plan (1969)

Development of industrial zones and the appropriate distribution of industry Management of major cities; division of national land into seven blocks; investment in infrastructure such as high-​speed rail, expressways, airports, bridges, and tunnels that link the mainland and other islands; and investment in information and communication networks The Third Comprehensive National Enhancement of the quality of life (better living environment), Development Plan (1977) improvement in the welfare system, regional development, and greater employment in regional areas The Fourth Comprehensive National Development of unique mid-​to small-​sized cities; further Development Plan (1987) development of the transportation infrastructure, particularly that enabling one day trips between regions (focusing on expressways); and further development of transport and communication networks The Fifth Comprehensive National Creation of multi-​axial national land structures, national land Development Plan ‘Grand Design conservation and management; improving living conditions for the 21st Century’ (1998) in regions, regional development of service industries, and improvement in transportation and communication systems

Source: Yamada (1994); Yada (2014); Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism website.

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Nagoya, and Osaka), while causing depopulation of mid-​sized cities and rural areas (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism 2012). The New Comprehensive National Development Plan of 1969 aimed to mitigate this phenomenon. After the Third Comprehensive National Development Plan was announced, the focus was placed on urban planning and design measures to respond to the concerns of overcrowded living environments. A  balanced distribution of populations to mid-​sized cities and regional development were also the focus. The extension of the Shinkansen (details are described in Section 3) facilitated successful plan implementation. The Fifth Comprehensive National Development Plan ‘Grand Design for the 21st Century’ (1998) included the plans for the ‘Tohoku Shinkansen’ and ‘Kyushu Shinkansen’ to complete the railway corridor forming the ‘backbone’ of Japan.

High-​Speed Rail Development Phase One: The Development of the Shinkansen Infrastructure development after World War Ⅱ progressed rapidly. In 1949, rail service began between Tokyo and Osaka; a one-​way trip took nine hours. The demand for freight transportation increased, with railways hauling 50 percent of freight goods (as measured in tons) at that time (Utsunomiya 2014). However, high-​speed rail development was not supported fully, as the railway industry, globally, was in decline. In fact, Japan Airlines, established in 1951, began domestic service between Tokyo, Osaka, and Fukuoka, becoming a competitor of rail (Japan Airlines website). In spite of this, the strong leadership of Shinji Sogo, the fourth president of the JNR, was able to drive the development of the bullet train (Utsunomiya 2014). Higher-​speed train operation started in 1958 as the ‘Business Express Kodama’ service, after completing the electrification of the Tokaido line. The ‘Business Express Kodama’ service ran between Tokyo and Osaka in 6.5 hours, which enabled a one-​day business trip between the two cities. As a result of the increase in speed, both the number of passengers and profits increased dramatically. By the late 1950s, the Tokaido line, which included the Business Express, carried a quarter of the JNR passengers. This helped to rally support for the development of the Shinkansen (Oikawa 2019). The Shinkansen, the world’s fastest high-​speed train (at that time), was promoted as a ‘Dream Superexpress.’ Its service began on 1 October 1964. With an average speed of 210 km/​hr, a one-​way trip between Tokyo and Osaka took only four hours.6 Nine days after the opening of the Shinkansen, the Summer Olympics were held in Tokyo. This global event served to showcase Japan’s post-​war recovery and strong growth to the rest of the world. The Shinkansen dramatically improved transportation capacity, by combining dedicated broad-​gauge rail with high-​capacity trains. It started with two services per hour (one way), later reaching approximately 60 services a day. Now, it runs every four minutes at peak hours, with 368 services (on average) per day.7 The speed of the Shinkansen has improved over time. It now runs at 285 km/​hr (fastest speed, as of 2015), completing travel between Tokyo and Osaka in 2 hours and 22 minutes (Central Japan Railway Company website). The passenger numbers continue to increase. Figure  6.1 shows the passenger numbers over a 15-​year period between 1965 and 1980. The exposure of Japan’s economic growth to the world continued with Japan hosting the 1970 World Exposition held in Osaka. To respond to additional transportation needs, a counterplan was developed to enhance capacity. For many visitors to the Expo, this was their first ride on the Shinkansen. ‘Hikari’ service was provided with 16-​car trains (the longest train formation in the world then) by investing in 276 new cars (Suda and Fukuhara 2014). The timetable was also 110

Passenger number (× 1000)

1976

344,209 125,636

338,161

338,876

123,767

1975

123,690

1974

393,054

429,557

364,918

1973

347,385

1972

126,796

1971

143,465

1970

157,218

109,854

1969

133,195

85,354

1968

350,904

84,628

1967

128,080

71,574 196,094

300,971

65,903 180,556

230,902

55,250 150,956

1965 1966

30,967 84,841

43,783 119,955

231,856

Japan’s Linear Megalopolis

1977

1978

1979 1980

Passenger per day (pax)

Figure 6.1  Trend in passenger numbers (1965–​1980) Source: JR Tokai (1995).

updated, and the platforms of each station were upgraded to accommodate the 16-​car trains. Additional service using normal trains was also provided. It is estimated that around 10 million Expo visitors used the Shinkansen (Suda and Fukuhara 2014). The Shinkansen served to launch the ‘train of the next generation,’ which was boosted by two remarkable international events demonstrating Japan’s strong economic growth and innovation. After the 1964 Summer Olympics and the Osaka Expo of 1970, the JNR made efforts to increase further the number of passengers through various promotion campaigns, such as ‘Discover Japan’ (1970). JNR further promoted increased ridership by encouraging schools to use the Shinkansen for their excursions. Thus, through its demonstrated performance and mass transport capabilities, the Shinkansen undertook the next expansion phase of the rail line.

Box 6.1: Special Timetable to Meet the Passenger Needs at the Time of the World Expo in Osaka 1970 The Japanese National Railways (JNR) expected an unprecedented demand for the Shinkansen during the World Expo in Osaka 1970 because, for many visitors, this was their first time riding the Shinkansen. For the Shinkansen to run frequently and on time without major issues, daily maintenance had to be performed during the night time hours, while the Shinkansen was not in operation. Therefore, the challenge during the Expo was to address the amplified transportation needs while securing sufficient time for maintenance. The JNR’s strategy was as follows: 1) they introduced 276 new cars and converted the Hikari service to run as 16-​car trains (the longest trains at that time); 2) three Hikari trains ran with limited stops; six Kodama trains offered non-​limited service on the hour; 3) three Kodama services had a fixed timetable and the other three ran flexibly with more non-​reserved seats; 4) a special timetable was made to connect the Shinkansen with an increased number of local train services (Suda and Fukuhara 2014). In accordance with the implementation of the Hikari 16-​car train formation, the station platforms were extended. This special arrangement was successful. Approximately 3,200 special services were provided and about 10 million passengers used the Shinkansen to go to the Expo. Nearly 460,000 passengers per day used the Shinkansen during its peak time (Suda and Fukuhara 2014).

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During the summer holiday season, the opening hours of the Expo was extended, which presented an additional challenge for Shinkansen service operation. ‘Expo Kodama’ express service was implemented as a solution. ‘Expo Kodama’ left Osaka at 23:05 and arrived at 6:53 in Mishima (in Shizuoka Prefecture), enabling passengers to arrive at their final destinations by transferring to local lines in Mishima. This arrangement was well received, and about 1,000 passengers used the service each day during the summer period (Suda and Fukuhara 2014).

Phase Two: Extension to the North and South The success of the ‘Dream Superexpress’ was met with strong internal and public support to develop the Shinkansen line further. The Cabinet’s ‘Economic and Social Development Program’ of 1967 included planned extension of the Shinkansen line to a total of 7,200 kilometers across the country (Oikawa 2019, Suda and Fukuhara 2014). The development of the ‘Sanyo Shinkansen’ (between Osaka and Okayama) began in 1967 and was in operation by May 1972 (Oikawa 2019). The JNR also launched a campaign of ‘Hikari goes to the West’ and extended its line to Hakata (Fukuoka prefecture), which was completed in 1975. Thus, the spine of the Tokyo–​Osaka–​Hiroshima–​Hakata corridor was complete; the travel time was less than seven hours. Legislation progressed to allow further development of Shinkansen lines. In 1970, the ‘Nationwide Shinkansen Development Act’ was enacted. Yet due to privatization described below, the development of new lines under this Act was postponed. After the extension of the ‘Sanyo Shinkansen’ to Hakata, the Tohoku, Joetsu, Hokuriku, Kyushu, and Hokkaido lines were developed under this Act. In July 1982, the ‘Tohoku Shinkansen’ began operation, followed by the ‘Joetsu Shinkansen’ that opened in November of the same year. The ‘Hokuriku Shinkansen’ that runs between Tokyo and Nagano opened in 1997, prior to the Nagano Winter Olympics held in 1998. From the ‘Tohoku Shinkansen,’ two lines were built to Akita (Morioka–​Akita that opened in 1997) and Shinjo (Fukushima–​Yamagata that opened in 1992 and Yamagata–​Shinjo that opened in 1999). These two lines use the track of existing JR lines,8 that is, they do not have their own dedicated tracks. They are generally referred to as the ‘mini Shinkansen’ but, officially, these lines are recognized as an improvement of existing narrow-​gauge railways. The ‘Kyushu Shinkansen’ (Kagoshima Route) started some operations in 2004; all routes between Hakata and Kagoshima were open by 2011. With the completion of the Hakata–​ Kagoshima route, the Japanese corridor from the north of the mainland (Aomori) to the south of Kyushu (Kagoshima) was connected by railway, 47 years after the opening of the first Shinkansen. The new-​generation trains were comparable to their French and German counterparts (Banister and Hall 1993). During this phase, the JNR was privatized in 1987 under the Nakasone Cabinet. The corporation was split into region-​based railway organizations. Several of the regional organizations serve entire islands (Hokkaido, Kyushu, and Shikoku), while the others cover the main populated island, Honshu. Among these organizations, JR Hokkaido (Hokkaido Railway Company), JR East (East Japan Railway Company), JR Tokai (Central Japan Railway Company), JR West (West Japan Railway Company), JR Shikoku (Shikoku Railway Company), and JR Kyushu (Kyushu Railway Company) operate as passenger railways.9 JR Tokai is currently leading the development of the maglev train, with speeds of 500 kph. Without privatization, the promotion of the maglev development plan might have yet to be realized, due to the financial concerns of the JNR and political issues. 112

Japan’s Linear Megalopolis

Figure 6.2  Shinkansen network18

The main purpose of the privatization was to reduce the economic impact on national finances, as the JNR had a significant amount of long-​term debt. The second purpose was to provide more efficient service by better considering local needs. Organizational arrangements were explored, along with the economic situation and social needs based on structural changes in Japan (i.e. post-​war urbanization, ageing, and depopulation). Thus, the individual railway organizations have new roles and responsibilities related to the needs of their specific region as independent railway service providers.

Superconducting Maglev (SCMAGLEV) Magnetic levitation (MAGLEV) research began in 1962 at the National Railway’s research institute (Suda and Fukuhara 2014). The Yamanashi Maglev Line was developed for test purposes in 1997 (Central Japan Railway Company SCMAGLEV website). By 2005, all necessary technologies/​tests had been established, and a green light was given for implementation (Central Japan Railway Company SCMAGLEV website; Oikawa 2019). In 2007, JR Tokai announced the development of the SCMAGLEV line (Oikawa 2019; Suda and Fukuhara 2014) that included six stations: Shinagawa (Tokyo), Kanagawa Prefecture,Yamanashi Prefecture, Nagano Prefecture, Gifu Prefecture, and Nagoya (Aichi) (Figure 6.4). In 2011, the final plan for the SCMAGLEV (Shinagawa–​Nagoya), under the ‘Nationwide Shinkansen Development Act,’ was approved, and construction began (Central Japan Railway Company SCMAGLEV website). As of 2019, it is expected that the Shinagawa–​Nagoya line (with a 40-​minute travel time) will begin operation in 2027. The full line to Osaka (with a travel time of less than 70 minutes) is expected to open in 2037, though this date may change. 113

1995 Hokkaido 2000

Tokaido/Sanyo 2005 2010 Tohoku 2012 Joetsu

Figure 6.3  Trend of Shinkansen passenger numbers (per Japan Railways) Source: Japan Transport and Tourism Research Institute (2019). 2013 Hokuriku

2014 Kyushu

2015 2016

39,196 12,016 12,935

37,313 10,154 12,580

90,985

90,448

86,794

86,056

82,780

43,017 30,726 13,160

2,116

42,960 31,838 13,482

102

81,680

75,033

36,136 9,805 12,093

34,382 9,288 4,402

36,723 9,664 3,946

80,113

71,669

36,101 9,427

27,254

57,669 22,810

237,452

235,017

225,477

222,713

214,844

201,337

204,075

188,890

196,267

195,942

Hitomi Nakanishi and Fumitaka Kurauchi

114 1990

115

Japan’s Linear Megalopolis

Figure 6.4  Screenshot of the SCMAGLEV route Source: Figure is provided by the Central Japan Railway Company. All rights reserved.

Hitomi Nakanishi and Fumitaka Kurauchi

Box 6.2: Plan of Regional Cities to Utilize the Opportunities Provided by the SCMAGLEV: The Case of Gifu Prefecture

After the construction plan for the SCMAGLEV line was approved, prefectures along the route, such as Yamanashi and Gifu, started discussions on how to utilize the Maglev line for regional development. For example, Gifu Prefecture established the ‘Research Board for Regional Development by the Maglev Line of Gifu’ in September 2009, and they published the ‘Basic Strategy for Utilising the Maglev Line of Gifu’ in March 2011. The strategy aimed to use the station as a new gate to eastern and northern parts of Gifu, a new surrogate city of Tokyo, Nagoya, and Osaka megaregions, to introduce the unique features of Gifu Prefecture and to prepare for future Nankai Trough earthquake activity. Gifu Prefecture is located nearly in the centre of the main island of Japan and is famous for its diverse and beautiful landscapes (e.g. Ontakesan), historical sightseeing spots (e.g. Takayama, Shirakawago, and Magomejuku) and hot springs (e.g. Gero and Hirayu Onsen).Three major strategies were proposed by the abovementioned research board:  tourism promotion  and town planning, industrial promotion, and infrastructure development. Tourism promotion and town planning included the development of new tourism offerings, promotion of emigration, and housing innovations related to unoccupied properties. Industrial promotion had to do with office and factory development, backup facilities for central governments, a maglev vehicle maintenance base, and so on. Infrastructure development entailed the development of facilities around stations, enhancement of access roads, and the creation of a bus service network. The construction of the maglev line is expected to have a tremendous impact on regional development; thus, local governments are trying to prepare in anticipation of its opening.

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The Role of High-​Speed Trains in Post-​War Japan along with the Regional Development The regional design of Japan is led by the national government, in association with the development of key infrastructure also led by national government. After the Fifth Comprehensive National Development Plan ‘Grand Design for the 21st Century,’ Japanese government developed National Spatial Strategies (2008), Grand Design of National Spatial Development towards 2050 (2014) and the Second National Spatial Strategies (2015). The main theme of each policy is shown in Table 6.2. As can be seen in Table 6.2, accelerating ageing, depopulation and risks of natural hazards are the challenges towards 2050. To prepare for and cope with the challenges, maintaining the infrastructure in regions is the objective of the plans above for sustainability. As discussed earlier, a unique topography of Japan has made the development of transport infrastructure that connects regions a challenge over time. However high-​speed rail (HSR) improved the connectivity of regions and travel between regions became faster. This was supported by the national government and industry. The development of the Shinkansen progressed with the post-​war recovery efforts and economic growth. The Shinkansen was a symbol of the aspirations and lifestyle of the Japanese people at that time, expressed as ‘Japan as Number One.’10 Hosting the Tokyo Olympics in 1964 and the World Expo in 1970 raised Japan’s status among countries, with the Shinkansen at the forefront, as an example of Japanese advanced technology and innovation. As stated by Vogel (1979), no Western country was ahead of Japan at that time in terms of the development of its railway network. After the early success of the Shinkansen, the benefits of high-​speed rail were reviewed by other nations, prompting high-​speed train construction such as the Train à Grande Vitesse (TGV) in France. Table 6.2  National development plan in 21st century Plan (year)

Main theme

National Spatial Strategies (2008)

Development of regional blocks across Japan and focus on their industry and urban development for further growth, globalisation and enhance connection with East Asia, sustainable development addressing the challenges of ageing society and depopulation, enhance disaster resilience/​preparedness, improve landscape Address challenges of progressive demographic shrinking and hyper-​aging society, prepare for mega disasters, heightening of city versus city competitions and globalisation, technological innovation, spatial development based on the concept of ‘compact and networks,’ collaboration across regions, set three key concepts of regional development as ‘diversity, connectivity and resilience,’ creation of super mega region by maglev train Based on the Grand Design of National Spatial Development towards 2050, revitalise regions, innovation, enhanced network of transport, information and energy supply, distribute population and industry to regions and enhance global competitiveness of regions, enhance disaster resilience/​preparedness, maintain national infrastructure, development of regional plan

Grand Design of National Spatial Development towards 2050 (2014)

The Second National Spatial Strategies (2015)

Source: Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism.

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Post-​war urbanization in core industrial zones and the concentration of the population in these areas boosted economic activity along the Tokaido corridor. It was reported that the effect of creating demand was three times larger than the construction costs, that is, the benefit was estimated to be 900 billion yen (2.5 billion US dollars at the time), and travel time savings was estimated to be worth 250 billion yen (694 million US dollars at the time) (Suda 2014). Although its effect has not been estimated, the benefits of development along the line were extensive, considering the number of factories within one kilometre of the railway network (i.e. Tokaido line), including both factories/​offices that were already there and those that were built after Shinkansen (Suda 2011).11 This enabled efficient, profitable operation of the Shinkansen when it opened, because there were already high demands for business travel between cities on Tokaido corridor (Givoni 2006). In 1970s, the main industry was manufacturing and the travel to explore new market/​clients was regarded as important (Usami et al. 2013). Thus, despite the rapid motorization and development of highway networks over the same period of economic growth, and the establishment of a national airline company providing service between major cities, the passenger numbers for the Shinkansen continued to increase, as shown in Figure 6.3 . Japanese business leaders and workers were particularly well served by the Shinkansen, as it connected major cities and making round-​trip travel within one day feasible. The service has only improved over time. Technology upgrades have improved the speed and comfort of the Shinkansen. Thus, there has been great interest in the Shinkansen, as evidenced by the export of its technology to other countries. Shinkansen brought positive economic impact, in particular on Tokaido corridor (Albalate and Bel 2012). However, social and environmental impacts were also brought and their negative aspects should be discussed. As the Shinkansen became faster, many people used the Shinkansen to commute from mid-​sized cities to metropolitan areas housing various industries and business organizations. An increase in the cost of living in metropolitan areas (such as Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya) also promoted a ‘commute by Shinkansen’ lifestyle. This did not make the Japanese people’s commuting time shorter,12 but it did provide them with more options regarding where to live and raise a family. However, the negative impact is that the limited time of these Shinkansen commuters to engage in family activities and their social life. On the other hand, it is also true that by using Shinkansen for commuting, they could avoid living separately as a family (Ohmori, Aono, and Harata 2008) (in Japan, many public and private organizations relocate their staff every 2–​3 years and many families live separately by having dual residences).Therefore, the social impact depends on the circumstances of individuals and family, and how they use Shinkansen. In addition, the negative impact here is the continued economic disparity between cities that have Shinkansen stations and those that do not. Major cities with Shinkansen stops have a larger population, more revenue, and a higher income level, whereas the cities that do not have Shinkansen stops tend to remain as regional/​rural cities with limited economic activity (Okada 1994). In particular, Tokaido Shinkansen triggered the concentration of population and goods to Tokyo metropolitan area in 1970s, then it started to impact Osaka metropolitan area in 1980s and Nagoya metropolitan area in 2000s (Usami et al. 2013). The planning of the Hokkaido Shinkansen and Shikoku Shinkansen is partly grounded on this concern. In addition, ageing is accelerating in these areas. An alternative travel mode to car (i.e. public transport) is important to support the life of the elderly in regional cities. However, the profitability and effectiveness of this expensive infrastructure in rural regions must be examined carefully, as depopulation and ageing in rural areas is unstoppable in both the short and long term due to young people leaving for education and employment in big cities, and the limited financial resources and services in these areas (Matanle 2017; National Institute of Population and Social Security Research 2019).13 Additionally, it is future generations who will be responsible 118

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for the cost, not only for the development but also for the maintenance. A further development of Shinkansen in Japanese regional areas would place a challenge in this context. The current situation of Japan is different from other Asian countries in this regard because it has already passed the age of growth. The Shinkansen was successful because it was developed when Japan was undergoing rapid growth. Among Asian developing countries, China developed its high-​ speed rail (HSR) network under a ‘mid-​to-​long term railway network plan’ (2004) and opened its first HSR in 2008 (Wang, Xia, and Zhang 2017). The timing was when China was experiencing rapid economic growth and urban expansion (Bai, Peijun, and Yansui 2014). The expansion plan of HSR (see Wang, Xia, and Zhang 2017) shows that the extension of HSR connects over 260 cities by 2025, the largest HSR network in the world (Jiao, Wang, and Jin 2017).14 This is a much faster development speed of HSR compared with Japan, who took more than 40 years to develop their current HSR and are still trying to extend it. In India, population increase is expected to continue to be 590 million in 2030 in major megacities (such as Bangalore, Mumbai, Kolkata, and Delhi etc.). Therefore there is a growing need for a high-​speed rail to provide better connectivity between cities (Verma et al. 2013). India and Japan signed a memorandum of understanding in 2015, to develop HSR between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, applying Japanese Shinkansen technology (Raghuram and Udayakumar 2016).15 Transport activities of Japanese population (per capita) doubled between 1973 and 2008 (Lipscy and Schipper 2013). Within four modes (plane, boat, train, bus car), car use increased the most, reflecting the increase in automobile ownership. Rail travel also increased during this time. Per capita CO2 emissions of rail (including both local line and intercity service) is extremely low compared with cars. In fact the expansion of Shinkansen was not promoted to reduce the environmental impact of other travel mode, rather because of the political considerations of the interests of industry such as construction and expansion of the railway network (Lipscy and Shipper 2013). According to the Central Japan Railway Company (2014), the CO2 emission per person is estimated as below (Table 6.3). Passengers of SCMAGLEV will produce more CO2 emissions compared with Shinkansen. However, their CO2 emissions will still be lower than airplane or car passengers. The extension of the Shinkansen to the south and north of Japan is further supported by national government, considering the needs of the economy and industry for further growth, as can be seen in the national development plans (Tables 6.1 and 6.2). During the period when the Shinkansen was extended, airports were developed in many rural cities of Japan. This promoted competition between air travel and land travel (e.g. Tokyo–​Fukuoka by air or the Shinkansen). However, the Shinkansen seemed to be preferred to air travel in competitive markets (Lipscy and Schipper 2013). It has more service frequency, flexibility (passengers can change their itinerary easily and often are not charged for the changes), and ease of use (the Shinkansen does not have baggage inspections). A recent trend is the popularity of the Shinkansen with international

Table 6.3  Comparison of CO2 emissions by travel mode Travel mode

CO2 emission (kg/​person)

SCMAGLEV (1000 seats/​train with occupation rate of 61.2%) Shinkansen (Tokaido line, series N700, 1323 seats/​16 car formation with occupation rate of 61.2%) Airplane (Tokyo–​Osaka service, B777-​200) Passenger car (run by 80 km/​h speed)

29.3 7.1 96.9 84.3

Source: Central Japan Railway Company (2014).

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tourists for domestic travel within Japan. As the number of international tourists has increased (Japan National Tourism Organization 2018), the number of international passengers using the Shinkansen has also increased. For example, after the opening of Hokuriku Shinkansen in 2015, the number of international tourists who visit hot spring area of Kanazawa using Shinkansen has been increasing (Oyabu et al. 2017). The development of HSR network which is driven by the national government is in its final stage and it has helped Japanese regions/​cities to be connected further. Some regions have had the increase of visitors which helps the local economy (Kurihara and Wu 2016). The national focus is now the SCMAGLEV as can be seen in national strategies (Table  6.2). The role of SCMAGREV in achieving the target of national regional plan is discussed in the following section.

Future Prospects and Conclusion In 2019, Japan began its new era ‘Reiwa,’16 just one year before the second Summer Olympics in Tokyo to be held in 2020 (postponed due to COVID-19 pandemic). The railway system of Japan also entered a new era, with progress on the construction of SCMAGLEV, which is called ‘Chuo Linear Shinkansen.’ The Chuo Linear Shinkansen connects Japan’s three major cities (Tokyo, Nagoya, and Osaka) within one hour, with an average speed of 500 km/​hr. In addition to providing faster travel compared with the existing Shinkansen, the SCMAGLEV is expected to play a significant role as an alternative mode of intercity travel, as a faster, more reliable, disaster-​ resilient mass transport service, as explained below. First, travel time is regarded as important for Japanese travellers, hence the reduction of travel time between Tokyo-​Osaka for 50 percent will have a great impact on intercity travel market (including air and coach) (Fu, Oum, and Yan 2014). This implies the potential creation of one mega-​region in the middle of Japan, that is, a megalopolis, which may have a lot of opportunities for business, industry, and services where people can live and work in the megalopolis using faster transportation. More interactions of economy and societies and communications are expected which may lead to an enhanced productivity (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism 2019). Second, due to the rapid construction work that occurred in an effort to meet the opening of the 1964 Summer Olympics and its age (about 60 years old), the deterioration of the ‘Tokaido Shinkansen’ tracks and systems are apparent. Without the necessary maintenance, it is in danger of running into serious disrepair, in terms of its service quality, performance, and safety. Thus, the ‘Tokaido Shinkansen’ is expected to undergo major maintenance and renovations in the near future. Considering the volume of passengers who use the current ‘Tokaido Shinkansen,’ an alternative travel mode is necessary to accommodate transportation needs during the period of repair and renovation. Any delay in developing this alternative is anticipated to have a major impact on Japan’s economy, should major issues develop with the existing line. Hence, the associated authorities have been proactive in conducting research and tests towards implementation of the new SCMAGLEV system. Third, the current ‘Tokaido Shinkansen’ runs along the Pacific Ocean as shown in Figure 6.4. It is expected that Japan will experience another mega-​earthquake (the so-​called Nankai Trough earthquake,17 see Box 6.2) in the near future, which is expected to induce tsunamis, similar to the ones that impacted the northeastern region of Japan in 2011, where the nuclear power plant at Fukushima was located. Under this threat of natural hazards, securing a disaster-​resilient alternative line is a high priority for Japan, even with an understanding of the implications of cost, accelerated ageing, and depopulation. 120

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Another priority is that of advancing Japan’s technology and innovation. As the Shinkansen encouraged the development of high-​speed rail in other countries, Japanese industry leaders expect the SCMAGLEV to promote their innovative status as ‘Japan as Number One.’ They also expect to export the technology to other countries, where there is an increasing need for maglev transportation such as China and the USA (Hellinger and Mnich 2009). In this context, it is important that SCMAGLEV meets expectations as a high-​capacity, highly sophisticated, new-​age mass transportation service when it begins operation. China opened its first fully automated maglev in Shanghai in 2004, applying Germany’s Transrapid system (Hellinger and Mnich 2009). However its 30-​km track is rather for the intracity travel, and not for the intercity travel. China planned maglev lines under ‘13th Five Year Plan (2016–​2020)’and opened another two lines (as of February 2020); Changsha airport maglev line (18.5 km) and Beijing S1 maglev line (10.2 km) (Lin and Sheng 2018). The 170-​km long Shanghai-​Hangzhou line is planned. USA has planned high-​speed rail network (Albalate and Bel 2012) and also has been researching the maglev system. Including USA, there are a large number of pending projects in Asia and North and South America (Hellinger and Mnich 2009). Concerns related to SCMAGLEV should be discussed. As discussed above, the SCMAGLEV may trigger the creation of megalopolis including Tokyo, Nagoya, and Osaka. It is expected that this mega-​region will comprise a population of 65 million.The existing geographic relationships, city functions, and so on, will be deconstructed, with the new megalopolis effectively acting as a global city by itself. It is too early to predict how the population distribution among individual cities would change when the Chuo Linear Shinkansen begins operations. However, there is some concern that some areas along the route may experience a decline in population and economic growth (Sato 2013). Using the SCGE (spatial computable general equilibrium) model, Sato (2013) found that the operation of SCMAGLEV may cause the decrease of population in Tokyo, whilst the population of Kofu and Nagoya areas might increase. Li and Xu (2018) viewed that the spatial impact of high-​speed rail depends on the nature of industries and the distance between cities. They showed the empirical evidence that agglomeration of service industries towards metropolitan cities occurs whilst manufacturing industries decentralize towards smaller cities. Considering the potential spill-​over effects, cities and prefectures located along the route have begun to prepare for the potential impact of Chuo Linear Shinkansen (see Box 6.2). Transport infrastructure is important ‘social common capital’ (Uzawa 2000). Along with the transitions in the economy, society, and associated human activities, the need for ‘social common capital’ has become more evident in post-​war Japan. As described in this chapter, Japan’s high-​ speed train changed over time: from initially being ‘a symbol of economic growth’ in the Showa era; then transitioning to an efficient, alternative long-​distance travel mode to cars or planes in the Heisei era; and, finally, to a disaster-​resilient innovative transportation mode during the Reiwa era. The SCMAGLEV may have to take on unforeseen roles after the start of its operation, in the context of it being ‘social common capital.’ For example, SCMAGLEV might contribute to promote social interactions of individuals in isolated areas through assisting socially motivated travel which decreases if the distance to social contacts become longer (Guidon et al. 2018). And interactions are regarded as an important factor by the Japanese government because it may enhance the productivity as discussed above. Attitudes towards travel and travel choices are ever-​changing in Japan. For example, studies report that Japanese young males are not owning cars as older generations once did (Kolnhofer-​Derecskei, Reicher, and Szeghegyi 2019; Maruyama and Fukahori 2020). Additionally, national governments have been promoting more flexible work hours and working from home options (Hamaguch 2019). Telework implementation would reduce the need to travel long distances. Global concern regarding climate change is growing rapidly, making the shift to more energy-​efficient travel in Japan imminent, 121

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especially among younger generations. Goal 11, ‘Sustainable cities and communities,’ of the United Nation’s ‘Sustainable Development Goals’ advocates the use of public transportation for both short-​and long-​distance travel. The role of SCMAGLEV is critical for Japan in enhancing economic opportunities, productivity and social interactions in regions for a sustainable future.

Notes 1. In the literature, ‘Japanese National Railways’ is used as its authorized English name. 2. The privatization of these businesses was promoted following global trends after the late 1980s. 3. The distance between major cities on the Tokaido is 200–​300 kilometres on average, which is suitable for railway connections. 4. The gauge was the same size as that used for the South Manchuria Railway (1435 mm), located in what is now Dalian, China. 5. The development of a ‘broad gauge’ line was supported after the war, which led to the development of the Shinkansen. Two tunnels constructed as part of this plan were completed and opened later as part of the Tokaido Shinkansen line. 6. This is the time for the ‘Hikari’ service. ‘Hikari’ has limited-​stop service in Tokyo, Nagoya, Kyoto, and Osaka. The all-​stop service is ‘Kodama,’ with a five-​hour travel time between Tokyo and Osaka (Suda and Fukuhara 2014). 7. Website of Central Japan Railway Company, https://​ global.jr-​ central.co.jp/​ en/​accessed on January 2020. 8. The Shinkansen runs wider tracks that are dedicated to its own service. However, these two lines do not have their own dedicated wider tracks, and they run at a fastest speed of 130 km/​hr, the same as existing limited express trains. Due to the topography and single track, trains on these lines must sometimes stop to wait for oncoming trains. 9. There are four related companies that were also established due to this privatization. However, these four companies are not directly in charge of railway service. 10. Vogel (1979) praised Japan for its rapid economic growth and the attitudes of the Japanese people to life and work, which enabled rapid recovery and growth after World War II, in his book, Japan as Number One: Lessons for America. 11. For example, Kakegawa city, Shizuoka a middle-​sized city, increased employment, productions, and sales significantly after the construction of new Shinkansen station (Okada 1994). 12. Ohmori, Aono, and Harata (2008) reported that the average commuting time of Shinkansen drawn from their study was 1 hour and 50 minutes one way. 13. The National Census counts recorded a decline of around 962,000 persons from 2010 to 2015. This trend is expected to continue and the total population is expected to be 88 million (127 million in 2015) with the proportion of elderly being more than 38 percent. 14. It should be noted that the current HSR network is concentrated on eastern region of China. The extension to western region needs to the consideration of balanced urban hierarchy (Jiao, Wang, and Jin 2017). 15. In December 2019, Indian government announced a review of the project due to delay in land purchase for construction and financial issues (Sharma 2019). 16. Due to the abdication of Emperor Akihito, a new era began on 1 May 2019. The current Emperor Naruhito is the 125th Emperor of Japan (as of January 2020). 17. Nankai Trough extends from Suruga Warf (Shizuoka) to Hyuganada (Miyazaki) between the Eurasian and Philippine Sea plates.The Nankai Trough Earthquake occurs approximately every 100 to 150 years. Over 75 years have passed since the last quake in 1944; the next one is expected in the near future. 18. This map is based on Digital Map Japan published by the Geospatial Information Authority of Japan and modification by the authors.

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Banister, D. and Hall, P. (1993). The second railway age. Built Environment, 19(3–​4), 156–​162. Central Japan Railway Company SCMAGLEV website https://​scmaglev.jr-​central-​global.com/​(accessed on 4 December 2019). Central Japan Railway Company (2014). Chuo Linear Shinkansen Environmental Impact Assessment (in Japanese). https://​company.jr-​central.co.jp/​chuoshinkansen/​assessment/​document/​kanagawa/​k_​shiryou.html (accessed on 5 March 2020). Central Japan Railway Company SCMAGLEV website https://​company.jr-​central.co.jp/​chuoshinkansen/​ linear/​(accessed on 4 December 2019). Chida, T. and Davies, P. (2013). The Japanese Shipping and Shipbuilding Industries: A History of their Modern Growth. London: Bloomsbury Academic Collection. Fu, X., Oum,T.H., and Yan, J. (2014). An analysis of travel demand in Japan’s intercity market empirical estimation and policy simulation. Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, 48(1), 97–​113. Givoni, M. (2006). Development and impact of the modern high-​speed train: A review. Transport Reviews, 26(5), 593–​611. Guidon, S., Wicki, M., Bernauer, T., and Axhausen, K.W. (2018). Explaining socially motivated travel with social network analysis: Survey method and results from a study in Zurich, Switzerland. Transportation Research Procedia, 32, 99–​109. Hamaguchi, K. (2019). Japanese policy regarding employment-​like working Styles. Japan Labor Issues, 3(18),  7–​9. Hellinger, R. and Mnich, P. (2009). Linear motor-​powered transportation: history, present status, and future outlook. Proceedings of the IEEE, 97(11), 1892–​1900. Japan Airlines website, JAL’s history, www.jal.com/​ja/​outline/​history/​(accessed on 28 November, 2019, in Japanese). Japan National Tourism Organization. (2018). Trend of international visitors to Japan after the launch of Visit Japan Campaign (2003–​2018) (in Japanese) Available on www.jnto.go.jp/​jpn/​statistics/​marketingdata_​ tourists_​after_​vj.pdf (accessed on 18 February 2020). Japan Transport and Tourism Research Institute. (2019). Railway statistics 2018, Suuji de miru testudo (in Japanese). Jiao, J., Wang, J., and Jin, F. (2017). Impacts of high-​speed rail lines on the city network in China. Journal of Transport Geography, 60, 257–​266. JR Tokai. (1995). Thirty year history of Shinkansen:  its growth and trajectory. Shikansen no 30 nen sono seichou no kiseki, Toppan Insatsu: Tokyo (in Japanese). Kikuchi, M. (1987). The social history of the modern Japanese city. Kinsei Toshino Shakaishi, Meicho Shuppan: Tokyo (in Japanese). Kolnhofer-​Derecskei, A., Reicher, R.Z., and Szeghegyi, Á. (2019). Transport habits and preferences of generations: Does it matter, regarding the state of the art. Acta Polytechnica Hungarica, 16(1), 29‒44. Kurihara,T. and Wu, L. (2016).The impact of high speed rail on tourism development: A case study of Japan. The Open Transportation Journal, 10(1), 35‒44. Li, Z. and Xu, H. (2018). High-speed railroads and economic geography: Evidence from Japan. Journal of Regional Science, 58(4), 705–​727. Lin, G. and Sheng, X. (2018). Application and further development of Maglev transportation in China. Transportation Systems and Technology, 4(3), 36–​43. Lipscy, P.Y. and Schipper, L. (2013). Energy efficiency in the Japanese transport sector. Energy Policy, 56, 248–​258. Maruyama,T. and Fukahori,T. (2020). Households with every member out-​of-​home (HEMO): Comparison using the 1984, 1997, and 2012 household travel surveys in Kumamoto, Japan. Journal of Transport Geography, 82, 102632. Matanle, P. (2017). Towards an Asia-​Pacific ‘depopulation dividend’ in the 21st century: Regional growth and shrinkage in Japan and New Zealand. The Asia-​Pacific Journal: Japan Focus, 15(6). Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport and Tourism. (2012). History of Japan’s Railway Development (in Japanese). Ministry of land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. (2019). The 5th Comprehensive National Development Plan. website www.mlit.go.jp/​kokudokeikaku/​zs5-​e/​index.html (accessed on 5 December 2019). Ministry of land, Infrastructure,Transport and Tourism. (2019). Towards the development of super megaregion: creating new value effective use of time and space, a final report of super megaregion investigation committee (in Japanese). National Institute of Population and Social Security Research. (2019). Population and social security in Japan, IPSS Research Report, No.85, July 26, 2019. 123

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Neuman, M. (2000). Regional design: Recovering a great landscape architecture and urban planning tradition. Landscape and Urban Planning, 47(3–​4), 115–​128. Ohmori, N., Aono, S., and Harata, N. (2008). Commuting by Shinkansen:  Activity participation while traveling. Proceedings of the 37th Conference on Infrastructure Planning, Japan Society of Civil Engineers in CD-​ROM. Okada, H. (1994). Features and economic and social effects of the Shinkansen. Japan Railway and Transport Review, 3, 9–​16. Oikawa,Y. (2016).The history of Japan’s railway development (Taisho and Showa (pre-​war) Nihon tetsudoshi Taisho/​showa senzen hen (in Japanese). Oikawa, Y. (2019). The history of Japan’s railway development (after World War II and Heisei), Nihon tetsudoshi Showa sengo heisei hen Kokutetsu no tanzhou kara JR 7 sha taisei e (in Japanese). Oyabu,T., Nakamura, J., Liu, A., and Kimura, H. (2017). Characteristics of foreign visitors in Kaga City after the extension of Hokuriku Shinkansen to Kanazawa City. Journal of Global Tourism Research, 2(2), 123‒8. Raghuram, G. and Udayakumar, P.D. (2016). Dedicated High Speed Rail Network in India: Issues in Development. W.P. No. 2016-​03-​58. Ahmedabad: Indian Institute of Management. Sato, T. (2013). Measuring the impact of the development of the Chuo Shinkansen using a quasi-​dynamic SCGE model that considers the population movement. Journal of the Eastern Asia Society for Transportation Studies, 10, 350–​362. Sharma, K. (2019). India’s Japan-​funded bullet train projects risks delays high-​speed rail link under scrutiny by new government in western state. Nikkei Asian Review, published 4 December 2019. Available at https://​asia.nikkei.com/​Business/​Transportation/​India-​s-​Japan-​funded-​bullet-​train-​project-​r isks-​ delays2 (accessed on 17 February 2020). Snorrason, S.B. (2017). Sneak Pilgrimage: The Development Of Domestic Tourism in Japanese Culture. Iceland: Doctoral dissertation, University of Iceland. Sorensen, A. (2002). The Making of Urban Japan Cities and Planning from Edo to the Twenty-​first Century. London and New York: Nissan Institute/​Routledge Japanese studies series, Routledge. Suda, H. (2011). The railway of Showa, Showano Tetsudo. Tokyo: Kotsu Shinbunsha (in Japanese). Suda, H. (2014). The history of Tokaido Shinkansen 50  years. Tokaido Shinkansen no 50 nen. Tokyo: Kotsushinbunsha (in Japanese). Suda, H. and Fukuhara, S. (2014). The trajectory of Tokaido Shinkansen 50 years. Tokaido Shinkansen 50 nen no kiseki. Tokyo: JTB publishing (in Japanese). Taniguchi,T. (1984). Japanese urban development and the railway network, 1880–​1980. Geographical Review of Japan, 57(2), 111–​123. The National Statistics Center, Population Estimates of Japan 1920 –​2000, 2007. www.e-​stat.go.jp/​en/​stat-​ search/​files?page=1&layout=datalist&toukei=00200524&tstat=000000090001&cycle=0&tclass1=000 000090004&tclass2=000000090005&stat_​infid=000000090261 (accessed on 9 March 2020). Toyo Keizai Inc. (1927). National Census of Meiji and Taisho (written in Japanese), the digital collection of National Diet Library, Japan. Usami, S., Okuda, T., Hayashi, Y., and Kato, H. (2013). Post-​evaluation of the long-​term impact on the regional economy of Tokaido Shinkansen, Proceedings of the 50th Annual Meeting of the Japan Section of the RSAI (Regional Science Association International), October 12-​14 2013, Tokushima, Japan. Utsunomiya, K. (2014).The rise of railway. Tetsudo Fukken Jidoshashakai karano daigyakuryu.Tokyo: Shinchosha (in Japanese). Uzawa, H. (2000). Social Common Capital. Shakaiteki kyotsu shihon. Tokyo: Iwanami shoten (in Japanese). Vogel, E. (1979). Japan as Number One: Lessons for America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Verma, A., Sudhira, H.S., Rathi, S., King, R., and Dash, N. (2013). Sustainable urbanization using high speed rail (HSR) in Karnataka, India. Research in Transportation Economics, 38(1), 67–​77. Wang, K., Xia,W., and Zhang, A. (2017). Should China further expand its high-​speed rail network? Consider the low-​cost carrier factor. Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, 100, 105–​120. Yada, T. (2014). On the national land development plans by the Japanese government since 1950. Sengo kokudo keikaku sakutei no kozu Shimokobe shogen kara yomitoku, Association of Economic Geographers Annals, 60(2), 47–​63 (in Japanese). Yamada, H. (1994). Economic growth, urbanization and regional policy in post-​ war Japan Sengo no keizaiseichou, toshika to kokudo seisaku. Society of Civil Engineers Journal of Infrastructure Planning and Management, No. 494/​Ⅳ-​24, 1–​12 (in Japanese).

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7 Germany’s ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ Stefanie Dühr

Introduction In comparison to other European countries, Germany was late in setting out a nation-​wide policy framework on metropolitan regions. The concept of European Metropolitan Regions (Europäische Metropolregionen)1 was introduced by the federal and state governments in the mid-​ 1990s in the particular context of German reunification and accelerating European integration. Since its inception the concept has stimulated considerable academic and policy debate in Germany. With the focus on the contribution of major urban agglomerations to the country’s competitiveness, an alternative discourse to the traditional concern with on achieving equality of living conditions in all parts of the nation was introduced. To this day, these two logics for German spatial development continue to stand side by side, with the obvious tensions between the different paradigms for spatial development yet to be resolved. Today, there are 11 ‘European Metropolitan Regions,’ which together cover more than half of the German territory and almost 70  percent of the national population. There is no federal funding attached to their designation, but the promise of enhancing the profile of selected urban regions explains the popularity of the concept. The new discursive frame has prompted regional and municipal actors to position themselves in relation to the emerging new regional map of Germany. While the strategic policy framework provides the normative agenda, focused on strengthening cooperation between cities, and between cities and their hinterlands in order to foster the economic competitiveness of the country, filling the concept with life has been left to the municipalities and stakeholders in the different regions. This has led to a considerable diversity in definitions applied to the functions and performance of metropolitan regions in the German context, and resulted in different metropolitan governance arrangements and levels of institutionalization in the different settings. From a perspective of regional design as discussed in this book, Germany’s ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ allow valuable insights into the questions of how new collaborative spaces at supra-​local scale are being defined and how they become part of a nation’s socio-​ economic and spatial consciousness. This chapter will consider the normative frame that has been introduced to German spatial planning since the mid-1990s, and discusses how Germany’s ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ have since their inception been shaped by political interests 125

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through top-​down and bottom-​up processes of engagement with the concept. In these processes of region-​building, spatial images (Feiertag, Harrison and Fedeli 2020) have played an important role, both in terms of offering analyses of Germany’s spatial structure and the position of the new metropolitan regions as well as by visualizing an attractive spatial development framework focused on collaborative spaces.

Spatial Planning in Germany and the Objective of ‘Equality of Living Conditions’ Spatial planning in Germany is based on the fundamental principles of federalization and subsidiarity, with the planning competences and tasks of the federation (Bund), the federal states (Länder) and the local authorities (Städte und Gemeinden) clearly defined and separated in the constitution.2 Although guided by federal framework legislation through the Raumordnungsgesetz (ROG) (Federal Spatial Planning Act), the 16 Länder (federal states, of which 13 are area states and three –​Berlin, Hamburg and Bremen ‒ are city-​states) have the right to establish their own spatial planning systems, including in relation to arrangements for (metropolitan) regional governance. Coherence between supra-​local Raumordnung (‘spatial ordering’) and Landesplanung (state-​ level spatial planning) on the one hand and local land use planning on the other is ensured through the requirement for mutual consultation through the so-​called ‘counter-​current principle’ (Gegenstromprinzip) (Tölle 2013). Supra-​local strategic planning (Raumordnung; literally ‘spatial ordering’) is coordinated on the basis of a requirement in the ROG that Bund und Länder agree on the main directions for the spatial development of the nation. This is done through the Ministerkonferenz für Raumordnung (MKRO) (Standing Conference of Bund and Länder Ministers for Spatial Planning), which was set up in 1967. Although the decisions of the MKRO are not binding, they play an important role in setting strategic direction for spatial development in Germany. The increased focus on the role of metropolitan regions within the country’s spatial-​economic structure since the mid-​1990s is a prominent example of how decisions by the MKRO influence thinking about large-​scale spatial development in Germany across all tiers. A long-​standing concern for German spatial planning has been to maintain a balanced settlement structure, which is considered important to achieve the constitutional commitment of ‘equality of living conditions’ across the country. The growth-​and competitiveness-​oriented goals associated with the MKRO’s new normative policy framework on ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ has since the mid-​1990s introduced a ‘neoliberal logic’ (Miessner 2020) to German spatial planning discourse. This stands in contrast to the traditional redistributive focus of spatial development. The objective to achieve equality of living conditions across the German territory is embedded in long-​standing spatial planning principles, notably the ‘system of Central Places’ (Zentrale Orte) which defines higher-​, middle-​and lower-​order centers across the country. The system of Central Places is a hierarchical model for supplying the population with public services within reasonable distance from their place of residence. It has been a cornerstone of German spatial planning since the post-​war period, and the ROG requires the Länder to include the hierarchy in their state spatial plans. In recent years, the system of Central Places has been subject to considerable criticism for relying on outdated theoretical assumptions and prioritizing geographical proximity over accessibility considerations (Deiters 2016). A recent federal inquiry into the equality of living conditions, launched in response to concerns over increasing socio-​economic and spatial disparities, highlighted the challenges for especially the rural and more peripheral areas in the Eastern parts of the country to access the services provided by centers of higher and medium order within 126

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reasonable travel times (BMI 2019). In spite of such concerns, the MKRO recently confirmed its ongoing commitment to the central place concept as a key spatial ordering principle for German spatial planning (BBSR 2018). Since the introduction of the concept of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ in the mid-​1990s, German spatial planning is now characterized by the competing logics of cohesion (as expressed through the system of Central Places and the objective of equality of living conditions) and competitiveness (as expressed through the focus on a smaller number of urban regions). The concept of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ has introduced network ideas into what in many respects remains a rather statist and regulatory planning system, and the two understandings of space, one based on proximity and the other on connectivity, have since been sitting uneasily side by side.

‘National Spatial Design’: The MKRO’s Policy Framework for ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ The focus on metropolitan regions is a reaction to a quickly changing national context as a consequence of major political developments in the 1990s, such as the country’s reunification, ongoing European integration and increasing trade flows in a globalized economy. In this period, the Bund expanded its involvement in spatial planning in matters of relevance to international cooperation and national coordination (Schmitz and Müller 2007).This has manifested itself also in the increasing importance of the MKRO as a platform to develop non-​binding Leitbilder3 for the spatial development of the entire country. The first Leitbilder prepared by the MKRO in the mid-​1990s coined the term ‘European Metropolitan Regions.’ It was used for the first time in the 1995 Raumordnungspolitischer Handlungsrahmen (action program for spatial planning) (BmBau 1995), although their location was not visually represented in this document.The Handlungsrahmen followed on from the publication of the first joint Bund-​Länder guidelines for spatial planning, set out in the Raumordnungspolitischer Orientierungsrahmen of 1993, which made reference to ‘urban agglomerations of international significance’ (BmBau 1993). The justification for what might be perceived as a paradigm shift toward competitive urban areas was presented as being an important aspect of achieving and strengthening the country’s decentralized settlement structure. The size and functional reach of the identified metropolitan regions was expected to result in agglomeration efficiencies, and thereby contribute to strengthening Germany’s international competitive position (Adam and Göddecke-​Stellmann  2002). The Handlungsrahmen identified the six largest agglomerations in Germany as ‘European Metropolitan Regions.’ In order of population size, these are: Rhine-​Ruhr, Berlin-​Brandenburg, Munich, Rhine-​Main, Stuttgart and Hamburg. A  seventh ‘potential European Metropolitan Region,’ the ‘Sachsendreieck’ (‘Saxon Triangle,’ the region around Dresden, Leipzig/​Halle, and Chemnitz/​Zwickau), was also mentioned. According to Adam and Göddecke-​Stellmann (2002), there was no empirical basis for identifying metropolitan functions nor were clear definitions provided to differentiate the identified ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ from other city-​regions. It was only with the federal ‘Spatial Planning Report’ (Raumordnungsbericht)4 of 2005 that analytical input into the debate on ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ was provided (BBR 2005). The Raumordnungsbericht of 2005 presented an indicator-​based analysis of Germany’s cities and urban regions according to three main ‘metropolitan functions’: a decision-​making and control function; an innovation and competition function; and a gateway function. In addition to the seven metropolitan regions identified by the MKRO, the analysis noted signs of metropolitan-​ scale functions also for the areas around Mannheim-​Ludwigshafen, Nuremberg-​Fürth-​Erlangen, Hannover-​Braunschweig-​Wolfsburg and Bremen-​Oldenburg (Figure 7.1). 127

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Metropolitan functions of German cities

Kiel

Hamburg

Schwerin Szczecin

Bremen

Berlin Hannover

Amsterdam

Potsdam Magdeburg

Düsseldorf

Dresden

Erfurt Liège

Praha

Wiesbaden Mainz

Luxembourg

Saarbrücken

München

100 km

Zürich

Index of metropolitan functions 250 100 10

© BBR Bonn 2004

Stuttgart

Strasbourg

Innsbruck

Spatial structure according to accessibility of centres and population density Central area Intermediate area Peripheral area Federal motorway

Sources: BBR Spatial Monitoring System, BBR European Spatial Monitoring System, BBR Accessibility Model, Project results from Espon Project Nr. 1.1.1 Data bases: Population update of the Federal Government and the federal states, ATKIS: Basis-DLM, LOCAL Demographie - infas GEOdaten, population data of the national statistical authorities, Espon data base

Figure 7.1  Indicator-​based analysis of metropolitan functions in Germany as presented in the Raumordnungsbericht of 2005 Source: BBR (2005, 185).

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Because the Raumordnungspolitischer Orientierungsrahmen and Raumordnungspolitischer Handlungsrahmen were widely regarded as useful instruments for stimulating a broader discussion on large-​scale spatial development trends and possible policy responses, the 1997 revision of the ROG made explicit provision for Bund und Länder to regularly prepare such joint spatial guidelines. New Leitbilder have since been published in 2006 and 2016, and they demonstrate the widening of the concept of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ since its initial inception. In the late 1990s, Germany’s main agglomerations were expanding their functional and economic roles, while at the same time some peripheral regions in Germany were affected by outmigration and economic decline. The increasingly uneven spatial development put the objective of equality of living conditions under more pressure, and these trends prompted a review of the Bund-​Länder concepts (Aring and Sinz 2006). The analyses from the Raumordnungsbericht 2005 provided input into the work of the MKRO on the new Bund-​Länder ‘Concepts and Strategies for Spatial Development in Germany,’ which were adopted after extensive discussion in 2006 (MKRO 2006). The new guidelines proposed to address spatial disparities through ‘closer cooperation between the regions’ and by fostering ‘urban–​rural partnerships’ (Tiefensee and Pfister quoted in MKRO 2006, foreword). Three Leitbilder were presented: the first one dedicated to ‘growth and innovation,’ centering on metropolitan regions, a second one on ‘securing services of public interest’ (resting on the system of Central Places), and a third one on ‘conservation of resources, shaping of cultural landscapes.’ The non-​binding status is clarified through the prominent disclaimer that the visualizations are an illustration only and not ‘a particular plan’ (Figure 7.2). In the 2006 ‘Concepts and Strategies,’ the concept of the ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ has been expanded significantly, paving the way for all parts of Germany to become connected with the ‘new urban elite.’ Thus, the Leitbild on ‘growth and innovation’ (Figure 7.2) identified

Concept: Growth and Innovation Metropolitan region Cores of the capital region and of existing European metropolitan regions Other cities with metropolitan functions Metropolitan region Areas of influence including rural areas in Tra Transition region between metropolitan regions me

Growth regions outside Growt G Gro metropolitan regions

Stabilisation areas

© BBR Bonn 2007

Spatial structure

100 km

Central area of high density Dense intermediate area This map serves as illustration and does not represent a particular plan.

Figure 7.2  Concepts and strategies for spatial development in Germany 2006 ‒ Leitbild ‘Growth and Innovation’ Source: MKRO (2006, 13). 129

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three main spatial structures: 1) the ‘European Metropolitan Regions’; 2) growth regions outside metropolitan regions; and 3) areas with need for stabilization, that is, rural, old-​industrial and peripheral locations that fall in-​between areas of growth. The spatial diagram is notable for offering an alternative spatial perspective to both the traditional Euclidean representation of Central Places, by visualizing the areas of influence of the metropolitan regions covering the entire country and omitting the administrative boundaries of the Länder. For political reasons, a second generation of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ including Bremen-​Oldenburg, Hannover-​Braunschweig-​Göttingen-​Wolfsburg, Nuremberg and Rhine-​ Neckar was identified, resulting in greater coverage of the national territory and with these regions intended to act as regional ‘growth poles.’ The resulting 11 regions show significant variation in terms of size, spatial structure, population density, accessibility, and economic and employment structures. The newly added Rhine-​Neckar region is the smallest with less than 2.5  million inhabitants, whereas the Rhine-​Ruhr Metropolitan Region comprises almost 12 million (IKM/​BBR 2008). Rhine-​Neckar was a surprising addition as it had not been part of the previous discussions and analyses, and its inclusion has generally been considered to be the result of skillful lobbying by regional and state actors (Harrison and Growe 2014).There are also significant differences in spatial structure between the designated regions, with five metropolitan regions being monocentric (Berlin-​Brandenburg, Hamburg, Munich, Nuremberg, Stuttgart); one bi-​polar (Bremen-​Oldenburg); and the others being formed around multiple cities (Hannover-​Braunschweig-​Göttingen-​Wolfsburg, Central Germany (previously called Saxon Triangle); or polycentric in structure (Rhine-​Ruhr, Rhine-​Main, Rhine-​Neckar). The wider ‘areas of influence’ of the now 11 metropolitan regions were proposed to be organized within ‘large-​scale communities of responsibility’ (großräumige Verantwortungsgemeinschaften) in the MKRO guidelines. Expanding the term of metropolitan region to now include additional regions of mostly regional relevance and introducing additional concepts on ‘partnerships’ with rural and peripheral regions raises important questions about the watering down of the concept and the international identifiability of Germany’s conurbations (Harrison and Growe 2014). A revision of the ‘Concepts and strategies for spatial development in Germany’ was published in 2016 (MKRO 2016). It presents Leitbilder on 1) ‘enhancing competitiveness’ (emphasizing the role of European Metropolitan Regions) (Figure 7.3), 2) ‘ensuring the provision of public services’ (with a focus on the hierarchy of Central Places), 3) ‘controlling and sustainably developing land uses,’ and a new Leitbild 4) on ‘shaping climate change and the transformation of the energy system.’ The label of ‘European Metropolitan Region’ continues to be used only for those 11 agglomerations that had already been listed in the MKRO’s ‘Spatial concepts and guidelines’ of 2006. However, in spite of the already extensive territorial coverage of the large urban regions and their wider ‘areas of responsibility,’ the 2016 revision saw a further broadening of the concept to cross-​border regions and regional growth poles (Figure 7.3). While the 2006 Leitbild on ‘growth and innovation’ had given little attention to cross-​border regions despite the discourse on functional relationships, the lobbying efforts of the German border regions since the 1990s succeeded in gaining attention for the external connections with Germany’s nine neighboring countries in the 2016 Leitbild (Tölle 2013, Hartz 2018, see Figure 7.3). Moreover, some federal states with a dominance of small and medium-​sized towns, such as Rhineland-​Palatinate, promoted a new concept of ‘Regiopolis.’ This refers to towns that while located outside the metropolitan regions are considered to have an important function in urban networks and therefore a crucial role in driving spatial and economic development (Aring and Reuther 2008). While ‘Regiopolis’ are not yet explicitly discussed nor visualized in the 2016 guidelines, the debate suggests that further expansions of the concept of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ may be possible. 130

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The map illustrates the concept only exemplarily. The symbols do not represent an planning provisions.

Competitiveness

Metropolitan regions cores of the capital region and of existing European metropolitan regions further locations of metropolitan functions immediate metropolitan zones of influence larger metropolitan zones of influence including rural areas transition zones between metropolitan zones of influence cores of metropolitan border regions (IMeG as of 2015) immediate metropolitan zones of influence in metropolitan border regions (IMeG as of 2015) metropolitan border regions (IMeG as of 2015)

examples of potential cross-border zones of influence

Rural and urbanized economic growth regions

Areas with special structural need for action

Transport infrastructure

(according to Trans-European Networks: Regulation (EU) No 1315/2013 of 11 December 2013)

road network rail network international airport international seaport main shipping routes Kiel Canal maritime planning area 100 km

© BBSR Bonn 2016

Figure 7.3  Concepts and strategies for spatial development in Germany 2016 ‒ Leitbild ‘Competitiveness’ Source: MKRO (2016, 14).

‘Institutional Design’ in the Regions There are many long-​standing examples of cooperation between local authorities across the country, which have been set up at different scales and resulted in varying levels of institutionalization. Some date back to the early 20th century, such as the amalgamation of smaller municipalities around the core city to create Groß-​Berlin (Greater Berlin) in 1916, or the creation of an association of municipalities in the Ruhr area in 1920 (Zimmermann 2017). The concept of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ introduced a top-​down perspective for Germany’s spatial development directions, aimed at enhancing the international profile of Germany’s metropolitan regions given the absence of a dominant global city. However, the implementation of the concept relies on the enthusiasm of the participating municipalities, given their high degree of autonomy over spatial planning in their territories. German local authorities have constitutionally assigned powers to undertake local land use planning, and taxes paid by households and businesses are an important source of their revenue. This means that the political will of the actors in the involved jurisdictions and the perceived benefit of coordinating infrastructure planning, urban development and the protection of open spaces across urban agglomerations are essential for achieving durable metropolitan governance arrangements. The status of ‘European Metropolitan Region’ is not linked to any structural financial support or the conferral of institutional or legislative power. It has been the task of the Länder 131

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and the municipalities involved in the respective metropolitan regions to bring the concept to life and decide on suitable institutional arrangements.This has resulted in ‘a considerable variety of institutional solutions for the governance of metropolitan affairs’ (Zimmermann 2017, 253). Metropolitan governance approaches range from mostly technocratic arrangements for specific tasks to multi-​purpose regional assemblies. On the one end of the spectrum, thus, there are loose networks at different scales (Central Germany), informal municipal networks (Munich) or state-​run regional planning organisations (as with the joint state planning department for Berlin-​Brandenburg). At the other end of the spectrum, there are legally institutionalized regional associations, as in the case of the Metropolitan Region Rhine-​Neckar, and relatively strong and institutionalized metropolitan-​regional associations (Stuttgart; Hannover) (Hartz, Damm and Köhler 2010). The Bund has remained engaged with the policy initiative by providing competitive funding for ‘model projects’ on different themes since 1997 (Baumheier 2007). One of the first model projects resulted in the launch of the ‘Initiativkreis Europäische Metropolregionen in Deutschland (IKM)’ in 2001. The Bund supports the work of the IKM through providing spatial analyses and regional monitoring, both important tasks given that metropolitan regions are not constitutionally recognized spatial units and therefore are not covered in the federal spatial monitoring system.The IKM has become an important lobby group for the country’s ‘European Metropolitan Regions,’ and aims to increase the visibility and voice of its members in EU and federal debates on spatial planning and regional policy. Not least because of the influence of the IKM on policy debates at different scales have the ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ themselves become recognized stakeholders in policy-​and decision-​making processes over the past years. The IKM website shows an abstract graphic depiction of the 11 member regions across Germany which glosses over the obvious differences in size (Figure 7.4). The reasons for different levels of engagement with the concept in the 11 metropolitan regions can at least partly be found in discrepancies between their ‘top-​down’ designation and the shape and identity of the region as perceived by the involved actors. The large size of the MKRO definitions, especially of the first generation of ‘European Metropolitan Regions,’ has not helped in finding common ground. Fragmentation and complexity of actor relationships can present considerable challenges especially in metropolitan regions with polycentric structures and no clear city hierarchy, such as Rhine-​Ruhr (Adam and Göddecke-​Stellmann 2002). Previous ‘bottom-up’ inter-​municipal cooperation experiences, and the trust established between the actors through their history of cooperation, have been identified as facilitating the establishment of metropolitan governance structures (Franz 2011). For example, in the Rhine-​Neckar region, a ‘Municipal Association of Rhine-​Neckar’, established in 1951, provided the basis for deepening cooperation over time. This stands in stark contrast to regions in Eastern Germany where inter-​municipal cooperation has only been possible since the reunification in 1990.While in principle metropolitan governance is considered the responsibility of voluntarily cooperating local governments, in those cases where the metropolitan region extends beyond the boundaries of a particular state an inter-​governmental agreement between these federal states through a Staatsvertrag (State Treaty) is required. In the cases of the ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ of Hamburg, Rhine-​Main and Rhine-​Neckar (that each stretch across three federal states) and Berlin-​Brandenburg (which covers two entire federal states) state governments therefore play an important role in their metropolitan governance. The challenges of bringing the ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ to life in different contexts can be illustrated with two prominent examples with different spatial structures, one monocentric (Berlin-​Brandenburg) and one polycentric (Rhine-​Ruhr). The two regions are often referred to as ‘special cases’ among the European Metropolitan Regions, with cooperation in the 132

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Figure 7.4  The members of the ‘Initiativkreis Europäische Metropolregionen’ Source: Initiativkreis Europäische Metropolregionen in Deutschland (www.deutsche-​ metropolregionen.org/​).

case of Berlin-​Brandenburg the domain of state actors whereas the Rhine-​Ruhr area is facing challenges of reconciling diverging interests and developing a shared identity in a large and politically fragmented region (Baumheier 2007, Zimmermann 2017).

Rhine-​Ruhr With a population of around 12  million, Rhine-​Ruhr is by far the most populous of the ‘European Metropolitan Regions,’ and features exclusively urban and suburban settlement structures. With a total of 20 cities and 11 Landkreise (counties), it is a truly polycentric region. It is entirely located in the federal state of North Rhine-​Westphalia, and an important traffic junction within German and Europe. Until the 1960s, the coal and steel industry in the Ruhr area was the unrivaled economic center of North Rhine-​Westphalia. The cities of Düsseldorf and Cologne were less affected by the coal crisis and subsequent economic restructuring, and the economic center has over the past decades consequently moved to the south of the federal state. 133

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The large designation of a ‘Rhine-​Ruhr’ European Metropolitan Region as proposed by the MKRO, which combines these two economic centers and the areas in-​between, found little recognition among regional and local actors (Blotevogel and Schulze 2010). The state of North Rhine-​Westphalia (NRW) played an important role in this designation through its participation in the MKRO. Indeed, North Rhine-​Westphalia was the first federal state to incorporate the concept of ‘European Metropolitan Region’ and the designation of the Rhine-​Ruhr, in both textual and graphical expression, in its spatial development plan of 1995 (MURL 1995). The draft version of the NRW state development plan showed distinct sub-​spaces of the Rhine corridor and the Ruhr area as they are commonly recognized by local and regional actors (Schmitt 2009). Yet the MKRO agreement on the much larger designation as considered in the context of the Raumordnungspolitischer Handlungsrahmen (BmBau 1995) prompted a ‘jumping of scales’ (Zimmermann 2017, 260) also for the final state development plan, which consequently only featured the significantly larger combined ‘European Metropolitan Region Rhine-​Ruhr.’ Moreover, the accompanying plan map showed a translation of the fuzzy Leitbild into a sharply demarcated region which left little room for bottom-​up interpretation. The criticism was reportedly fierce, and the subsequent years were characterized by considerable struggles to move ‘from a conurbation into a metropolitan region that is capable of acting’ (Blotevogel and Schmitt 2006, 55). In particular the tradition of inter-​municipal cooperation in the Ruhr area has been an important platform for challenging the large regional definition. In 1920, the Siedlungsverband Ruhrkohlenbezirk (SVR), a regional planning association based on voluntary cooperation of municipalities in an area characterized by heavy industries and rapid urbanization, was set up. In 1966 it adopted the first binding spatial plan for the Ruhr area, which defined a framework for urban development and infrastructure planning and also placed considerable attention to the protection of open spaces and green corridors (SVR 1970). However, in 1975 the state of North Rhine-​Westphalia withdrew the SVR’s competences for statutory regional planning and assigned this task to regional government offices (Bezirksregierungen) (Zimmermann 2017). The weakened planning association continued as an inter-​municipal service provider under the new name of Kommunalverband Ruhr (KVR, Municipal Association Ruhr), which on behalf of the municipalities took on tasks such as management of parks and leisure facilities and the collection of spatial data. Schmitt (2009) reported how local and regional actors have (unsuccessfully) tried to establish the Ruhrgebiet (Ruhr area) as a democratically legitimized regional government since the restructuring in 1975. These initiatives were mostly pursued with the intention to achieve more independence from the three Bezirksregierungen of Münster, Arnsberg and Düsseldorf which all have their offices outside the Ruhr area. However, only following a change in state government in 2004 was regional cooperation strengthened again. The Kommunalverband Ruhr was renamed to Regionalverband Ruhr (RVR, Regional Association Ruhr), and in 2009 regained the competence for statutory regional planning. For the first time since 1966 a joint regional plan for the participating 11 cities and four counties is currently being prepared, although subject to considerable criticism and delays (with the adoption still pending at the time of writing, see Schönfeld 2019, Hartmann and Laurin 2019).5 In 2015, the parliament of the state of North Rhine-​Westphalia introduced a new law that expanded the responsibilities of the RVR, allowing in future a sharing of competences between the RVR and municipalities in areas such as transport planning. Importantly, the law further made provisions for the direct election of the regional assembly in 2020, indicating further institutionalization at this scale (Zimmermann 2017). In comparison to the deepening institutionalization of regional cooperation in the Ruhr area, cooperation in the region Cologne-​Bonn in the south of North Rhine-​Westphalia remains 134

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informal. State government funding resulted in the setting up of the association Region Köln-​ Bonn eingetragener Verein6 in 2012, which provides a platform for networking and lobbying for its members (i.e. the three cities of Cologne, Bonn and Leverkusen, five counties, as well as industry partners) (Masin 2016). Given the divergent paths taken by the two sub-​regions, the future implementation of the MKRO’s concept of the ‘European Metropolitan Region Rhine-​ Ruhr’ through a joint metropolitan governance structure at this scale seems highly unlikely. Both the RVR and the Region Köln-​Bonn are now members of the ‘Initiativkreis Europäische Metropolregionen in Deutschland’ (IKM). However, the concept of the ‘European Metropolitan Region Rhine-​Ruhr’ continues to play a role as symbolic frame in national and international debates. While the current state development plan for North Rhine-​Westphalia, adopted in 2017, acknowledges both a ‘Metropolitan Region Ruhr’ (Metropole Ruhr) and a ‘Metropolitan Region Rhineland’ (Metropole Rheinland), although without visualizing them, it requires that in international discussions or competitions the ‘strengths and competitiveness of the entire Metropolitan Region North Rhine-​ Westphalia’ are to be emphasized (MURL 2016, 23 (author’s translation)).

Berlin-​Brandenburg In contrast to the Rhine-​ Ruhr region, the ‘European Metropolitan Region’ of Berlin-​ Brandenburg is characterized by a monocentric structure centering on the federal capital and largest city of Germany. Because of the mostly politically motivated (and consequently generous) delineations of the ‘European Metropolitan Regions,’ Berlin-​Brandenburg has a land area four times the size of the Rhine-​Ruhr, but with only half the population as it includes areas with very low density in Brandenburg. Because the metropolitan region covers two federal states, ‘regional governance’ requires an interstate agreement, and metropolitan cooperation has to date remained in the domain of the state governments (Zimmermann 2017). As Germany was divided between 1945 and 1990, any cooperation between Berlin and surrounding municipalities was impossible, and was also not allowed between towns in the former German Democratic Republic. After reunification, the formerly divided city of Berlin became again the capital city of Germany. With no public administration in place in the first years after reunification to control development activity in the new Länder, much uncontrolled development around Berlin occurred (Häussermann 2003). Already in the early 1990s this prompted calls for a joint planning authority for Berlin and its neighboring municipalities in order to better coordinate urban development and transport planning. While a referendum on a merger of the two states in 1996 failed due to opposition in Brandenburg, the two federal states agreed to establish a Gemeinsame Landesplanungsabteilung (Joint Spatial Development Department) in that same year (Nelles, Gross and Kennedy 2018). Organizationally, the Joint Spatial Planning Department is simultaneously part of the respective departments of the federal states of Brandenburg and Berlin, with the former appointing the Head of the Joint Spatial Planning Department of Berlin-​ Brandenburg and the latter nominating the Deputy.With the offices located in Brandenburg, the power is somewhat balanced toward Brandenburg, although the emphasis is on decisions being taken jointly and consensually executed. The Gemeinsame Landesplanungsabteilung is responsible for preparing the joint spatial development program and the spatial development plans for the territory of the two states, with these plans being binding on lower-​level administrations. The joint planning initiatives in Berlin-​Brandenburg have been interpreted as ‘the emergence of a durable consensus around spatial planning and economic development in the Berlin-​ Brandenburg region that recognizes the interdependence of the two states and the joint benefits of collaboration’ (Nelles, Gross and Kennedy 2018, 173). However, none of the cooperation 135

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activities in the region have to date added up to a comprehensive strategy for the functional urban region, and which would also be able to engage with local authorities and other actors from industry or civic society. Although the label of Hauptstadtregion (capital city region) has been coined and is also used on the most recent state development plan (GL 2019), the scale of the state planning initiatives obviously far exceeds the actual metropolitan region of Berlin and its hinterland. Fricke and Gualini (2019, 32) have argued that while cooperation initiatives on spatial planning and economic development ‘have taken place in a formal institutional framework of interstate cooperation, they mostly lack a clearly defined jurisdictional or territorial reference for “metropolitan space”.’ Rather than offering a platform for developing actual metropolitan-​scale policy responses, the large-​scale designation as ‘European Metropolitan Region’ has thus to date been mostly of symbolic significance with little effect on policies or practices.

Conclusions In comparison to other European countries, Germany was late in promoting the economic potentials of major urban agglomerations in order to strengthen the competitiveness of the nation. The evolution of the concept of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ is a fascinating story of how a new national perspective on spatial development has been introduced ‘top-​down’ and how over time it has been shaped and expanded through ‘bottom-​up’ interests. Over the past 20 years, the policy framework on European Metropolitan Regions has gained remarkable traction in both German and European policy discourses and spatial-​economic positioning, but in the process the concept has been expanded considerably. In parallel to the shifting discourse, and in response to lobbying efforts by local and regional actors keen to be included in the new map of Germany, the MKRO’s definition of European Metropolitan Regions has grown both in number and in size of individual regions. This has led to a situation today whereby some regions are too large to offer a frame of reference for identifying common issues and agreeing on coordinated action.While inter-municipal cooperation has a long tradition in Germany, proposals for establishing more institutionalised modes of regional governance are often confronted with challenges resulting from the strong constitutionally safeguarded autonomy of municipalities, territorially fragmented regional identities and state competition in the federal system (Hoyler, Freytag and Mager 2006). Genuine restructurings to strengthen metropolitan regions have been rare in Germany, and the processes of metropolitan region-​building have been mostly incremental and resulting in multi-​scalar arrangements rather than a clear shift in powers (Diller 2016). One exception is the case of Hannover where in 2001 a reform led to a merger between the city of Hannover, the surrounding county and the former regional planning association. There are also only few cases so far of directly elected metropolitan-​regional assemblies (Tomàs 2020). In many of the ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ the arrangements reflect the process of continuous adjustment and flexible adaptations of existing legal frameworks and institutions in response to the normative concept rather than more fundamental reforms. The main value of the concept of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ may therefore be that it has become a ‘significant discursive frame’ (Blotevogel and Schmitt 2006, 55)  that allows the participating actors to communicate the quality of their location both inside the region and outwards (Goppel 2012). The ‘visual language’ (Dühr 2007) of the normative concepts as presented in the Leitbilder has arguably been an important factor in enhancing the popularity of the concept. Such highly generalized and attractively presented visualizations are what Kunzmann (1993) has referred to as ‘Geodesign,’ that is, cartographic representations which contain a minimum of information and which allow even inexperienced map readers to quickly capture the key message without the need for additional information. In non-​binding planning 136

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processes, a convincing artistic impression can be more important for the communication of key messages and to reach agreement than the factually correct representation of details (Dühr 2007). Although since the mid-​2000s numerous analyses of metropolitan functions and their geographical extension have been prepared and informed the policy debate, the examples of the Rhine-​Ruhr and Berlin-​Brandenburg have shown that cooperation is shaped more by political interests than based on empirical evidence of functional relationships in the region. While the policy framework for ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ has demonstrated its value as an attractive bridging concept with the ability to stimulate considerable debate about the future spatial development of the nation, the two competing logics for Germany’s spatial development and their underlying conceptions of space will require attention. There are obvious tensions between the competitiveness discourse of the ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ and the cohesion discourse of the system of Central Places. Adding more concepts to the former while reducing the ambitions of the latter as has been attempted over the past years will not offer a solution but merely increases the fuzziness and at the same time likely decrease the strategic importance of these concepts. Moreover, the concept of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ has introduced network space ideas into what in many respects remains a rather statist and regulatory planning system that relies on a Euclidean understanding of space based on proximity of residents and businesses to public services and infrastructures. The challenges of combining ‘soft planning spaces’ with the traditional ‘hard’ planning approaches have been dealt with pragmatically in most regions, although where the metropolitan region has been incorporated into statutory spatial plans the spaces have inevitably become firmly defined and thus ‘hardened.’ An important future task will be to develop approaches that maintain the flexibility of a networked-​ based concept while ensuring policies for metropolitan regions can be developed, implemented and monitored.

Notes 1. In this chapter, the notion of ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ is used, although German spatial development debates now increasingly refer to ‘metropolitan regions’ (Metropolregionen) only. 2. National terms are explained but subsequently used in their German original and italicized. 3. A Leitbild is a strategic spatial development concept, that is, a soft (non-​binding) planning instrument which sets out a desirable future for a region or nation. 4. The Raumordnungsgesetz (ROG) requires the preparation of Spatial Planning Reports (Raumordnungs­ berichte) in regular intervals. Since 1963, altogether 16 such reports have been published to date, with the most recent 2017 version for the first time having a specific policy focus, namely the safeguarding of the provision of services and infrastructures. This report provided the basis for a subsequent federal inquiry on equality of living conditions (BMI 2019). 5. See www.rvr.ruhr/​themen/​regionalplanung-​regionalentwicklung/​regionalplan-​ruhr/​planentwurf/​ (in German) accessed June 17, 2020. 6. ‘eingetragener Verein’ means the association (Verein) is officially registered.

References Adam, B. and Göddecke-​ Stellmann, J. (2002). Metropolregionen  –​Konzepte, Definitionen und Herausforderungen. Informationen zur Raumentwicklung, 9: 513–​25. Aring, J. and Reuther, I. (2008). Die Regiopole.Vom Arbeitsbegriff zur konzeptionellen Idee. In Reuther, I. and Aring, J. (eds.), Regiopolen. Die kleinen Grossstädte in Zeiten der Globalisierung. Berlin: Jovis, 8–​30. Aring, J. and Sinz, J. (2006). Neue Leitbilder der Raumentwicklung. Ein Impuls zur Modernisierung der Raumordnung? Raumforschung und Raumordnung, 6: 451–​9. Baumheier, R. (ed.). (2007). Metropolregionen in Nordwestdeutschland.(Arbeitsmaterial der ARL. Metropolregionen und Raumentwicklung, Teil 1). Hannover:  Akademie für Raumforschung und Landesplanung. 137

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BBR, Bundesamt für Bauwesen und Raumordnung. (2005). Raumordnungsbericht 2005. Bonn: BBR. BBSR, Bundesinstitut für Bau-​ , Stadt-​ , und Raumforschung. (2018). Raumordnungsbericht 2017. Daseinsvorsorge sichern. Bonn: BBSR. Blotevogel, H. H. and Schulze, K. (2010). 1 oder 2 oder 3? Zur Konstituierung möglicher Metropolregionen an Rhein und Ruhr. Raumforschung und Raumordnung, 68(4), 255–​70. Blotevogel, H. H. and Schmitt, P. (2006). ‘European Metropolitan Regions’ as a new discursive frame in strategic spatial planning and policies in Germany. Die Erde, 137, 55–​74. BmBau, Bundesministerium für Raumordnung and Bauwesen und Städtebau. (1993). Raumordnungspolitischer Orientierungsrahmen –​Leitbilder für die räumliche Entwicklung der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Bonn: BmBau. BmBau, Bundesministerium für Raumordnung and Bauwesen und Städtebau. (1995). Raumordnungspolitischer Handlungsrahmen –​Beschluss der Ministerkonferenz für Raumordnung in Düsseldorf am 8 März. Bonn: BmBau. BMI, Bundesministerium des Inneren, für Bau und Heimat. (2019). Maßnahmen der Bundesregierung zur Umsetzung der Ergebnisse der Kommission ‘Gleichwertige Lebensverhältnisse.’ Berlin:  BMI. Online:  www. bmi.bund.de/​DE/​themen/​heimat-​integration/​gleichwertige-​lebensverhaeltnisse/​gleichwertige-​ lebensverhaeltnisse-​node.html (accessed June 17, 2020). Deiters, J. (2016). Der lange Abschied von der Theorie und Politik zentraler Orte. Review of Deutsche Raumplanung. Das Modell der ‘zentralen Orte’ zwischen NS-​ Staat und Bundesrepublik by Karl R. Kegler. Berichte ‒ Geographie und Landeskunde 2, 157–​76. Diller, C. (2016). The development of metropolitan regions in Germany in light of the restructuring of the German states: Two temporally overlapping discourses. European Planning Studies, 24(12), 2154–​74. Dühr, S. (2007). The Visual Language of Spatial Planning:  Exploring Cartographic Representations for Spatial Planning in Europe. London, New York: Routledge. Feiertag, P., Harrison, J. and Fedeli, V. (2020). Constructing metropolitan imaginaries:  who does this and why? In: Zimmermann, K., Galland, D. and Harrison, J. (eds.), Metropolitan Regions, Planning and Governance. Cham: Springer, 155–​72. Franz, P. (2011). Politische Institutionalisierung und Governance-​Formen der deutschen Metropolregionen im Vergleich. Wirtschaft im Wandel, 17(11): 387–​94. Fricke, C. and Gualini, E. (2019). Berlin as an ‘implicit’ metropolitan space. Contradictions in the institutional construction of scale. In: Gross, J., Gualini, E. and Ye, L. (eds.), Constructing Metropolitan Space: Actors, Policies and Processes of Rescaling in World Metropolises. London, New York: Routledge, 31–​64. GL, Gemeinsame Landesplanung Berlin-​Brandenburg. (2019). Landesentwicklungsplan Hauptstadtregion Berlin-​Brandenburg (LEP HR). Online:  https://​gl.berlin-​brandenburg.de/​landesplanung/​ landesentwicklungsplaene/​lep-​hr/​(accessed June 17, 2020). Goppel, K. (2012). Historisches Lexikon Bayerns: Metropolregionen. Online: www.historisches-​lexikon-​ bayerns.de/​Lexikon/​Metropolregionen (accessed June 17, 2020) Harrison, J. and Growe, A. (2014). From places to flows? Planning for the new ‘regional world’ in Germany. European Urban and Regional Studies, 21(1), 21–​41. Hartmann, G. M.  and Laurin, S. (2019). Krise beim Regionalverband Ruhr (RVR) ‘Wir machen aus unserem Unmut keinen Hehl.’ Welt, October 14, 2019. Online:  www.welt.de/​regionales/​nrw/​article201759830/​Krise-​beim-​RVR-​Wer-​traegt-​Schuld-​am-​Regionalplan-​Debakel.html (accessed June 17, 2020). Hartz, A., Damm, G.-​R. and Köhler, S. (2010). Großräumige grenzüberschreitende Verflechtungsräume. Ein ‘Modellvorhaben der Raumordnung’ (MORO) des Bundes. Raumforschung und Raumordnung, 68(6), 499–​513. Hartz, A. (2018). Das Konzept der Metropolitanen Grenzregionen:  Entwicklung, Strategien und Neuausrichtung. In:  Pallagst, K., Hartz, A. and Caesar, B. (eds.), Border futures-​Zukunft grenze-​avenir frontière: Zukunftsfähigkeit grenzüberschreitender Zusammenarbeit. Hannover: Akademie für Raumforschung und Landesplanung, 88–​114. Häussermann, H. (2003). Berlin. In: Salet, W., Thornley, A. and Kreukels, A. (eds.), Metropolitan Governance and Spatial Planning: Comparative Case Studies of European City-​regions. London: Spon Press, 113–​24. Hoyler, M., Freytag,T. and Mager, C. (2006). Advantageous fragmentation? Reimagining metropolitan governance and spatial planning in Rhine-​Main. Built Environment, 32(2), 124–​36. IKM, Initiativkreis Europäische Metropolregionen in Deutschland/​BBR, Bundesamt für Bauwesen und Raumordnung. (2008). Regionales monitoring 2008. Daten und karten zu den Europäischen Metropolregionen in Deutschland. Bonn: IKM/​BBR. Kunzmann, K. (1993). Geodesign: Chance oder Gefahr? Informationen zur Raumentwicklung 7, 389–​96.

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Masin, T. (2016). Metropolregion Köln/​Bonn–​gemeinsam verbindlich die Zukunft gestalten. Informationen zur Raumentwicklung, 5, 589–​93. Miessner, M. (2020). Spatial planning amid crisis.The deepening of neoliberal logic in Germany. International Planning Studies, 25(1), 52–​71. MKRO, Secretariat of the Standing Conference of Ministers responsible for Spatial Planning. (2006). Concepts and Strategies for Spatial Development in Germany. Adopted by the Standing Conference of Ministers Responsible for Spatial Planning on 30 June 2006. Berlin, Bonn: BMVBS, BBR. MKRO, Secretariat of the Standing Conference of Ministers responsible for Spatial Planning. (2016). Concepts and Strategies for Spatial Development in Germany:  Decision of the 41st Standing Conference of Ministers Responsible for Spatial Planning in Berlin on 09 March 2016. Berlin, Bonn: BMVI, BBSR. MURL, Ministerium für Umwelt, Raumordnung und Landwirtschaft des Landes Nordrhein-​Westfalen. (1995). LEP NRW Landesentwicklungsplan Nordrhein-​ Westfalen. Landesentwicklungsprogramm  –​ Landesplanungsgesetz, B.II.S.23. Düsseldorf: MURL. Nelles, J., Gross, J. and Kennedy, L. (2018). The role of governance networks in building metropolitan scale. Territory, Politics, Governance, 6(2), 159–​81. Schmitt, P. (2009). Raumpolitische Diskurse um Metropolregionen in Deutschland: Positionen, Kontroversen, Perspektiven. In:  Knieling, J. (ed.), Metropolregionen und Raumentwicklung, Teil 3:  Metropolregionen. Innovation,Wettbewerb, Handlungsfähigkeit. Hannover: Akademie für Raumforschung und Landesplanung, 60–​100. Schmitz, H. and Müller, C. (2007). Das Raumordnungsrecht nach der Föderalismusreform. Raumforschung und Raumordnung 5, 456–​66. Schönfeld, S. (2019). Der Regionalplan Ruhr soll erst in der ersten Hälfte der neuen Wahlperiode fertiggestellt werden. StadtSpiegel, September 15, 2019. Online: www.lokalkompass.de/​marl/​c-​politik/​ der-​regionalplan-​ruhr-​soll-​erst-​in-​der-​ersten-​haelfte-​der-​neuen-​wahlperiode-​fertig-​gestellt_​a1210347 (accessed June 17, 2020). SVR, Siedlungsverband Ruhrkohlenbezirk. (1970). Gebietsentwicklungsplan 1966. Köln:  Deutscher Gemeindeverlage, GmbH. Tölle, A. (2013). National planning systems between convergence and incongruity: Implications for cross-​ border cooperation from the German–​Polish perspective. European Planning Studies, 21(4), 615–​30. Tomàs, M. (2020). Metropolitan revolution or metropolitan evolution? The (dis)continuities in metropolitan institutional reforms. In Zimmermann, K., Galland, D. and Harrison, J. (eds.), Metropolitan Regions, Planning and Governance. Cham: Springer, 25–​39. Zimmermann, K. (2017). Re-​ scaling of metropolitan governance in Germany. Raumforschung und Raumordnung-​Spatial Research and Planning 75(3), 253–​63.

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8 Can Megalopolis Continue to Thrive? A Profile of the US Northeast Megaregion and its Prospects Robert Yaro

Overview This chapter provides a brief description of the physical geography and history of the United States Northeast Megaregion, a brief history of how the concept of the megaregion emerged, the current status of planning and governance in the Northeast, and prospects for its future infrastructure, economic development, and regional design. It will also describe the political and other impediments that affect the megaregion as it faces a broad range of mobility, climate, economic, and social challenges.

History Stretching from Maine to Virginia, the Northeast Megaregion encompasses portions of 13 American states.The urbanized portion of the megaregion stretches roughly from Bangor, ME to Richmond,VA, a distance of 783 miles. Although it contains less than 2 percent of the land mass of the United States, with a population of more than 52 million and a $3.6 trillion economy, the Northeast represents about 15 percent of its population and economy. Its four major metropolitan regions—​Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Washington-​Baltimore—​contain the world’s largest concentration of top tier research universities and teaching hospitals, anchor institutions that underpin the economy of its component metropolitan areas.These institutions play a pivotal role in driving the economies (and jump-​starting urban regeneration efforts) of both large and small cities across the megaregion (Birch 2014)

Vital Statistics The Northeast’s $3.6 trillion economy makes it America’s—​and indeed, the world’s—​largest megaregional economy, with a GDP larger than all but four countries in the globe (Florida 2019). The Northeast also contains America’s financial, commercial, communications, and 140

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political capitals, and one of its largest innovation economies. The megaregion is also the crucible in which millions of recent immigrants and refugees are integrated into the larger US society and economy. Physically, the megaregion is bounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the east, the Appalachian Mountains to the west, New England’s Northern Forestlands to the North, and the Piedmont Atlantic megaregion to the south. And despite having the highest population density of any US megaregion, the Northeast retains extensive areas of contiguous forest, agricultural lands, and natural landscapes. Compared with many other megaregions around the world, it is “well-​ watered”—​containing large surface and groundwater resources and several major river and estuarine systems, ranging from the Penobscot and Kennebec rivers in the North, the Connecticut, Hudson, and Delaware rivers in its mid-​section, and the Potomac in the south. In less than 400 years the Northeast Megaregion has developed from a collection of 17th-​ century colonial outposts into one of the world’s largest megaregional economies. For much of American history, its dynamic economy has driven the national economy. Today its diverse and innovative network of industry clusters—​including finance, business services, bio-​medicine, information technology, and advance manufacturing—continue to be engines for the national and global economies.

Regional Design and American Megaregions In 1961 Jean Gottmann identified the Northeast “megalopolis,” stretching from Boston to Washington, as the world’s first megaregion (Gottmann 1961). See Figure 8.i Gottmann also investigated how similar trends of metropolitan expansion and integration were emerging in other places. Little attention was paid to this concept over the next few decades, until the late 1990s when European researchers began to identify the emergence of a new concentration of economic power in Northwestern Europe—​variously defined by different geographers as “the Pentagon,” “the Blue Banana,” or “a Bunch of Grapes.” These became the focus of the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) adopted by the European Commission in 1999 (Faludi 2002). A key issue addressed by the ESDP was how to promote Europe’s territorial cohesion, given its recent expansion into less developed countries in Central, Eastern, and Southern Europe. It also examined how the European Union’s (EU) regional development program and its Trans-​ European Network of high speed rail lines, limited access highways, bridges, and tunnels could help achieve the integration of these places with the Pentagon in Northwestern Europe. In a series of visits to Europe in the 1990s and the 2000s, I began to explore with German, Dutch, Italian, Swiss, and British experts how high speed rail systems promoted by the EU were transforming the economic geography of the continent, and how the ESDP approach could be adapted to the United States. Then, in 2004, in partnership with Professor Jonathan Barnett, and Armando Carbonell from the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, I  led the University of Pennsylvania’s Plan for America studio. Almost by accident, this studio identified the emergence of the Northeast as one of 10 US “supercities”—​networks of linked metropolitan regions. The suggestion of supercities actually occurred in London in 2004, at a charrette at University College London, hosted by Sir Peter Hall. The studio’s goal was to outline a smart growth strategy for the US that could accommodate the Census Bureau’s projected population increase (since scaled back due to reduced fertility and immigration rates) in ways that would improve metropolitan quality of life and environmental quality.

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With this goal in mind, our students had prepared a series of spatial development forecasts for the US for discussion in London. When this map was presented in London, it appeared as though the exurbs of adjoining metropolitan regions across the country were merging with those of their neighbors, creating a new urban form that I called “Supercities.” In effect, Gottman’s predictions for the emergence of the Northeast Megalopolis with its continuous network of urban development was in the process of being realized.1 One of the studio’s products was an evocative map of America’s emerging supercities, later refined into the America 2050 map of the nation’s megaregions.This map has inspired a number of researchers to develop their own versions of this concept, including those prepared by Robert Lang, Richard Florida, and others (Lang and Knox 2011). These and other researchers have further defined the boundaries of individual megaregions, both in the US and around the world. Some are reported in this book. I first met Andreas Faludi in 1997 at an OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development) meeting in Paris focused on strategic planning for metropolitan regions. We had

Figure 8.1  The Northeast Corridor of the United States—​Megalopolis 142

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recently completed Regional Plan Association’s Third Regional Plan for New York (A Region at Risk 1996) and was fascinated by Faludi’s continental scale thinking and how it might apply to the United States. A key issue facing Europe at the time (around the year 2000) was the dramatic decline in fertility rates then being experienced across of the continent, leading to forecasts for population decline in many countries in the first half of the 21st century. (Immigration from Africa and the Middle East among other places have since increased many European nations’ populations.) By contrast, the US Bureau of the Census projected that if current fertility and immigration rates in the United States would continue into the 21st century, the US could expect to add 140 million additional residents by 2050. It was clear to me that with their dynamic economies, America’s emerging megaregions could provide the framework for the spatial development needed to accommodate this rapid increase in population—​if their infrastructure systems, housing markets, water supplies, and other natural resources were planned to accommodate this growth. In the fall of 2004, the Regional Plan Association and Lincoln Institute convened an expert roundtable discussion on this issue at the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s Pocantico Conference Center. Participants in this forum included many of the scholars and experts who had participated in that spring’s London Charrette, and other leading US regional thinkers, including Catherine Ross from Georgia Tech, Ethan Seltzer from Portland State University, and Robert Lang from the Fanny Mae Foundation. To stimulate this discussion, I  prepared a monograph entitled Toward an American Spatial Development Framework summarizing the work of the Penn studio and introducing the large-​scale planning concepts of the ESDP to an American audience. At this meeting, Armando Carbonell introduced the term “megaregions” to describe these places, since he and most other roundtable participants were concerned that the term “supercities” would not resonate well with American political thinking, given the nation’s historic anti-​urban sentiments. From this roundtable and subsequent research by participants in America 2050 emerged a definition of megaregions as networks of metropolitan regions with shared economic clusters, infrastructure, natural resources, culture, and histories. In addition to the initial ten megaregions, at the urging of Robert Lang and researchers at Arizona State University, an 11th megaregion, the Arizona Sun Corridor, was later added to this list by researchers at America 2050, as discussed below. Collectively these megaregions represent more than two-​thirds of America’s population and an even larger share of its economy. From the start, I saw megaregions as an emerging form that could be shaped by intelligent policies and investments, particularly through the development of high speed inter-​city and regional rail networks combined with smart growth strategies that would enable their successful growth and development. Although these places are already the engines of the national and global economies, with these investments and other strategic initiatives they have the potential to create even stronger economic bases and improved quality of life for their hundreds of millions of current and future residents. And with these actions the advanced technology and service industries that currently drive their success could become even more competitive. The fundamental question facing the Northeast and other megaregions is where the leadership would come from to finance and build the high speed railway and other investments and institutions needed to deliver these investments. This will be discussed later in this chapter.

Toward a Broader Movement From the Penn studio and Pocantico roundtable emerged a network of regionalists focused on megaregions—​scholars and public officials who investigated how these places in the US 143

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Figure 8.2  Urbanized areas of megalopolis, 2000 to 2050

and around the world could be defined and developed. The Pocantico forum also led to creation of the America 2050 initiative—​a joint venture between Regional Plan Association and the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, involving researchers and public officials from a number of universities and public agencies representing every US megaregion. The goal of this initiative was to develop national and megaregion-​scale infrastructure, economic development, and environmental protection strategies to shape the future growth and development of these places. We also partnered with Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-​OR) on a series of forums in each megaregion to discuss the key issues facing each one of these places. America 2050 undertook collaborative planning several megaregions, in partnership with universities and government and civic groups. In a series of charrettes held in 2005–​2008 at Fundación Metrópoli in Madrid, researchers from Penn and other American universities explored emerging trends in the Northeast, Texas Triangle, Great Lakes, Piedmont Atlantic, and Southern California Megaregions.2 Since 2005, Penn has also convened 18 graduate planning studios from 2004–​2019 focused on megaregion planning concerns, most of them addressing the special needs of the Northeast. At the same time, staff at Regional Plan Association (RPA) also focused on planning for infrastructure development and natural resource protection in the Northeast. Much of this work at Penn and the RPA focused on strategies to transform the Northeast Corridor rail network into a modern high speed rail system serving the entire megaregion. See Figures 8.2 and 8.3.

High Speed Rail Is the Key to Unlocking the Northeast’s Latent Economic Potential In much the same way that 20th-​century metropolitan regions were enabled by regional rail and limited access highway networks, we believe that the future success of megaregions will be shaped by high speed rail. HSR is the mode of choice in and between megaregions in Europe and Asia, since by definition these regions can stretch over many hundreds of miles, making them too large to be easily traversed by automobile and too small to be efficiently accessed by air. 144

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Figure 8.3  Landscape types of megalopolis

In the Northeast Megaregion,Amtrak’s existing Northeast Rail Corridor (NEC), for example, stretches over 475 miles between Boston and Washington, DC—​a distance too large to be easily traversed on the Northeast’s highly congested roads, and too small to be efficiently accessed by its equally congested airports. The Northeast’s highways, airports, and air space are already highly congested, with key routes such as Interstate 95, subject to increasing delays every year. A global analysis of urban traffic congestion levels found that Boston, for example is the 8th most congested city in the world. According to INRIX (2018), the average Bostonian now spends 164 hours sitting in traffic, at a cost of $2,291 per year. Moreover, congestion levels are increasing rapidly in Boston and other Northeastern cities. The only mode with the potential to meet the growing demand for inter-​city travel between the Northeast’s urban centers is high speed inter-​city rail. However, much of the existing NEC is 100 or more years old, and lacks the capacity, alignment, and power and signaling systems needed to permit modern high speed rail service of international standards—​generally defined as allowing speeds of 185 mph (300 kph) or more. And most of the train traffic on the NEC are slower regional rail trains serving every metropolitan region in the Northeast. Although Amtrak’s Acela HSR train sets were designed to travel at up to 160 mph, because of substandard alignments and congestion, these trains generally travel at less than half this speed. And because inter-​city trains share the NEC with commuter rail trains, the existing highly congested rail alignment permits only limited inter-​city departures between the Northeast’s major cities. Consequently, the potential economic synergies and agglomeration economies that HSR trains can create have not been achieved in the Northeast. Today, virtually every Asian and European megaregion is already served by HSR, or has plans to develop high speed services. Also, it must be noted that in every case these systems have been financed and built principally by national governments. Consequently, these places are already 145

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achieving the transportation benefits these systems can unlock, by creating greater agglomeration economies among their metropolitan centers and expanding housing and labor markets into this largest scale. Interestingly, instead of being one of the last megaregions in the world to build HSR, the Northeast could have been the first to have HSR—​or arguably, the second such system, following Japan’s Tokyo to Osaka Shinkansen service, which opened for service in 1964, as outlined in the political history that follows. In the early 1960s two prominent New England politicians proposed visionary investment goals for the United States. The first of these was President John F Kennedy’s 1961 proposal to land a man on the moon by the end of the decade.Then, in 1962 Rhode Island Senator Claiborne Pell proposed building HSR between Boston and Washington, DC (Pell 1966). Although this project needed to overcome much less daunting financial and technological hurdles than the moon shot, Pell’s vision has never been achieved. While Pell was able to get Congress to enact legislation in 1966 authorizing modest federal investments in the corridor, this program required collaboration with the private railroad companies that then owned the NEC, all of which were teetering on financial ruin due to reduced ridership and freight haulage. Pell’s HSR proposal became mired in the near financial collapse and merger of the failing Pennsylvania and New York Central Railroads in 1966, and bankruptcy of the merged Penn Central Railroad in 1968. Already, inter-​city passenger rail ridership across the country and the Northeast was in a state of steep decline, as passengers chose driving on the new and heavily subsidized interstate highways and flying out of heavily subsidized airports over travel on the increasingly unreliable and unpleasant rail network.

Why Can’t the Northeast Build HSR? America’s 19th-​and early 20th-​century railroads were financed and built through partnerships between private companies and state and federal governments. In the East, government provided franchises and public eminent domain authority for construction of railroads in return for requirements that they provide quality passenger and freight services. In And in the case of western railroads, the federal government provided extensive grants of public lands for rail rights-​of-​way, stations, yards, and adjoining urban development. In the Northeast, and elsewhere east of the Mississippi, through these partnerships private rail companies were able to condemn land for rail rights-​of-​way, rail yards, and stations. Excess land adjoining these properties was then developed by the rail companies themselves or sold to developers at enormous profit, creating cross-​subsidies for finance and construction of the rail infrastructure itself. High speed rail and rapid transit systems are still financed this way in Japan, Hong Kong, and Singapore. In the Northeast, the Pennsylvania and New York Central Railroads financed and developed their networks in much the same way. However, when the combined Penn Central Railroad collapsed in 1968, a financial maneuver by the failing company made future use of this technique impossible. Just prior to declaring bankruptcy, the Penn Central’s directors separated the company’s assets into two separate companies:  a real estate company that continued to own the company’s considerable holdings of non-​rail land and buildings, and a railroad company that soon declared bankruptcy. These rail assets were then dumped on the public, with state and federal governments left to pick up loss-​making rail operations and related financial obligations. In one of the most notable transactions, before its merger with the New York Central, in 1963 the Pennsylvania Railroad sold the jewel in the crown of its rail network, New  York’s 146

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Pennsylvania Station, to private developers, who demolished the station’s magnificent beaux arts headhouse, and then built a new, and barely functional train station in the basement. Over this residual station they constructed a new Madison Square Garden, the Felt Forum theater, and two major office buildings. And in one of its most short-​sighted actions, the New  York City Planning Commission approved this transaction, giving Madison Square Garden a 50-​year special permit to develop its arena, which expired in 2013. In 2013, the Planning Commission and City Council granted Madison Square Garden a ten-​year extension to this permit, with the explicit understanding that this time would be used to plan to relocate the Garden and redevelop Penn Station. The Planning Commission’s 1963 decision was based on its view that the decline in commuter and inter-​city rail ridership would continue, and that passenger rail operations would soon wither away, as commuters drove into Manhattan instead. Later, in response to the resulting public outcry of the Station’s destruction, the city established a new Landmarks Preservation Commission, and designated the city’s other great train station, Grand Central Terminal, as one of the city’s first landmarks. Several years later, the real estate holding company that had assumed ownership of Grand Central Terminal from the bankrupt Penn Central Company, proposed that the terminal be demolished to make way for another new office tower. The Landmarks Preservation Commission ruled that the terminal could not be demolished, leading to litigation that went all of the way to the US Supreme Court, which upheld the legitimacy of the Commission’s ruling.

Creation of Amtrak With railroads threatening to abandon passenger services across the country, in 1971 Congress established Amtrak to take over these passenger operations. Then, the 1973 Regional Rail Reorganization Act authorized Amtrak to acquire most of the Northeast Corridor—​except for sections in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York that had already been purchased by those states. Amtrak was not created with a sustainable business model, since the assumption at the time was that the new railroad company would not need to remain in business for long. This was because in the early 1970s demand for rail services appeared to be in terminal decline, as passengers were expected to continue to migrate to automobiles, buses, and commercial aviation. Amtrak was established as a short-​term stopgap—​a not-​quite public, and not-​quite private company, which was subject to annual appropriations and periodic re-​authorizations from an increasingly disinterested or even hostile Congress. Although several legislative efforts were made in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s to upgrade NEC service, these all became mired in partisan delays by the Reagan and Bush Administrations and Republican members of Congress. While up until the 1970s infrastructure had been a popular bipartisan issue, beginning with the “Reagan Revolution” in 1980, Republicans coalesced around the notion that cuts to taxes and government spending were the only ingredients needed to promote economic growth. This made projects like Northeast Corridor HSR a partisan issue, lacking strong bipartisan support. Contrary to early expectations, however, Northeast Corridor ridership continued to grow: in 2017 the Northeast Corridor Commission reported that the Corridor carried 820,000 daily passengers on 2,100 trains (NEC Commission 2017). While Amtrak functions as a national passenger rail company, the vast majority of its ridership continues to be in the NEC.The Northeast Corridor is the only significant portion of the national rail network that it actually owns and operates. 147

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Amtrak’s ability to invest successfully in the NEC continues to be hampered by Republican foot-​dragging on authorizations and appropriations for both its annual operating and capital budgets.Alone among transportation modes, Republican congressional leaders insist that Amtrak operate on a profit-​making basis, unlike the nation’s heavily subsidized highway and aviation systems. It is against this political, economic, and institutional background on which the Northeast Megaregion’s long-​term success depends. It will require major investments in modernizing and expanding inter-​city and regional rail networks, and the creation of high speed rail service among its major cities.

How High Speed Rail Shapes Megaregions High speed rail enables the creation of several key economic and environmental advantages for megaregion’s component cities. These include: •​ creation of synergies between urban economic clusters, especially for advanced technology, knowledge, and producer service industries; •​ Expansion of labor and housing markets to encompass multiple cities, creating the opportunity for new economic agglomerations to emerge. This reduces the over-​concentration of population in single urban centers, enhances mobility among urban centers, and creates new employment opportunities for skilled workers and their employers; and •​ Reduction of congestion on highways, airports and “classic” rail networks. For these reasons, despite the high cost of building and operating HSR, 25 countries already have HSR routes, and 29 others are planning to develop their own systems.3 Indeed, virtually all of the Northeast Megaregion’s global competitors outside North America already have or are planning their own HSR routes. This will place the Northeast and other US megaregions at an increasingly large competitive disadvantage in coming years. From 2005–​2009, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and America 2050 explored the emergence of megaregion-​scale economies and HSR mobility systems in Europe, Asia, and North Africa. A parallel set of research projects at American 2050 and Lincoln Institute explored the economic benefits associated with HSR systems around the world, culminating in the report High Speed Rail: International Lessons for US Policymakers (Lincoln Institute 2011; see Figure 8.4). This report underscored the extent to which HSR systems could unlock the economic potential that HSR would offer to the Northeast and other US megaregions. In 2007 the Regional Plan Association and America 2050 developed sketch plans for a national network of HSR routes serving all of the nation’s megaregions. In 2008 they successfully advocated for passage of the Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act—​PRIIA—​which authorized development of a national HSR network. This legislation enabled the investment of $11 billion in these projects in the 2010 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act “stimulus” legislation and subsequent appropriations in 2011. Unfortunately, however, in implementing this legislation, the Obama Administration decided to direct these funds to HSR projects in Florida, Ohio, Wisconsin, and California—​but not the NEC. In 2012 the Republicans took control of the Congress, eliminating additional appropriations. PRIIA also authorized establishment of a new Northeast Corridor Commission—​a joint venture between the Federal Railroad Administration, Amtrak, and participating states. However, the Commission’s membership is dominated by state transportation commissioners, who are primarily interested in keeping access fees low on the NEC for their commuter rail services, and not in inter-​city and HSR services. Many of these members also have little interest in the 148

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Figure 8.4  Proposed high speed rail route in megalopolis—​the Northeast Corridor

broader economic potential that HSR services could bring to the megaregion. Many of them see the Corridor as a zero-​sum game, in which improved inter-​city and HSR services would come at the cost of reduced access for commuter rail services.

One Step Forward and Two Steps Back on High Speed Rail In 2008 the author and his staff at Regional Plan Association also established the Business Alliance for Northeast Mobility (BANM)—​a coalition of regional business and government groups convened to advocate for investments in the NEC. Partners in this effort included regional business and government groups representing Boston, Providence, Hartford, New Haven, Newark, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, DC. BANM and its members urged the Federal Railroad Administration to direct American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funding to priority NEC investments, which they did only after Republican governors in Florida, Ohio, and Wisconsin rejected ARRA rail funds, by committing nearly $2 billion NEC improvements. In 2010, however, newly elected New Jersey Governor Chris Christie canceled the fully funded Access to the Region’s Core tunnels, which would have doubled NEC trans-​Hudson River tunnel capacity. Subsequent to Christie’s decision, Amtrak created the Gateway Tunnel project, its own Trans-​Hudson Tunnel proposal, and it advanced engineering and environmental reviews for this project. An initial segment of this tunnel has been completed across the Hudson Yards development project on Manhattan’s West Side. But as of 2019 the rest of the project remains unfunded due to opposition from President Trump’s Administration. 149

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In 2010 Amtrak also issued a master plan for the NEC (2010), which proposed to invest $50 billion in repairs improvements and other measures that would cut travel times from New York to Washington and from New York to Boston by a mere 15 minutes each. Underwhelmed by Amtrak’s proposal, Marilyn Taylor, Dean of the Penn School of Design, and I convened a graduate planning studio focused on transforming the existing NEC into a HSR route. With help from the multi-​disciplinary firm Parsons Brinckerhoff and other large engineering firms, along with senior staff from Amtrak and the City of Philadelphia, the studio developed sketch plans for a HSR system that would cut travel times almost in half from current levels, to 90 minutes between New York and Washington, and 100 minutes between New York to Boston.The studio also laid out proposed alignments, a service plan, and a finance plan needed to achieve these goals (see Figures 8.4 and 8.5). Through a fortuitous set of circumstances, senior Amtrak staff and an advisor to Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell participated in the studio’s final review in 2010. A  reporter from the Philadelphia Inquirer newspaper produced a story on the studio, which caught Governor Rendell’s attention. At Rendell’s request, the studio held a separate presentation of its recommendations in his Philadelphia office. Shortly after this presentation began, Rendell called out to his assistant, requesting that she get Vice President Joe Biden on the phone, who listened in for several minutes and then insisted that the studio hold a separate briefing at the White House. Consequently, the studio presented its recommendations in the White House to the Vice President, senior White House staff, the Federal Railroad Administrator (FRA), Senator Arlen Specter, and other administration and congressional staff in the summer of 2010. At the end of this presentation,Vice President Biden demanded that the FRA administrator advance the studio’s recommendations into an actionable plan for Northeast Corridor HSR.

Figure 8.5  Proposed high speed rail alignments from Boston to New York 150

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This led to FRA’s initiating NEC Future, a Tier 1 Environmental Impact Statement for corridor improvements. The FRA released its Record of Decision for the Environmental Impact Statement in 2017. Unfortunately, this seven-​year delay stretched into the Trump Administration, and the impetus was lost for action on HSR plans in the corridor. Furthermore, the FRA’s final proposal lacked a “business case” rationale for this investment, and its planning process also lacked a successful public engagement strategy. This led to opposition by the States of Connecticut and Rhode Island and their congressional delegations for its proposed route between New Haven and Providence.To date, no action has been taken by the Congress or the Trump Administration to advance funding needed to implement the NEC Future plan.

Envisioning a New Governance System for the Northeast Megaregion This history illustrates why the Northeast urgently needs a new governance system required to plan, finance, and deliver major public works projects like HSR. It will also need new institutions to manage other major systems that must be managed at the megaregion-​scale, including climate adaptation and carbon reduction, energy, water supply, and large-​scale landscape preservation. Related challenges include addressing growing highway congestion, airport and airspace capacity, and rapidly escalating housing prices, which threaten mobility and affordability across the megaregion. Given these circumstances, it will be necessary to create a new partnership with the federal government to finance all of these investments. Despite having a GDP of nearly $4 trillion—​ making its economy almost the size of Japan’s—​the governance capacity has not been able to finance or build 300 kph high speed rail along with regional rail networks to support it, or even bring existing transit systems to a state of good repair. While some of the cost of these investments can be financed through value creation and capture, and increased state taxes, tolls, and fees, new cost sharing and governance relationships with the federal government will be required to fulfill all of these needs.

A Note About Subsidiarity Given these experiences, I believe that a new governance system for the Northeast Megaregion should be organized around the principle of subsidiarity, in which issues are managed at the lowest level of government commensurate with the scale of the issue being addressed. The design of a high speed rail system for the Northeast, for example, should be at the scale of the megaregion, since it will serve the whole Northeast. Management of metropolitan growth and congestion, on the other hand, would be most appropriately handled at the metropolitan scale. Even though it was a collaboration with the states, the Federal Railroad Administration’s long-​delayed and flawed NEC Future project further illustrates why the Northeast Rail Corridor should be planned by an institution that functions at the scale of the Northeast, and not the nation, following the principle of subsidiarity. There are four alternative structures for megaregion-​scale governance systems: • Federal Regional Commissions: The first of these would be establishment of regional commissions by the federal government, possibly involving a partnership with the states. Precedents include the Tennessee Valley Authority and Bonneville Power Administration, established during the New Deal to develop hydropower systems for under-​developed regions of the country, and the Florida Everglades Restoration Program, initiated in 1996.This new federal/​state entity could be modeled after the United Kingdom’s new Transport for the North agency, 151

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which was established in 2018 to plan, finance, and deliver major transportation investments in the North of England. • Strengthen existing advisory bodies: Alternately, an existing advisory body, like the Northeast Corridor Commission, could be given new powers, in this case, to plan, finance, and deliver high speed rail and other improvements to the Northeast Rail Corridor. • Multi-​state collaboratives: A third option would be for the Northeastern states to collaborate around a shared issue or investment such as high speed rail. An example of this is the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative which since 2008 has administered a collaborative program to reduce carbon production from the Northeast’s electric power plants. A new 12-​state (and District of Columbia) collaborative, the Transportation and Climate Initiative of the Northeastern States, is setting out to coordinate low-​carbon transportation alternatives for the megaregion. • Private, non-​governmental institution: A fourth option would be for a new non-​governmental organization, modeled after the UK’s Northern Powerhouse Partnership, to lead in coordinating economic development strategies and infrastructure investments for the megaregion. As in the case of the Northern Powerhouse, this group would be led by CEOs of major corporations, universities, and former public officials. Funding for this group could come from foundations and government grants. It should be noted that creating or sustaining any of these alternatives will not be easy. And it may be necessary for there to be a crisis—​for example, failure of a major infrastructure system—​to catalyze federal action. It has been nearly a century since the federal government has taken the lead in establishing multi-​state energy or economic development initiatives like the Tennessee Valley Authority or Bonneville Power Administration. It has been more than half a century since the Congress established the ten-​state Appalachian Regional Commission in 1965. More recently, in 2000, Congress established the Delta Regional Authority, which promotes economic development in eight Mississippi River Delta states. A sustained economic crisis and strong presidential and congressional leadership were required to adopt legislation creating each of these institutions. Continued leadership is required to sustain funding for these initiatives over many decades. The consistent theme behind establishment of all of these federal authorities was that they were designed to revitalize depressed regions. While the Northeast contains a number of cities and sub-​regions lagging behind economically, it remains one of the engines of the national economy. The argument for creating a Northeast version of these bodies, therefore, should be that the investments the authority (or authorities) would make are needed to ensure that the Northeast can continue to lead the national economy, along with simultaneously improving the cities that are lagging behind. Other notable precedents for effective regional collaboration have been established in the United Kingdom. One of these is the Northern Powerhouse Initiative, through which two high speed rail lines and a related urban economic development program for the North of England are being developed, with a total estimated cost of $100 billion, financed through UK Treasury debt. A new transport planning, finance, and delivery entity, Transport for the North, has been established to advance these investments. A separate non-​governmental organization, the Northern Powerhouse Partnership, has been established to coordinate urban regeneration efforts in the region’s legacy cities. National government is also incentivizing establishment of metropolitan combined authorities to advance urban revitalization. It is important to note that these initiatives have been initiated by a Conservative British government—​the same political party that initiated the Thatcher-​Reagan tax cuts four decades ago. It raises the question: if the originators of this philosophy in the UK’s Conservative 152

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Party can evolve, can a similar new paradigm for national and regional economic development built around strategic investments in infrastructure and urban regeneration be adopted in the United States?

Three Scenarios for the Future of Northeastern Governance Here are three scenarios for how new institutions could be established to make megaregion-​scale investments in Northeast rail, flood prevention, and other infrastructures, and how they can be financed.

Scenario I: Current Trends Continue If by 2040 no actions are taken to address the Northeast’s urgent transportation, economic, and climate concerns, the megaregion could face a slow and sustained decline. Under this scenario, two key links in the Northeast Rail Corridor—​one of the two 120-​year old Hudson River rail tunnels and the 160-​year-​old Potomac River tunnel in Baltimore—​are closed to service when deteriorated masonry starts to fall on train tracks in the late 2020s. Subsequently, Northeast Corridor inter-​city and regional rail service is replaced by buses on an increasingly gridlocked Interstate Highway 95. Major financial institutions, unable to get workers into Manhattan, announce that they are leaving New  York for Canadian cities, following repeated flooding during hurricanes in 2029 and 2034 that flood the city’s subway and automobile tunnels. They are joined there by millions of climate refugees moving from Southern and Southwestern states as repeated severe heat waves and droughts undercut the livability of sunbelt cities.

Scenario II: The Federal Government Acts Following the shocking failure of the Hudson River and Baltimore rail tunnels in 2029, in 2030 the Congress acts to transform the Northeast Corridor Commission into a body with authority to finance and deliver a $150 billion dollar investment in HSR serving the whole megaregion. High-​level state and federal officials are appointed to the reconstituted Commission’s board to oversee this effort. A business case study funded by the Commission confirms that this investment will pay for its itself and its debt service several times over in increased incomes and tax collection across the Northeast. The 30-​year US Treasury bonds floated to finance this investment are eagerly purchased up by overseas sovereign wealth funds, leading the President to thank his G-​20 colleagues for “rebuilding America’s infrastructure and economic future.” Value creation and capture mechanisms are established by the states to finance their matching share of these investments. In a related effort, Congress authorizes $50 billion in matching funds for construction of flood and tide gates and levees by the US Army Corps of Engineers, which are needed for effective new metropolitan flood control measures in every major Northeastern city. These investments will prevent recurrence of hurricane-​related storm surges that struck New York, Boston, and Washington in the 2020s, and anticipate the impacts of future sea level rise. In a related measure, the US rejoins a strengthened Paris Climate Accord in 2021, which leads to effective global efforts to prevent even more catastrophic climate change.

Scenario III: The States Take the Initiative Following the failure of the Hudson River and Baltimore rail tunnels in 2029, the Congress fails to adopt legislation that would give the Northeast Corridor Commission additional funding 153

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and authority to build HSR in the Northeast. In response, newly elected governors from Maine, New Jersey, and Maryland seize the initiative by convening all 13 Northeast governors and the Washington, DC mayor to discuss the strengthening of the Northeast Transportation and Climate Initiative to finance and build a transformed Northeast rail network. Toll revenues, mileage fees, and a modest surcharge on sales taxes across the Northeast are pledged to finance this $150 billion investment. An additional $100 billion is raised to finance construction of effective metropolitan flood prevention measures following catastrophic hurricane-​related storm surges that struck New  York, Boston, and Washington in the late 2020s. A  new Northeast Flood Prevention Initiative—​a partnership between the Northeastern states—​is established to lead this effort. Debt service for this investment is raised through a surcharge on casualty insurance payments across the megaregion. Bonds sold on Wall Street are snapped up by sovereign wealth funds, leading the new US President (and former Maine Governor) to thank his G-​20 colleagues for rebuilding the Northeast’s infrastructure and ensuring its economic future. His election was helped when he promised to have the federal government finally take action to meet the urgent transportation, economic development, and climate issues of America’s remaining ten megaregions.

Conclusion The Northeast Megaregion can continue to lead the nation and the world in innovation and productivity, and provide its tens of millions of additional residents by mid-​century with improved quality of life, but only if action is taken to address its urgent transportation, economic development, climate impact, and other needs. While investments needed to meet these needs will total in the hundreds of billions of dollars over decades, this represents a mere rounding error in the Northeast’s robust, nearly $4 trillion annual economy. Effective leadership to advance these long overdue investments is urgently needed at the state and federal level. To achieve this goal, the Northeast Megaregion and the nation must break out of the four-​decades-​old “Reagonomics” dogma that only tax cuts and fiscal austerity can achieve economic growth. With luck, and with the impetus that could be provided by potential disruptions in the Northeast’s 100+ year old infrastructure systems and expected climate-​ related disasters, this leadership could emerge from the next generation of political leaders. Our future depends on it.

Notes 1. In addition to Professor Hall and studio faculty and students, participants in the London charrette included several participants in the European Spatial Development Perspective, including Andreas Faludi from the Technical University of Delft,Vincent Goodstadt, Chair of the Royal Town Planning Institute, and Alfonso Vegara, President of the Fundación Metrópoli in Madrid. Other participants included Fritz Steiner, Dean of the University of Texas School of Architecture, Mark Pisano, Executive Director of the Southern California Association of Governments, and Paul Farmer, President of the American Planning Association and other distinguished researchers. With this extraordinary level of intellectual firepower in the room we quickly developed the concept of this new urban form. 2. These researchers included Fritz Steiner, Kent Butler, and Ming Zhang from the University of Texas, Austin, Michael Neuman from Texas A&M, Margaret Dewar from University of Michigan, Catherine Ross from Georgia Institute of Technology, Mark Pisano from USC, and Andreas Faludi from the Technical University, Delft. 3. Wikipedia “Proposed high-​speed rail by country” accessed June 23, 2020. https://​en.wikipedia.org/​ wiki/​Proposed_​high-​speed_​rail_​by_​country 154

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References Birch, E. (2014). Anchor institutions in the Northeast Megaregion: An important but not fully realized resource. In Wachter, S. and Zeuli, K. (eds), Revitalizing American Cities Book. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Faludi, A. (2002). The European Spatial Development Perspective—​What Next? Cambridge, MA:  Lincoln Institute of Land Policy. Florida, R. (2019). The real powerhouses that drive the world’s economy. CitiLab (February 28, 2019). Gottmann, J. (1961). Megalopolis: The Urbanized Northeastern Seaboard of the United States. New York: Twentieth Century Fund. INRIX. (2018). The 2018 Global Traffic Scorecard. https://​storage.pardot.com/​171932/​83004/​Traffic_​ Scorecard_​Infographic_​2018_​US_​FINAL_​_​v5_​.pdf Lang, R. and Knox, P. (2011). The new metropolis: Rethinking megalopolis. In Neuman, M. and Hull, A. (eds), The Futures of the City Region. London: Routledge. Lincoln Institute of Land Policy. (2011). High Speed Rail: International Lessons for US Policymakers. Cambridge, MA: Lincoln Institute. Neuman, M. and Hull, A. (eds). (2011). The Futures of the City Region. London: Routledge. NEC Commission. (2017). Northeast Corridor Annual Report 2016. Washington, DC: Author. NEC Working Group. (2010). Northeast Corridor Infrastructure Master Plan. Washington, DC: Author. Pell, C. (1966). Megalopolis Unbound: The Supercity and the Transportation of Tomorrow. New York: Praeger.

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9 The Texas Urban Triangle Megaregion Michael Neuman1,2

Introduction and Context The Texas Urban Triangle megaregion is a singular, complex, and unprecedented urban phenomenon in the United States. For decades it has been and continues to be one of the most dynamic urban regions in the nation. The Triangle is comprised of the metropolises of Dallas-​ Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio, and Austin and the lands in between, totaling approximately 60,000 square miles and over 20 million inhabitants as of 2020. Moreover, the most rapid urban growth and land consumption in the state are in the Triangle cities’ fringes, as well as with selected stretches along the southern border with Mexico and the boom and bust oil towns of west Texas, in a mega-​boom in the late 2010s, largely due to fracking, and in another bust in 2020, largely due to a crash in oil prices and COVID-​19. This study analyzed the Triangle from multidisciplinary and multi-​scalar perspectives, from the neighborhood to the megaregion. Data collection and analysis was a challenge, as most data was collected by existing agencies at the municipal, county, and state levels; owing to these being long-​standing administrative units that did not correspond to the geographic areas we assessed (we being the researchers and students listed in note 1 at the end of the chapter). At the inception of this study, the Triangle did not figure in the popular, professional, political, or scholarly imaginations, with the exception of a historical mention by the prominent geographer Meinig (1969). Anecdotally, its main metropolises form a megalopolis divided into four parts by geography, history, and football rivalries.Yet there is more that connects them, and this research is a preliminary exploration of their connectivity and complementarity that links them strongly into a new and unique urban phenomenon. As a consequence, our intent was two-​fold. First, to put the Texas Urban Triangle “on the map” literally and figuratively, that is, in the public realm. Second, the intent was to make a proactive, forward-​looking, and evidence-​based case for policy, planning, and investment in the Triangle as a whole, as well as a strategic context for efforts at the metropolitan and city scales. A particular interest was advancing the high-​speed rail agenda in order to connect the apex cities of the triangle.

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The Texas Urban Triangle is distinguished among megalopolises because it is not linear but rather triangular, with the axes being 170, 200, or 240 miles long (about 275, 320 and 390 km respectively). Further, the urban development between its metropolises is not physically contiguous on two of the three axes. The north-​south axis from San Antonio through Austin to Dallas is nearly fully urbanized due to the proximity of the string of cities along the highway Interstate 35. In contrast, on Interstate 45 between Dallas and Houston, and on Interstate 10 between Houston and San Antonio, there are only small villages and towns along these arteries surrounded by farms and woodlands. In these ways, the Triangle is an unprecedented phenomenon, at least among North American megaregions. On one hand, the Texas Urban Triangle’s characteristics corroborate findings of scholarship on multiple-​metropolis mega-​city regions in the United States (Regional Plan Association 2008, Regional Plan Association and Lincoln Institute for Land Policy 2007, Lang and Knox 2007) and Europe (Hall and Pain 2006): regional growth is polycentric, as it has been for individual metropolises. On the other hand, unlike other megalopolises, much of the Texas Urban Triangle’s urban development is not continuous or contiguous. Instead, connections among the metropolises that comprise it take advantage of telecommunications and transportation infrastructure networks to make the links, indicating a socio-​spatial order called the networked urban megaregion (see also Alagic, Boelens, and Glaudemans 2017). The state of Texas is projected to continue to grow steadily in population, according to U.S. Census Bureau projections. In the Triangle, population is projected to increase 40 percent between 2020 and 2040, for a total of approximately 28  million, calculated by aggregating its five largest metro areas’ planning organizations’ (MPOs) projections, together with county projections as of 2019. The Texas Urban Triangle is projected to account for approximately 8.5 million of the state’s 11 million new inhabitants in that 20-​year period, or 77 percent of all of Texas’s growth. The attendant impacts of growth—​new homes, new jobs and businesses, new transportation and infrastructure networks, less farm and ranch lands, more traffic congestion, more pollution—​are easy to predict based on past experience. How Texas handles this new growth will determine to a large degree whether the state continues to prosper and enjoy a high quality of life. The sources of population and employment growth are principally due to low housing and living costs, no state taxes, an abundance of land and resources, and a long-​standing pro-​g rowth culture. Our analysis revealed that four issues will continue to dominate the Texan landscape and imagination over the next decades: urban growth, transport, water, and energy. The research questions asked were spatial in nature. Accordingly, geographic information systems (GIS) were the primary method of data analysis. Two stages of research were performed between 2006 and 2010. First was conducting a development suitability analysis for the overall triangle. Second was developing and applying a spatial decision support system for optimal route alignments for high-​ speed rail. Both stages used a GIS-​based suitability analysis inspired by Ian McHarg’s Design with Nature (1969). The suitability analysis for the first stage gathered megaregion-​wide data for 82 factors across 58,000 square miles; the second stage for the high-​speed rail across two counties was done in two phases, and selected 42 and 8 factors respectively. These data were analyzed to answer the following questions: • • • •

Where should the growth go in the future? What are the impacts of this growth? Are these locations vulnerable to hazards both natural and human? What scale/​type/​location of infrastructure is necessary to support it?

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The primary research question, simply put, is where will these people live and work? This chapter presents an overall synthesis of data, analysis, findings, and recommendations for these issues. More detailed information is contained in several reports.3 These findings provide an evidentiary foundation for policy guidance to decision makers at all levels of government—​especially state and federal—​and the private sector. Unlike most sector-​ specific studies, this study took a broad and synthetic view of the key factors that drive regional growth so that in the future growth can be accommodated in a more sustainable regional design. The findings also inform and extend the debate about the nature and the future of the city region (Simmonds and Hack 2000, Neuman and Hull 2011, Scott 2019). Will the homes and workplaces that will be built to meet the needs of this growing population continue to sprawl outward from the central cities at ever-​lower densities, and along the major highway corridors between them? While a precise definition of urban sprawl has been hotly contested, the effects of uncontrolled or poorly managed growth are less so (Burchell et al. 2002). Multi-​fold environmental impacts, expensive and congested infrastructure, long commutes, high home prices, and a host of other social, economic, and fiscal costs typically attend rapid growth, especially when dispersed in low densities. In Texas as across North America, suburban and exurban sprawl has been such a persistent and pervasive phenomenon that it gave rise to several movements to counter it: growth management, new urbanism, smart growth, and sustainable urbanism among them. The problems and limitations of the earlier of these movements were two-​fold: scope and scale. As growth control efforts, their scope was limited by its legal basis in the application of police (regulatory) power, and was thus bound to extant legal jurisdictions: the municipality and the state. As such, growth management was played out in the realm of land use only, and never considered physical design. Moreover, its scale was limited because the region was a gaping hole in growth management practice. Because of these limitations, growth management never fulfilled its promise, as most significant growth-​related problems have metropolitan or regional origins, and require other methods, such as design, to develop effective solutions. This formed a significant motivation for the regional design research presented in this chapter. Regional design addresses both of these limitations by bringing physical design back in, and by establishing a regional basis. Regional design also tackles the institutional issues necessary to deal with growth in a multi-​jurisdictional context at greater than the metropolitan scale. However, most existing work on regional design to date has focused on three types of classic regions: the metropolitan region (see Chapter 1, The Emergence of Regional Design), the rural or ecological region, and the linear urban corridor. As a new phenomenon, the Texas Urban Triangle falls outside of these three classic conceptions. Some of the problems in managing regional development stem from not being able to grasp the whole of the region and its settlement patterns, much less the impacts of growth and implications of changing regional settlement patterns. This research redressed this shortcoming by visualizing, using two-​and three-​dimensional digital software, the outcomes of current land use practices—​planning and zoning—​at a scale never before attempted at the time of the initial research (2006/​7), to our knowledge. This visualization allows policy makers and opinion shapers to see where and how much growth is currently permitted by existing ordinances. It also allows them to compare and contrast current conditions to future projections. The remainder of the chapter discusses the two stages of research—​overall megaregion analysis and high-​speed rail route determination—​and concludes with notes regarding regional institutions, or in the case, the lack thereof.

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Megaregion Spatial Analysis: Findings of the First Stage of the Research The suitability of locations for infrastructure and urban development in the Texas Urban Triangle was one primary finding, determined after the analysis of the 82 factors across the entire area. Another is the fact that the Triangle functions as a single, coherent urban megaregion, in spite of the fact that its main metro areas are not contiguous and historically have been perceived as separate regions divided by geography, history and football rivalries. What makes this urban triangle a functional mega-​city region is the high and increasing degrees of integration found among their metropolitan areas’ economies and societies, as indicated by the extent of the movement and trade of goods, services, ideas, money, and people. For example, 80 percent of the individual industrial specialties (42 of 54 SIC codes) in the four metro areas of the Triangle do not overlap. This research revealed that the economic location quotients showed little overlap or duplication of primary economic activities among these metros. Rather, they are complementary (Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas 2004). This suggests that the linkages among these four metros are as important as the metro areas themselves, highlighting the criticality of smart and fast transport infrastructures. Patterns of growth—​its location, densities, uses, and suitability to its underlying ecological constraints—​cause or worsen many of the less than desirable conditions pointed out above. Furthermore, growth occurs at a pace that outstrips the fiscal and infrastructural capacity to support it to the quality levels and standard of living to which residents have become accustomed, or at least prefer. How many workers are forced into double shifts at hours that are inconvenient or even burdensome, much less conducive to raising a family? How many hours are wasted on slow, infrequent, and unreliable public transport—​where it exists—​for those without a car? To solve these and other growth-​related problems, and to correct these inequities, regional approaches that complement and support local ones will be critical, in order to direct growth into more sustainable patterns. Challenges abound in the Triangle region, notably water supply and distribution (draughts, flooding), the conversion of prime farm and ranch lands to exurban sprawl (rising food costs, pollution), metropolitan traffic congestion (pollution, global warming, time costs), air and water pollution, high per capita and absolute rates of energy consumption, urban poverty, and land subsidence. In Houston, land subsidence in areas that are at or near sea level has reached nearly 15 feet (almost five meters) since 1900 and is increasing. It has damaged buildings, increased flooding, jeopardized numerous hazardous and toxic waste facilities, and exposed the metropolis to much greater risk in the face of hurricanes, global warming, and sea level rise, as the dramatic devastation of Hurricane Harvey in 2018 showed. Ozone and other airborne pollutant levels exceed federal limits. They are not only injurious to health and the economy, but place at risk billions of dollars of federal transportation funding, due to the laws governing the links between air pollution attributed to vehicles, and U.S. Department of Transportation funding rules. Specifically, our findings reveal the following regional conditions that need to be considered in planning and policy making for sustainability. • Transportation in all modes consumes over 28 percent of all U.S. energy, mostly oil based, a percentage that has remained consistent over the last generation (EIA 2019). • Transportation accounts for the highest amount of carbon dioxide release into the atmosphere among all sectors, due to its heavy reliance on oil-​based derivatives (EIA 2019).

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• The Dallas-​Fort Worth “Metroplex” has overtaken Chicago as the nation’s top inland port/​ gateway. • Aquifier levels have dropped over 800 feet (about 240 meters) in the Dallas area, and 400 feet (about 120 meters) in the Houston area in less than a century. This had led to subsidence in the Houston area due to the unconsolidated soils (no solid bedrock) in its coastal plain, and jeopardized water supply. • Farmland loss is a key issue. Most prime farmlands are located on the rapidly growing Interstate 35 corridor and in the outskirts of the Triangle’s metro areas. Thus they are increasingly valuable as developable lands and, as a consequence, at risk. • Distances between the large apex metropolises, averaging 200 miles apart, traversing sparsely populated and flat terrain; conditions that make it ideal for high-​speed rail.

Project Significance The Texas Urban Triangle is the economic motor of Texas and a major hub of the national transportation network operating in a global economy. The Triangle has emerged as an urban megaregion in its own right, competing with Los Angeles and New York, by virtue of its size, activities, and extensive connections. The volume of movements of people and goods within the Triangle, especially among its metropolises, exceeds the volume of movements from it to places outside the Triangle, pointing to its increasing functionality as a single regional unit (Neuman and Bright 2008). This is especially revealing when one considers that Dallas-​Fort Worth is the largest inland port in the USA, Houston is one of the largest seaports, and both Dallas-​Fort Worth and Houston are major airport hubs. That is, in spite of their extensive networks connecting nationally and internationally, their principal connections are amongst themselves. Given that transportation infrastructure shapes and supports growth, $547 billion in transportation infrastructure needs over the 25 year period 2015–​2040 has been identified, the vast majority of which is in the Texas Urban Triangle (Texas Department of Transportation 2015). Consequently, a new set of policy priorities for transport, energy independence, and renewable energy is needed. Moreover, existing highway-​dominated surface transport systems are exceeding design capacity and are increasingly costly to expand and maintain. Accordingly, there is an urgent need for policy and investment decisions that are based on a new and wider set of criteria that account for new conditions and considerations, to include issues like options for non-​vehicular transport, climate change, social and economic equity, sustainable infrastructures, and so on. A key implication of this work is to guide regional design using regional scale infrastructure systems, especially transportation, telecommunications, energy, and “green” networks. Just as cities cannot exist without urban infrastructure, the Texas mega-​city region cannot function without regional infrastructures, grey, green, and blue.

Spatial Decision Support System (SDSS) for High-​speed Rail in the Texas Triangle This part of the project addressed sustainable transportation in the Texas Urban Triangle at the regional scale. Its aim was to determine the most suitable locations for new transport infrastructure by employing an SDSS developed in this project. The SDSS differs from existing transportation decision systems in that it focuses on selected strategic driving forces of growth of the region as a functional unit—​transport infrastructure, available land, economic activity, water, and 160

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energy—​and then identifies corresponding measures of sustainability for key transportation systems and corridors within the Triangle. For example, development patterns driven by transportation infrastructure in turn create impacts on surface and groundwater resources in terms of water quantity and quality. Conversely, consideration about water availability and waste assimilative capacity can be used as a driver of infrastructure planning decisions to achieve greater long-​term sustainability. The design of the SDSS thus supports integrated policy making for comprehensive sustainable regionalism. Another feature of the SDSS is that it considers explicitly the intermodal linkages that ensure greater intersystem operability, enhance travel connectivity, and therefore improve overall mobility. For example, for passengers, the decision model assesses and identifies suitable locations for linking intercity high-​speed rail and metropolitan public transit (rail and buses of all speeds and gauges) with other surface transportation in key metropolitan nodes such as city centers and international airports. The SDSS assesses and identifies suitable locations for interconnections among freight modes, especially links among air, sea, and land in Houston, Dallas-​Fort Worth, and San Antonio. Additionally, SDSS outputs suggest strategic sites for advanced logistics zones (ALZs) where both intermodal transshipment of goods and adding value to goods between modes (assembly, packaging, etc.) occur. ALZs are new strategic project areas in their metropolises, further enhancing economic growth and competitiveness. The SDSS developed in this project was tested through its application to a prototype corridor parallel to Interstate 35 between San Antonio and Austin. The SDSS provides a composite foundation for enhanced regional mobility. By using it in policy analysis and investment decisions, it can strengthen the Texas Urban Triangle as a hub in national transportation networks that can be emulated in urban regions worldwide. In addition to assessing and evaluating locations for transportation rights of way, the SDSS can be adapted to assess locations for other surface infrastructure networks that are configured by linear corridors in large networks, such as electric power and water supply. Decision criteria in the model identify opportunities for shared rights of way among infrastructure types, further saving capital and land acquisition costs, lessening environmental impacts and habitat fragmentation, and so on. The SDSS model has been designed in a generic manner, so that it can be adapted to account for parameters and factors that exist outside of Texas and the United States, thus broadening its applications geographically.

SDSS Development Method The project developed a GIS-​based SDSS that is interactive and web-​based. It is designed to help local, metropolitan, and state jurisdictions and authorities in Texas and elsewhere understand the implications of transportation planning and investment decisions, and plan appropriately for the future. Using the model, decision makers are able to assess multiple corridor location options and to determine, using a multi-​attribute decision model, the suitability of locations for regional and metropolitan transportation corridors in the future. The SDSS provides an easily accessible, graphically represented, interactive, multi-​attribute database that considers the following factors: infrastructure, demographics, environment, agriculture, economics, hazard, and land use. These spatial factors are selected because of their strategic importance as drivers shaping growth and development, and corresponding transportation corridor and hub location decisions that reinforce both individual metro areas and the entire Texas Urban Triangle as a single functioning unit. One immediate application of the model developed by the researchers was to select the location of possible high-​speed rail corridors in the Triangle. 161

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The SDSS is flexible, as it can be modified by users to support location decisions regarding transportation corridors. Furthermore, it can be used to evaluate other types of infrastructure corridors that can be placed in shared rights of way within or alongside transportation corridors. The SDSS is multi-​scalar in addition to multi-​attribute, and represents an advance in decision support system model development, building on existing transportation and planning decision support systems.4

Strategic Drivers of the SDSS The vastly changed transportation investment decision panorama in Texas and the United States calls for a new type of decision making that considers more than just capital costs and environmental constraints. It needs to consider the life cycle of the systems, and the economic, demographic, social, ecological, infrastructural, and fiscal parameters influencing decisions. Today, erratic fuel prices, climate crises, CO2 emissions, and traffic volumes that meet or exceed highway and freight-​rail capacities on several corridors—​plus the spiraling costs of expanding highways in urbanized areas—​seriously complicate decisions that in the past were conditioned mainly by population, demographic, and economic factors, along with U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) air and water pollution restrictions. Strategic drivers that have been incorporated into the SDSS include those factors that are foreseen to most likely shape growth patterns and resulting transportation demands/​needs over the next 50 years: demographic and labor force changes; economic activity; land availability; environmental suitability; natural resources such as water, oil, and gas; utilities such as electric power and other infrastructures; accessibility and mobility of people and goods; producer services and secondary services availability; housing affordability; and the security and reliability of the transportation networks and other critical infrastructures. As strategic drivers, they are intimately connected to the surface transportation networks and therefore are accounted for in the SDSS.

SDSS Development Process To develop the SDSS, researchers have taken the following steps: 1. Identify factors to be included in the SDSS analytical model. 2. Identify factor specialists to provide expert advice on the factors. 3. Select factors to be included in the SDSS model. 4. Identify data sources for the factors and collect data. 5. Determine internal classification for each factor. 6. Determine weights for each factor. 7. Create a cost surface with the incorporated factors. 8. Find an optimized route based on the suitability score. 9. Conform step 8 results to horizontal radius allowance for the curvature of high speed rail tracks.

Identify Factors “Factors” in the SDSS refers to the individual criteria used in the model to assess the most suitable location for locating transportation corridors on the landscape. The research team initially

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selected 82 factors that could be included in the SDSS criteria, based on the first phase of the research, analyzing the entire Texas Urban Triangle, organized in seven categories: • Agriculture • Demographics • Engineering • Environment • Hazards • Infrastructure • Land use. After research and deliberation, the team identified 42 factors appropriate for an SDSS to locate a transportation corridor. Eight were eventually used in the pilot study, which used Hays County between Austin and San Antonio as the geographic unit. Researchers used the same number of eight factors but expanded the number of counties to six in the final study. This expanded geographic study boundary gives a much more comprehensive picture and suggests possible high-​ speed rail routes between Austin and San Antonio. For each factor, researchers determined the criteria or indicators employed in the model. In some cases, it is a simple binary, such as present or not present, which means high-​speed rail right of way does or does not exist, or should or should not exist, within the transportation corridor. In other cases, the factors are quantitative, and in still other cases the factors are qualitative. In the quantitative and qualitative cases, the factors mark a gradient or a range within which there are acceptable/​suitable or non-​acceptable/​non-​suitable values.

Identify Factor Specialists For each of the SDSS factors, researchers identified factor specialists/​experts, mostly located on the Texas A&M University campus, to assist in understanding the factor fully in relation to high-​speed rail. The research team worked closely with these persons to determine the extent to which the factor is critical, what its dimensions are, and how it may be applied specifically in this SDSS in Texas. Researchers also asked the factor specialists if there were related factors not on the list that were pertinent to the SDSS. Finally, researchers worked with the factor specialists to obtain data to test the SDSS model.

Select Factors for SDSS The research team met numerous times throughout the year to review the factors and select which ones to use in the SDSS model. They started with 82 factors and narrowed the number down to 42 by the end of the model development stage. See Table 9.1. Finally, eight different factor categories marked with an * in Table 9.1 were selected and used in the study.

Identify Data Sources The research team identified and gathered databases and data sets for each factor. Many of the sources are online databases. Specifically, population data sets were collected from the U.S. Census Bureau website in both TIGER shapefile and database file formats. The Texas Natural Resource Information System (TNRIS) website provides comprehensive data sets within Texas,

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Michael Neuman Table 9.1  SDSS model factors Roadway right of way—​existing private, state, county roads* Railroad right of way—​existing active Bridges Slope/​maximum grade* Width of right of way Vertical clearances Horizontal alignment Option to enter and leave highway right of way Air quality Control speeds on turns (turning radius < 2 miles) Inactive railroad stations Turnouts Location of power generators Station locations Historic areas Historic sites Historic markers Cemeteries: existing/​not existing Archeological/​paleontological resources Parks & wildlife areas American Indian sites: present/​not present

Urban areas: present/​not present Superfund sites Location of hazardous material facilities Solid waste disposal site Subsidence Coal deposits Forestland & forestland patches Riparian areas Threatened & endangered species Farmland Floodplain* Aquifers Geology/​faults* Surface waters* Soil types* Wetlands Property line divisions Oil & gas pipelines Population density* Structure value/​improvements (parcel value)*

* Factors applied in the model.

and researchers obtained floodplain, hydrology, and transportation data from the site. The U.S. Geological Survey website has a massive amount of geological data sets, from which geology and soil data were downloaded. Some other governmental websites such as the Capital Area Council of Governments website were also helpful sources for collecting relevant data sets for each factor.

Determine Internal Classification for Each Factor Factor weights refer to the value, on a scale of 1 to 5, assigned to each of the factors (decision criteria) in the SDSS. A value or weight of five is the highest weight for each factor and reflects a negative value for locating a transportation corridor in that place—​the least suitable location. A value of 1 is the lowest weight for each factor and reflects a positive value for locating a transportation corridor—​the most suitable location. For example, population density is in the unit of persons per square mile. Since there are 640 acres per square mile (one square mile = 2.59 square kilometers), a density of 2000 is less than four people per acre (10 people per hectare), or one to two households per acre (2.5 and 5 households per hectare), which is a low figure. Improved property value units are in dollars per parcel. Some factors such as roads and hydrology were classified as a binary—​present or not present. The researchers concluded that constructing high-​speed rail over an interstate highway requires a complex decision-​making process as well as high costs. Hence, having a rail route over an interstate highway receives a higher score than doing so over a local street. Similar logic is applied to the hydrology factor, and thus the major stream category receives a higher score than the others.Tables 9.2 and 9.3 are indicative of the way weights were assigned to the eight factors. 164

Texas Urban Triangle Megaregion Table 9.2  Weights for population density Population Density

Scale

0–​0.49 0.5–​2.99 3.0–​9.99 10.00–​29.99 30.00 or more

1 2 3 4 5

Table 9.3  Weights for roads Roads

Scale

Local streets County roads Farm-​to-​market roads State highways U.S. and interstate highways

1 2 3 4 5

This classification process involves many inputs from professionals and the literature. Based on relevant literature, each factor was scored. Some other factors that did not have strong theoretical backgrounds utilized experts’ and factor specialists’ opinions instead. In the SDSS, these opinions were implemented with the classification tool, and the main categorization on a 1-​to-​5 scale was performed with standard deviation.

Determine Factor Weights Factor weights refer to the relative value of factors compared to each other. Thus, for 42 factors, the most important factor to consider for locating high-​speed rail (HSR) in the Texas Urban Triangle is weighted the most, the second most important factor is next, and so on, until the least important factor. In order to determine appropriate factor weights, the research team implemented the analytic hierarchical process (AHP). The AHP is a widely accepted decision-​making strategy, especially when dealing with various data sets with multiple criteria. The relationship between eight pre-​ selected factors was tested in this study: population density, property value, road types, vertical slope, floodplain, geology, soil types, and hydrology. Researchers found that the relationships between the factors and factor weights are a crucial part of the entire SDSS process.The way the factor weights are determined could give different result to the final routes. Table 9.4 illustrates the AHP result. Similar to the factor selection step, this process also encourages public participation. Participants can set up their own priorities and give a different emphasis to each factor based on their own judgment. As will be described in the later section, Property Value factor has been dropped out because of data availability issues. Eigen vectors represent the factor weight for each factor and are standardized values.

SDSS Methodology and Testing The SDSS compiled these indicators/​decision criteria into a land suitability analysis model (McHarg 1969), employing GIS to map strategic social, economic, and environmental 165

Michael Neuman Table 9.4  Factor weight matrix using AHP and reliability test Density

Slope

Roads

Hydrology

Floodplain Geology Soils

Eigen Vector

%

Density Slope Roads Hydrology Floodplain Geology Soils

0.33 0.22 0.17 0.07 0.07 0.11 0.08

0.40 0.27 0.09 0.05 0.07 0.08 0.07

0.29 0.43 0.14 0.03 0.03 0.04 0.03

0.24 0.24 0.24 0.05 0.02 0.17 0.17

0.20 0.16 0.18 0.08 0.04 0.16 0.14

0.20 0.23 0.23 0.02 0.02 0.07 0.04

0.23 0.23 0.29 0.02 0.02 0.09 0.06

0.27 0.26 0.19 0.04 0.04 0.10 0.08

29.0% 27.0% 19.0% 5.0% 4.0% 9.0% 8.0%

SUM

1.04

1.02

0.99

1.15

0.96

0.80

0.94

1.00

100%

Notes: λmax = 7.7070, Consistency Index (CI) = 0.1178, Random Index (RI) = 1.32 (n = 7) Consistency Ratio (CR) = 0.0893 = 8.93% 300 kph) effect an urban region? Today, Segovia, Avila, and Toledo are now part of the Madrid region, after their HSR connections. At the same time, given the importance of localism and reduced travel to attain sustainability, we may well see a resurgence in the importance of metro-​hinterland interactions. All this questions the search for the exact perimeters of a region, which seems to be a pastime of some academics. Yet design and manage regions we must. This underscores the tension between delineating a region and its planning and governance, always approximate and incomplete. While the circumstances of each region determine the most appropriate approach, we believe that the following criteria can help elaborate the new regional governance. 1. The integration of design with planning. In most countries these disciplines are distinct in practice as well as in teaching, even as they have some overlap. Design in this sense is not limited to spatial/​physical design, and includes institutional design. 2. The integration of places and processes, and the integration of urban forms with urban flows. Processes determine and shape places –​form follows flow. This perspective enables new ways to see governance, financing, planning, and design. 3. The integration of infrastructure networks, including green and blue infrastructures, so that ecosystem services become the norm where feasible, to lessen the reliance on old, expensive, outdated, and unsustainable centralized built infrastructure systems. In other words, that ecological principles replace engineering ones, and open, interconnected networks replace closed ones. 448

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4. The sustainable integration of city regions with natural ecosystems. Designing with nature in an updated sense so that hybrid regions respect all life and do not deplete natural resources and overwhelm the natural capacities of the planet and its ecosystems. 5. The integration of the structures of governance and its mechanisms with the spatial and processual characteristics of the territories and functions to be governed. This pertains to the architecture of governance institutions themselves as well as their policies, programs, plans, regulations, and investments. Hierarchical forms of government could be replaced with networked forms to correspond to the networks shaping economies, societies, and settlements. Instruments oriented to territorial units could be reoriented to specific flows and processes. The emphasis is on integration because past practices  –​business as usual  –​have not been integrated in many ways. These past practices include disciplinary silos rather than interdisciplinary collaboration, different levels of government whose decisions and actions are contrary/​ conflicting rather than complementary/​aligned, and the separation of urbanity from nature, and urban processes from natural ones, so that they are not sustainable, to name a few. Alas, many of these practices are not past –​they are still present. It is our view that in city regions as in nature, integration is essential for full sustainability. Integrative thinking is creative and synthetic thinking, a far cry from the analytical thinking that prevails in schools and in practice.This shift is a tall order in a divided, siloed world. One prospect is embedded in a key regional design tool –​ the image. Through images, regional design is integrative. A well-​conceived image can and does integrate thinking, whether spatially or politically.

The Paradox of Governing Flows Through Governing Places: Institutions for Multi-​scalar and Multi-​level Regional Governance Willem Salet’s chapter on institutions and governance is a critical one. To this we add emerging theories of regional design and governance in Verena Balz’s chapter. In terms of regional design, Salet stresses “institutions in action”, stressing the long shadow of agency as exercised by institutions –​path dependence. He refers to “spatial design”, to understand the regionalization of urban structures hand in hand with the development of proposals for critical spatial interventions, and to “capacity building”, which deals with the development of effective and legitimate power at city region levels. This is sometimes referred to as “institutional” or “organizational” design (Neuman 2012, 2007). Salet addresses three key issues: 1) the regional manifestation of present day cities, 2) key problems associated with that, using Kevin Lynch’s theory of city form, and 3) the connected need for new public norms and practices (“institutions in action”). Readers will need to link regional design with institutional design according to their own contexts. In Europe, for example, one approach was the “federation of municipalities” on a supra-​ municipal level. In some countries its basis is found in 1970s legislation. These federated entities constituted voluntary collaboration between central cities and municipal environs, with a focus on public facilities/​infrastructure (Eythórsson et  al. 2018). In Belgium, Flemish cities were compensated by national government for fulfilling regional functions by the “Municipal Fund”. Yet in practice they did not always work well or last.1 An insightful study of supra-​municipal practices in 26 European nations identified four principal organisational models of associations of local structures. These are as follows:  (1) the consolidated model (existing in Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden), (2) the bipolar model (in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Estonia, Italy, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Switzerland), (3) the 449

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federative model (in Austria, Belgium, Germany, Spain), and (4) the fragmented model (to be found in France, United Kingdom, Poland, Hungary, and Romania). (Kołsut 2018, 39) While in these European countries, municipalities have organized themselves, often for political reasons; how metropolitan regions have organized themselves for self-​governance is more revealing and pertinent. A global report on metro regions found four types of governance bodies: coordination entities, intermunicipal authorities, supra-​municipal authorities, and special status “metropolitan cities” (OECD 2015, 21). These and similar approaches have the potential to address three elements posited in this conclusion. One is the networked nature of city regions. A  second is the spatial-​institutional “matching” between the shape of a territory and its governance institutions. Another is a more balanced sharing of power. Other studies and experience suggest that a strong regional authority is needed. Can the two –​networked municipal federalism with a unitary authority –​ be integrated or otherwise made compatible? There are other approaches, too numerous to mention here. More studies on this topic are needed to support a robust vision of regional design and governance. Among other matters, there exists a need to address the overlooked peripheral spaces in city regions, as these seem to become ever more marginalized, which lead to protests in the ballot box or on the streets, or both. How do marginalized actors/​places respond to regionalization and globalization? What strategies do they use? How are their needs incorporated into planning, policy, and design? This is fundamental, as being well-​connected is seen as a measure of success. It also has critical implications for social and economic equity and opportunity. This has inferences for at least two areas of research and practice for regional design. The first is nature/​ecological services, the second is transport connectivity as inter-​related with communications connectivity. Both are briefly highlighted next. As suggested above and in several chapters, nature services/​ecological services are increasingly important in terms of sustainability, resilience, and overall city region viability. Their factors are increasingly incorporated into ecological and economic accounting schemes, into green infrastructure planning, into sustainable schemes to reuse wastes (cradle to cradle, circular economy), and into land and biological conservation. They can be partly represented in the “environs” of regional design’s spatial triad of centers (urban places), linkages/​connective tissue (infrastructures), and environs (the places in between centers). In this case, farms, forests, nature preserves, and wild places, along with water bodies and oceans serve as “lungs” for cities and the planet. This clean image of environs and nature services becomes muddy and belies the hybrid nature of most regions, due to human incursions even in the remotest of places. Yet the principles of nature services can animate and inform regional design practices, especially infrastructures, as green infrastructures have the premise of being less expensive and harmful –​thus more sustainable. Then there are the logistical aspects of city regions and their economies, including food production, transport, communications, warehousing, distribution, and freight. These have become indispensable with the logistics associated with the rise of large online retailers and home delivery. Home delivery is also exploding for local residents and workers, as was seen in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic of 2020 and beyond. These activities are rapidly changing urban outskirts and city centers alike, along with their interactions. Journals such as the Journal of Transport Geography, European Planning Studies, Transportation Research Record, Regional Science, and Economic Geography, and so on, document these types of rapid transformations in city regions that design ought to take into account.

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This partial sample suggests that our premise, that regional governance and regional design go hand in hand, is a central premise of the entire book. We link the two not merely for reasons of implementation –​to put into action the plans, policies, and designs created by the practice of regional design. Equally important is the notion that governance can be, and always has been, designed. Our aim is to link the two more closely at the new scale of urban society, the region. While municipalities have a millennium of history as legal corporations (in Europe), and nation states have a few centuries, regions as objects of government have merely a few generations of history. Most of that regional history is experimental, one-​off, and not widespread. Design can break loose the path dependence on these two old and historical units of government and seize the creative initiative on the relative blank slate of regional governance. We recognize that other instructive case studies could have been included in this book. We considered many of these and would like to include at least some of them in future editions. Among others: the Flemish Diamond, Berlin, Moscow, Buenos Aires, Mexico City, São Paolo, Cairo, Mumbai, Jakarta, Shanghai, Beijing, and Tokyo.This would do more than expand the geographic reach. It would also include innovations in regional design. As city regions and hybrid regions gain in size and power, it is inevitable that regional design and governance will come to the fore. They will increasingly supplement, at first, and later perhaps supplant local governance as a locus of sub-​national strategy, planning, and governance. So what does the future hold? Human futures are designed. Without doubt, they are tied to regions. Perhaps Louis Albrechts qualifies it best  –​“the transformative power of regional design”.2

Notes 1. Per Louis Albrechts, personal communication, that amount was “a drop on a hot plate” –​a small amount that evaporated quickly. 2. Personal communication.

References Alberti, M. (2016). Cities That Think Like Planets. Seattle: University of Washington Press. Brenner, N. (1999). Beyond state-​centrism? Space, territoriality, and geographical scale in globalization studies. Theory and Society, 28, 39–​78. Brenner, N. (2019). New Urban Spaces: Urban Theory and the Scale Question. New York: Oxford University Press. Castells, M. (2010). The Power of identity. Chichester, UK: Wiley-​Blackwell, 2nd edition. Cidel, J. (2010). Concentration and decentralization:  The new geography of freight distribution in US metropolitan areas. Journal of Transport Geography, 18(3), 45–​69. Crozier, M., Huntington, S., and Watanuki, J. (1975). The Crisis of Democracy: Report on the Governability of Democracies to the Trilateral Commission. New York: New York University Press. Dahl, R. (1961). Who Governs?: Democracy and Power in an American City. New Haven: Yale University Press. Dijkstra, L. (2018). Everything You Heard about Urbanization Is Wrong. Brussels:  European Commission, Directorate General for Regional and Urban Policy. Eythórsson, G. T., Kettunen, P., Klausen, J. E., and Sandberg, S. (2018). Reasons for inter-​municipal cooperation: A comparative analysis of Finland, Iceland and Norway. In Teles F. and Swianiewicz P. (eds), Inter-​ Municipal Cooperation in Europe; Institutions and Governance. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 105–​29. Faludi, A. (2018). The Poverty of Territorialism:  Neo-​ Medieval View of Europe and European Planning. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar. Fernández de los Ríos, Á. (1868). El futuro Madrid: Paseos mentales por la capital de España, tal cual es y tal cual debe dejarla transformada la revolución. Madrid: Biblioteca Universal Económica, republished 1989. Forman, R. (2008). Urban Regions: Ecology and Planning beyond the City. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 451

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Friedmann, J. and Weaver, C. (1979). Territory and Function:  The Evolution of Regional Planning. Berkeley: University of California Press. Geddes, P. (1915). Cities in Evolution. London: Williams and Norgate. Hack, G. (2021). Foreward. In: Neuman, M. and Zonneveld,W. The Routledge Handbook for Regional Design. New York: Routledge, xiv–xviii. Hall, P. (1966). The World Cities. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. Hall, P. (1977). The World Cities. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2nd edition. Hall, P. (1984). The World Cities. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 3rd edition. Hesse, M. (2006). Global chain, local pain: Regional implications of global distribution networks in the German north range. Growth and Change, 37(4), 570–​96. Hesse, M. (2008). The City as a Terminal. Aldershot: Ashgate. Jacobs, W., Koster, H. and Hall, P. (2011). The location and global network structure of maritime advanced producer services. Urban Studies, 48(3), 2749–​69. Kołsut, B. (2018). National associations of municipalities in Europe: Different Models of institutionalized political cooperation. Geography, Environment, Sustainability, 11(4), 39–​55. Kunkel, B. (2017). The Capitalocene. London Review of Books, 35(9), 1–​13. Malm, A. (2015). Fossil Capital: The Rise of Steam-​Power and the Roots of Global Warming. London: Verso. Moore, J. (2015). Capitalism in the Web of Life: Ecology and the Accumulation of Capital. London: Verso. Neuman, M. (2012). The image of the institution: A cognitive theory of institutional change. Journal of the American Planning Association, 78(2), 139–​56. Neuman, M. (2007). Multi-​scalar large institutional networks in regional planning. Planning Theory and Practice, 8(3), 319–​44. O’Connor, K. (2010). Global city regions and the location of logistics activity. Journal of Transport Geography, 18(3), 354–​62. OECD The Organization for Economic Co-​operation and Development. (2015). Governing the City. Paris: OECD. Piketty, T. (2020). Capital and Ideology. Cambridge, MA:  Harvard University Press, translated by Arthur Goldhammer. Rodrigue, J. and Notteboom,T. (2010). Comparative North American and European gateway logistics: The regionalism of freight distribution. Journal of Transport Geography, 18(4), 497–​507. Salet,W. (2021).The complex ecology of the city-​region. In: Neuman, M. and Zonneveld,W. The Routledge Handbook for Regional Design. New York: Routledge, 428–444. Scott, A. (2019). City-​regions reconsidered. Environment and Planning A, 51(3), 554–​80. UNFPA. (2019). State of the World Population 2019. New York: United Nations Population Fund. Vidal, J. (2020). ‘Tip of the iceberg’: Is our destruction of nature responsible for Covid-​19? The Guardian, 18 March. Online:  www.theguardian.com/​environment/​2020/​mar/​18/​tip-​of-​the-​iceberg-​is-​our-​ destruction-​of-​nature-​responsible-​for-​covid-​19-​aoe?fbclid=IwAR1y1rR3Uoawbzyj1e_​1a6HdQ-​ 7GX-​X8kDvd9f4VwAu-​Wam8tIN7kuFLyKc (accessed 17 June 2020).

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Technology, hyper-​connectivity, global shifts, and spatial planning expand our capacity to grapple with the push and pull of cities. Now we must have methods and processes that allow us to rethink the design and governance of cities and regions. Increasingly, it is clear that for there to be more progress in shaping resilient places, we must recognize, embrace, and rely on local knowledge and practice. This reliance must be coupled with the fundamentals of traditional regional planning, design, construction, and governance. Further, they must all be integrated with new spatial and economic determinants. Currently, there is an urgent need for cross-​jurisdictional planning. In addition, we must understand more fully the factors necessitating that certain planning can only be done efficiently at the regional and megaregional scale. Some of those factors are related to the following dynamics: the increasingly globalized economy; the quest for a more uncontested competitive advantage; the growing demand for more resilient systems; the need to exercise greater oversight over the natural environment and human-​produced resources; and the constant drive for a higher quality of life. The attainment of those factors will help define successful regions. To achieve sustainable cities and regions we must ultimately confront challenges such as environmental degradation, climate change, congested transport systems, cleaner energy, economic inequities, and socio-​cultural separations. Future regions will be enhanced greatly if we can successfully integrate innovative design and planning with emerging, leading-​edge technologies. However, the regional design approach must be holistic. That is, it must be responsive to the growing demand for environmental sustainability and more green space, especially in dense cities and communities. Greenspace must be a part of the service ecosystem (see the chapters of Steiner, Fisk, and Qu and Qi in this volume, and Jennings et al. 2016). Furthermore, regional planning must embrace rationality and be structured to respond to current and future market dynamics and political realities. Planners must capture the imagination of stakeholders and engender the support of decision-​makers and businesses. Today regions are fraught with inequities, administrative overlap, duplication, conflicts, and self-​interested bureaucracies that profess to operate efficiently within the context of government financial constraints. Despite these obstacles, the potential exists to create sustainable, equitable, and innovative regions. However, the challenges and constraints outlined above must be recognized and navigated successfully. Often, this will require coordination at the regional, 453

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national, and global scale. Nevertheless, it is what is required to create innovative, sustainable, and robust regional systems. Regions are increasingly places where information and data are collected and shared. This is especially the case for the burgeoning roll-​out of computational capacity, artificial intelligence, and other emerging digital technologies. Increasingly, to make the most effective use of these technologies requires contributions from diverse disciplines with a common purpose of creating platforms that respond to planned and unplanned future needs. How are these places to be managed to respond to local, regional, national, and global dictates? How should they be developed and designed in such a way that allows them to be financially solvent and still meet regional objectives? How do they respond, across multiple levels, to pressures that arise from climate change, water resources management, commodity and freight flows, and the rampant scourge of inequality? Today there is a void in policy, practice, governance, development, coordination, and infrastructure planning required at different scales. The regional design process offers a responsive way forward to respond to this gap. Currently, the redesign of our communities attempts to be responsive to Ravetz’s observations. But for the kind of systems appropriate to the city or regional level, such as a housing sector or a landscape type, the drivers of environmental change tend to be economic pressure, and the drivers of economic activity tends to be social needs and demands. If the critical links from environmental, economic, and social chains are combined, a multidimensional framework starts to emerge with boundaries drawn to suit the investigation, and including cultural, social, economic, political, physical, spatial, technological, environmental, and ethical dimensions. These can be put together as a very approximate chain of causality. (Ravetz 2000) While Ravetz agrees that social and cultural characteristics of places have much in common, he questions the extent to which it is possible to develop a common basis on which regions can be compared (Ravetz 2000). However, stakeholders operating around common principles and procedures can be responsive to both current and future needs. As a result, coalitions may be developed around needs, programs, and policies that may change or become altered over time. Regional design must encapsulate these and other concerns and be compelling and sufficiently compliant to sustain growth and development. Currently, regional design has begun to insinuate itself within planning and design traditions. Nevertheless, it is aware that certain spatial underpinnings must be fully integrated into the redevelopment efforts.This is a formidable challenge. It requires creativity and innovation driven by the particularities of processes, traditions, people, and places. Historically, there has existed a marriage between the ability to coalesce around the desired perspective and the ability to shape more responsive decision-​making structures. Typically, the success of regional coalition building is driven by expected and unexpected consequences such as natural disasters, societal upheavals, public emergencies, safety, health, and financial events. In a word, reactive. This historic coalescence has served as the primary driver for rallying consensus and united action. Today there is a great need and opportunity to rethink the structure and functioning of the places in which we live. We must form and implement integrated methods, policies, and processes that drive regional and local unification –​and this must become the normal state of affairs. In another word, proactive. The design process is equipped to be responsive and can make substantial contributions in several ways. For example, traditional planning and design processes and practices typically 454

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embody requirements for iterative, participatory, and multilevel inclusion of stakeholders and decision-​makers. Such processes are very relevant today. The multi-​scale approach of inclusiveness holds the promise of gathering requisite information and data needed to undergird the development of sustainable and equitable places where we will live in the future (Neuman 2007). Different techniques and prototypes for creating vibrant, healthy communities have emerged. They focus on adaptability, reuse, greenspace, walkability, and seamless transportation with easy access to community resources and services. These systems are achievable if we create pathways that focus on the participation of people and communities. Improved strategies for negotiation and multijurisdictional cooperation must be established. Further, they must be infused with these inclusive features. A critical question is this. What is the architecture that will guide the development of the consensus required to generate support for this kind of thinking? That architecture must be sufficient to address the need for innovative services, enhanced management practices, technology-​ based processes and solutions, and the creation of healthy places.To achieve improvements in the operations and benefits of regional design, the process must be both inclusive and comprehensive. The integration of multiple disciplines and information systems will expand our knowledge and generate vast amounts of data and intelligence required to support the restructuring of the places where we currently live and the places we will occupy in future years. The Internet of Things (IoT) encapsulates hyper-​connectivity because it links electronic devices, data, machines, and global networks in a system that encompasses people, places, and increases our understanding of their interactions and interrelationships. Cities and regions contain networks within themselves and networks that connect them. These webs of intersection and interaction have given rise to cities and regions that have distinctive structures but integrated networks. The ubiquitous links within these networks allow us to perceive them as one entity, rather than as separate and distinct entities. The routine interactions among businesses, social networks, and families are all quite distinctive but can operate seamlessly as one community. While the shape and structure of regions differ, they remain functionally dependent on each other.These integrations in urban and regional networks capture the codependency shared both within and among cities and city regions. The multiplicity of governments allow the benefit of local control. However, they also create obstacles that undermine regional cooperation. It is not the differences or variations in preferences, social interactions, or socio-​economic structure that connect our communities and places, but the things that they share in common. The commonalities extend across the cities and many overlapping networks that connect them. They lay the groundwork that creates a clearer path toward the development of resilient, sustainable equitable cities, regions and megaregions (Ross 2009).This pursuit of resilient, equitable city regions is endorsed by many in the global community. The capacity to integrate stakeholder preferences, economics, and social-​ environmental information in an inclusive approach is a powerful lever for deriving more explicit knowledge of communities. The lack of inclusion and consideration of local and sub-​regional concerns and the absence of effective policies have limited the potential for greater economic development, efficiency, and prosperity. It is critical to include different perspectives and spatial planning and innovative governance to enhance greater connectivity. When this is done it creates the opportunity to form the new architecture that will shape the future of the places where we live and work. This greater connectivity across regions allows for more collaboration and the development of shared principles based on a ground-​up approach to the management and construction of cities. It is important to establish more extensive partnerships with the private sector. This will provide the resources for investments and business opportunities that link economic development 455

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and new enterprises. Further, there must be more consideration given to supporting local, global, and gig economies in the redesign of our regions. Structuring agreements that benefit both communities and commercial enterprises requires careful consideration of the basic differences in the goals of the public sector and for-​profit operating principles of the private sector. Nevertheless, there is great potential for successful collaboration. For public entities, an overriding concern is improving the everyday lives of citizens. The successful pursuit of a sustainable, equitable future for cities and towns must embody the greening of urban systems and the capacity to create greater resiliency and transform economies, services, and infrastructure. Mutual risks and benefits should be explicitly spelled out. Decision-​makers must include CEOs, mayors, city and regional institutions, and citizens in their discussions. Alternative energy sources, driverless mobility systems, and networked neighborhoods are representative of transformative opportunities that are possible in the creation of new business models, service delivery systems, and institutions. Regional entrepreneurship, immersed with emerging and new technologies, can enhance and invigorate urban systems, populations, and productivity. Restructuring and redesigning the places where we live to improve the quality of life is challenging. It means we must also confront the design and construction professions and demand change as we contemplate cities of the future. It is often difficult to envision multi-​regional and multijurisdictional cooperation. Yet the benefits of doing so are unimaginable. The emergence of the COVID-​19 pandemic in late 2019 offers one of the clearest examples of the need for a new regionalism. The pandemic has highlighted the daunting commonality of needs, vulnerabilities, and lack of scale to handle operations and massive requirements for materials and machines.To address this void, the leadership of the northeastern United States formed a new alliance, led primarily by New York state. A similar alliance formed on the west coast. The members agreed to merge their purchasing power, share manufacturing capacity, data, personnel, and deploy consistent policy guidance.The formation of these alliances signals the need to explore the importance of extended regions and networks of metropolitan centers, and not just in reaction to crises and disasters. These areas are linked to each other by interdependent economic, environmental, social, and infrastructure systems. Better regional design can further enhance the capabilities of these regions. It is important to recognize and leverage the ubiquitous interdependencies and significant opportunities that regional planning allows.

References Jennings, V., Larson, L., and Yun, J. (2016). Advancing sustainability through urban green space: Cultural ecosystem services, equity, and social determinants of health. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 13(2), 196. Neuman, M. (2007). Multi-​scalar large institutional networks in regional planning. Planning Theory and Practice, 8(3), 319–​44. Ravetz, J. (2000). Integrated assessment for sustainability appraisal in cities and regions. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 20(1), 31–​64. Ross, C., (ed) (2009). Megaregions Planning for Global Competitiveness. Washington, DC: Island Press.

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Note: Page numbers in italics indicate figures and in bold indicate tables on the corresponding pages. Abercrombie, P. 6, 21 Adam, B. 127 Adams, R. 7 Adriatic-​Ionian region, Europe, 40, 44 Advanced Green Building Demonstration Home (AGBDH)  363–​5 agency 52, 71, 81, 223, 415, 445 agency of mapping 417, 418, 425 Aggarwalla, R. 188 Ahern, J. 57 Alberti, M. 447 Alexander, C. ix, 7 Allmendinger, P. 74, 81–​2 Alpine region, Europe, 40, 44 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) 148, 149 Amtrak 147–​8, 150 anxiety for unbound regions 416–​17 Appalachian Regional Commission 152 Appalachian Trail 6, 30, 52 Appiah, A.  297–​8 Appleyard, D. 7 “assemblage-​thinking” in regional design 79 Bacon, E. 20–​1 Baker, H. 214 balanced regional development see Korea Baltic Sea macro-​region 40, 44, 350–​2, 351 Banerjee, T.  291 Banham, R. 286 Barber, B. 440 Barcelona, Spain, metropolitan region 227–​8; contents of urban director plan for 243–​4; demographic dynamics in 239–​40; economic recovery and town planning for major events in, 1986–​2008 230–​1; emerging problems and hypothesis for intervention in 240–​3, 242; end of dictatorship and international energy crisis in, 1975–​1986 229–​30, 230; engines of recent urban growth in 239–​40; global financial

crisis and slow recovery in, 2008-​today 231–​2; infrastructure and mobility in 240; metropolitan governance in 236–​9, 237; Metropolitan Project (PDUM) for 244–​5; metropolitan territorial planning in 232–​6, 233–​5; modern industrialization and the property boom in, 1950–​1975 228–​9, 229; productive activities and employment in 240; significant phases of contemporary growth in 228–​32, 229–​30 Barnett, J. 58, 141 Barnier, M. 38, 42 Basque city-​region 398–​401, 399, 408 Belt and Road initiative, China 41–​2 Benelux Structural Outline 7 Berlin-​Brandenburg region, Germany, 135–​136 Bidagor, P. 6 Biden, J. 150 bioregional design 356–​7; Advanced Green Building Demonstration Home (AGBDH) and 363–​5; Carrizo Springs, Texas 360–​3; conclusions on 370; Laredo Blueprint Farm, Texas 365–​7; Miskito Indians, Nicaragua, and 358–​60; process of 357, 357–​8, 358; sPOD (seedPod) infrastructure system 367–​70, 371 Bloomberg, M. 178, 180 Bolan, R. 439 Bolkestein, F. 42 Booth, P. 79 Boston-​Washington Megalopolis 23, 24 Bourdieu, P. 439 Bright, E. 166 Brooklyn Bridge Park, New York 178 Brown, A. 266 Buenos Aires, Argentina 24–​5 Burden, A. 178 Burgundy Valley, France 24 Burnham, D. xiv, xv, 409 Bush, G. H. W. 147 Business Alliance for Northeast Mobility (BANM) 149

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Index

Caliskan, O. 73 Calthorpe, P. 19, 30, 58, 59 Canada 48 Cantal-​Dupart, M. 255 Capital Area Council of Governments (CAPCOG), 167 Carbonell, A. 58, 141 Carrizo Springs, Texas 360–​3 Castells, M. 20, 395, 446 Castro, R. 255 centers concept, Los Angeles 295–​6, 296 Central Japan Railway Company 119 Central Valley, California 24 Cerdà, I. 6, 296 Chakrabarti, V.  178 Chakravarty, S. 293 Cheever, J. 20 Chicago School 292–​3 Chile see Santiago de Chile metropolitan system China: Belt and Road initiative 41–​2; ecological security plan for 61, 61; Pearl River Delta region of (see Pearl River Delta (PRD), China, region) Christie, C. 149, 179 Chungju Enterprise City, 103, 103 Cities in Evolution 20 CITIES Project 395–​7, 407 City of Cities: A Plan for Sydney’s Future 274 city-​regions: conclusions on 440–​2; introduction to 428; need of new place qualities for changing 429–​32; path dependence and terms of power conditioning changes of urban hardware in 434–​8, 435–​7; reconstruction of institutions in action in changing 432–​4; symbolic representation of urban transition in 438–​40 Civil War, American,  48 coastal plan, Los Angeles 294–​5 cohesion policy 37–​8 Colombia, Caribbean and Santanderes regions of 404–​5,  405 colonialism see Nairobi, Kenya Color of Law,The 184 combining linkages 28 Committee on Spatial Development (CSD),  37–​39 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), 37 commonwealth drainage-​basin approach 61–​3, 62 communities of place 25; hierarchy of 25–​6 Communities of Place 7 Compendium of Planning Systems and Policies, 41 consolidated city, Sydney as 270–​3, 272 contemporary theory, regional design: directions for further research on 81–​2; introduction to 66–​7; reflections on research for 80–​1; regional design as rule-​building practice in 73–​9, 75–​6; spatial planning in 67–​72, 70–​2 458

Contrats de plan État-​région, 38 Cooke, T.  30 Corner, J. 60, 415, 416 corridor centers 26 corridor city, Sydney as 268–​70, 269 corridor environs 29 corridor regions 23–​4 COVID-​19 pandemic 156, 177, 192, 296, 445 creativity in regional design 78 cross-​border, transnational planning 11–​12 cultural patterns and metropolitan regions 207–​11,  208–​9 Cuomo, A. 179, 188 Dangermond, J. 60 Danube region, Europe, 40, 44 Darwin, C. 50–​1, 52 Dealing with Change in the Connecticut River Valley 29 Datar 38, 261 de Gaulle, C. 249, 254 Delors, J. 37 Delouvrier, P. 254 Deltametropolis Association 305, 309, 310, 312, 315, 423 Deltametropolis concept: aftermath of 317–​18; conceptual innovation in 310; deltametropolis concept and 307–​15, 308–​9, 311, 313, 314; discourses and conceptual innovation of 304–​5; discussion on 315–​17; emergence of alternative entrepreneurial policy discourse on 306–​7; green-​blue 310–​12, 311, 314–​15; interdepartmental disputes in 312–​14, 313, 314; introduction to 303–​4; mapping and 423–​4; methodological account of 305; origins of 307–​10, 308–​9; two conceptualizations in coexistence in 312; two planning discourses on 305–​7; urban-​rural spatial policy discourse on 306 density and capacity, linkage 27 Design of Cities, The 21 design studio teaching 383–​4, 384 Design with Nature 6, 20, 53–​6, 54, 55, 157, 186 Deverall, W.  288–​90 discretion, regional design as form of 74, 76–​8 Doctoroff, D. 178 Donovan, S. 182 Dühr, S. 80 ecology in regional design: introduction to 48–​9, 49, 50; new ecological regionalism 56–​60, 57, 59; origins of 50–​6, 52, 54, 55; promise and prospect of, in the Anthropocene 60–​3, 61, 62 Ecology of Fear 286 ecosystem services 60–​1 El Futuro Madrid 6 Eliot, C. 48–​9, 51, 52, 56, 60

Index

Elkins, D. 33–​4, 44, 45 Emerald Necklace plan, Boston 48–​9, 51, 52, 56, 60 Enterprise City, Korea 100–​3, 102, 103 environs 28; corridor 29; metropolitan 28; rural 29 Envision Utah 58–​9 Eppink, D.-​J. 42 Europe 2020 44 European Metropolitan Regions, Germany: Berlin-​Brandenburg 135–​6; conclusions on 136–​7; institutional design in 131–​6, 133; introduction to 125–​6; national spatial design policy framework in 127–​30, 128–​9, 131; Rhine-​Ruhr 133–​5; spatial planning in 126–​7 European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP): as design cloud 44–​5; EU-​level regional design and 35–​6; introduction to 33–​5; masterplan 36–​41, 40; territorial cohesion 41–​4 European Spatial Policy and Planning 34 European Union (EU) 11. 35, 43, 58, 103, 141. 231, 339, 344, 350–​1, 351, 422, 446 Euskalhiria, Basque Country 398–​401, 399, 408 Faludi, A. 36, 69, 74, 82, 142, 447 Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) 167 Federal Railroad Administration 148 Federation of Korean Industries (FKI) 100–​1 Fernández de los Ríos, Á. 6 Ferriss, H. 184 Fields, Factories and Workshops 20 Finger Plan, Copenhagen 12, 21 Fischler, R. 68 Florida, R. 395 Flows and Function 447 Fogelson, R. 290 Forman, R. 59, 61, 447 Four Corridors initiative 192 framing 417–​22,  418–​21 Frampton, K. 56 Fregonese, J. 58 Fricke, C. 136, 260 Friedman and weaver 447 functional city, Sydney as 264–​6, 265; creative synthesis in Malacca Straits Diagonal and 405–​6,  406 future cities, imagining of: beyond smart, beyond urbanism in 407–​9, 408; Caribbean and Santanderes regions of Colombia and 404–​5, 405; Euskalhiria, Basque City-​region and 398–​401, 399, 408; Singapore megaregion and quiet growth 402, 402–​3; supercities intelligence and 394–​8, 396 Future Shock 3 Garvin, A. 181 Gateway National Recreation Area, Jamaica Bay 186

Geddes, P. 6, 20, 50–​3, 52, 58, 247, 407 Geddes, R. 5, 30 Geertz, C. 13, 36 geodesign 60 geopolitical mapping 422–​3 Geppert, A. 248 German Democratic Republic 39–​41, 40, 135 Giscard d’Estaing, V. 249 globalization and Los Angeles 291–​4, 292, 293 Göddecke-​Stellmann, J. 127 Godron, M. 57 Gottmann, J. 3, 19, 58; on megalopolis regions 24; on the Northeast megalopolis 141 Governors Island, New York 178 Grand Central Terminal, New York 147 graphic design 415–​16 Greater London Plan 6, 21 greenbelt city, Sydney as 266–​8, 267 green-​blue deltametropolis concept 310–​12, 311,  314–​15 greenways 56; Pearl River Delta 326–​35 growth-​leading linkages 28 Grumbach, A. 254, 258 Gualini, E. 136 Guigou, J.-​L. 38 Guimard, H. 249 Hack, G. 29 Haeckel, E. 48 Hajer, M. 304 Hall, P. 141 hamlets 27 Harper, R. 3 Harvey, D. 286 Haughton, G. 74, 81–​2 Hegemann, W.  7 Heikkila, E. 291 Hellman, I. 287 Henderson, L. 55 Hendriks, B. 220 High Line, New York 178 High Speed Rail: International Lessons for US Policymakers, 148 high speed rail: barriers to, in the Northeast 146–​7; creation of Amtrak and 147–​8; in Japan (see Japan); shaping megaregions 148–​9, 149; in Texas (see Texas Urban Triangle megaregion) Hise, G. 287, 288–​90 history and evolution of regional design 6–​8 Holland, L. B. 284 Holmes, R. 61–​3, 62 Hough, M. 58 Housont-​Dallas-​Austin-​San Antonio multi-​plex  24–​5 Howard, E. 6, 20, 49, 59, 60 Huchzermeyer, M. 221 Hudson River Park, New York 178 459

Index

Humboldt, Alexander von 52 Hurricane Sandy 7 Husson, C. 42 Hutcheson, M. B. 49 Huxley, T. 50–​1, 55 hybrid regions 24–​5 Ingels, B. 182 ‘Initiativkreis Europ ä ische Metropolregionen in Deutschland (IKM),’ 132–​133, 133 Innovation City, Korea 96–​100, 98–​9, 99 institutional design, Germany 131–​6, 133 interdisciplinary regional design: contributions of planning, design, and social sciences to 379–​83, 380–​3; implications for planning education 391–​2; integrative nature of regional planning and design studio teaching in 383–​4, 384; introduction to 377–​9, 378; pedagogical measures to integrate design, planning, and social sciences, in 389, 389–​91; regional development studios at TU Delft and TU Munich for 383–​4, 384 International Architecture Exhibition 7 Internationale Bauausstellung (IBA) 7 Jacobs, J. 428, 431 Jameson, W.  214 Japan: development of the Shinkansen in 110–​12, 111; economic development led by infrastructure planning in 108–​10, 109; extension of Shinkansen to the north and south in 112–​13, 113; future prospects and conclusions on 120–​2; high-​speed rail development in 110–​16, 111, 113–​15; introduction to linear megalopolis of 107–​8; role of high-​speed trains in post-​war 117, 117–​20, 119; superconducting Maglev in 113, 114–​15, 116 Jaussely, L. 250 Jefferson, T.  48 Jeffersonian grid 286–​7 Jensen, J. 49 Jessop, B. 79 Johnson, S. 13 JR Tokai  113 Kennedy, J. F. 146 Kenyatta, J. 216 Keynes, J. M. 408 Kiley, R. 187 Korea: balanced regional development and competitive cities in 92–​3; conclusions on urban policy in 105; Enterprise City in 100–​3, 102, 103; four key strategies for balanced regional development in 93–​104; Innovation City in 96–​100, 98–​9, 99; Livable City/​Community Making in 103–​4, 104; new 460

multi-​functional administrative city (NMAC) in 93–​6, 94, 96, 97; urbanization and urban policy in 89–​92, 90, 91 Korea Land Corporation 95 Korthals Altes, W.  69 Kouche, D. 254 Kropotkin, P. 20 Kunzmann, K. 136 Landmarks Preservation Commission, New York  147 landscape ecology 57,  57–​8 Lang, R. 143 La Poste 42 Laredo Blueprint Farm, Texas 365–​7 Laws, D. 304 Laws of the Indies 286–​7 layer-​cake 54, 55, 259 layers 54–​55, 217, 227, 277, 280, 305 Le Corbusier 60, 416 Lee Myung-​Bak 104 Lenfant, C. 254 Le Play, F. 52 Lewis, P. 192 Leygues, J.-​C. 37, 38, 42 linkages 27; combining 28; density and capacity of 27; growth-​leading 28 Lion,Y. 254, 255 Lister, N-​M. 60 Livable City/​Community Making, Korea 103–​4,  104 Long-​Term Ecological Research (LTER) sites  57–​8 Los Angeles region 284–​5; centers concept redux in 295–​6, 296; description of 285–​6; design by referendum in 294–​5; emergence of Tieboutian space and its liabilities in 290–​1; impact of polycentric to polyglot regionalism of globalization on 291–​4, 292, 293; imprint of Laws of the Indies and Jeffersonian grid on 286–​7; infrastructure and profits from real estate development in 287; multiple designers of 296–​8, 297; wasted vision of regional design in 288–​90,  289 Los Angeles-​San Diego-​Tijuana megalopolis  24–​5 Lynch, K. 7, 21, 29, 428, 429–​31, 439, 449 Ma, X. 334 Maastricht Treaty,  37 MacKaye, B. 6, 30, 52–​3 macro-​regions 11–​12, 40, 44–​5; Baltic Sea 350–​2,  351 Madison Square Garden, New York 147 Magdalena River, Colombia 404–​5, 405 Making of the European Spatial Development Perspective, The 34 Malacca Straits Diagonal 405–​6, 406

Index

Managing the Sense of a Region 21 mapping: anxiety in 416–​17; conclusions on 424–​5; of controversies 422–​4; framing in 417–​22, 418–​21; introduction to 413–​14; metaphors and agency with 414–​16, 415; of new planning regions 416–​22, 418–​21 Marcuse, P. 293 Maritime/​Marine Spatial Planning (MSP): in the Baltic Sea macro-​region 350–​2, 351; conclusions on disruptive forces of the sea and 352–​3; evolution of 341–​3, 342; introduction to 338; national-​level planning in Slovenia 345–​8, 346, 347–​8; new conditions of urbanisation of the sea and 339–​41, 340, 341; regional design approaches in 343, 343–​52; sub-​national planning in Scotland 345–​8, 346, 347–​8 Marks, G. 34, 36 Mayntz, R. 77 Mboya, J. 222 McGuirk, P. 273 McHarg, I. 7, 20–​1, 53–​6, 54, 55, 58, 60–​1, 157, 186 McSherry, L. 61–​3, 62 megalopolises 24, 394 Megalopolis: The Urbanized Northeast Seaboard of the United States 58 megaregions 58; high speed rail in shaping 148–​9, 149; New York (see New York metropolitan region); Northeast (see Northeast Megaregion); Texas (see Texas Urban Triangle megaregion) Meinig, D. W. 156 Melbourne 2030 7 Mercer Human Resource Consulting Group (MHRC), 104 meta-​governance in regional design 79 metaphors 414–​15,  415 metropolitan environs 28 metropolitan regions 23; framing of 420–​2, 421; see also specific regions Mexico City, Mexico 24 Miller, W.  49 Ministerkonferenz für Raumordnung (MKRO), German, 126–​130,  131 Ministry of Construction and Transportation (MOCT), Korean, 100–​101 Miskito Indians, Nicaragua 358–​60 Mitchell 215 Mitchell, J. 20 Mitullah, W.  220 Moi, D. T. 215, 216–​17 Moon Jae-​In 95, 100, 104 Moris, R. 206 Moses, R. 30 Mostafavi, M. 60 Muan Enterprise City, 102–​3, 103 Muju Enterprise City, 102, 103 Mulholland, W.  287

Mumford, L. 6, 21, 52–​3, 58, 407, 409 Myers, G. 215 Nairobi Informal Settlements Coordination Committee (NISCC), 219 Nairobi, Kenya: context and drivers for design in 216–​17; future prospects for 222–​4; governance in 219–​20; history of 214–​15; introduction to 214; planning performance in 220–​2; regional design in 217–​18; region description 216 Nairobi metro 2030: A world class African metropolis 218,  220–​2 national boundaries, mapping and 422–​3 National Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), 167 Needham, B. 74 Netherlands, the see Dutch Deltametropolis Neuman, M. 14, 35, 36, 247, 338, 340 new ecological regionalism 56–​60, 57, 59 New Jersey State Plan 7, 29, 186 new multi-​functional administrative city (NMAC), Korea 93–​6, 94, 96, 97 New Orleans/​Mississippi River delta 8, 10 New Urbanist movement 58 New York metropolitan region 177–​80, 178; conclusions on regional design in 192–​3; equity in 189; first regional plan, 1929 183–​4, 184; fourth regional plan, 2017 188–​92, 191; health in 189; 9/​11 terrorist attacks and 178, 179–​82; prosperity in 189; regional design and the RPA plans for 183; second regional plan, 1968 184–​6, 185; Superstorm Sandy and 177, 180, 182–​3; sustainability in 189–​90; third regional plan, 1996 186–​8, 187 New York Regional Plan Association (RPA) 5–​6, 7, 21 Next American Metropolis, The 19 Ngau, P. 220 9/​11 terrorist attacks 177, 178, 179–​80; legacy of  181–​2 Nordenson, G. 192 Northeast Megaregion: barriers to high speed rail in 146–​7; creation of Amtrak and 147–​8; envisioning a new governance system for 151–​3; high speed rail as key to unlocking latent economic potential in 144–​6, 145; history of 140; how high speed rail shapes megaregions and 148–​9, 149; overview of 140; progress on high speed rail in 149–​51, 150; regional design and 141–​3, 142; scenarios for future of 153–​4; subsidiarity and 151–​3; toward a broader movement for 143–​4, 144–​5; vital statistics on 140–​1 North Rhine-​Westphalia (NRW), 133–​134 Northwest Ordinances 48, 49 Nouvel, J. 254 Nyayo Monument, 216–​217 461

Index

Obama, B. 148 O’Connor, A. 216 Old Northwest Territories, United States, 48 Olmstead, F. L. 20, 49, 51, 52, 56, 60 On Architecture 63 Ordinary Cities: Between Modernity and Development 224 Paasi, A. 80 Paris, France, metropolitan region: conclusions on regional design in 261–​2; as consultation or smoke screen, 2008 debate on 253–​8, 255, 256–​7; expected discourses conveyed by settled images of 255–​8, 257–​8; historical resistance to regional design in 249–​53, 251, 252; insoluble issue of limits to greater 252–​3; introduction to 247–​8; lack of role in creating institutions in 260–​1; pedagogy and marketing of Grand Paris Express Project in 258, 259; political context of state taking control in 253–​4; posture, methodology and sources on 248; testing and complementarity of regional planning in 259–​60; traditional reluctance of development planning in 250–​2, 251, 252; various functions of regional design in 258–​61, 259; very large teams directed by architectural heavyweights long involved in debate over 254–​6, 255 Park Chung-​Hee 92 Park Geun-​Hye 104 Parks, Playgrounds, and Beaches for the Los Angeles Region 288 Passenger Rail Investment and Improvement Act (PRIIA), US, 148 Paves Reyes,, M. I. 211 Peach, C. 293 Pearl River Delta (PRD), China, region: current status of 323–​4; drivers of regional design in 324–​6, 325–​6; formation and development of 322–​3; interim outcome of PRD greenway construction in 332–​3; planning and design of PRD greenway network in 326–​31, 327–​9, 330–​1; regional coordination and collaboration for planning and implementing in 331–​2; regional design in Chinese context and 334–​5; upgrading greenways into regional green infrastructure in 333–​4 Penn Central Company, 147 performance parameters of regional design 67–​72,  70–​2 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 20 Piano, R. 249 Pickford, M. 290 Pieterse, E. 220, 223–​4 Plan d’Urbanisme Directeur 249 Plan for New York and Environs 5, 7, 21, 30; first regional plan, 1929 183–​4, 184; fourth regional plan, 2017 188–​92, 191; second 462

regional plan, 1968 184–​6, 185; third regional plan, 1996 186–​8, 187; see also New York metropolitan region Plan Regional de Estratégia Territorial 30 Planning the Fourth Migration: The Neglected Vision of the Regional Planning Association of America 21 Planning Theory and Practice, 43 politics 8, 253–​4 polycentric city/development/region/structure, Sydney as 12–14, 130, 132–3, 428, 431, 434, 436, 438; in Basque Country 398, 400; in Bintan, Indonesia 403; in European history 33, 39, 42; in Germany 130, 132–3; Territorial Diamond 406; in the United States 157, 291, 297 Popper, K. 73 Port of Rotterdam, 39 Porter, M. 395 Portzamparc, C. de 254, 255, 258 Potomac River Basin plan 53–​6, 54 Poverty of Territorialism,The 34, 44, 447 Powell, J. W. 48, 50, 61 Power of Identity,The 446 Princeton/​Route One 23 Pronk, J. 312 Qadeer, M. A. 293 Ranstad Plan 6, 15, 21, 58, 303–​4, 305, 314, 316–​17, 414, 417–​20, 418–​20; Deltametropolis concept as replacement for 307–​310, 317–​18; government participation in 310–​12, 315; structure of 310; transport connections in 312–​14 Reagen, R. 147 Reclus, E. 52 Reed, C. 60 referendum, design by 294–​5 regional centers 26 regional design: American megaregions and 141–​3, 142; applied to rural, urban and hybrid regions 4; “assemblage-​thinking” in 79; bioregionalism and (see bioregional design); blurred boundaries in 5; changing world and 3–​4; contemporary theory for (see contemporary theory, regional design); creativity in 78; current concepts and practices in 8–​11; defined 8–​9; ecology in (see ecology in regional design); empirical research on 78–​9; as form of discretion 74, 76–​8; history and evolution of 6–​8; imperative of 19–​20, 30–​1; institutions for multi-​scalar and multi-​ level regional governance and 449–​51; interdisciplinary (see interdisciplinary regional design); introduction to 3–​6; mapping for (see mapping); in Maritime/​Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) 343–​52; meta-​governance in 79; in outline 21–​3; at range of scales 11; by referendum 294–​5; reflections on research for

Index

80–​1; as rule-​building practice 73–​9, 75–​6; sources of 20–​1; spatial parameters in 4–​5; state of the art of 29–​30; thinking and acting regionally in 445–​9 regional design professionals, values and norms of 79 regional governance 8, 10; in Barcelona, Spain 236–​9, 237; design of 11–​13; institutions for multi-​scalar and multi-​level 449–​51; in Nairobi 219–​20; new Northeast Megaregion 151–​3; in Pearl River Delta region 331–​2 Regional Planning Association of America (RPAA) 6, 21, 30, 52 Region at Risk, A 186 regions: communities of place and 25–​6; corridor 23–​4; defined 22; hybrid 24–​5; metropolitan 23; as networks of components 23; rural 24; types of 22 Rein, M. 304 Rendell, E. 150 Reyes, M. 206 Rhine River, Germany 24 Rittel, H. W. J. 79 Robinson, J. 218, 224 Rockefeller, N. 185 Rockefeller Foundation 178, 182, 192 Rodin, J. 182 Rogers, R. 249, 254 Roh Mu-​Hyun 89, 92, 93, 94, 100 Rothstein, R. 184 Ruhr region, Germany 134–​5 rule-​building practice, regional design as 73–​9,  75–​6 rural environs 29 rural regions 24 Rushdie, S. 298 Sack, R. D. 34 Sadik-​Khan, J. 178 Sager, T  221 Salet, W.  447 Sandercock, L. 294 San Diego, California 29 San Francisco, California 24 Sao Paolo, Brazil 24–​5 Santiago de Chile metropolitan system: changing organization of regional government in 196; changing spatial preferences in 206–​7; context for regionalisation and regional planning for 194–​5; cultural patterns and prospects in 207–​11, 208–​9; development of 198–​203, 199, 201–​2, 202–​3; development of strategies and plans for 196–​8, 197; micro-​region 199, 199–​200; new centralities and forces that create them in 203–​6, 204; regionalization and decentralization in 195–​6 Sarkozy, N. 247, 253, 254, 257, 258

Sassen, S. 20 Schmitt, P. 134 Schön, D. A. 80 Scotland, sub-​national marine planning in 345–​8, 346, 347–​8 Scott, R. 298 sea, urbanisation of the see Maritime/​Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) Seavitt, C. 192 Secchi, B. 394–​5 Seltzer, E. 143 Seoul Metropolitan Area (SMA) 90, 90–​3,  91 Shaping Our Cities 273 Shaping Regional Futures 248 Singapore megaregion 402,  402–​3 Slovenia, national-​level Maritime/​Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) in 345–​8, 346, 347–​8 Smith, C. 215 social sciences in regional development 379–​83,  380–​3 Solà-​Morales, M. de 243 Spatial Decision Support System (SDSS) 160–​1; conclusions for 172–​4, 173; determining factor weights for 165; determining internal classification for each factor in 164–​5, 165; development method for 161–​2; development process for 162–​5, 164, 165; factor specialists/​ experts for 163; findings from 167–​72, 168–​72; identifying data sources for 163–​4; identifying factors in 162–​3; methodology and testing in 165–​7, 166; selecting factors for 163, 164; strategic drivers of 162 spatial planning: attention to geographies in 67–​9; in Chile (see Santiago de Chile metropolitan system); in Germany 126–​7; influencing performances of regional design 72; key performance parameters of regional design in 67–​72, 70–​2; maritime (see Maritime/​ Marine Spatial Planning (MSP)); performance of regional design in discursive dimension of 69, 72 Spirn, A. W.  58 sPOD (seedPod) infrastructure system 367–​70,  371 Starr, K. 286, 287 State of African cities 220, 222–​3 Steel, B. 178 Stein, C. 52 Steinitz, C. 59, 60, 61 Stern, R. 30 Structure Plan Flanders 6 Studio Libeskind 181 subsidiarity  151–​3 supercities 394–​8,  396 Superstorm Sandy 177, 180, 182–​3, 188 Sussman, C. 21 463

Index

Sydney, Australia, metropolitan region: background on 264; conclusions on 280–​1; as consolidated city 270–​3, 272; as corridor city 268–​70, 269; as functional city 264–​6, 265; as greenbelt city 266–​8, 267; introduction to 263–​4; as polycentric city 273–​6, 275; tri-​city region of 276–​9, 277, 279 Taean Enterprise City, 103, 103 Taylor, M. 150 Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) 53 territorial cohesion, EU 41, 238 Territorial Diamond concept 405–​6, 406 Territory and Function 447 Texas Natural Resource Information System (TNRIS), 163–​164 Texas Urban Triangle megaregion: conclusions for SDSS in 172–​4, 173; directions for the future, including regional institutions, of 174–​5; findings on 167–​72, 168–​72; introduction and context 156–​8; project significance 160; SDSS development method for 161–​2; SDSS development process for 162–​5, 164, 165; SDSS methodology and testing for 165–​7, 166; spatial analysis of 159–​60; spatial decision support system (SDSS) for high-​speed rail in 160–​1 Tiebout, C. 290 Tieboutian spaces, Los Angeles 290–​1 Times Square, New York, 178 Toffler, A. 3, 356 Tokyo,Yokohama, and Yokusuka ring 24–​5 To-​morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform 20 Toward an American Spatial Development Framework 143 Town and Country Planning, 43 Town Planning Review, 43 towns 26 transport infrastructure 434–​8, 435–​7; see also Japan Treaty of Amsterdam 38–​9, 42 Traety of Lisbon 43

464

Treaty of Maastricht 36, 37 Trump, D. 149, 151, 183 Udall, S. L. 53 UN Habitat 218, 220, 222–​3 Unleashing the Economic Potential of Agglomeration in African Cities 218 US Army Corps of Engineers 182 US Census Bureau 167 US Geological Survey (USGS) 167 van den Broeck, J. 7 van Duinen, L. 305 Verma, N. 291 Versteeg, W.  304 villages  26–​7 Vitruvius Pollio, M. 63–​4 Volkswagen company 41 Waldheim, C. 60 Weller, R. 59,  59–​60 Westgate Mall, Nairobi 217 White, T.  215 Whitehead, J. 181 White Paper on European Governance 42 Who Designs America?: Who designed the Los Angeles region?  284–​5 Whyte, W.  20 Williams, D. 44 Williams, R. H. 34, 45 Wonju Enterprise City 103, 103 Wood, D. 413 World Health Organization (WHO) 63 Wright, F. L. 60 Wulf-​Mathies, M. 37, 42 Yang, Q. 334 Yaro, R. 29, 30 Yeongam/​Haenam Enterprise City 103, 103 Yu, K. 61, 61 Zonneveld, W. A. M. 35, 36, 44, 247, 318, 338, 340