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‘What else?’: Community Perspectives on Tourism-led Urbanization in Spiti, India
No full textThe remote Spiti Valley in northern India, is experiencing a tourism boom, which, in turn, in fueling a construction boom in the villages of the region. The region offers a unique landscape – a rocky high altitude desert with splashes of greenery. Rare wildlife can be spotted in winters, with the region under a cover of snow. Perhaps the most important component of the region’s cultural attractions are the monasteries of Tibetan Buddhism. Today the fragile Himalayan ecosystem is threatened by the rapid urbanization and increasing tourist loads. Social structures and cultural practices are under stress. Two questions lead this project. (a) What are the community’s aspirations and concerns with regards to tourism and urban development in the Spiti Valley? (b) Why, despite witnessing undesirable urban outcomes in numerous Himalayan towns, has very little changed in terms of tourism policy in this sensitive region? The study examines attitudes towards tourism in Kaza, a small town in the Spiti Valley, facing rapid urbanization as a hub for the fast-expanding tourism sector. Based on a survey of residents and business-owners (N=420), and in-depth interviews with key informants, the paper reports the principal narratives in the region on the themes of growth and sustainability.publishedVersio
Landscape and Ecological Networks in Urban Planning: Technical Standards for Implementation
Get PDFThis paper proposes a reflection on the possible role of landscape and ecological networks within the local urban planning practices. We are faced with a constant population growth in cities and peri-urban and marginal areas are increasingly subject to environmental degradation. Therefore, it is necessary to identify and recognize the ecological values of the environment to define plans and natural resources. This contribution, starting from some pilots conducted in Piedmont Region, reflects about the urban planning operational paradigms, the importance of green infrastructures and ecological quality for sustainable and resilient city is sustained by a proposal of local planning regulations. The paper aims to tackle the quest for a new form of implementation based on the integration of the approaches to planning the urban and ecological problems with the aim of ensuring complete compatibility between urban transformation and the demands for environmental quality. The ecological regulations described in this paper propose an evolution of the meaning of the planning schemes, especially those applicable to green space: the regulations in fact consider the collective use of green infrastructures as a crucial requisite, while according priority nonetheless to the role of private areas as an invaluable factor in the environmental regeneration of urban tissue. Therefore, this contribution focuses on an innovative model of planning and management at the local scale, the role of ecosystem services, the relationship between biodiversity of the ecological network structural areas and periurban and agricultural residual ecological areas to be strengthened to improve connectivity between ecosystems.publishedVersio
The governance of the circular economy: insights from the Veneto Region
Get PDFOver the last decade, the notion of circular economy progressively emerged all over Europe. It can be defined as “the reducing, reusing and recycling activities conducted in the process of production, circulation and consumption” (Ghisellini, Cialani, & Ulgiati, 2016), but also as “a system that is designed to be restorative and regenerative” (Charonis, 2012). It is a popular approach towards green economy and sustainability (Geissdoerfer, Savaget, Bocken, & Hultink, 2017). Circular economy systems are being developed in many countries and contexts, particularly China. There is a growing literature on the various dimensions of the circular economy from many disciplinary perspectives, including planning (Murray, Skene, & Haynes, 2017). However, little attention has been paid to its governance. What is the impact of some variables related to governance, such as actors, actor configurations, collective action, policy instruments, compliance processes, as well as institutional levels and policy sectors, on the development of the circular economy? Are some of these variables more important than others? Through which causal mechanisms do they intervene? To answer these questions, we analyze four cases from the Veneto Region in the materials, building, food and textile sectors. Unlike most of the literature, instead of focusing on the peculiarities of each case, we chose to focus on what they have in common and the interaction of these key variables with the planning and institutional system. The insights were collected through participant observation in the framework of a transdisciplinary collaborative research project.publishedVersio
Urban and architectural adaptive strategies for inclusive cities : A review of international innovation experiments
Get PDFplaNext-Next Generation Planning Vol. 9 (2019) Navigating change: Planning for societal and spatial transformations 65-82The current migration flows toward Europe are having a significant impact on social composition, economy, urban services, and on the physical dimensions of cities. Cities have a key role in developing immigration policies and sustainable accommodation models, that can promote an inclusive society as well as local development. Due to the persistence of migratory flows, these models of integration and development cannot be supported by an emergency condition, but they should be based on systematic strategies. This paper presents a series of accommodation models and urban policies, coming from international experimental projects, that we argue can foster integration and urban development. These strategies show the potentials of immigration in boosting urban transformation and regeneration. Innovative strategies for dealing with immigration are based on flexible tools, typically from temporary habitat (housing modules, light construction systems, customized solutions) that find a place inside the city. Integrated design strategies use the existing city as a frame being filled up by flexible houses, through urban densification or regeneration process. Housing dissemination, temporary and flexible architectural solutions and inclusive process are the drivers for developing a flexible habitat, at the base of a more sustainable and democratic city
Editorial Vol. 8 (2019) : Making Space for Hope: Exploring its Ethical, Activist and Methodological Implications
Get PDFplaNext-Next Generation Planning Vol. 8 (2019) : Making space for hope 6-9This volume is a special issue with contributions that stem from the collaborations of the 2018 AESOP PhD workshop, held 5-8 July at Tjärö island, Sweden. The overarching aim of the workshop was to establish inclusive spaces for dialogue and collaboration between PhD students across countries and continents on issues that pertained to the AESOP’s 2018 congress theme “Making space for hope”. Furthermore the PhD students got the chance to learn from the invited mentors with long experience from the academic planning field. The theme drew from a recognition of the severe challenges facing the world at present, for example, challenges coupled with the climate crisis, growing social inequalities, rapid population growth in urban regions and de-population trends in peripheral regions. Planning, considered broadly, is an activity that is striving to create better futures. It is an activity for maintaining predictability and stability whilst responding to societal challenges. Yet, it has been pointed out by policy makers as well as by researchers that planning is unable to effectively respond to these challenges with its traditional sets of approaches, calling instead for new and innovative planning methods. But this conference call asks not only for innovative approaches, but also for a more “hopeful research agenda” that challenges the “dystopian” views on the world that is represented in much research, in which cities are “...depicted as dark and dysfunctional places wrecked by endless capitalist crises and social-ecological catastrophes” (Prakas, 2010 in Pow, 2015, p. 464; cf. Torisson, 2015). The AESOP congress local organising committee argued that:
“...planning should contribute to making space for hope [and we] need to go beyond mainstream politics, negation and cynicism. Instead planning debates ought to “excavate” the hidden and submerged desires for better future by exploring hope and optimism” (AESOP bid 2015, emphasis added)
Advisability of Reintroducing the Building Code document to Canton Sarajevo Spatial and Urban Planning Legislation
Get PDFIn most European countries urban planning is a process controlled by many instruments, among which is a building code document. Sarajevo, as a part of former Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, got its first Building Code in 1880, followed by a second Building Code in 1893. Ever since, the Building Code Document is missing in Sarajevo's spatial regulative, which resulted in unclear building procedures and urban "cacophony". In 1936, there was an attempt to make a unified Building Code for all cities in former Kingdom of Yugoslavia, but it failed in its implementation. Today, in Canton Sarajevo, the procedure of obtaining the urban permit has no clear structure and rules for how to build in a specific urban area. Obtaining the building permit depends on individual aesthetic criteria of municipality clerk who is creating an individual frame of rules. This makes procedures unclear, not transparent and often open for corruption. The result of unclear procedures is urban and architectural "cacophony", which is especially visible in the urban area of Sarajevo valley. Situated in South East Europe, after the fall of Berlin wall in 1990 the city has faced some dramatic changes due to Yugoslav wars and the transition processes, among which is transition from the former socialist political and economic system to the capitalist system which specifically affects spatial planning and development process
Citizen Participation in Transitional Society: An Evolution of Participatory Planning in Serbia
Get PDFPlanning for Transition – book of proceedings 31; 2Arnstein’s seminal article influenced both the scholars and practitioners to explore the ways of citizen engagement against the public administration and politicians. To illustrate this, I present the case study of Serbia through four phases of its planning history. After the Second World War, the topdown spatial planning for social good was controlled by the elite multidisciplinary technocratic decisions. Citizens were just informed about the possibilities for public insight and debate. The state decentralization of the1970s, influenced the shift of planning from the state focused allocation to the community responsive planning, based on delegated power of the civil sector in partnership with representatives of local politics. In the 1990s, when and development process was almost exclusively driven by private investment greenlighted by the national government, the citizen participation was not even manipulated – it did not exist, neither in planning legislation, nor in planning practice. Today, Serbia faces the privatization of state land and resources, while experts try to find their own place in an arena of manifold interests, making the citizens able to exercise only ‘de jure’ public consultation. The need for substantial citizens involvement is indisputable, however, the step towards its implementation follows the democratic development of Serbia.publishedVersio
Practicing a Polycentric (Post) Metropolis: A Dialogue about the Milan Urban Region
Get PDF‘Practicing a Polycentric (Post) Metropolis’ is the eighth booklet published as part of the AESOP Young Academics ‘Conversation in Planning Theory and Practice’ project whose aim is learning through conversations across generations of planners. In a first phase of the project, booklets were divided in three series or themes, such as, the use of philosophical theories in planning, planning theories and planning practices (Exploring place matters in planning practice), being the last one the framework for this booklet. Now, we have combined these series into a sole and comprehensive structure.
From a pedagogical perspective, the uniqueness of the project is learning through conversations. The booklets aim to provide an introduction to the theories and ideas of senior scholars: what and how they contributed to the field of planning; what and who influenced the development of these theories; and how this implicated/reflected on planning debate in theory and/or practice. The young academic authors not only learn from the senior scholars about their work, but also get involved in conversation with them in order to make sense of how the senior scholars have used these theories in their work, and how such theories are applied in planning theory and practice.
This booklet has been conceived as a reflection grounded on the practice of planning in the context of the Milan Urban Region. The dialogue merges the vivid experience of Alessandro Balducci with the sharp questions of Mario Paris discussing the phenomenology of post-metropolis and the governance of polycentric urbanized territories in Lombardy. Corinna Morandi and Willem Salet have offered their comments and enriched the conversation, bringing their perspectives into it. Being Urban Planning a practice-oriented discipline, we think it is important to stress the interdependency between theories and the way they apply in various contexts and places. Also, we think that the direct narrative of planners’ experience may open new interesting perspectives for advancing knowledge. In this respect, the extensive interview that is discussed in this booklet - and the reflections built around it - give the reader many insights concerned with an open and plural planning approach in processes of regional urbanization
The Aniene River: a green infrastructure to set up a metropolitan strategy
Get PDFThe latest territorial government tools have embedded green infrastructure with the aim to preserve the natural character and to stimulate regeneration processes of public open space and social cohesion, especially in peri-urban areas, where suburbs melt with agricultural and natural landscapes, and along the rivers, often neglected. This contribution will investigate the preparatory works for the new General Master Plan of Tivoli. A special focus is about the Aniene River as a potential Green Infrastructure, capable of restoring continuity to the ecological and functional fragmentation of landscapes heavily compromised by urban growth and production pressure. During the last decades, peri-urbanization and industrialization phenomena in these areas have ignored the river basin. The results are features of brownfields, industrial archaeology sites, informal settlements whereas open space is abandoned or unfittingly occupied by landfills, junkyards, brownfields. The Aniene River system boasts a relevant geographical dimension in order to test a strategic metropolitan governance able to address different sectoral issues. In this direction, the Aniene River Contract, that has recently started its official process, complements the traditional planning tools and represents a main opportunity for participatory processes where the community turns out to be central.publishedVersio
Spontaneous Living Spaces – Dwellings and Settlements in Pemba (Mozambique) : A typo-morphological analysis in changing urban environments
Get PDFSelf-construction determines large parts of the urban landscape of cities in developing countries. Self-built houses born from need, haste and limited economical resources, with formal or informal methods, are often conceived as temporary when built but then become constituent parts of the urban fabric. Loosing the character of temporariness, it becomes necessary to consider them as an integral part of the city. This research is aimed at mapping the “spontaneous living spaces” of changing urban environments, in terms of dimensions, inhabitants, used technologies, etc. identifying a stage of development and analysing the characteristics of contemporary living in contexts not designed by professionals. The results produced by this research experience can be useful for the development of policies and projects respectful of local, contemporary ways of living. Up to 2019, the research has analysed three case studies: the favela Guapira II in Sao Paulo, Brazil (2012); Pok Fu Lam neighbourhood, Hong Kong (2013) and four selected neighbourhoods in Pemba, Mozambique (2016-2018). Focusing on the evolution of architectural and urban elements that characterize self-built urbanization in Pemba (Mozambique), this paper illustrates the main evolution lines that define the relationship among the house, the city and the main settlement trends, addressing how traditional selfbuilt architecture is evolving and creating new forms of living within the city. Architectural and urban categories, as conceived in the western tradition, such as formal/informal or planned/unplanned are not applicable in developing contexts. Thanks to a typo-morphological on-site survey on, and analysis of, 50 houses in four selected neighbourhoods, this research gives its contribution to a critical understanding of their role, creating a more conscious background on living systems in Pemba. The analysis was integrated with schemes, architectural drawings, photographs, videos and interviews to the inhabitants.publishedVersio