Diminutive

Land of Promise: Addressing Long Term Spatial Trends in an Era of Diminutive Planning

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• published: 20 Jan 2013
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Alexander von Humboldt Lecture Series 2012-2013 on 'Making Cities Work' see also: www.ru.nl/humboldt Alexander von Humboldt Lecture: Land of Promise: Addressing Long Term Spatial Trends in an Era of Diminutive Planning Prof. Mark Tewdwr-Jones, School of Architecture Planning and Landscape, Newcastle University, UK Monday, January, 14, 2013 Abstract: In this time of global economic uncertainty, demographic upheaval, social polarisation and climate change impacts, modern society still wants it all. We have an insatiable demand for land for everything we require. We remain concerned about the provision and cost of new housing especially in capital city regions, there are consequences of possible increases in population numbers for the provision of essential services such as health and education, but also of water and fuel provision, and there is growing anxiety at the impact of extreme weather conditions. The land does not only enable us to have homes, shops, hospitals, schools, universities, leisure facilities, transport, and places of work. It provides us with water, food, energy, recreation, biodiversity, minerals, and is a site for our waste. Whether it is urban or rural in character, or located in an upland or lowland location, at the coast or in a valley, land supplies us with our essential needs and quality of life. But the amount of land we have is just about constant. There is a finite supply of it, and that means as our appetite for more essential services increases and quality of life improves, so does the problem of how to manage how our land is used in different areas. The planning system has lurched from one set of political objectives to another throughout the last 100 years in response to changing socio-economic and environmental conditions, and as a political tool of governments. But politicians have believed that they can achieve win win scenarios -- sustainable develop-ment in some countries is now a hollow sentiment. There are long term trends and drivers of change that are now much more difficult to analyse and address as countries become preoccupied with short term needs, and where economic growth remains the dominant problem. Politicians and planners are increasingly working within narrow disciplinary parameters and failing to take a synoptic view of policy impacts across related fields. As we embrace more pluralist and collaborative forms of democracy, who has the power to take long term nation-ally-significant planning decisions? Methodologically, we often lack the concep-tual and analytical means to combine social science with science, and to take short term decisions within the context of long term scenario building and fu-tures thinking. This talk considers long term socio-economic and environmental trends, and considers whether strategic spatial planning is fit for purpose. Call-ing for a new relationship between social science thinking and environmental science in the interests of our cities and regions, Professor Tewdwr-Jones sets out the case for a range of new concepts and techniques that provide the means to deliver sustainable development over the next 50 years, while also reconfiguring the role and position of urban planning.