Planning for Sustainability in Small Municipalities: The Influence of Interest Groups, Growth Patterns, and Institutional Characteristics

How and why small municipalities promote sustainability through planning efforts is poorly understood. We analyzed ordinances in 451 Maine municipalities and tested theories of policy adoption using regression analysis.We found that smaller communities do adopt programs that contribute to sustainability relevant to their scale and context. In line with the political market theory, we found that municipalities with strong environmental interests, higher growth, and more formal governments were more likely to adopt these policies. Consideration of context and capacity in planning for sustainability will help planners better identify and benefit from collaboration, training, and outreach opportunities

The mechanism of disaster capitalism and the failure to build community resilience:learning from the 2009 earthquake in L'Aquila, Italy

This paper reflects on what materialised during recovery operations following the earthquake in L'Aquila, Italy, on 6 April 2009. Previous critiques have focused on the actions of the Government of Italy and the Department of Civil Protection (Protezione Civile), with little attention paid to the role of local authorities. This analysis sheds light on how the latter used emergency powers, the command-and-control approach, and top-down planning to manage the disaster context, especially in terms of removal of rubble, implementing safety measures, and allocating temporary accommodation. It discusses how these arrangements constituted the mechanism via which ‘disaster capitalism’ took hold at the local and national level, and how it violated human rights, produced environmental and social impacts, hindered local communities from learning, transforming, and building resilience, and facilitated disaster capitalism and corruption. To make the disaster risk reduction and resilience paradigm more effective, a shift from centralised civil protection to decentralised, inclusive community empowerment systems is needed

No weighting for healthy sustainable local planning: Evaluation of a participatory appraisal tool for rationality and inclusivity

This paper is concerned with the contribution that project, plan and policy appraisal can make to effective decision making when shaping a built environment that needs to respond to the demands of local voices and also concerns for global sustainability and for population well-being. It argues that effectiveness depends on appraisal processes being rational, based on sound science, and also inclusive, involving stakeholders and implementers. A particular problem in all respects is the widespread reliance of decision makers on methods that use weighting. Although these give the appearance of validity, authority and objectivity, the paper argues that such methods are not compatible with the key tenets of appraisal and decision making that can address the challenges of localism, sustainability, health and inclusion. The paper advocates and evaluates a new technique, SPECTRUM, trialled in practice, which has been developed to meet these challenges. Specific attention is paid to its role in the development of the award winning ICON housing scheme in the Houndwood development at Street in Somerset, England. © 2013 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC

Mixed income housing (MIH)

Mixed Income Housing (MIH) is the outcome of a deliberate effort to build a mixed-income development, usually including a variety of housing typologies, sometime combined with the goal of creating a mixed-tenure development. International consensus on a more specific definition of MIH does not exist; instead, multiple expressions can be equally used, with similar meaning. The expression MIH is mainly used within the USA context where it is sometime replaced by mixed-income neighborhood. In Europe, MIH tend to fall within initiatives on (sustainable) urban regeneration, neighborhood restructuring, urban renewal, while the UK legislation often refers to “pepper-potting” with respect to different tenures in the same neighborhood aimed to achieve MIH. Non-English-speaking countries tend to use different terms. The MIH policies are challenged by a specific connotation, i.e., in the United States it is the combination between urban poverty and black or Latinos ghettoes; hence, spatial segregation is combined with racial considerations which are less present in other countries, except for South Africa. In the USA, desegregation in public housing estates became a legal obligation following the famous 1969 Gautreaux case, because of the application of the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibiting racial discrimination in federally funded activities

A methodology for assessing structure planning processes

Most of the research and published literature deals almost entirely with the effects of planned intervention. This is remarkable because since the late 1970s emphasis has shifted from plan to planning process. A planning process cannot be assessed in terms of the traditional measures of effectiveness. The purpose of this study is to describe a methodology for assessing a planning process by making use of variables related to normative, methodological, and institutional dimensions of planning with a view to initiate a comparative examination of methodologies for assessing a planning process as well as to develop more integrated thinking with regard to such an assessment.

Scenario construction for urban planning

There exists a substantial amount of literature on visionary urban futures. These scenarios over the urban futures have been interesting attempts to inform professional planners and futurologists as to the rich variety of alternative physical-spatial developments ahead. They have, however, been based on the prospect of large-scale urban growth and are not relevant for the slow or no growth conditions which characterize many cities and towns in Sweden and in other Western countries. The paper presents one method for constructing alternative urban scenarios under economic and political uncertainty. The method has been applied by the urban government in Västerås, Sweden. The paper is divided into six sections. The introductory section includes a very brief discussion of urban visions and their relevance for current urban planning problems. The second section contains a brief review of the Swedish urban planning system. In the third section the author discusses some conceptual and methodological issues in constructing scenarios. The fourth section contains the Västerås method for constructing scenarios which requires the participation of decision-makers and planners in order to ensure the implementation of development strategies outlined in the scenarios. The fifth section discusses the use of scenarios in urban planning in Västerås. A discussion of the operational and methodological problems and suggestions of key issues for further research are put forward in the concluding section.forecasting learning planning urban affairs futures research

Municipal planning in a mixed economy

Municipal Planning in a mixed economy is subjected to two sets of restrictions: those caused by the character of the politicoeconomic system and those arising from the relationship between the central and the municipal government. Planning methods need to take these restrictions into explicit consideration if they are to be useful. This paper discusses the first set of restrictions in connection with the analysis of economic planning in France and Sweden. The 'degree of plannedness' (manner and extent of planning) is related to the extent of governmental control with regard to the plan itself, its construction, and its implementation. The second set of restrictions is either of legal and 'regulatory' nature or defined by the economic relationship between the central and the local government. Thus municipal plans in a mixed economy become a flexible guide to municipal policymaking rather than a control instrument over municipal development.

EU democracy projection in the Southern Mediterranean a practice analysis

This is an original manuscript / preprint of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Mediterranean Politics on 01 Mar 2021, available online: https://doi.org/10.1080/13629395.2021.1883283