44 Publications
Nordic cycling policy: National objectives, mechanisms, and actors in Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden
This paper reviews how Nordic countries are working to improve cycling via policy and planning. It takes a national-level approach to review cycling objectives, mechanisms and key actors in Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden.
2023 November
- Working paper
- Europe
- Nordic Region
- Sustainable development
- Urban planning
The OECD Rural Agenda for Climate Action Compendium of Best Practices: Peatland ACTION
Peatland ACTION is a programme delivering peatland restoration projects across Scotland to tackle climate change and biodiversity loss. Peatlands are terrestrial wetland environments where the peat – a dark brown substance like soil – is waterlogged for most of the year. 80% of the UK’s peatlands, the majority of which are in Scotland, are estimated to be in poor condition. In their natural state, peatlands represent the single most important terrestrial soil carbon store. Yet, activities such as artificial drainage, forestry, over-grazing and extraction, result in the peatlands emitting carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases (GHG), thereby contributing to climate change. In addition, other benefits of healthy peatlands such as source-water quality, flood management and addressing wildfire risks are much reduced. The UK’s GHG inventory estimates that degraded peatlands are contributing over 15% of Scotland’s GHG emissions. To reverse this trend and ensure that peatlands act as a carbon storage, Peatland ACTION provides funding to land managers to restore peatlands as well as advisory services, project design and restoration management. This storymap was produced as a collaboration between Nordregio and the OECD Rural Agenda for Climate Action.
2023 September
- Storymap
- Europe
- Sustainable development
Nordregio Magazine
Each issue of the Nordregio Magazine provides perspectives on a specific theme related to regional development and planning in the Nordic countries. With Nordregio Magazine you are kept up to date with the interesting research results produced by Nordregio in a European and global perspective.
2022 January
- Nordregio magazine
- Arctic
- Baltic Sea Region
- Cross-border
- Europe
- Global
- Nordic Region
- Arctic issues
- Bioeconomy
- Covid-19
- Digitalisation
- Finance
- Gender equality
- Governance
- Green transition
- Integration
- Labour market
- Maritime spatial planning
- Migration
- Regional innovation
- Rural development
- Sustainable development
- Tourism
- Urban planning
Maximising mobility and access to services in rural areas
Demographic change and limited public funding in remote rural areas threaten the accessibility of goods and social services in many countries in the Baltic Sea Region (BSR). The MAMBA project aims to meet this challenge by promoting sustainable “people-to-service” and “service-to-people” solutions in rural areas. These guidelines seek to provide feasible policy recommendations for national, regional and local government bodies, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and transport service providers. They offer insights into overcoming legal, financial and governance obstacles to rural transport solutions, and aim to improve and maximise both mobility and access to services in rural regions. They are based on what has been learned during the three-year project in the nine regions involved, which have tested pilot schemes and established mobility centres. The pilot actions were part of the MAMBA project co-funded by the Interreg Baltic Sea Region Programme and included legislative, economic and social analyses. The main recommendations for maximising mobility and access to services in rural areas are: Develop long-term mobility planning tools Improve social inclusion and access to services Try out innovative solutions using smaller vehicles Support grassroots initiatives Combine trips to save resources Establish conditions that guarantee mobility Make mobility-related procurement easier inrural areas Take risks and come up with innovative solutions Go digital. MAMBAThis document is the official output O5.4 of MAMBA (Maximising Mobility and Accessibility of Services in Regions Affected by Demographic Change). MAMBA is a transnational cooperation project part-funded by the European Union (European Regional Development Fund under the Interreg Baltic Sea Region Programme 2014–2020). The contents of this publication are the sole responsibility of the authors and can in no way be taken to reflect the views of the European Union, the Managing Authority or the Joint Secretariat of the Interreg Baltic Sea Region Programme 2014–2020. About this guidance document:These guidelines are…
2020 September
- Other publications
- Report
- Europe
- Regional innovation
- Rural development
Planning for agglomeration economies in a polycentric region
Envisioning an efficient metropolitan core area in Flanders. To some degree, metropolitan regions owe their existence to the ability to valorize agglomeration economies. The general perception is that agglomeration economies increase with city size, which is why economists tend to propagate urbanization, in this case in the form of metropolization. Contrarily, spatial planners traditionally emphasize the negative consequences of urban growth in terms of liveability, environmental quality, and congestion. Polycentric development models have been proposed as a specific form of metropolization that allow for both agglomeration economies and higher levels of liveability and sustainability. This paper addresses the challenge of how such polycentric development can be achieved in planning practice. We introduce ‘agglomeration potential maps’ that visualize potential locations in a polycentric metropolitan area where positive agglomeration externalities can be optimized. These maps are utilized in the process of developing a new spatial vision for Flanders’ polycentric ‘metropolitan core area’, commonly known as the Flemish Diamond. The spatial vision aspires to determine where predicted future population growth in the metropolitan core area could best be located, while both optimizing positive agglomeration externalities and maintaining its small-scale morphological character. Based on a literature review of optimum urban-size thresholds and our agglomeration potential maps, we document how such maps contributed to developing this spatial vision for the Flemish metropolitan core area.
2018 August
- Research articles / EJSD
- Europe
- Governance
- Urban planning
An Institutionalist View on Experimentalist Governance: Local-level obstacles to policy-learning in European Union Cohesion Policy
The paper has the dual objective of contributing to theory development as well as to the debate about the added value of EU Cohesion Policy. Experimentalist governance theory suggests that a virtuous feedback loop between policy design and implementation can the input- and output-legitimacy of policy making. EU Cohesion Policy formally resembles this experimentalist setting, but persistent debates about its added value suggest that the virtuous loop is blocked. The paper uses new institutionalism theory to systematically identify theoretical explanations for this blockage. It argues that the experimentalist link between organizational structure, pooling of experiences, greater participation, and policy learning is highly precarious. First, the rational-choice perspective suggests that the link rests on the optimistic assumption of a common utility function among the participating actors. Moreover, the structural funds provide strong incentives for grant-seeking. Second, the discursive perspective shows that the identification of shared interests depends on highly demanding speech conditions. Third, the sociological perspective highlights that the evaluation of information is socially conditioned. Therefore, learning may be based on fallacious assumptions and lead to undesired results. The paper substantiates these insights with empirical evidence from one case of institutionalized cross-border cooperation in East Central Europe. This article is published by the European Journal of Spatial Development, which in turn is published by Nordregio and Delft University of Technology, Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment.
2017 December
- Research articles / EJSD
- Cross-border
- Europe
- Governance
The construction of a trading zone as political strategy: a review of London Infrastructure Plan 2050
The recent London Infrastructure Plan 2050 appears as an attempt for coming up with innovative answers to infrastructure issues, aiming at providing new spaces where different actors can collaborate, defining adequate visions and governance bodies. Our hypothesis is that the plan can be interpreted through the relevant and yet ambiguous concept of ‘trading zone’, which highlights the setting up of new spaces for confrontation but also shows their use as political vehicles to advocate for increased powers and resources. To investigate the issue, the paper reviews the literature on the concept of trading zone in order to discuss in this perspective the London Infrastructure Plan planning process. The analysis is developed as follows: after a theoretical discussion of trading zones and their relationship with infrastructure planning processes, two significant aspects of the London Infrastructure Plan are examined: the stakeholders’ engagement required by strategic planning processes, and the ongoing planning processes of London, influenced by the Localism agenda. Consequently, the London Infrastructure Plan 2050 is described and reviewed in the light of its political strategic meaning, providing a discussion of its vision, contents and planning process. The analysis uses and rediscusses the concept of trading zone by observing how local authorities may use planning processes to strategically position themselves and influence the complex governance of infrastructure planning. This article is published by the European Journal of Spatial Development, which in turn is published by Nordregio and Delft University of Technology, Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment.
2017 July
- Research articles / EJSD
- Europe
- Governance
Multi-level Territorial Governance and Cohesion Policy: Structural Funds and the Timing of Development in Palermo and the Italian Mezzogiorno
This article explores the role of changing arrangements of multi-level territorial governance in the European Cohesion Policy. It hypothesises the existence of a temporal duality between successful/unsuccessful phases of Cohesion Policy between the 1990s and 2000s, that is, a structural change in the implementation of Structural Funds stemming from the reforms at the turn of the millennium. The article seeks to understand the implications of such a duality using case study analysis, with the theoretical aim of exploring in-depth the connections between the European and the local scale. It analyses in the long term (1994-2013) the use of Structural Funds for urban development in a specific context, the city of Palermo in the Objective 1 region of Sicily, under-explored by international literature. The phases of Structural Funds are understood in the wider context of Palermo, Sicily and Southern Italy, emphasising the temporal coherence between (i) the phases of autonomous/dependent development, (ii) evolution/involution in the implementation of cohesion policies, and (iii) shifting multi-level territorial governance arrangements. The local case confirms the duality hypothesised and, based on this, wider considerations for the future of Cohesion Policy are set out. This article is published by the European Journal of Spatial Development (archive), which in turn is published by Nordregio and Delft University of Technology, Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment.
2016 October
- Research articles / EJSD
- Europe
- Governance
- Urban planning