Showing papers in "Environment and Planning A in 2007"

Caution! Transitions Ahead: Politics, Practice, and Sustainable Transition Management:

Abstract: Green is not alone in contending that `̀ environmental c̀rises' require fundamental changes in the socio-technological structure of the way we live and work.''(1) For those concerned with sustainability, the idea of transitionöof substantial change and movement from one state to anotheröhas powerful normative attractions. If `we' can steer change, shape future development, and manage movement in desired directions, perhaps `we' can make the environment a better and more sustainable place in which to live. But how so to do? In a manifestly complex world dominated by hegemonic ideologies of neoliberal capitalism, global finance, and commodity flows is it really possible to intervene and deliberately shift technologies, practices, and social arrangementsönot to mention their systemic interaction and interdependenciesöonto an altogether different, altogether more sustainable track? Across the board there is growing recognition of the holistic, unavoidably interrelated nature of contemporary environmental problems and of the need for fresh approaches and forms of governance capable of engaging with complex challenges of this kind. Theories and models of sustainable transition management, derived from a blend of academic traditions in innovation, history, and technology, appear to fit this bill and it is no wonder that they are now catching on across a number of policy domains. In the Netherlands, government-sponsored programmes have explicitly adopted methods of `transition management' (Kemp and Loorbach, 2006) and in the UK, the policy relevance of similar theories and methods is being explored and actively promoted through projects and events like those supported by the ESRC's Sustainable Technologies Programme. Academically, and in just a few years, there has been rapid growth in the transition management literature and in the appeal of approaches characterised by an alluring combination of agency, complexity, uncertainty, and optimism. We do not intend to provide a thorough review or critique of what is in any case a burgeoning and quickly evolving literature, but at a time when the notion of transition management is capturing so much attention it is as well to reflect on the distinctive features of this particular policy innovation. With this limited aim in mind, we offer some cautionary comments and identify a handful of questions that deserve more explicit attention. The notion of transition is firmly rooted in traditions of system thinking which highlight the coevolution of the social and the technical and which seek to understand and analyse the emergence, transformation, and decay of sociotechnical systems. Much of the `systems in transition' literature makes use of Rip and Kemp's (1998) `multilevel' model of innovation which distinguishes between the macrolevel of the sociotechnical landscape, the mesolevel regime, and the microlevel niche. The key Commentary Environment and Planning A 2007, volume 39, pages 763 ^ 770

Semiparametric Filtering of Spatial Autocorrelation: The Eigenvector Approach

Abstract: In the context of spatial regression analysis, several methods can be used to control for the statistical effects of spatial dependencies among observations. Maximum likelihood or Bayesian approaches account for spatial dependencies in a parametric framework, whereas recent spatial filtering approaches focus on nonparametrically removing spatial autocorrelation. In this paper we propose a semiparametric spatial filtering approach that allows researchers to deal explicitly with (a) spatially lagged autoregressive models and (b) simultaneous autoregressive spatial models. As in one non-parametric spatial filtering approach, a specific subset of eigenvectors from a transformed spatial link matrix is used to capture dependencies among the disturbances of a spatial regression model. However, the optimal subset in the proposed filtering model is identified more intuitively by an objective function that minimizes spatial autocorrelation rather than maximizes a model fit. The proposed objective function has the a...

Transit-oriented development’s ridership bonus: a product of self-selection and public policies

Abstract: Transit-oriented development is shown to produce an appreciable ridership bonus in California. This is partly due to residential self-selection—that is, a lifestyle preference for transit-oriented living—as well as factors like employer-based policies that reduce free parking and automobile subsidies. Half-mile catchments of station areas appear to be indifference zones in the sense that residents generally ride transit regardless of local urban design attributes. Out-of-neighborhood attributes, like job accessibility and street connectivity at the destination, on the other hand, have a significant bearing on transit usage among station-area residents. The presence of self-selection, shown using nested logit modeling, underscores the importance of removing barriers to residential mobility so that households are able to sort themselves, via the marketplace, to locations well served by transit. Market-responsive zoning, flexible residential parking policies, location efficient mortgages, and adaptive reuse ...

Gentrification as a governmental strategy: social control and social cohesion in Hoogvliet, Rotterdam

Abstract: The emergence of gentrification as a ‘global urban strategy’ (Smith, 2002, “New globalism, new urbanism: gentrification as a global urban strategy” Antipode 34 427–451) is clearly visible in the peripheral boroughs of Dutch cities. We suggest, however, that the driving force of gentrification in these areas is not the local government's need to strengthen its tax base or developers' pursuit of profit. Gentrification is also not a response to the housing demands of a new middle class. Instead, we conceive of state-led gentrification in the Netherlands, and perhaps elsewhere as well, as an attempt by a coalition of state actors and housing associations at generating social order in disadvantaged neighbourhoods. Gentrification is used to pacify tensions and to reduce concentrations that pose a problem for authorities. In many cases, residents support this strategy, either actively or passively. But, at the same time, interaction between low-income and higher-income households, and between renters and homeown...

Studentification and 'apprentice' gentrifiers within Britain's provincial towns and cities: extending the meaning of gentrification

Abstract: This paper focuses on processes of studentification, and explores the link between higher education students and contemporary provincial gentrification. The paper provides two main, interconnected,...

Diagnostic Tools and a Remedial Method for Collinearity in Geographically Weighted Regression

Abstract: Geographically weighted regression (GWR) is drawing attention as a statistical method to estimate regression models with spatially varying relationships between explanatory variables and a response variable. Local collinearity in weighted explanatory variables leads to GWR coefficient estimates that are correlated locally and across space, have inflated variances, and are at times counterintuitive and contradictory in sign to the global regression estimates. The presence of local collinearity in the absence of global collinearity necessitates the use of diagnostic tools in the local regression model building process to highlight areas in which the results are not reliable for statistical inference. The method of ridge regression can also be integrated into the GWR framework to constrain and stabilize regression coefficients and lower prediction error. This paper presents numerous diagnostic tools and ridge regression in GWR and demonstrates the utility of these techniques with an example using the Columbu...

Social Influence on Travel Behavior: A Simulation Example of the Decision to Telecommute

Abstract: This paper addresses interagent interactions, an issue that has received limited attention in travel behavior research. Drawing upon the theory of externalities and the sociological notion of socia...

Spatialising Participatory Approaches: The Contribution of Geography to a Mature Debate

Abstract: This paper explores the contribution that geographers can make to debates about the nature and utility of participatory approaches It argues for a constructive reconciliation between these approaches and the growing poststructural critique of participation Through an examination of the similarities and entanglements between power and empowerment it highlights the centrality of geographical issues to understanding how participation works and how its resources might be distanciated beyond the arenas of participatory projects to produce empowering effects elsewhere

Outdoor Environments, Activity and the Well-Being of Older People: Conceptualising Environmental Support

Abstract: Although the outdoor environment provides older people with various opportunities to enhance their quality of life (QOL), few studies have investigated the extent to which this environment is influential in practice. In order to enable empirical research on this topic, in this paper we propose and examine the concept of environmental support. On the basis of a review of recent literature in gerontology, public health, environmental psychology, landscape architecture, and urban design, we argue that the supportiveness of neighbourhood environments that make outdoor activity (eg, walking) easy and enjoyable is conducive to a better QOL for older people. We introduce three ways of conceptualising environmental support focusing on the following: personally meaningful outdoor activities, environmental attributes found relevant to people's activities, and unmet needs for daily activities. Several conceptual frameworks that incorporate environmental support, QOL and other potentially salient constructs are also presented. We suggest possible future research directions employing this concept.

“How Shall I Say it … ?” Relating the Nonrelational

Abstract: As the ideas of the relational and relationality become part of the everyday conceptual make-up of human geography, in this paper I seek to recall the insistent and incessant importance of the nonrelational. In dialogue with nonrepresentational theory, as well as its critics, I suggest that any thought or theory of relationality must have as its acknowledged occasion the incessant proximity of the nonrelational. The occasion for this discussion is a consideration of the relationship between suffering, pain, or passion and the thematising actions of representation, communication, narrativisation, and theorisation. Such affections, it is claimed, present social science with a particular problem, a problem which revolves around an irreducible nonthematisability within these dimensions of corporeal existence. Drawing on the writings of Butler, Derrida, and Levinas I offer an account of how this problem or impasse allows for a rethinking of the ethical within social analysis and of the nature of representation, corporeality, and intersubjectivity.

Modes of governing municipal waste

Abstract: From recent debates on governance and governmentality, two key analytical imperatives arise: the need to engage simultaneously with the structures and processes of governing, and the need to recognise the plurality and multiplicity of governing sites and activities. In seeking to address these imperatives, we develop an analytical approach, the modes of governing approach, which engages with the rationalities, agencies, institutional relations, and technologies of governing that coalesce around particular objectives and entities to be governed. Drawing on the example of municipal waste management, we illustrate how this framework can illuminate the dynamic and multiple nature of governing, and outline the key modes of governing which currently shape the policy and practice of municipal waste.

Loft Conversion and Gentrification in London: From Industrial to Postindustrial Land Use

Abstract: It is argued that many major Western cities have seen the conversion of centrally located commercial and industrial property to residential uses in recent years. This is seen as part of a wider pro...

Higher Education and Spatial (Im)Mobility: Nontraditional Students and Living at Home:

Abstract: I investigate the mobility decisions of students going into higher education in the UK, and look particularly at the circumstances under which students in one higher education market chose to live at home and their experiences of attending a local university. As more young people from nontraditional backgrounds are encouraged to participate in higher education, and as the financial costs of attending are increasingly borne by students and their families, more students are choosing to stay at home for financial reasons. I explore the advantages and disadvantages of students' decisions to live at home in the context of normative debates which stress the value of spatial mobility to the student lifestyle. While the evidence supports the argument that living at home is an economically rational decision for students from nontraditional backgrounds, it is also steeped in young peoples' emotional attachments to locally based networks of family and friends. Further, the connections between living at home and soci...

Cross-sectional and quasi-panel explorations of the connection between the built environment and auto ownership

Abstract: Auto ownership is a critical mediating link in the connection between the built environment and travel behavior: the built environment presumably influences auto ownership, which in turn impacts travel behavior. However, the way in which individual elements of the built environment affect auto ownership choices is far from understood. Further, residential self-selection may confound the interaction between the built environment and auto ownership. And the absence of panel data impedes our understanding of the causal relationships. Using a survey of 1682 respondents in Northern California, this study applied ordered probit and static-score modeling techniques to investigate the causal link from the built environment to auto ownership in both cross-sectional and quasi-panel contexts. Through variable selection in cross-sectional analysis, we found that individuals’ attitudes regarding residential neighborhood and travel are more strongly associated with their auto ownership decision than is the built environment per se. Specifically, when general preferences for various neighborhood traits were allowed to enter the model, they drove out from the model the (perceived) measure of the same trait for the neighborhood of current residence, a pattern suggesting that the observed correlation between neighborhood characteristics and auto ownership is primarily a result of self-selection. On the other hand, the quasi-panel results indicate that some built environment elements such as outdoor spaciousness and mixed land use are causes of auto ownership (remaining even after attitudes were allowed to enter the model), but their effects are marginal. In contrast, the strong influence of socio-demographics suggests that households’ auto ownership decisions are fundamentally based on their mobility needs and purchasing power. Given the mixed findings, this study does not definitively confirm a causal relationship between the built environment and auto ownership. However, it provides encouraging evidence that land-use policies designed to reduce auto ownership and use will lead to a marginal reduction in auto ownership.

Employment Concentrations in Los Angeles, 1980–2000:

Abstract: Are contemporary metropolitan regions becoming more dispersed? There are theoretical arguments for both concentration and dispersal. The purpose of our research is to establish an empirical base that can help us to understand the evolution of metropolitan spatial structure. Using data for the Los Angeles region from 1980, 1990, and 2000, we identify employment centers and describe spatial trends in the pattern of employment inside and outside these centers. We find: (1) a remarkable degree of stability in the system of centers; (2) an increase in the average distance of jobs from the traditional core; (3) the emergence and growth of employment centers; (4) the rapid growth of dispersed employment in outer suburbs. These trends appear to defy simple models of urban evolution and call for a more nuanced portrayal of contemporary regions and the dynamics underlying spatial organization.

A Theory of Institutional Change: Illustrated by Dutch City-Provinces and Dutch Land Policy

Abstract: Since the early 1990s, planning theory has focused on the issue of institutional change. Not only does institutional change have clear bearings on processes of spatial planning, it is also, increasingly, seen as an object of planning. A core concept in the literature is the juxtaposition of ‘institutional design’ and ‘institutional evolution’. Yet, in understanding processes and the role of institutional change, this dichotomy does not appear to be very helpful. We therefore propose a more encompassing perspective that includes both ‘design’ and ‘evolution’ dimensions, invoking various components from theories of policy change, inspired by the work of Kingdon. We try to unravel, in particular, why, under seemingly comparable conditions, some cases show substantive institutional transformations while others do not. We briefly discuss two cases from the Netherlands to illustrate this point, namely the thwarted process of establishing city regions within the scalar fabric of territorial governance, and some ...

Reviewing Geographies of Memory/Forgetting:

Abstract: In this paper I seek to review the literature regarding the spaces of memory and forgetting outside the geographical core of the Western discipline. This takes in two bodies of literature. First, works from outside the geographical discipline on memory and forgetting, as conceived at both the individual and the collective scale. Second, I move beyond the scope of ‘developed’ countries to look at works on memory in India, where subaltern, communal, and rural memories have been explored.

Global events, national politics, local lives: young Muslim men in Scotland

Abstract: In this paper I explore the influence of global events on the lives and experiences of young Muslim men living in postdevolution urban Scotland. Expanding upon understandings of scale, I highlight the complex ways that scale is struggled for and over, and in doing so challenge the notion that young people are disengaged from, and apathetic about, mainstream politics. Drawing on the young men's reactions and experiences of the global, nation, state, and local scales following 11 September 2001 and the subsequent war in Iraq, in this paper I include the voices of minority ethnic youth in political geographies and understandings of political participation.

Mutinous Eruptions: Autonomous Spaces of Radical Queer Activism:

Abstract: This paper offers a reflexive ethnography of a set of queer autonomous spaces created in London over the last five years. It traces the political genealogies of a recent strand of radical queer activism that is broadly aligned with the anarchist and anticapitalist wings of the global justice movement. In line with the usage of the term ‘queer’ by these activists themselves, to refer to a variety of states of being that challenge both homonormativity and heteronormativity, this paper utilises a definition of ‘queer’ that moves beyond the ways in which it has been mobilised by many sexual geographers. The ethnography poses questions about the ‘queer’ in ‘queer geography’ and what it means to be an ‘activist’. This work considers the importance (as well as the limits) of these autonomous queer spaces. It suggests that the process of collective experimentation to build autonomous queer spaces is ultimately more transformative and empowering than the resulting structures.

Molecular Affects in Human Geographies

Abstract: In this paper I engage critically with the relation between affect and the molecular—the former touching upon but not limited to questions of mood and emotion, and the latter registering the power of processes including, but not limited to, the neurochemical. The backdrop to this engagement is an emerging diagram of the molecular processes and pathways in which affect is implicated. The emergence of this diagram not only foregrounds the importance of thinking critically about how affect is caught up in a range of techniques and technologies: it also raises the question of how to attend to molecular affects—and their implication in the matter and movement of thinking—without falling back upon a kind of biological or physiological reductionism. I provide a provisional answer to this question. In doing so I draw support from a range of thinkers, including Lucretius, Spinoza, Deleuze, and Guattari, each of whom points to the possibility of cultivating a kind of molecular logic of sense. In moving towards a co...

Designer Neighbourhoods: New-Build Residential Development in Nonmetropolitan UK Cities—The Case of Bristol:

Abstract: New-build city-centre residential development in the UK has increasingly been identified as a form of ‘third-wave’ or ‘postrecession’ gentrification. The aim of this paper is, first, to extend our understanding of new, developer-led, residential development in the context of nonmetropolitan urban areas in the UK, which it does by means of a case study of the city of Bristol. The second aim is to revisit the issue of whether such residential development should be seen as a form of postrecession gentrification and to question the meaning of the term ‘gentrification’ as it has been increasingly used in a global context. This discussion draws both on a detailed case study of Bristol and on a critical reading of Davidson and Lees (2005, “New build ‘gentrification’ and London's riverside renaissance”, Envronment and Planning A 37 1165–1190) account of new-build ‘gentrification’ in London's riverside. In conclusion, it is argued that these forms of residential development and investment flows reflect a powerful ...

Stuck at the front door: gender, fear of crime and the challenge of creating safer space

Abstract: This paper is in respectful challenge to two streams in urban social geography and planning literatures: the question of how gendered geographies of fear help constitute identities spatially, and the related question of how gendered urban space can be made and remade to be more egalitarian. I argue that the first of these bodies of literature is often trapped in an unhelpful public–private divide, which reflects the inability of mainstream crime prevention to include violence committed within families and households as a central focus of concern. I further argue that the question of how urban space can become more egalitarian needs to be concerned with violence and fear in the private realm as well as the public realm. Although the paper is primarily a review of recent academic and policy-oriented literature, my arguments are illustrated by a research project on how grassroots organizations serving new-arrival women in the outer suburbs of Melbourne and Toronto, as well as their funders, are redefining vi...

A SWOT Analysis of Planning Support Systems

Abstract: Insight into the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) of planning support systems (PSS) is fragmented between users and system developers. The lack of combined insights blocks development in the right direction and makes potential users hesitant to apply PSS in planning. This study presents SWOT of PSS from a combined user^developer perspective. We first express them in terms of combinations of planning task, PSS information function, and user, and subsequently use a literature survey, a series of interviews, and a web survey to gather views from developers, users, and PSS experts. The analysis shows that planners mainly use simple information storage and retrieval systems for exploration tasks, while the majority of PSS are technically much more advanced and aim to support complex tasks. The potential of these advanced PSS can only be realized if planners and system developers start to share knowledge and demands and identify opportunities in a cooperative PSS-development process. Without such a process, the advantages and opportunities of PSS will remain unexploited.

If you pick up the children, I'll do the groceries: spatial differences in between-partner interactions in out-of-home household activities

Abstract: While many studies have been conducted about the allocation of household duties within households, little is known about the impact of land use and accessibility on the distribution of out-of- home household tasks between spouses and about men's participation in such activities. This paper addresses this impact, while controlling for the impact of household structure, life cycle, employment status and hours, access to transport systems, and interactions among activities in persons' activity schedules. Path models for male^female couples in the Amsterdam^Utrecht corridor, the Netherlands, show that land use and accessibility influence between-partner interactions in maintenance activity participation, although their role appears to be smaller than that of sociodemographics and access to transport systems. While women perform the bulk of out-of-home household tasks, men are respon- sible for a larger share of out-of-home household duties in neighbourhoods characterised by a higher population density and/or more diversity of land uses than they are in lower density and/or less diverse neighbourhoods. However, women's responsibilities are not reduced to the same extent, because spouses' joint participation is also somewhat larger in higher density, more diverse neighbour- hoods and because part of men's participation in these neighbourhoods reflects household activities not undertaken elsewhere.

Which SMEs Use External Business Advice? A Multivariate Subregional Study

Abstract: The authors examine factors that influence the propensity of a firm to take up external business support across four large English towns, using random effects nominal probit regression analysis to capture sector heterogeneity. The results suggest a strong positive association between the orientation of the firm towards growth and its propensity to use external business advice. ‘Push’ factors, including the existence of recruitment difficulties, are identified as key triggers to use business advice. These results provide valuable guidance to public policy organisations concerned with business development and competitiveness, and suggest a number of avenues for future research.

Is Gentrification a Useful Paradigm to Analyse Social Changes in the Paris Metropolis

Abstract: The category of gentrification has only recently began to be used for the study of French cities. The process through which working-class neighbourhoods became areas of upper-middle-class residence was earlier discussed as embourgeoisement, largely referred to as state intervention and seen as the effect of the permanent preference for central locations of higher categories. The detailed empirical examination of the Paris metropolis shows that such changes have indeed been occurring steadily over the last decades, but that the largest number of neighbourhoods experiencing that change of social profile are to be found in the first ring of banlieues and not in the central city. The analysis of the social profile of gentrifiers shows that it differs substantially between areas. Three main types of processes are identified: the first is the expansion of upper-class areas into adjacent working-class neighbourhoods, with an influx mainly of private-sector professionals, managers, and engineers; the second is up...

Investigating Urban Spatial Mismatch Using Job–Housing Indicators to Model Home–Work Separation:

Abstract: During the past four decades a great deal of research has been carried out investigating aspects of the spatial mismatch hypothesis. At its foundation, the notion of spatial mismatch is driven larg...

Making New Political Spaces: Mobilizing Spatial Imaginaries, Instrumentalizing Spatial Practices, and Strategically Using Spatial Tools

Abstract: This paper explores space as the object of mobilization (rather than focusing on space as resource or constraint, or on the spatial configuration of actors within the organizational structure of a movement). In the context of state-restructuring processes, it is argued that new political spaces result not only from social movement activities (as in the drive for ‘free spaces’), but also in a dynamic interaction between state and civil society actors. The author asks what it takes to create a new, effective, and significant political space. Three elements are explored empirically and theoretically: the production of allegiance and legitimacy through spatial imaginaries, the instrumentalization of spatial practices and of the political culture, and the strategic use of spatial tools. In light of the case of Toronto, where a new regional political space eased the normalization of neoliberalism, it is concluded that new political spaces create the conditions for political exchange, but do not guarantee emanci...

Twenty Years on: Has the Economy of the UK Coalfields Recovered?:

Abstract: Almost the whole of the British coal industry has closed since the early 1980s. The authors assess the extent to which the areas once dependent on coalmining have adapted to this job loss. A ‘labour-market accounting’ approach is employed to document the principal changes in employment, unemployment, commuting, and activity rates among men in the English and Welsh coalfields over the period to 2004, building on previous similar research covering the period 1981–91. The authors point to a strong recovery of employment among men in these areas, though this is not yet on a scale to offset all the coal job losses and there is important variation between areas. There is also evidence of extensive and continuing ‘hidden unemployment’.

Immigrant Grocery-Shopping Behavior: Ethnic Identity versus Accessibility

Abstract: This paper contributes to the ongoing debate in the ‘new’ economic geography over the dialectic between the cultural and the economic, and in which the study of the geography of consumption is a prime example. The consumer behavior of culturally distinct immigrants is an intriguing and complex economic and cultural inquiry. In this paper we explore the grocery-shopping behavior of suburban middle-class Chinese immigrants in Toronto, where the group's ethnic economy has become full-fledged. Using a mixed approach combining focus groups and logistic modeling, we examine the preferences of Chinese immigrants between the fast-growing Chinese supermarkets and competing mainstream supermarket chains. Attention is focused upon the interplay of ethnic identity and accessibility in determining store patronage. The findings suggest a stronger effect of ethnic affinity on immigrants' choice of shopping venue than that of economic rationality. Grocery shopping, a most mundane and taken-for-granted activity, is practi...