Planning or Market Deficits for Sustainable Development in Norway

All over Europe cities are facing high immigration rates and are growing. The bigger cities in Norway are no exception. In Norway, as in most other European countries, Compact City Development is regarded as the most sustainable urban growth model. For more than 20 years urban land transformation and the reuse of grey- and brownfield urban land into urban residential areas has been the main tool in sustainable accommodating of the growing population. Despite many successful developments there are still attractive areas in the core of the cities staying undeveloped. It stays undeveloped despite being designated for redevelopment by the local planning authority, despite rising house prices in the neighbouring area and despite high land values. This paper outlines a theoretical approach aiming at explaining why such area stays underdeveloped. It addresses planning theory, market theory and collective action theory in order to better understand urban redevelopment processes. The ideal of the compact city runs parallel with another important change in urban planning in Norway. There has been a market orientation in urban planning since the 1980s [4] [6] [3]. This market orientation has tree characteristics: In Norway today, implementation of plans – in the understanding of producing urban space – in practice has become a private matter. Developers are drafting detailed zoning plans tailored for the projects they want to build. Also, the Norwegian local governments have few financial instruments to finance municipal land purchase: the local authorities do not own urban land (only smaller spots pepper-sparkled around the cities, and land already used for public services). The local authorities are refraining from buying lands and are reluctant to use eminent domain and pre-emption. Therefore the local governments are dependent on private, commercial developers implement land use plans, and to realise their housing objectives as well as pushing economic development.