Volumen 70 (2012): Edición 5 (October 2012)

This paper introduces a land suitability analysis, based on the Dutch "ABC location planning". Two criteria are applied in this process: Firstly, the accessibility of high-ranking local public transport locations as well as town centres, and secondly, the density of the surrounding urban fabric. The aim of the paper is not only to employ this method as a technical assessment instrument for planners, but to use its transparency and traceability for the purpose of introducing a "mediation and communication tool" into discussion processes at the local level. The underlying case study involved the assessment of the building land reserves of Lower Austrian municipalities belonging to the Biosphere Reserve Wienerwald. These are characterised both by a significant degree of suburbanisation radiating from Vienna, the capital of Austria, and also by the considerable heterogeneity of the settlement structure. The method described not only serves to operationalize the process of sustainability within local spatial planning, but also to make planning processes accessible to larger groups of actors in terms of a governance strategy, thus triggering broader discussion processes at the local level, about when settlement development can be seen as "good" or "bad".

The utilization of urban planning practices for political purposes has become an issue of planning theory in the last decades. Until the 1970s town planning was considered to be a neutral and rational instrument for the purpose of spatial regulation and administration as well as the general improvement of living conditions. Only recently with the rise of communicative planning theory this perspective has been complemented by critical perceptions of the political and ideological role of planning practices within society, their context-dependence, legitimization, normative purposes and also its interlinkages to individual aims as well as political and economic power. Jerusalem, the (partly occupied) capital of Israel, is a prototypic example of the utilization of urban planning for (even geo) political ends. This article is based on qualitative fieldwork and aims to scrutinize the scalar political consequences of various urban planning practices in Jerusalem. We undertake an analysis of the reciprocal relations of local, national, and geostrategic interests as well as the resulting actions by the relevant stakeholders. Theoretically informed by postcolonial geographies and performative approaches the paper concludes, that urban planning in Jerusalem is a highly political instrument that is strongly involved in the performative implementations of particular geographic imaginations of Jerusalem as a united capital of the state of Israel and historic as well as religious symbol of the Jewish nation. Hence urban planning in Jerusalem is an active element in the enforcement of hegemonic political interests which reach beyond the local context of Eastern Jerusalem.

This article examines recent shifts among German homeowners towards the use of their housing equity under the circumstance of demographic change. Whilst traditionally housing equity was considered a consumer good, recent developments in pension provision and demographics strengthen its position as a pension asset. Consequently, more and more young German households consider their dwelling to be a centrepiece of their financial provisions in preparation for future risks and for retirement. This is clearly a new perspective in a predominantly tenant society. Based on 36 in-depth interviews with members of households, the authors assert that homeowning behaviour and attitudes have evolved differently for different generations and point out distinguishable "housing generations". The younger a household the more often housing equity features as an investment good, with the downside that with this development continuing inheritances may decline, often the only way young German households can afford buying a house.

Doubtlessly the ecological effects of renewable energies play an important role for the acceptance in the population, but local politicians need to introduce the economic benefits in the public debate as well. In particular a potential gain in regional value added through local production of renewable energy becomes the focus of attention for urban and rural communities. This study aims at quantifying these economic effects arising from the energy production through wind, sun, water and biogas for four German model regions: Trier, Hannover, Friesland and Nordschwarzwald. Especially the value added during the operating phase of a renewable energy production facility is of interest here. A procedure was developed accounting for direct and indirect effects on the value added. But also so called induced effects are considered generated through the partly spending of the additional incomes (direct and indirect). The main results show, that the average net value added differs widely between the various kinds of energy sources, but also within one energy source there are differences between the four model regions.

Enterprises and business associations increasingly influence spatial development policies, being a public task in the first place. They develop own plans and positioning strategies, they contribute actively to political decision-making processes or they determine social norms and values. The production of space and place by private actors is not a new phenomenon. What is different, however, is that strategic entrepreneurial decisions are not only focusing on issues which are directly related to the enterprise's divisions but encompassing urban or city-regional contexts as well as issues that could not directly be linked to a corporate's business. This article presents selected case studies to analyse the rationales of enterprises, operating at supraregional level, with regard to their (spatial) involvement in local or regional contexts: Do private sector initiated development processes follow business-driven motivations or do enterprises altruistically assume responsibility for the local or regional place? Does this, according to the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility, even allow for speaking of a Corporate Spatial Responsibility? The qualities and spatial implications of the various business-driven strategic approaches will be systemised and evaluated by means of an analytical matrix. It becomes obvious that the entrepreneurial agenda, compared to the public agenda, is not that integrative. Enterprises only pursue social and spatial approaches, if those are not contradicting corporate goals and if they increase the operating income or improve the corporate's image.