Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Metropolitan Area in 2007 may be the start of a new regional phase, although this
is still an informal body. It is a bottom-up initiative designed to produce and co-or-
dinate plans for improving accessibility, economic re-structuring, sustainability and
landscape integration for the co-operating municipalities, but still has no official
status. This led Janssen-Jansen (
2011
) to suggest it is an encouraging sign of build-
ing city-region consciousness, but it is in an area that is still without the will for an
effective metro governance to emerge. Yet even when these regional government
structures are created there is no guarantee that they will survive. Their potential
fragility can be seen by the experience of Melbourne where a regional co-operative
structure similar to the Vancouver model was created in 2002 but was abandoned
in 2010. Kroen and Goodman (
2012
) have argued that it failed because of several
problems. The first was that there was not a strong regional consciousness in the
area which never developed during the regional government's existence, mainly
because the lower tier local authorities became convinced they were being ignored
in the decision-making. In addition, the necessary bi-partisan support among major
political parties was absent, so that the structure was easily dismantled when a new
state party opposed to regional governments was voted into office. Third, there were
few clear guidelines over regulation. This led to the opinion that it failed
because of a fundamental reluctance on behalf of government to act decisively and to
require, rather than recommend, its policies… (further noting that)… the expectation that
market behaviour affecting the shape of the city could be altered simply on recommendation
without the use of regulation would appear very nave (Kroen and Goodman
2012
, p. 319).
Hence, it was concluded that more mandatory powers are usually needed to carry
out key regional initiatives, incidentally still one of the ever-present difficulties of
most regional governances. Finally, the strategy did not have a clear purpose and
vision and lacked the support of many in government, especially the senior civil
servants and the members of key financial ministries.
These failures in Melbourne and Amsterdam provide a vivid example of the
problems faced by city-regional governments in general. Indeed, many have argued
that most of the current examples produce unstable and often uncoordinated struc-
tures that are fragile since they depend on co-operation and usually consensus in
decision-making among the partners, which is often difficult to maintain. In a wider
context Lovering (
1999
) and Markusen (
1999
) have made additional criticisms, such
as the fact that a focus upon the delivery of services or functions has meant that the
concern for removing inequalities that lay behind many older regional approaches,
especially the economic schemes, has been forgotten. Although the critique is based
more upon the larger regional entities, not city-regional planning, the critique is still
relevant, for the addition of a new transport system, regional shopping centre, or
new plant, is usually lauded for its economic impact, not on whether they reduce so-
cial and economic inequalities within and between regions. Rossi's (
2004
) critique
about recent changes in the Mezzogiorno in southern Italy, provides a good example
of this problem. New endogenous growth in Italy in the last few decades, based on
small and middle level enterprises, especially linked to exporting fashion goods,
has provided a source of local dynamism in a region known for its low growth
