The case of coordinated land use and transport policy: Investigating new tools for regional governance and policy coordination

In this project, we focus on two public management reforms that change the terms of coordinating land use and transport policies at the regional level in Norway: The regional public administration reform 2010 and the revision of the Planning and Building Act (PBL) 2009. The project analyzes how reforms have affected counties possibilities and abilities to fill the regional coordination role in land use and transport policy. The project has produced four scientific articles, a synthesis report, popular scientific articles, several user-oriented lectures, and a closing seminar for key user groups. The project can be summarized in four main sections: 1.The transfer of state roads to regional authorities has led to few changes in the counties coordination of road and public transport initiatives and actual political (re) priorities between road and public transport. The expertise and knowhow still lies within the Public Roads Administration, whilst available resources have been tied up by cost and maintenance backlog on the road network.The reform has nonetheless boosted local and regional political commitment on road and public transport initiatives and helped to strengthen the regional authority as a negotiator in existing networks where the state sector authorities, cities and counties are participating. 2.The project has developed a new productivity index measuring the effects of governmental decentralisation reforms on cost efficiency and effectivenes. Testing the index shows that the reform has small effects on overall cost efficiency levels, and there is no correlation between the size of the regional transport administration and its cost efficiency. We find further that the change in contextual factors suggests somewhat lower productivity, while county council's priorities has increased the achievement of safety relative to accessibility and sustainability. 3.The revised PBL has shown limited effects on the counties ability to coordinate and manage land use and transport developments in more sustainable directions. The clearer goals from the national level are perceived as being in line with previous objectoves from the counties and municipalities themselves. Mandatory plan strategy has in some counties contributed to clearer priorities and increased legitimacy and political support for the plans they decide to prepare, but have little effect in others. Regional level forum is on the other side perceived as a very important meeting point and forum for discussion, sharing of knowledge and building trust. This was however the practice in several counties even before the revision of the PBL. Moreover, the ability to introduce binding provisions in regional plans has not strengthened the counties' ability to coordinate and manage either. In most cases it has been used as a mechanism to move the power to determine the retail development from the national level to the regional one, while land-use plans in the hands of municipalities are less affected. 4.To sum up, the reforms have shown small short term effects on the counties' abilities to steer the regional land use and transport development in more sustainable directions. Yet we see changes in regional cooperation and planning processes that may provide goal achievment in the longer term. Counties put themselves in the driving seat by initiating coordinated land use and transport processes in which they define a framework for coordination, allowing for communication between sectors and levels, the development of common goals, understandings and plan concepts. At the same time reforms seem to have strengthened the regional authorities as negotiators in existing networks where the state sector authorities, cities and counties are participating. Partly in the form of increased overall transport responsibility, partly in the form of increased resources financially and partly in the form of better opportunities to set the agenda and take early guidance in the planning processes.

REGPOL analyzes the regional coordination of transport and land use policies in light of two recent public sector reforms in Norway: The regional reform (RF) which decentralizes the responsibility of road investments from the state to the same (regional) governmental level as local public transport; and the revised Planning and building act (PBA) which grants the regions new initiatives for (regional) land use agreements with municipalities. In sum, the reforms have empowered the regions with new tools fo r regional governance and coordination of land use and transport policies. This project will assess their impact on regional governance modes, policy coordination and public sector performances. REGPOL offers a multi-disciplinary approach, combining the ories anchored in political science, organizational theory, sociology and economics, which are divided into the following analytical perspectives: 1) Regional development and fragmentation, 2) Power-structures and conflict management and 3) Fiscal federal ism and public sector performances. The project will combine identifying models of regional coordination with in-debt studies of how RF and PBA have affected the planning processes, and assess impacts of the reforms on public sector performances and goa l achievement. A state of the art study will set the scene and contextualize the RF and PBA, while the different approaches will be integrated, and lessons learned and policy implications pointed out, in the project synthesis. The project will take adva ntage of method triangulation, i.e. applying diachronic and synchronic data of qualitative and quantitative character. Data collection methods include reviews of official documents, literature, statistics, internet surveys and qualitative semi-structured interviews, and the project will benefit from both qualitative and quantitative analytical techniques (e.g. efficiency analysis).e