Governing private provision of public space: developing governance models and urban design that ensure inclusive, democratic public space

DEMOSSPACE has studied the democratic role of public spaces in Norwegian cities. Urban spaces are emphasized as integral to sustainable urban development, but they are also under pressure as densification policies and ideals of attractive cities inform availability, functions and access. Cities also have different modes of ownership and management of public space, which has implications for planning and governing of public space, and how they are experienced and used by citizens. In DEMOSSPACE, we have focused on planning and governance processes as well as urban design and actual use practices that may limit or promote democratic dimensions of public space. We have also studied how anti-terrorism measures shape public space, and how cities negotiate tensions such as those between security and accessibility. By connecting urban studies, democracy and governance studies and urban design perspectives, we have developed a framework for studying processes from policy and planning to design, management, operation and use. We have theorized some key democratic qualities of urban spaces: accessibility, participation, representation, social cohesion and user diversity. Furthermore, we analytically separate between phases in the planning and development process of public space from visions to actual use, but with attention to the continuities and tensions across and between these. Empirically, we have studied public spaces with a mix of private and public ownership and management structures in Oslo, Stavanger and Bodø. We have focused on how actors engage and act within current planning frameworks, how planning and governance tools work together in the development of public spaces, and to what extent and how private, public-private or public ownership and solutions inform the qualities, access and use of public spaces. We see major increase in awareness about the role of public spaces for sustainable urban development, but with emphasis on social and environmental qualities more than awareness of the political dimensions of public space. Planners experience that political and administrative leaders as well as private actors emphasize the importance of diverse public spaces that may vary according to functions and use. Nevertheless, complex ownership structures and division of responsibilities within the municipalities as well as between public and private actors complicate the planning, governance and management of public spaces. It is important to ensure interconnections between the phases of development from vision to governance, maintenance and use of public space. Visions reflected in planning documents will affect the design and maintenance in ways that promote or inhibit democratic qualities. It is thus critical that maintenance and use are considered early in the planning process, since this inform citizens' experience and use of public spaces. A key question is how private ownership and management affect the development and use of public spaces. Municipalities must balance needs of private interests and of the community. Cities actively use the planning instruments in the Planning and Building Act (PBL, 2008) to establish visions of good quality public spaces, and seek to negotiate various interests in their local plans. The cities sometimes go beyond what is required in the Act. Oslo and Stavanger have developed their own planning documents to ensure material quality and division of responsibilities around public spaces. This may indicate that the instruments in the Act are not sufficient to ensure comprehensive area development. Furthermore, municipalities use planning tools to balance public and private roles and interests, like instructing developers to include publicly available spaces in projects. While this may provide more ? and often high quality ? public spaces, we also find that private ownership creates frictions between residents' interests, the interests of the neighborhood and of the larger urban communities. Privately owned/managed public spaces can restrict citizens' constitutional right to freedom of expression. Legislation on how the public's interests are to be safeguarded through plans and agreements has been underdeveloped. When privately owned spaces are zoned as public, the City ensure the freedom of mobility and access, but not the right to expression of opinion and political activity. The constitutional right to freedom of expression emerge as a legal gray area in the planning and management of these spaces. In practice, this can lead to restrictions on use, which limits freedom of expression. Citizens' opportunity to participate in the planning and design process is also not sufficiently secured through pbl (2008 ). More recently, cities have developed participatory strategies that moves beyond minimum requirements, but there is still a lack of systematic involvement of the local community, user groups and residents in planning, design and development of public spaces.

DEMOSSPACE har bidratt til å bygge opp og styrke forskningskompetanse ved NIBR og NMBU, som har ført til utvikling av nye forskningssøknader og prosjekter. Internasjonale nettverk er blitt styrket, og blitt videreført inn i arbeid med nye søknader. Funn og anbefalinger publiseres i en kommende bok, som retter seg særlig mot studenter, praktikere og forskere innen byutvikling. Med tanke på mer langsiktige virkninger , har vi identifisert noen utfordringer i dagens lovverk knyttet til regulering av medvirkning, og i hvilken grad allsidig bruk og ytringsfrihet er tilstrekkelig ivaretatt når offentlige rom forvaltes og driftes privat. Disse funnene vil legge grunnlag for videre arbeid og anbefalinger i etterkant av prosjektperioden.

The project DEMOSSPACE targets the democratic deficits observed in the practice of new private governance of urban public space, and aims to contribute to inclusive urban development policies. To do so, the project studies how governance models and urban design can ensure inclusive and democratic public space. To address this objective, the project will identify the factors that constitute democratic and inclusive urban public spaces and how these factors can be enhanced or obstructed by institutional settings, planning processes, urban design, and management. An interdisciplinary, international team of researchers has been assembled to address complex urban challenges with a complex integration of knowledge, competences and methods. Succeeding in the interdisciplinary approach is the project's challenge, aimed overcome by a solid research design. Initially, we identify central qualities of democratic public spaces, combining theoretical insights from the deliberative democracy perspective and the capabilities perspective, together with inter-disciplinary approaches. On this basis, we carry out case studies in which we investigate public space developments, identifying their democratic qualities and seeking the factors contributing to enhancement/ obstruction of these qualities. Thus, we focus on the development of public space, scrutinizing the institutional settings, planning procedures and processes, and on spaces in use, examining urban design, functional program, and spatial management practices involved. Cases in Oslo, Stavanger and Bodø are selected, whose institutional contexts and relevant public space developments will be compared to those in Copenhagen, Malmö and London. Finally, the project contributes with a synthesis aimed to enhance the research state of the art and to provide recommendations on how to enhance democratic qualities of urban public spaces, assisting the work of planners, practitioners and politicians.