Strategic Spatial Planning's Role in Legitimizing Investments in Transport Infrastructure

This paper discusses to what extent spatial visions might play an important role in not only supporting, but also legitimizing the need for investments in transport infrastructures. Drawing on discussion of an ‘infrastructure turn’ in strategic spatial planning (Dodson 2009), this paper explores how the recently proposed vision of a Loop City for the Danish/Swedish Øresund Region has played an important role in legitimizing and building political support for a light railway connecting the outer suburbs of Copenhagen. It is not unusual for large investments in new transport infrastructures to be a key part of spatial visions. However, within the case of the cross-border Loop City vision, a specific light railway project in a local area is being framed as a key link and the main factor in the future competitiveness of the region. Drawing on interviews with key planners involved in the light railway and Loop City planning processes together with document analysis of background reports and analyses from the last 10-15 years, the paper investigates to what extent the vision of a Loop City has played an important role in legitimizing the need for a light railway in the outer suburbs of Copenhagen. Furthermore, the paper discusses to what extent the vision of a Loop City represents a ‘moment of opportunity’ (Healey 2006a) for strengthening national spatial planning in Denmark, or whether the Loop City just conveniently unites a policy problem with a policy solution, which has existed for decades (Kingdon 2011). In conclusion, the paper suggests that the case of the Loop City potentially reveals a wider trend in strategic spatial planning, in which political lobbying for key infrastructure projects, rather than land use policies, becomes the focal point for preparation of strategic plans. Such a development raises a number of concerns about strategic spatial planning’s potential for guiding future urban development.