Strategische Planungsräume – zur Rolle eines neuen Instruments der Stadtentwicklungsplanung

“Strategic planning areas are an area-based management tool for the organization of spatial change. In European cities strategic planning areas first appeared in the context of strategic urban development concepts, seeking a simultaneity and unity of the traditionally separated management functions orientation and implementation in urban planning. Thus strategic planning areas derived from the model of strategic planning and also represent a widely detected “”renaissance”” of the strategic in spatial planning. Although both urban development concepts as a typology of “”big plans”” and the strategic planning model have been described comprehensively by academics little attention has been paid to strategic planning areas at all. The paper at hand attempts to fill this gap and to introduce strategic planning areas on the example of the London ‘Opportunity Areas’, the Berlin ‘Transformationsräume’ (transformation areas) and the Vienna ‘Zielgebiete’ (target areas) as a new instrument of strategic spatial planning. To summarise, it can be stated that strategic planning areas in practice are not a standardised instrument, but diverse and conceived in various ways. Still, findings indicate three common principles that constitute the instrument: they are spatially selective and set spatial priorities in urban areas with the aim of reducing complexity; they form spatial frames for arenas of cooperation processes of stakeholders with different logics of action, aiming to gain the stakeholders’ commitments for a coordinated and effective urban development; by establishing management structures within the strategic planning areas they offer the opportunity for coordinating efforts on part of the political-administrative system with the aim to show the public sectors “leadership“ for the public interest. Thus, strategic planning areas represent the political-administrative systems instrument for optimising efficiency and effectiveness in urban planning.”