After Potsdam

The TiF meeting in Potsdam looked into the future. Claudia Mier challenged the audience to think about how their home town or village might look in 20 years time. Will it be a place where there is an active social life and green energy systems, or a run-down settlement with empty property where only old people are left?

 

Claudia brought expertise from the Hinterland Project, another Baltic Sea Region project, but in the European Urban Knowledge Network programme. It looks at the problems of areas more than 50km from coasts or big cities. These are places that are grappling with dramatic changes as agriculture restructures, young people move out, properties fall vacant and the population numbers fall and the profile becomes more elderly. Claudia explained how the implications of such trends can be explained in terms of what they mean locally, so that alternative future visions can be developed as a springboard for actions. “What does the demographic transition mean for my village? You need to analyse the risk of properties becoming empty. Discuss with people where are the local potentials and how to capitalise on them. Local workshops can be held in each village and also regional workshops,” she said.

 

The future might not be about reversing decline, but it can be about managing change in a way that averts a more serious situation. Claudia sketched out three possible scenarios. The first was a trend scenario, which drew on data to project a growing level of empty houses, that in turn would see the closing of schools and decline in other public services, while the young and active people move out and economic and social problems mount. In such situations the morale of remaining residents will be reduced and a cycle of decline will continue. She then looked at the “worst case” scenario which envisaged the dilapidation of whole settlements, a serious withdrawal of services, shops etc, and a totals loss of more skilled workers. In this situation regions would see catastrophic economic decline and the social gap between such places and prosperous cities and regions would become very wide.

 

In contrast, her optimistic scenario was “Villages of the Future”. In this the abandonment of houses would be managed. While there will still be pressure on service provision (as costs per person rise due to the dwindling population), new more flexible solutions to the supply of essential services would be created. A key part of the stabilisation of the region would be strong networking between public bodies and businesses. The promotion of place identity and country living were a key part of this positive scenario. “You have to involve everyone and everyone should act together. You should start the scenario process early in the project” advised Claudia.

 

A key part of the experience in Havelland-Flaming is the use of strategic development planning to tackle the challenges of regional change. As Torsten Naubert explained, this is a region of contrasts between the fringes of Berlin in the east and deep rural villages only 30-40km away, where unemployment levels can be twice as high. While commuters move into municipalities close to Berlin, the distant villages are expected to lose up to 30% of their population by 2030. In particular, young women leave these areas very quickly after graduating from school. Birth rates are also low, so the population is not replacing itself.

 

The latest (2009) development plan for the Brandenburg state has a strategy of “Strengthen Strengths”. This means trying to consolidate services on larger settlements that appear to be doing better, and in this way protect provision, even if it means people in smaller places having to travel further to access key facilities.

 

Gunter Heinrich explained the implementation of this approach in Nauen. It involves a commitment to support services through hierarchical system of settlements, with services being sustained provided that population does not dip below pre-defined threshold levels.  

 

The relatively low house prices might be seen as something that would induce people to move into some of the declining villages. However, Knut Vareide from the Telemark Research Institute dismissed this idea, arguing that low house prices are likely to deter people, just as high house process might. In presenting his findings about applying his “Attractivity Barometer” to Germany, he repeated the key message he had delivered more fully at the workshop in Trakai in February. This was that migration between regions is only partly caused by differences in job opportunities and economic development. The barometer measures the difference between jobs and population change, and shows which regions and towns are doing better (or worse) in terms of attracting residents than might be expected in view of the jobs on offer locally.

 

Knut’s presentation showed the importance of scale and use of statistical evidence when discussing policy about attracting residents. The Havelland-Flaming region had 8.4% employment growth 2005-8, and 9% increase in jobs. However, net population growth was 1% and net migration is 3.6%. “As commuters increase, so attractiveness matters more than jobs” said Knut. Because the region is not replacing its own population it is very dependent on attracting new residents who will then commute to work elsewhere. However, at local level there is very little link between job creation and in-migration. This could be because the units of analysis – the municipalities – are very small in Germany, so one municipality’s jobs can easily be accessed by people living in another municipality nearby.

 

Knut also touched on the use of branding to attract tourists. His research shows that promoting the area as a place of nature, history and culture does not attract people to live there. However, it may indeed draw in visitors, whose spending then benefits the local economy. Might there be a case for a separate “Visitor Attractivity Barometer”?

 

The need for transformative interventions in public spaces was emphasised by Mike Fuller-Gee. “Why should people choose to live in ugly, boring places?” he asked. Mike told the partners how to organise urban design workshops. The aim of such workshops should be to create sustainable communities where people want to live and work now and in the future, he stressed. Workshops should result in a shared understanding of the challenges and agreement on the priorities. A typical workshop might do an analysis of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats for an area of town or a site. In this way the workshop can develop ideas for what needs to be done, by whom and when and how to fund improvements. However, Mike warned against the risk of “Just another workshop”: it is important that the town’s representatives are committed to acting on the outcomes of a workshop.

 

Mike suggested having open meetings in popular and well-known places like a public library at the beginning, middle and end of the process. Who should be invited? Politicians, officials from council departments likely to be involved in the issues, shop keepers, hotel managers and other local businesses, but also try to get those who own land and properties as they are likely to have a key role in decisions. He also stressed the need to try to get users of the area – of all ages, as well as organisations and pressure groups.

 

Mike urged his listeners to use the power of story telling to capture local imagination about the possibilities for town improvement. By telling about what had been achieved in similar towns and regions – and showing the pictures – you can inspire people to believe that places can be transformed. This was amply demonstrated by the trip the group had made the previous day to seen improvement work that had been done in two small settlements in Havelland-Fläming.

 

The story of Tribben is an impressive one. The town, home to 5,000 people, had been able to access regeneration funding from a programme in which the German Federal Government, the Brandenburg state government and the local government each contributed one-third of the costs of the upgrade. This had led to a design competition to give the market area a make-over. The triangular space in front of the town hall used to be full of cars, while the space between the old church and the town hall was something of a backwater. Today there is designer lighting, good quality, well-designed paving and matching benches, trees and flower beds, and a small water feature. The cars have been displaced to round the edges of the site, and instead we have a space for people, where annual celebrations are held.

 

A key part of the Tribben story is the use of a legend about a medieval figure – Hans Clauert – who is brought to life by a sculpture of him as a boy leaning over the water in the town centre.  If Clauert was a hero from the past, the Mayor, Thomas Berger, is a hero for today. He had the vision to see the possibility of transforming his town and to sustain his support for the scheme from the start to the end. This story of the benefits of good political leadership is another one that the TiF project should be telling.  Just as important is the integration of policy across the different tiers of government that made the money available to undertake the uplift in Tribben. This point was also made in the presentation in the conference by Lutz Kriebel from Brandenburg’s Ministry of Infrastructure. “Rural town development only works with partners”, he said. As well as co-ordination between tiers, there needs to be networking amongst smaller towns.

 

This workshop, combined with the one last month in Valmiera, marks a key stage in the development of the TiF project. Much of the groundwork and preparation has now been done. Knut Vareide is rolling out his statistical analysis using the Attractivity Barometer. Soon guidelines on how to do narratives and story telling will appear, along with a toolbox on scenarios. Equipped with these the partners will move ahead and build the main actions in Work Packages 3 and 4, when they engage with their local politicians, businesses and residents to consider how to make their towns and regions more attractive. The workshop in Potsdam gave a strong message about the benefits from transnational co-operation in undertaking these tasks. Discussions were held amongst partners with shared interests and plans began to be formulated. The next stage of TiF promises to be where the ideas and aspirations are put into practice.