Table Of ContentUrban Growth Management
and Its Discontents
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Urban Growth Management
and Its Discontents
Promises, Practices, and Geopolitics
in U.S. City-Regions
Yonn Dierwechter
URBANGROWTHMANAGEMENTANDITSDISCONTENTS
Copyright © Yonn Dierwechter, 2008.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2008 978-1-4039-7524-9
All rights reserved.
First published in 2008 by
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PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave
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and other countries.
ISBN 978-1-349-53588-0 ISBN 978-0-230-61290-7 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9780230612907
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Dierwechter, Yonn.
Urban growth management and its discontents : promises, practices, and
geo-politics in u.s. city regions / Yonn Dierwechter.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Cities and towns—United States—Growth. 2. City planning—
United States. 3. Regional planning—United States. 4. Geopolitics—
United States. 5. Local government—United States. 6. Municipal
government—United States. I. Title.
HT384.U5D54 2008
307.760973–dc22 2007051217
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Westchester Book Group
First edition: July 2008
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
Preface vii
List of Figures ix
List of Tables xi
1 Introduction 1
I History and Theory 13
2 Pro-Growth, Anti-Growth, Smart Growth: Urban Growth
Management for a “Usable Future” 15
3 The Territorialities of the Smart Growth Paradigm:
A Theoretical Framework 43
II Goals and Tools 71
4 Spatial Promises: Smart Goals for “Improved” Urban Growth
Management 73
5 Spatial Practices: Tools and Techniques in the Geopolitics
of Urban Growth Management 91
III Case Studies 121
6 The Portland City-Region: Excavating the “Geopolitics
of Success” 125
7 The Seattle-Tacoma City-Region: Rescaling the Spaces of
Fragmented Places 153
8 Greater Baltimore: Hope through Smart Growth and the
Geopolitics of Retreat 185
vi ● Contents
9 Madison-Dane County: Regionalizing the
Progressive Tradition? 213
10 Conclusions: After the “Next Step” 237
Notes 249
References 255
Index 287
Preface
The origins of this book emerged out of the broad intellectual transitions
a person sometimes makes when traveling between different places that
simultaneously represent distinct phases in one’s life. Specifically, the
general idea for something like this book—where space, planning, poli-
tics, and city-regions might be held together in one research project—
formed loosely in my mind during a crowded flight from London to
Seattle, just after I had completed my doctorate on the new geographies
of urban planning in post-apartheid Cape Town, particularly as these
geographies intersected (uneasily and tenuously) with the large, fast-
growing, and extremely dynamic “informal” economy of the city.
Having worked professionally in urban development in South Africa
during the mid-1990s, I had witnessed the rapid transition away from
the profound fragmentation of apartheid urban governance to the inte-
grated metropolitanism of the post–apartheid era. Cape Town, for exam-
ple, simply eliminated dozens of general-purpose (racially constituted)
municipalities in the short space of a few years, replacing them with a
“mega-city” government that set to reconstruct and gradually reverse the
spatial and social legacies of the previous dispensation. Nothing like that
seemed possible in the United States—and it was inspiring to watch and
study.
During my PhD project at the London School of Economics (LSE),
Jenny Robinson, now at the Open University, got me thinking about
critical geography (Lefebvre, Foucault, Massey, and Thrift, amongst
others) while Margo Huxley, now at the University of Sheffield, helped
me to further link these ideas to ordinary planning practices, to become
a “planographer” as she once put it to me. I strongly suspect that neither
Jenny nor Margo would accept all that follows; but talking about the
“spatialities” or the “geopolitics” of urban planning makes a lot more
sense to me (and hopefully the reader) because of their early influence
and ongoing enthusiasm.
viii ● Preface
While in London, British-based geographers and planners spoke
increasingly of a “new regionalism” in both economy and state, although
it was not yet clear what the new region or city-region, as they increasingly
insisted, might always promise. That said, over the years, Andy Thornley,
of the LSE, and Tassilo Herrshell, at the University of Westminster, have
helped me to consider how planning, politics, and city-regions increas-
ingly relate to one another, though they too would depart from many of
my theoretical commitments. Andy remains a rare model of how to be a
brilliant educator, administrator, and scholar.
Transitioning to Washington State in 2001 meant falling squarely
into already well-developed American debates about how to manage
metropolitan regions with planning tools and approaches, wherein
regionalism, politics, and smart growth collide. Everything started to
come together, though it required an interdisciplinary eclecticism that,
in an era of growing disciplinary rivalries and even jealousies, not every-
one will appreciate. Happily, a small urban studies program is, in the
end, a very good home to cross over the otherwise potentially rigid
boundaries of planning, geography, politics, and social theory. Working
with and thinking alongside of my colleagues—Brian Coffey, Lisa
Hoffmann, Tom Carlson, Linda Hurley-Isham, Anthony Falit-Baiamonte,
and Marc Pendras, but also, in other academic programs, Michael
Forman, Julie Nicoletta, and Michael Kucher—have been a constant
source of inspiration and support. All of us at UWT have had to build
new programs on this fast-growing campus pretty much from scratch—
while also maintaining the energy and drive to think about and deliver
new research. Alas, none of these very good people, in Tacoma and else-
where, have the power to wave away the many problems and faults that
surely accompany the discussion that follows here, but each has con-
tributed to whatever strengths this contribution might have.
As always, though, my deepest gratitude is to Tanya. Together we have
brought Ella, born September 28, 2005, into our old home on L Street.
And so it is to Ella that this book is affectionately dedicated. May this
little box of sunshine inherit a future worthy of her latent commitments
to do good work in a world that likely hangs in the balance during the
years that stretch out before her.
List of Figures
2.1 Fixing the urban-rural edge in Oregon 30
2.2 Major urban growth management legislation in
Florida, 1930–2000 31
3.1 The U.S. smart growth paradigm 53
3.2 The multiple rationalities and spaces of smart growth 66
6.1 Metropolitan Portland 128
6.2 Portland’s urban growth boundary 143
7.1 The Seattle-Tacoma city-region 155
7.2 Seattle-Tacoma’s urban growth boundaries 163
7.3 Tacoma’s spatial growth strategy 171
7.4 The Alderton-McMillin community plan in context 177
8.1 Greater Baltimore 186
8.2 Changes in total vacant housing units in
Baltimore neighborhoods, 1990–2000 189
8.3 Residential construction (permitted value)
in the Baltimore city-region, 1998–2005 194
8.4 Priority Funding Areas in Greater Baltimore 197
9.1 Madison-Dane County, Wisconsin 216
9.2 Shifting growth trends in Madison-Dane
County: Percentage of County population
by type of community 217
9.3 Urban Service Areas in Madison-Dane County 221
