Functional regions, urban-rural relationships and post-2013 EU Cohesion Policy
Functional regions, urban-rural relationships and post-2013 EU Cohesion Policy
Contextual Settings
This study is part of a set of 3 studies designed to inform the Economic and Social Council's position statement on "Cities' Competitiveness, Territorial Cohesion and Spatial Planning".
Rationale
For the first time several strategic and political documents, underpinning the preparation of the forthcoming common strategic framework 2014-2020, give a significant importance to functional regions and urban-rural relationships in the design and implementation of new instruments for the EU cohesion, urban and rural development policies.
This study springs from the acknowledgment of the growing importance of the concept of "functional regions" in the political and academic agenda namely with concern to:
1. Reinforcement of the urban-rural integration dynamics
The increased influence of cities in more or less distant territories (home-to-work commute, use of infrastructure, inter-business relationships, etc.) has fuelled not only the rise of new concepts - labour pool, functional urban area (FUA), functional urban region (FUR), metropolitan region, etc., but also a series of studies that prove the expansion of the functional city far beyond the morphological city. A similar debate, both political and academic, has emerged in other fields, particularly about the "FEMAs - Functional Economic Market Areas.
2. Need for spatially referenced rather than administrative units-based statistical information
The outline and characterisation of functional urban areas or functional economic regions demands the availability of spatially referenced information that is adequately and comparably organised. Urban Audit (Eurostat), for example, has been producing since 2003 information sets in order to compare European cities. The Urban Audit currently uses two concepts: City (the administrative boundary and "larger urban zone" (LUZ) which aggregates the several administrative units inside a "functional urban regions". Taking stock of the 2001 data for a set of 92 European metropolitan areas, only 49% of the inhabitants of "larger urban zones" live in the respective administrative cities, a figure often dropping below 25% in cases such as Manchester, Paris, Athens or Lisbon.
3. The rise of new principles and strategies for territorial cohesion and cooperation
The growing awareness of the negative effects of urban growth on its surrounding rural areas; the need for an integrated management of the different systems crisscrossing urban and rural space (transports, green corridors, hydric resources, etc.) and the revalue of several rural areas' functions (leisure, food supply, logistics, etc.) have led to the strengthening of the urban-rural partnership as one of the guiding principles of European spatial planning and in the member-states, mainly after the publication, in 1999, of the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP). Since the ESDP the principle of an urban-rural partnership has widened its scope as it became expressly linked to new forms of territorial governance (Territorial Agenda 2007), to territorial cohesion objectives (Green Book on Territorial Cohesion, 2008) and post-2013 cohesion policy (Territorial Agenda 2010, 2011).
4. The development of new forms of territorial governance in non-functionally integrated administrative areas
Flexible geographies determined by functional relationships raise new issues regarding policy instruments and forms of territorial governance. In recent years, several countries have developed with varied degrees of success different forms of urban-rural cooperation and coordination. Simultaneously, international bodies (e.g. OECD), European networks (Eurocities, Metrex, etc.) and Community bodies (Commission, European Parliament, ESPON) have developed initiatives towards the comparison of examples of best practice of the urban-rural interaction.
Expected Outcomes
This study will systematise examples from other countries and will forward a set of recommendations for the adequate use, by the Portuguese authorities, of the forthcoming opportunities provided by the existence of policy instruments in the forthcoming common strategic framework 2014-2020 that are "functional regions"-based and oriented toward the qualification and integrated management of the interdependence relationships that exist, or should exist, between urban and rural areas.
Functional urban regions, urban-rural relationships, territorial governance, cohesion policy
Contextual Settings
This study is part of a set of 3 studies designed to inform the Economic and Social Council's position statement on "Cities' Competitiveness, Territorial Cohesion and Spatial Planning".
Rationale
For the first time several strategic and political documents, underpinning the preparation of the forthcoming common strategic framework 2014-2020, give a significant importance to functional regions and urban-rural relationships in the design and implementation of new instruments for the EU cohesion, urban and rural development policies.
This study springs from the acknowledgment of the growing importance of the concept of "functional regions" in the political and academic agenda namely with concern to:
1. Reinforcement of the urban-rural integration dynamics
The increased influence of cities in more or less distant territories (home-to-work commute, use of infrastructure, inter-business relationships, etc.) has fuelled not only the rise of new concepts - labour pool, functional urban area (FUA), functional urban region (FUR), metropolitan region, etc., but also a series of studies that prove the expansion of the functional city far beyond the morphological city. A similar debate, both political and academic, has emerged in other fields, particularly about the "FEMAs - Functional Economic Market Areas.
2. Need for spatially referenced rather than administrative units-based statistical information
The outline and characterisation of functional urban areas or functional economic regions demands the availability of spatially referenced information that is adequately and comparably organised. Urban Audit (Eurostat), for example, has been producing since 2003 information sets in order to compare European cities. The Urban Audit currently uses two concepts: City (the administrative boundary and "larger urban zone" (LUZ) which aggregates the several administrative units inside a "functional urban regions". Taking stock of the 2001 data for a set of 92 European metropolitan areas, only 49% of the inhabitants of "larger urban zones" live in the respective administrative cities, a figure often dropping below 25% in cases such as Manchester, Paris, Athens or Lisbon.
3. The rise of new principles and strategies for territorial cohesion and cooperation
The growing awareness of the negative effects of urban growth on its surrounding rural areas; the need for an integrated management of the different systems crisscrossing urban and rural space (transports, green corridors, hydric resources, etc.) and the revalue of several rural areas' functions (leisure, food supply, logistics, etc.) have led to the strengthening of the urban-rural partnership as one of the guiding principles of European spatial planning and in the member-states, mainly after the publication, in 1999, of the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP). Since the ESDP the principle of an urban-rural partnership has widened its scope as it became expressly linked to new forms of territorial governance (Territorial Agenda 2007), to territorial cohesion objectives (Green Book on Territorial Cohesion, 2008) and post-2013 cohesion policy (Territorial Agenda 2010, 2011).
4. The development of new forms of territorial governance in non-functionally integrated administrative areas
Flexible geographies determined by functional relationships raise new issues regarding policy instruments and forms of territorial governance. In recent years, several countries have developed with varied degrees of success different forms of urban-rural cooperation and coordination. Simultaneously, international bodies (e.g. OECD), European networks (Eurocities, Metrex, etc.) and Community bodies (Commission, European Parliament, ESPON) have developed initiatives towards the comparison of examples of best practice of the urban-rural interaction.
Expected Outcomes
This study will systematise examples from other countries and will forward a set of recommendations for the adequate use, by the Portuguese authorities, of the forthcoming opportunities provided by the existence of policy instruments in the forthcoming common strategic framework 2014-2020 that are "functional regions"-based and oriented toward the qualification and integrated management of the interdependence relationships that exist, or should exist, between urban and rural areas.
