Special issue article: Why does everyone think cities can save the planet?

Urban Studies
1–21
Ó Urban Studies Journal Limited 2020
Urban sustainability and Article reuse guidelines:
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counter-sustainability: Spatial DOI: 10.1177/0042098020919280
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contradictions and conflicts in policy
and governance in the Freiburg and
Calgary metropolitan regions

Byron Miller
University of Calgary, Canada

Samuel Mössner
University of Münster, Germany

Abstract
Drawing on empirical research carried out in the metropolitan regions of Freiburg, Germany, and
Calgary, Canada, we reposition the sustainability policies of municipalities within a wider regional
and relational framework. This perspective reveals significant epistemological blind spots in the
localist and non-relational ontologies that undergird much of the urban sustainability discourse.
While the city of Freiburg has garnered world-wide attention for its multi-faceted initiatives and
achievements in sustainable urban development, these initiatives have yet to be coherently
addressed in the wider Freiburg metropolitan region, leading to a variety of policies and practices
in the hinterland that run counter to Freiburg’s ‘green city’ objectives. In a parallel fashion, the city
of Calgary incorporated significant sustainability principles in its 2009 Master Development Plan
and Transportation Plan – ‘Plan-It’ – yet such principles have not been taken up on a regional
scale. Despite substantial differences in size and developmental history, both cities exhibit a pro-
found disconnection from their regional contexts with regard to sustainable development policies
and politics. In both metropolitan regions, conventional growth politics are still paramount. A sig-
nificant conflict emerges between ‘sustainable’ central cities seeking a ‘sustainability fix’ to their
fiscal, environmental and quality of life problems, and more remote jurisdictions seeking to attract
investment through low tax regimes and limited development regulation – what we label a
‘counter-sustainability fix’. These contrasting and dialectically related policies have substantial con-
sequences for the social and environmental dimensions of sustainable development, calling into
question policies that promote ‘sustainability in one place’.

Corresponding author:
Byron Miller, Department of Geography, University of
Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, Alberta T2N
1N4, Canada.
Email: [email protected]
2 Urban Studies 00(0)

Keywords
Calgary, counter-sustainability, Freiburg, metropolitan governance, policy (im)mobility, urban
sustainability

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⌋Ⲵᕇ䎆๑བྷ䜭ᐲ४ฏᗇࡠॿ䈳а㠤Ⲵ䍟ᖫˈሬ㠤൘޵䱶ൠ४ࠪ⧠Ҷ਴⿽н਼Ⲵ᭯ㆆ઼
‫ˈ⌅ڊ‬оᕇ䎆๑Ⲵ“㔯㢢෾ᐲ”ⴞḷ㛼䚃㘼傠DŽ਼ṧˈ঑ቄ࣐䟼ᐲ൘ަ2009ᒤᙫփਁኅ㿴
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ቭ㇑єњ෾ᐲ൘㿴⁑઼ਁኅশਢкᴹᖸབྷⲴᐞᔲˈն൘ਟᤱ㔝ਁኅ᭯ㆆ઼᭯⋫ᯩ䶒ˈє
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ትҾ俆㾱ൠսDŽ“ਟᤱ㔝”Ⲵѝᗳ෾ᐲራ≲䍒᭯ǃ⧟ຳ઼⭏⍫䍘䟿䰞仈Ⲵ“ਟᤱ㔝䀓ߣᯩ
Ṹ”ˈ㘼ᴤ‫ٿ‬䘌Ⲵ㇑䗆४ࡉራ≲䙊䗷վ〾᭦ࡦᓖ઼ᴹ䲀Ⲵਁኅⴁ㇑੨ᕅᣅ䍴˄ᡁԜ〠ѻ
Ѫ“৽ਟᤱ㔝䀓ߣᯩṸ”˅ˈ䘉є㘵ѻ䰤ਁ⭏Ҷ䟽བྷߢケDŽ䘉Ӌᖒᡀ勌᰾ሩ∄ф䗙䇱⴨‫ޣ‬
Ⲵ᭯ㆆሩਟᤱ㔝ਁኅⲴ⽮Պ઼⧟ຳቲ䶒ӗ⭏Ҷ䟽བྷᖡ૽ˈሩ“൘ањൠᯩ‫׳‬䘋ਟᤱ㔝ᙗ”
Ⲵ᭯ㆆᨀࠪҶ䍘⯁DŽ

‫ޣ‬䭞䇽
঑ቄ࣐䟼ǃ৽ਟᤱ㔝ᙗǃᕇ䎆๑ǃ䜭ᐲ⋫⨶ǃ᭯ㆆ˄䶎˅⍱ࣘᙗǃ෾ᐲਟᤱ㔝ᙗ

Received August 2017; accepted December 2019

Introduction
1999; Roseland, 1997; Worldwatch Institute,
A number of cities around the world – 2016). This urban sustainability imperative
Freiburg, Vancouver, Zurich, Stockholm, has received strong support from the
Copenhagen, Melbourne, Singapore and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
many others – have garnered considerable (IPCC) (2014), which asserts that cities are
attention for their multi-faceted initiatives crucial locations where innovative pathways
and achievements in the realms of green towards sustainability can be explored and
energy, low-carbon economic development, implemented. The World Bank (2010) makes
sustainable and active mobility, compact a similar argument.
mixed-use land use planning and citizen par- Yet, high profile support for urban sus-
ticipation. Global and national policy pro- tainability initiatives aside, effective sustain-
grammes have helped put cities on the new ability initiatives are frequently offset by
frontline in efforts to combat climate change: policies and practices that promote their
it is now common for cities to address sus- opposite, what we term ‘counter-sustainability’
tainability in both their politics and their initiatives. Particularly striking is the fact
planning (Bulkeley et al., 2011; Calthorpe, that sustainability initiatives do not often
2010; Hall, 2013; Newman and Kenworthy, operate on a regional or broader scale, and
Miller and Mössner 3

indeed usually stop at municipal boundaries. discussing the origins of eco-cities, asserts
Behind the seemingly universal support for that cities are places where the many dimen-
urban sustainability are a number of contra- sions and processes of sustainability transi-
dictions and conflicts stemming from inade- tions come together and can be effectively
quate consideration of the spatial and addressed. Similarly, Newman et al. (2009)
structural constitution of the processes that argue that cities need to respond to environ-
shape cities, first and foremost how these mental crises by ending their dependence on
processes operate in the context of territo- fossil fuels and reducing their ecological
rially fragmented states and neoliberal poli- footprint. Many authors, moreover, hold up
cies that set municipalities against each cities as places that can instil hope for transi-
other, often in beggar-thy-neighbour compe- tion to a sustainable world (Hall, 2013;
tition (Cox, 1993, 2010; Peck and Tickell, Newman et al., 2009).
1994, 2002). This inattention to the spatial This modern merging of urban and envi-
and structural constitution of urban pro- ronmental agendas is a relatively recent
cesses has implications for the success – and phenomenon, first becoming common in
lack thereof – of urban sustainability policy. the 1970s (Béal, 2012). More longstanding
In this research, we attempt to under- is the idea of cities as discrete territorial
stand how sustainability initiatives taken up entities with distinct economic, social and
by two dominant central cities – both pursu- even psychological characteristics, manifest
ing strategies of ‘sustainability in one place’ in a binary division of rural and urban
– ‘travel’, or fail to travel, throughout their spaces. Early Marxian-inspired analyses
respective metropolitan regions. Our conceived of an ‘urban mode of produc-
research compares two seemingly quite dif- tion’, with cities as ‘a developmental force,
ferent cities – Freiburg, Germany, and the seat of modern industry, of the division
Calgary, Canada – within their broader of labour, of the reproduction of labour-
metropolitan-regional relationships, fore- power, of technological innovation’
grounding the different positions and roles (Merrifield, 2013: 911). The notion of an
of central cities vis-a-vis peripheral jurisdic- urban mode of production had its counter-
tions. Comparing sustainability and counter- part in the notion of the urban as a mode
sustainability politics and planning within of consumption, illustrated in Castells’
and between these metropolitan regions, we (1977 [1968]) influential treatise The Urban
examine the systemic implications of the Question. In both conceptions, ‘the urban’
pursuit of ‘sustainability in one place’, the is considered a real ontological entity with
limitations of sustainability initiatives under discrete properties and powers. Henri
conditions of state fragmentation and neo- Lefebvre presented the first significant
liberal policy, and possible ways forward. break with this perspective in The Urban
Revolution (2003 [1970]), in which he advo-
Sustainability and evolving cated thinking beyond the notion of the
conceptions of the urban- bounded city, focusing instead on ‘urban
society’ – a concept that emphasises the
environmental relationship
relations and flows that run through cities,
Increasingly, eco-cities, green cities and sus- but are not bounded by them. ‘Urban soci-
tainable cities are presented by academics ety’ signals cities standing in relationship
and policy-makers alike as holistic and effec- to all of society, including non-urban areas,
tive strategies for the transition to a more likewise shaped by processes extending far
sustainable society. Roseland (1997), beyond constructed boundaries.
4 Urban Studies 00(0)

Most urban-focused sustainability strate- structural organisation were eliminated from

gies proceed from a pre-Lefebvrian concep- the scope of debate. Instead, problems were
tion of the urban, coupled with a weak to be approached as technical and managerial
notion of sustainability that does not require concerns within existing political-economic
systemic redesign of production and structures. While climate change, energy pol-
exchange relations. These conceptions icy and related urban issues were ‘seemingly
underlie the belief that sustainability policy politicised as never before’ (Swyngedouw,
can be implemented in a piecemeal step-by- 2010: 213), they became governed and de-
step – and place-by-place – fashion. The politicised ‘through a stage-managed consen-
early environmental movements of the 1960s sus’ (MacLeod and Jones, 2011: 2632) that
and 1970s arose from the grassroots and reduced politics to the ‘administration and
often critiqued piecemeal measures, calling management of processes whose parameters
into question the organisation of production are defined by consensual socio-scientific
processes and their relationship to natural knowledges’ (Swyngedouw, 2009: 602).
systems (Commoner, 1971; O’Connor, The present era of urban sustainability
1997). By the 1980s and 1990s, however, politics and policy, then, rests on three key
market-oriented neoliberal policies became inter-related assumptions: 1) the idea that cit-
increasingly widespread, and market-based ies are largely discrete territorial entities pos-
actors, such as corporations, chambers of sessing a degree of autonomy and self-
commerce, utilities, developers and others, determination that allows them to effectively
began to wield significantly more influence set and implement policy, despite the sub-
in environmental policy generally and in stantial influences of broader scale processes;
urban environmental policy specifically 2) the idea that broader scale processes such
(Béal, 2012; Keil, 2007; Krueger and Gibbs, as capital accumulation, the extraction of
2007). Not surprisingly, systemic critiques as resources from and dumping of waste into
well as the social dimensions of sustainability the natural environment and the (mal)distri-
were increasingly de-emphasised, replaced by bution of wealth need not be challenged in
the belief that economic growth and environ- any fundamental way. Seen through the lens
mental improvement could be promoted in of ecological modernisation, the problems of
tandem. Under the ascendancy of ‘ecological unsustainable development are believed to be
modernisation’, the economic and political solvable through technological innovation,
processes that determine the consumption of the fine tuning of market signals and, in the
resources, the deterioration of the environment case of cities, better planning and design;
and the distribution of both benefits and and 3) the idea that sustainability is not a
harms were downplayed (Krueger and Gibbs, political question in any fundamental sense.
2007; Wilson, 2015), and the core processes These assumptions resonate with neoliberal
and power relations of a capitalist system were policy generally, and undergird plans and
kept in place. Policy was focused on improve- policies of cities aiming to promote sustain-
ments in the technologies of production and ability within their borders.
consumption, often using market mechanisms
to incentivise technological innovation and Sustainability in one place?
disincentivise consumption of environmen- Spatialities, systems and policy
tally harmful goods. Concurrently, sustain-
(im)mobility
ability planning became ‘post-political’ in the
sense discussed by Swyngedouw, Ranciére, There is no doubt that cities have an impor-
Žižek and others: challenges to fundamental tant role to play in the transition to a more
Miller and Mössner 5

sustainable low-carbon world. But to what block their transfer. While fully concurring
extent can action at the scale of individual cit- with these analyses, we contend that it is cri-
ies be a solution? Over the last two decades, a tically important to go beyond a focus on
diverse and wide-ranging literature addressing actors and actor networks to consider the
the role that cities can play in the pursuit of broader spatial and structural contexts in
sustainability has developed across the social which actors act. Policy (im)mobility is a
sciences and planning and design professions. matter of political power and struggle, con-
In the rapidly growing field of sustain- stituted through a variety of co-implicated
ability transition studies, cities are often spatialities (Miller, 2013; Miller and Ponto,
viewed as a primary site of experimentation 2016).
and ‘niche innovation’ development (Geels, Beyond networks, the spatialities of terri-
2011). There is little doubt that they have tory, scale and place are relevant to under-
become significant sites of policy, planning standing policy (im)mobility. Territory
and design innovation (Evans et al., 2016). concerns ‘the geographical strategies of par-
What drives the diffusion and adoption of tition and integration employed by eco-
innovations that underlie sustainability tran- nomic and political actors (states, firms)’
sitions is, however, less clear. McCann and (Bridge et al., 2013: 336), creating the neces-
Ward (2011) and Temenos and McCann sary preconditions for the establishment of
(2013) find that policy transfer depends not territorial interests and territorial competi-
only on the building of relationships tion. Scale denotes ‘territorially nested, mal-
between agents and institutions; it is also leable relationships among territorially
shaped by differing subjectivities, rational- embedded or constituted agents and institu-
ities, institutions and local contexts. Policy tions, shaping their responsibilities, capaci-
mobility is not inevitable and cannot be ties, opportunities, and constraints’ (Miller,
assumed – a matter of great relevance if cit- 2009: 62). Such relationships can ensure suf-
ies are to be considered a primary vector of ficient municipal resources and foster colla-
sustainability transitions. As Rutherford borative inter-municipal relationships, or
and Coutard (2014: 1366) put it, policy tran- their opposite. Place refers to social rela-
sitions are inherently political and ‘may tions, stretched across space, focused in par-
result in deep changes in the spatial organi- ticular locations. Places ‘are the spaces we
sation, economic performance, and social see, smell, taste, touch, hear, and bond to
cohesion of societies, but the precise nature (or not) as we inhabit, visit, and pass
of these changes will differ between places through them ... [They] are the spaces of
and also over time’. Such deep changes, social practice and meaning’ (Miller and
unsurprisingly, may provoke strong resis- Ponto, 2016: 268), with important implica-
tance and ultimately lead to the deliberate tions for the reception of policy ideas. All of
and active blocking of policy transfer. these relational spatialities imply the exercise
Affolderbach and Schulz (2016: 1952) argue of power, including the creation of bound-
that understanding policy (im)mobility aries delineating geographical interests and
requires an ‘actor-centred approach’ that authoritative and allocative capacities, as
focuses on ‘individual actors and actor well as the construction of shared collective
groups in their respective contexts’, while identities and values that support or inhibit
Nciri and Levenda (2019) point to instances the reception and adoption of new policies
of powerful corporate and state actors inten- and practices. Territorial and scalar relation-
tionally framing policy experiments as fail- ships, in particular, are often highly conten-
ures, creating ‘perverse policy lessons’ to tious given their implications for structuring
6 Urban Studies 00(0)

locally dependent material and cultural 1994, 2002). Intra-metropolitan divisions of

interests. The assertion of territorial and sca- labour, however, lead municipalities to com-
lar power is often a primary means through pete on different bases. Addressing energy
which policy transfer is contested, as actors flows, carbon flows, commuting practices,
representing incumbent policy regimes seek land-use mix, urban green space and other
to protect their interests while challengers environmental concerns may be an effective
attempt to create fertile ground for change. ‘fix’ to the problem of stagnant growth for
Sustainability policy may travel, mutate, be some cities, but other cities may find it very
rendered immobile or in some cases give rise difficult to attract investment and labour on
to policies promoting its opposite. this basis. Within territorially fragmented
state systems, municipal entrepreneurialism
frequently gives rise to conflicting territorial
The sustainability fix . and interests and objectives, with attendant con-
counter-sustainability fix flicts over tax base, employment and status
Urban sustainability initiatives must be con- (Cox, 1993, 2010; Peck and Tickell, 1994,
sidered within the broader spatial and struc- 2002).
tural contexts of fragmented territorial One response to economic stagnation and
states and neoliberal policy. The notion of competitive pressure has been to adopt
the ‘sustainability fix’, first proposed by city-regional strategies in which cities across
While et al. (2004), represents an important metropolitan regions develop cooperative
attempt to understand the contemporary economic development strategies. Such stra-
marriage of environmental and economic tegies are, at best, partial and not to be
development policy, conceptualising ‘evol- taken for granted. Indeed, many municipally
ving forms of local economy-environment based urban sustainability initiatives, and
relations’ in the context of capitalist accu- the options for urban living they represent,
mulation and inter-urban competition. often give rise to their opposite – growth-
While et al. (2004) argue that cities increas- first ‘counter-sustainability’ initiatives
ingly search for ‘spatio-institutional fix[es] to resembling traditional development-focused
safeguard growth trajectories’ (While et al., ‘growth machines’ (Jonas and Wilson, 1999;
2004: 551) through ‘selective incorporation Logan and Molotch, 1987) – elsewhere in
of environmental goals, determined by the the same metropolitan region. Within metro-
balance of pressures for and against environ- politan regions, cities differentiate them-
mental policy within and across the city’ selves in terms of housing costs, amenities,
(While et al., 2004: 552). For many cities, taxation and ways of life, as they attempt to
sustainability initiatives not only improve attract investment, jobs, residents and a
environmental conditions and quality of life; strong tax base. When some municipalities
they play a key role in attracting capital promote sustainable and active transporta-
investment and highly skilled labour. tion, renewable energy, cultural amenities,
Alongside the benefits of urban sustain- parks, compact development and better
ability initiatives, however, are contradic- housing (usually at higher cost), opportuni-
tions and conflicts. In a neoliberal era of ties arise for other municipalities in the same
slashed revenue transfers from national and metropolitan area to appeal to a very differ-
provincial governments and limited local ent market segment, such as households
capacity to generate revenue, municipalities needing or desiring lower-cost housing, more
are under pressure to compete for investment living space, lower taxation and automobile-
(Cox, 1993, 2010, 2011; Peck and Tickell, oriented ways of life. Indeed, given rising
Miller and Mössner 7

income inequality and increasing shortages known mainly for being the headquarters
of affordable housing, many households city of almost all of Canada’s oil and gas
have little choice but to opt to live in lower- corporations, for being a poster-city for
cost, more remote and less ‘sustainable’ jur- urban sprawl and for having one of the
isdictions (see Sheppard, 1980). In short, world’s highest ecological footprints. It too,
market-oriented urban sustainability policies however, has strongly stressed sustainability
tend to have a strong affinity with class and in its urban planning, especially since 2009.
cultural polarisation, giving rise to ecologi- Our research for this comparison began
cal gentrification (Dooling, 2009; Quastel, with a series of individual case studies exam-
2009) in some parts of the metropolitan ining the planning and development
region, and a focus on lower-cost provision dynamics of each city (for Freiburg, see
of basic necessities in others. In the context Freytag et al., 2014; Mössner, 2015, 2016;
of regional scale relationships and inter- Mössner and Miller, 2015; Mössner et al.,
dependencies, attempts to produce ‘sustain- 2018; for Calgary, see Miller, 2016; Miller
ability in one place’ (Mössner and Miller, and Smart, 2011, 2012; Townshend et al.,
2015) can create regional scale contradic- 2018). For both cities, our attention to
tions and conflicts that undermine the sustainability-related planning and politics
sustainability objectives of sustainability- has covered the period from the mid-1990s
oriented cities, as households of lesser to the present, a period in which
economic means locate in lower-cost, less sustainability-related politics and planning
‘sustainable’ parts of the metropolitan were matters of widespread discussion and
region and commute greater distances to debate, if not always under the label of
access jobs, services and amenities. ‘sustainability’. Information was gathered
In both the Freiburg and Calgary metropol- through a variety of means: analysis of plan-
itan regions, we see clear examples of efforts to ning documents; interviews with city officials
promote sustainability agendas and to promote including planners, city councillors and
their opposite: growth-first ‘counter-sustain- mayors; analysis of communications by and
ability’ agendas. The reasons for this, in two among officials; and participant-observation
such different metropolitan regions, are illumi- in policy-making and political processes
nated through comparative analysis. through participation in planning engage-
ment meetings and membership on city plan-
Comparing sustainability policies ning committees (especially in Calgary).
and politics in the Freiburg and Informal comparison of the Freiburg and
Calgary cases reveals, despite significant dif-
Calgary metropolitan regions
ferences between the two cities, a very signif-
At first glance, comparison of the sustain- icant commonality: intense debates and
ability policies and politics of the Freiburg, disagreement over sustainability planning
Germany, and Calgary, Canada, metropoli- within the metropolitan regions of both cit-
tan regions may seem somewhat surprising. ies, with the large central cities favouring a
Freiburg has garnered world-wide attention sustainability agenda but outlying municipa-
for its sustainability programmes and lities indifferent or opposed. This curious
achievements. Peter Hall, in his last book commonality led us to consider conflicts
focused on European sustainability plan- over sustainability policies and planning in
ning, called Freiburg ‘the city that did it all’ these two metropolitan regions in an expli-
(Hall, 2013: 248). Calgary, by contrast, is citly comparative manner.
8 Urban Studies 00(0)

Comparative research, at its most basic, and the scope of its ambitions (Hambleton,
examines two or more cases and attempts to 2015: 228), Calgary’s more recent sustain-
make sense of them through a common expla- ability agenda is nonetheless significant
natory model (Ward, 2010). Urban compara- given the extent to which it attempts to
tive research attempts to think about cities change the development trajectory of a
‘through elsewhere’ (Robinson, 2015), in major city that has not been historically
order to better understand the tactics, strate- aligned with sustainable development. In
gies and logics of urban development and pol- recent years, both cities have developed
icy-making. There are, of course, multiple sustainability agendas in a more or less
approaches to comparative research. Building autonomous fashion, de-emphasising their
from Charles Tilly’s classic work, both Ward embeddedness in their broader metropoli-
(2010) and Robinson (2011) provide thorough tan regions. Each city’s connection with its
reviews of these approaches and the issues hinterland appears tenuous, fragmented
they raise. Of the four commonly accepted and surprisingly under-addressed in research
comparative frameworks – individualising, and practice. On this basis, both cities have
universalising, encompassing and variation- mainstreamed sustainability planning at the
finding – the framework adopted for this municipal scale, producing clear economic
research can be best characterised as encom- and environmental benefits, but also unin-
passing. Encompassing comparative research tended consequences.
assumes that ‘different cases are . part of
overarching, systemic processes, such as capit-
alism or globalisation. [...] [T]hey can be ana- Freiburg
lysed as instances or units, albeit
systematically differentiated, within the Mainstreaming sustainability at the
broader system’ (Robinson, 2011: 7). This municipal scale
characterisation is consistent with our obser- Freiburg, a medium-sized city of just over
vations of the dynamics of the Freiburg and 230,000 people in 2018, has a long history of
Calgary metropolitan regions. However, we sustainable urban development that can be
go beyond a conventional comparative traced back to the environmental move-
approach to examine the Freiburg and ments of the 1970s. Freiburg was among the
Calgary metropolitan regions relationally first cities in the world to establish an insti-
(Hart, 2018; Ward, 2010), considering how tutional framework to promote sustainabil-
interactions and relationships between muni- ity goals in urban politics, policy and daily
cipalities have affected the (im)mobility of life. Early 1970s protests by farmers from
sustainability policy. This relational compari- the nearby wine-growing region against a
son occurs on two levels: between the proposed nuclear power plant near the vil-
Freiburg and Calgary metropolitan regions, lage of Whyl are often cited as the beginning
and within the Freiburg and Calgary metro- of Freiburg’s environmental ethos (see
politan regions. Given space limitations, our Rohracher and Spath, 2014), but significant
analysis focuses primarily on the latter. environmental objectives did not appear in
the city’s policy agenda until the late 1980s
Searching for a sustainability fix in and early 1990s. Given the territorial delimi-
tation of municipal power, it is not surpris-
Freiburg and Calgary
ing that most of Freiburg’s sustainable
While Freiburg is widely recognised as a urban development agenda has been focused
global leader for its sustainability initiatives within the city’s borders. By the 1990s,
Miller and Mössner 9

politicians, policy-makers, citizen initiatives contributed to a stabilisation of the housing

and private investors began to seriously pro- market for a short period, as housing
mote a set of urban policies favouring eco- demand continued to climb, prices for hous-
housing, energy-efficient green buildings, ing in these neighbourhoods followed suit,
public transportation, bicycling and walking with Vauban and Rieselfeld becoming
in response to steadily growing demand for attractive investment sites.
housing in a very tight housing market. The
politics of sustainable urban development
was spurred by the creation of new spaces of Market signals and the urban sustainability
citizen participation in planning and neigh- fix
bourhood design, the promotion of more Freiburg’s planning innovation notwith-
sustainable modes of consumption in every- standing, both the Vauban and Rieselfeld
day life and the institutionalisation of com- eco-neighbourhoods largely follow a con-
paratively strict energy and environmental ventional development model in which the
standards that later became cornerstones for private housing market responds to housing
future sustainable neighbourhood develop- demand. Vauban and Rieselfeld illustrate
ment (Müller, 2015). Support for these the locally focused and market-reliant
initiatives has been particularly strong approach that underlies Freiburg’s sustain-
among citizens with connection to the ability planning. This approach has given
University of Freiburg, the city’s largest rise to a range of social consequences and
employer. In the 1990s, the sustainability contradictions, first and foremost high hous-
agenda culminated in the development of ing prices and rents resulting from the very
two eco-neighbourhoods (almost entirely success of Freiburg’s sustainability initia-
based on private market housing), Vauban tives. Both neighbourhoods are among those
and Rieselfeld, that are now widely dis- with the highest rent increases over the past
cussed in the international sustainability lit- decade (Amt für Liegenschaften und
erature and bolster the city’s green image. Wohnungswesen der Stadt Freiburg, 2013).
The ecological success of these two neigh- Expensive rents and housing prices, the rela-
bourhoods derives from a number of widely tive lack of affordable housing for lower-
praised planning features, some of them income households and consequent social
quite innovative: combined heat and power polarisation are all causes for concern.
(biomass fuelled in Vauban) with district Vauban in particular has become home to a
heating; a ‘plus energy’ solar district (in comparatively higher-income, eco-friendly,
Vauban) that utilises both passive solar academic middle class that has privileged
design and photovoltaics; attention to soil access to public participation processes
permeability and environmentally sound (Mössner, 2015). Indeed, the success of
water management; an emphasis on active Freiburg’s sustainability planning has been a
and public transportation including light double-edged sword. On the one hand, the
rail, cycling and walking; minimal use of city has made great strides in promoting sus-
cars; direct citizen participation in residential tainable mobility, renewable energy and a
planning; and private homeowner initiatives high quality of life, achievements for which
that actively experiment with green technol- the city rightly deserves praise. On the other
ogies (Beatley, 2007; Hopwood, 2007; hand, successes like these – which have been
Medearis and Daseking, 2012; Newman replicated in several other parts of the city –
et al., 2009; Scheurer and Newman, 2009). have made Freiburg an even more attractive
Although Rieselfeld and Vauban city, which, in the context of a market-based
10 Urban Studies 00(0)

system of housing allocation, has priced a sustainable level of resource consumption

substantial portion of those who live and (Global Footprint Network, 2015).
work in Freiburg out of the city’s housing Calgary’s low-tax, minimally regulated,
market. These dynamics came to a head in automobile-dependent suburban growth
2018 when the Green mayor, Dieter model seemed to work reasonably well
Salomon, was voted out of office after fail- through the 1990s. But by the early 2000s,
ing to convincingly balance issues of sustain- attitudes towards Calgary’s growth model
ability and affordable housing. Today a new began to change. Not only did traffic conges-
political and administrative direction aims at tion start to become a significant problem –
creating housing on a large-scale basis, in 2000, Dave Bronconnier ran for mayor on
falling back on more traditional and market- an unofficial slogan of ‘roads, roads, roads’
based planning instruments in the new devel- – it was increasingly apparent that Calgary’s
opments of Gutleutmatten and Dietenbach. quality of life was declining. Moreover, city
revenue was increasingly falling short of
what was needed to build and maintain the
Calgary city’s sprawling infrastructure and to provide
city services.
Mainstreaming sustainability at the
As mayor from 2001 to 2010,
municipal scale Bronconnier broadened his approach to the
In comparison with Freiburg, Calgary is a city’s problems to include expansion of pub-
relatively young city – first incorporated in lic transportation infrastructure, increasing
1884 – that has seen the overwhelming development levies paid by suburban develo-
majority of its growth since the Second pers and intensifying development. Perhaps
World War. Its population in 1945 was just his most significant policy, however, was to
over 97,000 people; by 2019, the population initiate a citizen-based city-visioning project
of the city had grown to almost 1.3 million, from 2004 to 2006 called ‘imagineCalgary’.
making it the fastest growing major city in ImagineCalgary engaged over 18,000 citi-
Canada. Its growth has been fuelled, first zens, producing a Long Range Urban
and foremost, by the oil and gas industry; Sustainability Plan for Calgary that called
Calgary has become home to the headquar- for major changes in the development trajec-
ters of virtually all Canadian oil and gas cor- tory of the city. The goals of the
porations. Highly remunerated employment imagineCalgary plan (adopted by the City
has produced the highest median household Council as a non-binding advisory docu-
income in Canada: CA$100,320 in 2017 ment) addressed the full range of sustainabil-
(Alberta Government, 2020). Given that ity concerns, aiming to produce a future that
almost all of Calgary’s growth has occurred would be more environmentally sound,
during the automobile era, its infrastructure socially and economically equitable and par-
is decidedly automobile-oriented and its ticipatory. Among its many specific targets,
development stereotypically sprawling: it called for lowering of the city’s ecological
mostly low-density, automobile-dependent footprint to 7.25 global hectares per person
and based on segregated land uses. The by 2036. Building from imagineCalgary, the
combination of high levels of household City incorporated significant sustainability
spending and inefficient land use and trans- principles into its 2009 Master Development
portation has given Calgary a very high eco- and Transportation Plan, ‘Plan-It’. The plan
logical footprint, calculated at 9.8 global emphasised the coordination of land use and
hectares per person – five times the globally transportation planning, with a particular
Miller and Mössner 11

eye to increasing density and significantly seized on an independent economic analysis

expanding the modal shares of public trans- conducted by the IBI Group for the City of
portation, walking and cycling, and decreas- Calgary, The Implications of Alternative
ing reliance on the private automobile. Growth Patterns on Infrastructure Costs
(City of Calgary, 2009). The analysis showed
that the City would save CA$11.2 billion in
Market signals and the urban sustainability infrastructure costs and CA$130 million in
fix annual operating costs if it adopted the
In the extensive public consultation process Hybrid scenario, compared with the
for Plan-It, planners laid out three different Dispersed scenario (City of Calgary, 2009).
development scenarios: 1) ‘Dispersed’ – The argument was compelling, from a
essentially a continuation of Calgary’s strictly economic perspective, so much so
automobile-dependent sprawl; 2) ‘Compact’ that Plan-It was unanimously approved by
– a dramatic reorientation focusing on den- Calgary City Council in September 2009.
sification and active and public transporta- The new land use and transportation plan,
tion, with virtually all new growth taking combined with increases to development
place within the city’s existing built foot- levies that would, by 2016, see the elimina-
print; and 3) ‘Hybrid’ – a compromise sce- tion of City subsidies for suburban infra-
nario calling for growth to be evenly split structure, represented a major change in
between new suburban development and growth and development policy. This sea
intensification within the city’s built foot- change has begun to curtail low density sub-
print. Given citizens’ strong support for urban sprawl and promote intensification
change, one might have expected the com- within the built footprint of the city, provid-
promise Hybrid scenario to gain strong sup- ing a sustainability fix for the City’s tenuous
port across the city and on the City Council, fiscal balance sheet; it has also begun to
but the proposed change in direction turned reverse the problem of declining quality of
out to be highly controversial. life by increasing investment in public and
Resistance came largely from the Urban active transportation. This is a major accom-
Development Institute (UDI), which repre- plishment, given the scope and scale of
sented, first and foremost, Calgary’s subur- Calgary’s sustainability challenges. While
ban development industry. Its resistance one can make a compelling argument that
was, perhaps, to be expected, given the impli- Plan-It represents real progress towards the
cations of Plan-It for suburban development. realisation of a more sustainable city, this
UDI argued that Plan-It was a social engi- claim must be qualified on at least two
neering document that took away the choice counts: 1) The argument that won the day
of consumers in a free market. UDI made no for Plan-It was strictly economic – indeed,
mention of the extent to which suburban neoliberal – in its rationale. Environmental
sprawl had been subsidised by the City of policies have been supported largely to the
Calgary (by not charging developers the full extent that they can be justified in economic
cost of infrastructure for new development), cost–benefit terms, and the social objectives
and many conservative City Council mem- so prominent in the citizen-produced
bers bought into the UDI argument for ‘free’ imageCalgary plan have gone largely unrea-
choice. Plan-It appeared headed for defeat lised; 2) Like Freiburg’s sustainability poli-
until citizens mobilised in support of it. cies, the overall effects of Plan-It and other
Cognisant of the market-oriented bent of Calgary sustainability policies cannot be
opposing City Council members, supporters understood divorced from regional relations.
12 Urban Studies 00(0)

Regional relations: Counter- Südlicher Oberrhein) are 126 municipalities

sustainability policies and in four administrative districts (Stadt
practices Freiburg im Breisgau, Landkreis Breisgau-
Hochschwarzwald, Landkreis Emmendingen
Freiburg’s regional embeddedness and Ortenaukreis) incorporating approxi-
The provision of affordable housing is a mately 1 million inhabitants (see Figure 1).
major blind spot in Freiburg’s sustainable Despite the long German tradition of inter-
urban development agenda. The local municipal cooperation, there is a ‘highly
Badische Zeitung newspaper reports that the differentiated landscape of metropolitan-
city witnessed a new peak of young family governance arrangements with reference to
relocation to the surrounding region in 2016. functional scope, geographical scale, institu-
Approximately 660 parents between the ages tional form and even content of metropolitan
of 30 and 45 left the city with their children politics’ (Heinelt and Zimmermann, 2010:
in search of ‘cheaper’ housing (Badische 16). The Freiburg metropolitan region is an
Zeitung, 2017). Further underscoring the example of relatively weak and dysfunctional
phenomenon of outmigration from regional governance, particularly when it
Freiburg, Baden-Württemberg’s Statistisches comes to questions of urban sustainability.
Landesamt (2020) estimates that 4524 people Effective regional planning in the
between the ages of 30 and 40 moved out of Freiburg region faces three central chal-
the city between 2014 and 2018. Freiburg’s lenges: 1) the principle of subsidiarity gives
reliance on distant municipalities to provide planning authority and responsibility to local
much of the region’s affordable housing has municipalities; 2) the principle of counter-
led to more extensive commuting, thereby vailing influence requires that higher-ranked,
increasing energy consumption and GHG that is, provincial, planning authorities be
emissions. Unsurprisingly, those municipali- respected at lower scales; 3) the strong reli-
ties that have most intensively invested in the ance on market-mechanisms runs counter to
planning of new areas for single-family democratic-administrative coordination.
houses, and not necessarily sustainable hous- The Upper Rhine Valley Regional
ing, have had the most success attracting Planning Association consists of a regional
new residents, including higher-income assembly and main administration, both
households seeking more living space at located in the city of Freiburg. The regional
lower cost. assembly is empowered by the province
These dynamics must be understood in (Baden-Württemberg) to be the regional
the context of the governance of the wider decision-making body for planning matters,
Freiburg metropolitan region. Freiburg can with 80 regional councillors elected from
be characterised as seeking a ‘sustainability four districts. Not all of the 126 municipali-
fix’ (While et al., 2004) to its economic con- ties are represented, and mayors often par-
cerns, but those efforts end at its municipal ticipate ‘as [local] watchdogs rather than as
borders. This is partly related to the particu- regional politicians’ (interview with regional
lar governance framework of the greater administrator, 19 May 2014), defending the
Freiburg region. The Upper Rhine Valley interests of their municipalities against larger
covers an area of approximately 4000 square regional initiatives. Regional politics is a
kilometres, bordering France to the West ‘difficult construct when [decisions are] in
and Switzerland to the South. Included the end made by local politicians’ (interview
in the Upper Rhine Valley Regional with regional administrator, 19 May 2014).
Planning Association (Planungsverband Regional planners, moreover, do not
Miller and Mössner 13

Figure 1. Freiburg region map.

develop their own specific understanding of In 2010, the regional assembly decided to
regional sustainability, but instead attempt revise the regional development plan that
to enact the principles developed in the came into effect in 1995 (part of it dating
province’s regional development plan. back to the 1980s). In the current draft of
14 Urban Studies 00(0)

the new plan, which is undergoing public cooperation between Freiburg and its sur-
comment, three categories of municipality rounding municipalities, which has been
have been proposed, representing different confirmed by several other municipalities,
growth trajectories and different levels of occurs for a variety of reasons. In contrast
environmental protection. The first category to Freiburg’s international position as a
encompasses those municipalities that have green city (e.g. prominently represented at
potential for modest growth without signifi- the Shanghai EXPO and at other interna-
cantly impacting the environment. The sec- tional events), Freiburg’s politicians do not
ond category is comprised of municipalities play a leading role in the greater Freiburg
that do not control growth and instead region (interview with regional administra-
repeatedly expand their developable area. tor, 19 May 2014). Many municipal officials
The third category is comprised of munici- across the region feel distant from Freiburg
palities that exhibit little growth potential due, in part, to the lack of an efficient
and currently have no plans to designate regional transportation system that affects
new areas for development. Under the new not only commuting patterns but also the
regional plan, growing municipalities (cate- building of social and political networks.
gory two) are expected to be reduced from Another obstacle to effective regional coop-
56 (in 1995) to 40, thereby focusing popula- eration is political party affiliation. While
tion growth mostly along major transporta- the City of Freiburg was governed by a
tion infrastructure (train lines and major Green Party mayor (Bündnis 90/Die Grüne)
roads). The regional plan, however, lacks a from 2002 to 2018, most of the surrounding
clear statement regarding sustainability and municipalities have long been governed by
appears to be a rather weak instrument for the Conservative Party (Christdemokratische
regulating development, which is still predo- Union or CDU). The political distance is not
minantly determined by market mechan- as great as it might first seem, however, as
isms. This situation is largely a product of the Green Party in Freiburg sometimes coop-
the fraught constellation of a regional erates with the Conservatives and pursues
assembly based on an amalgamation of rather conservative objectives in local poli-
local, rather than regionally oriented, inter- tics. At the provincial (Baden-Württemberg)
ests, although it is also influenced by the scale, a Conservative–Green (CDU–Green
self-conception of the planners who under- Party) coalition has governed since 2016.
stand their responsibility to be to ‘just’ The lack of significant policy transfer and
translate the abstract sustainability goals of coordination between the city of Freiburg
Landesplanung (provincial planning). and its surrounding region, despite obvious
As a consequence, the implementation of commuting, political and economic relation-
a regional sustainability transition extending ships, is not a simple matter of political
beyond the borders of the city of Freiburg obstacles and cleavages. It is, rather, based
depends heavily on voluntary cooperation to a substantial degree in economic and cul-
between Freiburg and its surrounding muni- tural competitiveness. This defence of local
cipalities. Such cooperation is rare. For territorial interests occurs both in Freiburg
example, the mayor of a municipality desig- and in the municipalities of the region, and
nated for significant new growth only cannot be understood apart from the market
23 kilometres from Freiburg told us: economy and a growth-oriented housing
‘Cooperation with Freiburg? Well. I have market. Steady population growth in the
once talked informally with them’ (interview Upper Rhine Valley has made the develop-
with mayor, 30 June 2014). The lack of ment and geographical distribution of new
Miller and Mössner 15

housing a major economic and political as cities such as Calgary had had a very high
well as cultural issue in the region. Many degree of control over development beyond
municipalities are re-zoning land in order to their borders, but from 1994 onwards strong
capture a greater portion of that growth, tar- regional planning was replaced with a quasi-
geting both those in need of more affordable anarchic system in which the only regional
housing as well as a portion of Freiburg’s planning that took place was that which was
better-off middle class that seeks more space formulated on a voluntary municipality-to-
at lower cost. In a parallel fashion, Freiburg municipality basis. Not surprisingly, regional
has harnessed its sustainability agenda to the planning since 1994 has been highly ineffec-
wagon of high-end economic development. tive, giving rise to considerable sprawl
Municipalities across the Freiburg region are beyond Calgary’s borders. The level of con-
attempting to position themselves in an eco- flict associated with regional planning and
nomic niche, especially with regard to the governance is considerably higher in the
housing market. The net result is more sub- Calgary metropolitan region than it is in the
urbanisation and more commuting over Freiburg metropolitan region, but the cen-
increasingly long distances – an outcome that tral issues are strikingly similar. Decades of
runs directly counter to Freiburg’s renowned strict regional planning had starved the small
sustainability policy objectives. cities, towns and rural municipalities of the
Calgary metropolitan region of tax base,
employment and commercial activity. Since
Calgary’s regional embeddedness the abolition of strong regional planning in
In the months leading up to the City Council the 1990s, their primary concern has been
vote on Plan-It, Calgary’s suburban develop- attracting investment to increase land values
ment industry threatened to respond to and property tax revenue while keeping costs
Plan-It by shifting development beyond and the overall tax burden to a minimum.
Calgary’s borders to the larger metropolitan Sustainability has not received strong sup-
region. The development industry’s threat port and, to the extent that it is associated
was mostly empty, at least on a large scale, with higher densities, restrictions on develop-
due to regional restrictions on water supply ment, significant infrastructure costs and
and infrastructure extension. But it did sig- measures seen as inimical to ‘the rural life-
nal an understanding of the importance of style’, the sustainability agenda encounters
the regional housing market as well as the outright opposition from significant parts of
long-standing strategy of threatening disin- the larger metropolitan region.
vestment to gain political leverage (Cox, Regional opposition to Calgary’s sustain-
1993). And to the extent that an extremely ability policies is most apparent in the inabil-
weak regional planning regime was in place, ity of the Calgary Regional Partnership (the
the threat was not completely hollow. voluntary regional planning association, that
The Calgary metropolitan region’s history was comprised of 17 municipalities in the
of planning and governance has been fraught Calgary region as of June 2009) to persuade
with conflict (Miller, 2016), even more so all of its members to ratify the Calgary
than that of the Freiburg metropolitan Metropolitan Plan (see Figure 2).
region. While the province of Alberta had a The Calgary Metropolitan Plan was
very strong system of regional planning in drafted between 2007 and 2009 with citizen
place from the 1950s to the early 1990s, this input from all municipal members of the
system was abolished as part of a major neo- Calgary Regional Partnership. The central
liberal policy turn in 1994. Prior to 1994, principle guiding the plan was that growth
16 Urban Studies 00(0)

Figure 2. Calgary region map.

Source: Calgary Regional Partnership 2014 Calgary Metropolitan Plan.

and development should be coordinated Rocky View – prevented its adoption. This
across the entire metropolitan region. means that the Calgary metropolitan region
Practically speaking, this meant that the continues to operate without a regional plan
City of Calgary’s land use and development 26 years after the abolition of Alberta’s pre-
plan, Plan-It, and the broader regional plan, vious regional planning system. The effect of
the Calgary Metropolitan Plan, needed to be this quasi-anarchic situation has been poorly
coordinated and compatible. Indeed, the coordinated development, the continuation
two plans were very much joined up, but of sprawl beyond Calgary’s borders – partic-
ongoing opposition from some regional ularly to the west of the city – and increased
municipalities, including the largest jurisdic- commuting from bedroom communities to
tion bordering Calgary – the county of employment in Calgary. The lack of a
Miller and Mössner 17

common compatible policy framework used their sustainability agendas to reposi-

undermines, and runs directly counter to, tion themselves within larger national and
Calgary’s sustainability policy objectives. global systems of competition. At the fore-
front of these strategies are infrastructural
Conclusions: Sustainability and improvements, technological innovations
counter-sustainability lessons and smarter approaches to land use and
transportation planning.
from the Freiburg and Calgary Despite their substantial differences in
metropolitan regions development history and form, the Freiburg
While Freiburg and Calgary exhibit substan- and Calgary metropolitan regions are beset
tial differences in size, developmental history by strikingly similar conflicts over sustain-
and political orientation, both demonstrate a ability policy and governance. In each case,
profound disconnection from their regional the region’s largest city has pursued a signifi-
contexts. The municipalities surrounding cant sustainability agenda as part of a larger
Freiburg often favour growth and new con- strategy of economic development, cost con-
struction over densification, stricter energy tainment and quality of life improvement.
standards and other approaches to reducing Freiburg’s and Calgary’s sustainability poli-
carbon emissions, contradicting Freiburg’s cies can be considered reasonably successful
sustainable urban development agenda by sustainability fixes (While et al., 2004). But
promoting suburbanisation, commuting and considering the full spectrum of sustainabil-
soil sealing. Similarly, Calgary’s sustainabil- ity objectives – social, environmental and
ity policies contrast with those of many sur- economic – from a broader process-based
rounding municipalities which have adopted perspective, it is clear that both regions are
policies designed to attract as much growth falling short of achieving what might be con-
and investment as possible, with a minimum sidered a strong notion of sustainability.
of regulation. A further and very important Why have both regions fallen short of a
parallel between Freiburg and Calgary is the strong, robust form of sustainability? The
relationship between each city and its sur- inability to coordinate sustainability policies
rounding metropolitan region: in both cases, beyond municipal boundaries plays an
the relationship is fraught with conflicting important role. The processes that shape cit-
interests and objectives. Sustainable develop- ies and their social, environmental and eco-
ment in the greater Freiburg region has yet nomic sustainability do not end at municipal
to be coherently addressed, leading to a vari- borders; the necessity of collaboration at the
ety of policies and practices that run counter regional scale is obvious. In both the
to Freiburg’s ‘green city’ sustainability objec- Freiburg and Calgary regions, the failure to
tives. In a parallel fashion, Calgary’s more develop coherent regional sustainability pol-
recently adopted sustainability agenda – pri- icies has multiple causes, including lack of
marily represented through ‘Plan-It’ – has institutional capacity (Healey et al., 2002)
yet to see any significant uptake on a and conflicting territorial imaginaries and
regional scale. city-centricity, masked by the planning prin-
The mainstreaming of sustainability in ciple of subsidiarity. The lack of effective
both cities is accompanied by larger eco- coordinating regional governance mechan-
nomic strategies aimed at reducing infra- isms becomes critical in the context of inter-
structure and service provision costs and municipal competition and a reliance on
coping with the negative outcomes of urban market mechanisms. Were the provision of
growth. At the same time, both cities have essential goods, such as housing,
18 Urban Studies 00(0)

coordinated through democratic institutions existing sustainability (Krueger and

and guided by principles of equity and jus- Agyeman, 2005), then, is that it may pro-
tice, inadequate provision of affordable duce its opposite outside its territorial con-
housing would not be a widespread and per- tainer. These contradictory processes are
sistent problem. In the context of insuffi- hidden from view when sustainability is con-
ciently regulated regional housing and land sidered
markets, however, housing is distributed in aspatially, but come to light when adopting
accordance with land values and the ability a spatial-relational perspective.
of individual municipalities to develop stra- The dialectic between sustainability and
tegies to capture particular segments of the counter-sustainability is not, however, a
metropolitan market. In lieu of comprehen- given. It is a product of the operation of
sive and effective affordable housing policy, markets that respond to exchange value
sprawl becomes the de facto affordable rather than human and ecological need, and
housing policy, producing longer commutes, of the mismatched territorial and scalar
increased energy consumption and increased bounding of critical institutions of govern-
GHG emissions – all undermining core sus- ance. Regional labour markets, agglomera-
tainability objectives. tion economies, infrastructure networks,
Both Freiburg and Calgary illustrate how, cultures and attachments to place (Cox,
in the face of weak institutions of regional 2010, 2011; Jonas, 2012; Keil et al., 2016)
governance and an almost exclusive reliance call into question the very local basis on
on market-based housing provision, ‘sustain- which many, if not most, urban sustainabil-
ability in one place’ policies may not only be ity initiatives are advanced, with significant
weak, but may actually produce their oppo- implications for the effectiveness of such
site: counter-sustainability. Counter-sustain- initiatives. A central dilemma of the politics
ability practices may arise not only from the and planning of urban sustainability, then,
functioning of market mechanisms; they derives precisely from its localist ontology
may also derive from policies deliberately and city-centric focus (see Angelo and
designed and adopted by municipalities to Wachsmuth, 2015; Brenner and Schmid,
enhance their ability to capture capital 2015; MacLeod and Jones, 2011; Merrifield,
investment and tax base through inter- 2013), which is at odds with the spatial con-
municipal competition. stitution of many processes that underlie
Both the Freiburg and Calgary sustainability issues.
regions tell complex stories of dialectical Governing for any strong notion of sus-
relationships between sustainability and tainability requires rethinking both the spa-
counter-sustainability policies. While tial organisation and the structural power
Freiburg and Calgary have sought to relations that underlie urban and regional
enhance their economic situations through planning. That will require in-depth political
sustainability fixes, neighbouring municipa- debate over the design of key institutions of
lities have sought to enhance their own eco- governance and resource allocation, not
nomic situations by adopting policies marginal adjustments in ecological moderni-
sation policy.
designed to capture different niches in the
regional housing, commercial and industrial
markets. These policies do not necessarily Acknowledgements
align with the principles of higher-quality, We are indebted to Robin Poitras, cartographer
and generally higher-cost, sustainable devel- of the Department of Geography, University of
opment. A central paradox of actually Calgary, and to Birgitt Gaida, cartographer of
Miller and Mössner 19

the Institute of Environmental Social Sciences Brenner N and Schmid C (2015) Towards a new
and Geography, University of Freiburg, for their epistemology of the urban? City 19(2–3):
cartographic assistance. 151–182.
Bridge G, Bouzarovski S, Bradshaw M, et al.
Declaration of conflicting interests (2013) Geographies of energy transition:
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of Space, place and the low-carbon economy.
interest with respect to the research, authorship, Energy Policy 53: 331–340.
and/or publication of this article. Bulkeley H, Castán Broto V, Hodson M, et al.
(eds) (2011) Cities and Low Carbon Transi-
Funding tions. Abingdon and New York: Routledge.
Calthorpe P (2010) Urbanism in the Age of Cli-
The author(s) received no financial support for mate Change. Washington, DC: Island Press.
the research, authorship, and/or publication of Castells M (1977 [1968]) The Urban Question: A
this article. Marxist Approach. London: Edward Arnold.
City of Calgary (2009) The Implications of Alter-
ORCID iD native Growth Patterns on Infrastructure Costs.
Byron Miller https://orcid.org/0000-0001- Report prepared by the IBI Group, 2 April.
7310-2962 Available at: http://www.reconnectingameri
ca.org/assets/Uploads/planitcalgarycoststudy
analysisaprilthird.pdf (accessed 15 May 2020).
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