 |
 |
18th International Society of Planning History Conference
Yokohama, Japan, 15-19 July 2018
Planning History and Megaevents: design, spaces and legacy
Convenors: John R. Gold (Oxford Brookes University) and
Margaret M. Gold (London Metropolitan University
Megaevents such the Olympic Games and Worlds’ Fairs/Expos have had a long association with host cities going back over 160 years. Inter alia, they have provided opportunities for planning and architectural innovation, have served as important media for place promotion and city marketing, and have created large event spaces that need to be integrated into the city once the event is over. Over the last half century, there has been an increasing tendency for city managers and local growth coalitions to use these events for their own agendas and as instruments of planning, infrastructural, economic, social and promotional transformation. The popularity of staging such events has waxed and waned. Notably, the International Olympic Committee had trouble engaging with potential summer hosts at the end of the 1970s and again in the current round of bidding for 2024 and 2028. Nevertheless, we have also seen the rise of multiple hosts for the Summer Games, with London hosting on three occasions, Paris and Los Angeles due to achieve the same status in the next decade, Tokyo about to stage the Games for a second occasion and Beijing about to be the first city to stage a Summer and Winter Games. For their part, the World’s Fairs have had mixed fortunes with suggestions that their day had gone, but a series of successful Expos this century has revived interest, with the USA back to exhibiting and even signs that to American cities are toying with the idea of hosting such events once again.
Against this background, it is proposed to hold either one or two sessions of papers (depending on demand) about the relationship between planning history and megaevents at the forthcoming biennial conference of the International Society of Planning History Conference, Yokohama, Japan in July 2018.
Themes on which papers might be contributed include:
* growth coalitions and city promotion
* megaevents and urban spatial structure
* event spaces in strategic urban planning
* instrumental use of megaevents
* architectural and planning innovation
* multiple hosts and the emergence of the megaevent city
* megaevents and infrastructural development
* issues of tangible and intangible legacy
* megaevents, security and city design
* megaevents and urban sustainability
We particularly welcome contributions that offer a historical approach which is theoretically grounded and provide a comparative perspective. While also welcoming papers that deal with the experience of cities in South East Asia, we would emphasise that there is no restriction on the empirical focus of potential contributions.
Anyone interested is invited to submit a title and brief abstract (no more than 300 words) to the convenors by 4 December 2017.