Hamburg Conference 2008

Urban waterfronts have historically played a crucial role in the processes of urbanization in port cities around the world – whether viewed from the perspective of the growth of the built environment, the economy, or socio-cultural systems and institutions. While this remains the case, recent large scale socio-economic changes make the conference particularly opportune at this time. Large investments have been
made, and more are being planned, in urban waterfront development projects around the world that are envisioned to have major infl uences on the form of cities, their role in both local and international systems, and the social relations that occur within them. Waterfront developments are being promoted as spaces of promise and crucial territorial wedges in 21st century competitive-city growth strategies.

The ‘fixity and flow of urban waterfronts’ is an exciting and innovative concept that captures the many tensions that give rise to change on urban waterfronts. It also provides a critical lens through which to analyze the dynamism and interconnectedness of the tangle of relations and organizations associated with waterfront development. While waterfronts have always been special places where land and water meet, they have recently become leading sites for achieving urban transformations as cities compete at a global scale to attract corporations in the new information processing economy and their high-income jobs. A spatial expansion and integration of the global economy is fundamental to these recent urban waterfront developments.

Hamburg provides a particularly appropriate location for the conference: it is a city with a long and rich waterfront history, and recent changes to these lands and plans for additional expansion of port facilities all make for an exciting case to see and study.