Planning infrastructure replacements: Restructuring and exerting partial control over the environment. Issue 103 (January 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Zandvoort, Mark; van der Vlist, Maarten J.
• Is Part Of: Environmental science & policy. Issue 103(2020)
• Page Start: 67
• Page End: 76
• Publication Date: 2020-01
• Subjects: Uncertainty -- (un)control -- Replacement strategies -- System transformation -- Infrastructure; Environmental policy -- Periodicals; Environmental sciences -- Periodicals; Environnement -- Politique gouvernementale -- Périodiques; Sciences de l'environnement -- Périodiques; Environmental policy; Environmental sciences; Periodicals; Electronic journals; 363.70561
• DOI: 10.1016/j.envsci.2019.10.010
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1462-9011

Abstract

Highlights: Infrastructure replacement decisions restructure environments, landscapes and water systems. Replacements come with locational and functional decisions for the long-term. Adequate strategies need to consider system, network, location and object level choices. Adaptive options for replacements are closed and opened through interaction of different levels. Abstract: By building infrastructure, planners want to exert control over the environment for the sake of society. Due to uncertainty and complexity, such control is always limited and can become contested. Based on a case study of replacing a pumping station, we show how planners can understand the replacement of infrastructure and what informs adequate replacement strategies amid uncertainty. The paper argues that the concepts (un)control and (re)structuring help understand replacements in the context of infrastructure planning. Infrastructure replacements are interventions on different levels which restructure existing systems, asset networks, local areas and assets themselves. Necessary information for developing a replacement strategy, exerted control or uncontrol, possible innovations and restructuring effects differ among these levels. We conclude that planners need to be cognizant that infrastructure replacements, no matter how large or small, restructure both environments and social institutions.