Urban environments of the entrepreneurial city : from Aker Brygge to Tjuvholmen
Abstract
The focus of this thesis is the regeneration of industrial harbor and
brownfield areas to properties primed for urban development along the urban
waterfront of Oslo, Norway. The project revolves around an empirical study
of Tjuvholmen, a privately operated waterfront development scheme,
centrally located in the city. The point of departure for the thesis is to explore
how Tjuvholmen was conceptualized as urban environment, within a
particular model of political-economic conduct, to better understand the
relation between the current-day urban development policies and the urban
form of waterfront redevelopments.
The thesis frames the case study in a historical framework of political,
economic and disciplinary practices in Oslo, tracing urban waterfront
redevelopment in Oslo from the late 1970s. A specific emphasis lays on the
area Aker Brygge, developed within a similar model of conduct 25 years
earlier. The comparative study of Aker Brygge brings insights to the relations
between architectural practice forms, political economic practices, and the
project-based development strategies that characterize Oslo’s urban
waterfront today. The project relates to a broad scope of urban research that
scrutinizes forms of fragmentation, gentrification and aesthetics of urban
landscapes, within the political-economic context of what David Harvey has
labeled “the entrepreneurial city,” but is fundamentally based on a
morphological approach to research on the city. The aim is to disclose how
ideals and interpretations of the city affect Tjuvholmen as urban
environment, and expose the dynamics of architecture and urban form within
entrepreneurial forms of urban planning and governance.