Redeveloping Lyon Part-Dieu : Innovative construction sites management in a dense urban area

Abstract: This study aims at identifying on a concrete example the possible transfer of methods from strategic spatial planning to lower scales of planning like urban programming or operational planning of construction sites. Strategic spatial planning is a participatory and open method establishing the basis for cooperation between public and private stakeholders to achieve what is defined by said stakeholders as the best evolution for the territory it is dealing with, it relies on tools and processes like territorial diagnosis, thematic workshops and roundtables; Objectives are more qualitatively than quantitatively defined to allow flexibility to adapt to internal and external changes. This paper considers the territory of Lyon conurbation, France, as its territory of focus and particularly the redevelopment project of its central business district and multimodal hub, Part-Dieu. The planning of Lyon conurbation was in the 80s at the vanguard of strategic planning in France. Driven by Lyon urban planning agency and Grand Lyon, the local authority in charge of the area, under the pressure of local economic actors, Lyon conurbation acquired and integrated new tools and methods from strategic spatial planning. The hypothesis of this study is that, from then on, strategic planning methods and processes got transferred from the field of pure strategic spatial planning to the lower notches of the decision-making chain leading to the realization of a project: the stage of the programming of a neighborhood – the Part-Dieu district – and the stage of the operational planning of a construction or redevelopment operation. This study puts forward the following reasoning to explain this transfer of methods: an acculturation process to the collaborative and qualitative methods of strategic spatial planning took place in the territory of Lyon conurbation. It happened between the corporate cultures of spatial planning and those of urban program design and construction operation management. However, more than a way to really involve all stakeholders in the decision-making process in a bottom-up approach, this study suggests that the use of these methods at the stage of construction/redevelopment operation management is more of a facade to make stakeholders better accept decisions already taken by experts and/or public authorities. One could talk about a top-down approach disguised as a bottom-up approach.