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DPU Working Paper - No. 171
King鈥檚 Cross railway lands: A 鈥済ood argument鈥� for change?
25 November 2014
Author: Dave Brenner
Publication Date: September 2014
ISSN: 1474-3280
Should the future differ dramatically from the past? Should historical patterns of growth be left by the wayside? If so, should it be a single vision which urges us towards the future or a complicated comingling of many? In the view of the theorist Jurgen Habermas, 鈥渋deal鈥� stakeholder engagement tends to produce a 鈥渂est argument鈥� for development. This 鈥渁rgument鈥� may range from the conservative and incremental to the radical and dramatic. For such processes to be 鈥渋deal,鈥� however, a series of alternative development paths, or scenarios, must be expounded and debated as rationally as possible.
This working paper sets out to test some of Habermas鈥� assumptions by analyzing the 20 year planning process surrounding the King鈥檚 Cross Railway Lands in central London. This 26 hector site of largely unutilized land represented one of the largest single development opportunities in the modern history of London. To believe in the possibility of a best argument, it is necessary to first make some rough assumptions about rationality, or as this paper argues, rationalities. This raises several questions as to what a 鈥渂est argument鈥� might consist of and, critically, how values are appraised within development scenarios. In answering these types of questions, light is shed onto stakeholder claims to legitimation.
This working paper begins with an analytic framework for rationality and visioning and then lays out six visions of Kings Cross Railway Lands, all draw from planning documents. With visions in one hand and a theoretical understanding of rationality(ies) in the other, chapters 3 and 4 explore how they relate. Chapter 5, the conclusion, seeks to determine whether Habermas鈥� assertions and the discussion of rationality(ies) in general are indeed useful as tools to understand planning logic.