Farming ruins: a landscape study of incremental urbanisation

Abstract

This study demonstrates a need for landscape studies of urbanisation in which the slow process of ruination and reuse is considered. The paper argues that a focus on maintenance and repair facilitate symmetrical studies in which the dismantling of former uses and the establishment of new activities and regulations are examined as an incremental process. This is illustrated here using the case study of a contested development project at the fringe of town Skurup, Sweden. The study traces partial dependencies of past planning, arguing that current farms have been successively separated from their previous networks of farming and, in the process, have become entangled in a complex interdependency of urban growth strategies dating back to the 1970s. The case provides a richer understanding of the contested landscape; it demonstrates the insufficiency of new growth boundaries, but also the potential to re-assemble the place, whether for farming or sustainable urban development.