City branding in polycentric urban regions: identification, profiling and transformation in the Randstad and Rhine-Ruhr

ABSTRACT

In polycentric urban regions several distinct cities, none of which is dominant, cooperate and compete with each other to attract inhabitants and firms. In such settings city branding strategies do not solely affect one city, but the entire region. We examined how city branding in the face of ecological modernization, that is, delivering higher added economic value, while lowering environmental impacts, is playing out in the Dutch Randstad and the German Rhine-Ruhr. Our findings show that regional identity formation occurs at the sub-polycentric urban region level, coinciding more with (historical) economic profiles than with planning imaginaries. The Dutch cities profile themselves more along the lines of ecological modernization than their German counterparts. Differences between subregions within each polycentric urban region are also noticeable, where more industrialized regions, such as the Ruhr or southern Randstad focus on ‘green’, ‘liveable’ and ‘knowledge-oriented’, while cities with stronger knowledge-intensive sectors portray themselves as ‘smart’ or ‘sustainable’. Cities generally substantiate their profiles through projects, but a significant gap persists between reality and aspirations for improved environmental conditions. This is especially true for the Dutch cities, where many claims, but little visible action can be observed.

KEYWORDS:

• City branding
• polycentric urban regions
• ecological modernization
• Randstad
• Rhine-Ruhr

Acknowledgements

The authors are indebted to the South China University of Technology/TU-Delft Joint Research Centre Urban Systems & Environment (JRC-USE), the Delft Initiative for Mobility and Infrastructures (DIMI) and the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) for funding this research. They also thank Arjan Harbers and Merten Nefs for their advice and support in organizing several of the interviews. Finally, they thank all interviewees and their respective organizations for their valuable input.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Translation by authors.

2. The cities are arranged according to the original North Wing and the South Wing for the Randstad and the Ruhr area, Bergisches Dreieck and the Rhine-axis for the Rhine-Ruhr in all following tables and figures.

3. Nonetheless, the remainder of the text will continue to use the term Rhine-Ruhr to denote the polycentric urban region as depicted in Figure 3.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO); Delft Initiative for Mobility and Infrastructures (DIMI) and South China University of Technology/TU-Delft Joint Research Centre Urban Systems & Environment (JRC-USE).