An Arrow-Cycle Interpretation of the Redevelopment of Stockholm's Central Business District

Danish Journal of Geography 95: 83–91, 1995.

The core of Stockholm's central business district, Lower Norrmalm, underwent a process of total renewal during the post-war period. This study asks if this renewal process may be interpreted as a manifestation of a logic of cyclicity inherent to the economies of regions and nations. First, time series over construction activity are presented for three geographic levels: Stockholm, the inner city and Lower Norrmalm. Then the observed booms and slumps are analyzed in the following contexts: construction activity on the national scale, transportation and urbanization, and finally, economic and spatial restructuring. Developments on Lower Norrmalm during this period seem to have been part of a regional and national building cycle, and were moulded by adaptation to transportation needs and rapid economic restructuring. But the local effects of these forces would have been very different were it not for the mediating and actively orchestrating roles assumed by local institutions.