This SSHRC-funded project is led by CCGES Affiliate Ute Lehrer (Faculty of Environmental Studies), this research and brings together academics from York University (Roger Keil/CITY Institute/Faculty of Environmental Studies) and from Goethe University in Frankfurt (Susanne Heeg and Bernd Berlina). It focuses on how supportive policy environments in commercial and residential land development, security and transportation infrastructure are created in decentralized mid-size suburban municipalities in the Frankfurt and Toronto regions. The group will study how these municipalities react to the challenges of belonging geographically and functionally to a global city region. The overriding question is how regional growth policies (in planning and regional political institutions) work in a globalizing city region in light of the inter-municipal competition inside the region. The research project will employ up to 12 graduate students over the next three years.

Research Director: Ute Lehrer (CCGES/York)
Research Collaborators: Roger Keil (CCGES/CITY Institute/York) and Bernd Belina and Susanne Heeg (Institute fuer Humangeographie, Goethe University, Frankfurt/Main)
Email: lehrer@yorku.ca