Incoherence of urban planning policy in Bucharest: Its potential for land use conflict

- Not exist, yeat, solution to reintegrate in Bucharest urban structure a former Ceausescu's project − Vacaresti Lake.
- Lack of urban planning policy generates land use conflicts between former ownerships, authorities, population and NGO's.
- The key point is solving property problem and stoping of responsibility transfer from an institution to another.
- Passive urban management encourages an emotional and speculative management for an encapsulated space.
- Nobody can estimate the complex consequences of natural restoration of a fragile space without water ventilation.

Bucharest is a city in transition from its communist past to a market economy, but poor urban planning in is impacting adversely on contested spaces. Lack of effective and strictly enforced regulation and public sector indecision, mixed with problems inherited from the Ceausescu regime, generate many examples of poor urban planning and management. One such example concerns the uncertain future of Văcăreşti “Lake”, our in-depth case study, which is an encapsulated 184 ha wetland whose management has been particularly poor. Employing a mixed methodology of mapping the evolution of the area in question and conducting interviews with surrounding residents and experts in the urban planning or public administration, we demonstrate how lack of an effective planning system and appropriate policies serves to exacerbate conflict between interested parties. Initially there was a conflict between former land owners and authorities, after which developers, surrounding populations, urban planners and ecologists were added. Worse still, the juridical owners of the site are unresolved! Many government agencies and the Bucharest municipality have also compounded the problem by failing to take a lead in future planning and conflict resolution by adopting a passive management approach, which is a recipe for inaction in a poorly regulated land market. Thus, incoherent land use policy has greatly amplified individual and professional conflict both at the local level and city-wide.