Accrediting the success of Bilbao’s urban regeneration to the Guggenheim Museum is misguided

About Arantxa Rodriguez

Arantxa Rodríguez is Associate Professor of Applied Economics at the Faculty of Business and Economics (Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Empresariales) of the University of the Basque Country (Universidad del País Vasco – Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea) in Bilbao (Spain). She teaches urban and regional economics and planning. Her research deals with dynamics of territorial development and planning. During the last few years, her research has focused on urban regeneration strategies and policies and, particularly the consequences of large-scale urban redevelopment schemes for socio-spatial fragmentation.

The Guggenheim Museum is good for Bilbao’s city branding but not per se for its urban revitalization

Obviously, there is no discussion that Frank Gehry’s lucky architecture and the iconic effect of the building have, indeed, provided a ready-made city branding means for Bilbao. Yet, one thing is to recognize the successful branding and city marketing contribution of the Guggenheim Museum (i.e. the building itself rather than the Museum activity) in terms of selling the city and attracting visitors, and another very different (and misguided) argument is to assign it the sole or even main role in Bilbao’s urban revitalization process. In my opinion, the main contribution of the Guggenheim Museum is related to its key role in the construction of a new urban identity for Bilbao making it more appealing and marketable in a context where cities increasingly compete for attention, investment, visitors, events, talent, etc. City branding is seen today as a critical means to make cities desirable, attractive and successful and the Guggenheim Museum has effectively provided Bilbao with this new identity of a modern, cultural, dynamic, artsy, avant-garde and successful city.

Bilbao Ría 2000, Metropoli 30 and large-scale transport and infrastructure projects accounted for urban regeneration in the city

Now, despite the fact that the Guggenheim Museum acts as a magnet for visitors and new event-related activities, the dynamics of urban revitalization in Bilbao are a result of a combination of series of initiatives and strategies. These include, on the one hand, the development of new policy instruments for urban revitalization, notably: the new Municipal Urban Plan (1989), the Metropolitan Spatial Plan (1994) and the Strategic Plan for Metropolitan Revitalization (1992). On the other hand, Bilbao’s urban regeneration process relied heavily upon critical institutional and urban governance innovations, especially the creation of Bilbao Ría 2000 in November 1992, a private firm of public shareholders set up to carry out integrated urban redevelopment initiatives in the metropolitan area of Bilbao, and Metropoli 30, a public-private partnership, established to implement and give continuity to the process of strategic planning. Finally, the third lynchpin of urban regeneration strategies in Bilbao has been massive investment in large-scale transport and infrastructure projects. These projects played a fundamental role in urban regeneration since they made it possible for important redevelopment operations to be carried out along the river and estuary. Among these projects are: new underground system (metro), the expansion of the outer port, the new airport terminal, new railway lines, the Guggenheim Museum, the Euskalduna Concert and Congress Hall, a new Business Exhibit Centre. These development plans (UDP) have been the catalyst of the city’s regeneration process. In less then one decade, these UDPs concentrated over 4.000 million euro investment providing the skeleton of the process of urban regeneration in Bilbao.

The Abandoibarra project: a test case of a policy to be generalised for the whole urban region. But is this realistic?

Bilbao’s urban regeneration process has been widely marketed on an international scale, as a success story, a unique example of “best practice” in urban regeneration and a model to be imitated by other cities undergoing similar destructuring and socioeconomic and urban decline problems. Obviously, there have been important achievements in Bilbao and they are particularly intensely related to the physical transformation of the city. However, there are also important shortcomings. First, there is the subordination of statutory planning to the needs of large-scale emblematic projects where focalised and fragmented intervention operates as a laboratory for urban policy innovations. As in other redevelopment schemes, the Abandoibarra project (Abandoibarra is the most emblematic of all the projects carried out by Bilbao Ría 2000 in its regeneration of the city of Bilbao) is originally presented as an emblematic intervention firmly anchored in a strategic framework whose final objective is to provide the physical and functional conditions for competitive restructuring in the urban economy. However, the overwhelming emphasis on efficiency and financial feasibility has left the project captive of a short-term return maximisation logic that subordinates the strategic component to the requirements of speculative redevelopment. This shift is all too evident in Abandoibarra’s turn from a production-oriented development to a consumption-based renovated space catering to the demands of the urban elite. The weakening of the strategic component of Abandoibarra impinges upon the economic objectives of the project and its capacity to lead a process of competitive restructuring of the urban economy. And, while there is some evidence of economic recovery in metropolitan Bilbao, the question remains as to whether property-led redevelopment schemes such as this provide a sound base for urban revitalisation. This is a critical issue since this scheme is presented as a test case of a policy to be generalised for the whole urban region. The speculative character and the potentially regressive consequences of narrow short-term feasibility also challenge the financial sustainability of this model. The speculative bias introduced by the diffusion of a financial maximising logic can have extremely negative consequences as speculative increases filter through the metropolitan land market. Needless to say, the consequences on access to housing for less favoured income groups can be devastating. Notwithstanding trickle down effects, the new urban policies epitomised by Abandoibarra’s redevelopment scheme incorporate a not insignificant risk of social and spatial exclusion as uneven redevelopment may intensify existing social and functional divisions of space within the metropolitan area. Finally, improvements in urban policy in metropolitan Bilbao would require overcoming the limits imposed by the overriding emphasis on economic feasibility and short-term maximisation and acknowledging the need for a more integrated socio-economic strategy. This means the need to refocus in a more direct way on the consequences of both economic decline as well as uneven redevelopment; that is, to incorporate both an economic and social strategy for integrated development in the new urban agenda.

The so-called ‘Guggenheim effect’ operates, firstly, in the realm of the symbolic

Already before its opening date in October 1997, the Guggenheim Museum had become the outstanding icon for the revitalisation of Metropolitan Bilbao. The museum was soon recognised as an architectural landmark and the new icon in the representation of the city (see the New York Times Sunday Magazine Cover of Sept 1997 on the “miracle”). The parallels between the original, innovative and highly seductive design of the building and the city itself have been purposefully underlined as part of an image reconstruction operation and a city marketing strategy. And, indeed, from this perspective, the museum can be considered a complete success. However, both the marketing and the image reconstruction aspects are mediated objectives of an strategy aimed at enhancing the city’s capacity to compete for the attraction of international capital investments, the acquisition of key command functions, high level producer services and also visitors. And, from this point of view, the ‘Guggenheim effect’ is still to be shown. So far, the most important positive impacts have to be with the dramatic increase in the number of visitors to the museum/city that has exceeded even the most optimistic expectations. For a city that has been traditionally out of the tourist track, the attraction of almost 1,400,000 visitors during the first year of operation of the museum is definitely a big success. However, in terms of attracting international capital investments and key command functions, the impact of the Guggenheim Museum is very limited.  So far, all direct investments associated with the setting up of the GBM have come from the Basque public administration, an event made possible by the special fiscal autonomy status of the Basque region. The original expectations regarding the attraction of direct foreign investment and command functions to the city have not been met. Thus far the undeniably strong advertising capacity of the Guggenheim has had little impact in attracting international capital investments for Abandoibarra’s regeneration process itself. More significantly, the attraction of command functions or headquarters to the site is, so far, nil. In sum, a preliminary analysis of the impact of Abandoibarra’s redevelopment scheme suggests that its success lies predominantly in the consumption and circulation realms. The production side of this project, its directional and strategic quality, has all but disappeared under the dominance of a short term return maximisation logic that has weakened the strategic component of the scheme and heightened its speculative dimension. The original expectation that the Guggenheim would act as a propulsive firm to activate a cultural production sector has all but disappear.

Interested in urban regenaration (in Bilbao)? Rodriguez recommends the following publications

• 2009 “Innovación, creatividad y territorios inteligentes”, Ciudad y Territorio/Estudios Territoriales, 159. With M.Esteban.
• 2009 “Regeneración urbana, areas de oportunidad y gentrificación en el “nuevo Bilbao””. In With L. Vicario
• 2008 Territorios Inteligentes: Dimensiones y Experiencias Internacionales. Coruña: Netbiblo  with Esteban, M., Ugalde, I. and Altuzarra, A.,
• 2007 “Social Innovation for Neighbourhood revitalization. Empowered Participation and Integrative Dynamics in Spain”. In McCallum, Hillier, J., Moulaert, F. and Vicari, S. (eds.) Social Innovation and Territorial Development. London:Ashgate.
• 2005 “Innovación, competitividad y regeneración urbana: los espacios retóricos de la ciudad creativa en el Nuevo Bilbao”, Ekonomiaz, 58. With L. Vicario
• 2004 Integrated Area Development in Fragmented Cities. A gender perspective”, Cities, 2
• 2003 The Globalized City. Economic Restructuring and Social Polarisation in European Cities. Oxford: Oxford University Press. With E. Swyngedouw and F. Moulaert.
• 2002 Neo-liberal Urbanization in Europe: Large-scale urban development Projects and the New Urban Policy. Antipode, 21. With E. Swyngedouw and F. Moulaert.
• 2001 “Uneven redevelopment: new urban policies and socio-spatial fragmentation in metropolitan Bilbao.  European Urban and Regional Studies, vol. 8, 2. With E. Martínez, and G. Guenaga.
• 2000 Globalization and Integrated Area Development in European Cities. Oxford: Oxford University Press. With Moulaert, F. et al. 

EUKN, by Elizabeth Winkel