Common Regional Development Strategies on Iberian Territories - A Framework for Comprehensive Border Corridors Governance: Establishing Integrated Territorial Development

Abstract

Although the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) has made a considerable contribution to increasing transport infrastructure and improving transport services, it still often seems that border regions have reduced accessibility compared to central regions. The Iberian border regions of Alto-Alentejo (Portugal) and Badajoz (Spain) were analyzed. Studies conducted in the Iberian territories confirm some of these regions’ unsustainability and the non-impact on the inhabitants’ quality of life. Also, a few questions arise: Can we verify the change in methods and measures used by development strategies? Is it necessary to acquire a more comprehensive view of corridor flows and interactions through common regional development strategies for managing development corridors? Will we influence the change of the methodological approach to be strategic and that it does not imply a corridor only in terms of the flow and mobility of people and goods, but also the search for the causes of movements in growth corridors? So, infrastructure and connectivity planning, regional economic development, and land use planning are critical contexts in developing territorial policies in the planning of development of corridors and their integration into development processes. This study proposes a framework for strategic corridor governance to increase accessibility and regional equity.

Analyzing Pilot Projects of Creative Tourism in an Ultra-Peripheral Region: Which Guidelines Can Be Extracted for Sustainable Regional Development?

“…If we focus on remote, more isolated regions-the so-called peripheral and ultraperipheral territories-the available literature tells us that economic growth represents a stimulus for sustainable development (see: [26][27][28][29][30][31]). Therefore, the prospect of developing different types of tourism, such as rural tourism, religious tourism, or creative tourism, is strongly associated with entrepreneurship, new business models, and Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SMEs) (see: [31][32][33][34][35].…”

Accessibility in European Peripheral Territories: Analyzing the Portuguese Mainland Connectivity Patterns from 1985 to 2020

“…The next step was to determine the absolute accessibility index I (IAAi) (see: [2][3][4][17][18][19][20][21][22][23]), as follows:…”

“…The European Union (EU) has defined guidelines for sustainable transport infrastructure by adding an assessment of accessibility, socio-economic impacts, and regional cohesion in peripheral and ultra-peripheral regions [7][8][9]. Nevertheless, after analyzing the accessibility of mainland Portugal, the question arises whether this has given good results in overcoming the peripherality of some regions [16][17][18][19][20]. In this sense, this paper aims to explore the linkages between inner peripheries, ultra-peripherality concepts, and the concept of accessibility, from 1985 to 2020, in parallel with the analysis of some demographic trends in the same research period.…”

Creative Tourism in Islands and Regional Sustainable Development: What Can We Learn from the Pilot Projects Implemented in the Azores Territory?

“…It is conceivable to demonstrate that the nexus between cultural and creative tourism and various development techniques and procedures could drive additional developments which rely on the territory's social and cultural characteristics and heritage and natural assets [51][52][53][54][55][56][57].…”