Blog: Espoo Master Plan 2060 – plan proposal stage approaches

This is the start of a blog post series where we shed light on the content, backgrounds and perspectives of the Espoo Master Plan 2060. In the first part, we will look at how the master plan work proceeds from draft to proposal. This is a topical issue, as the work is being carried out all the time!

The guidelines for the urban development of Espoo are outlined in the Espoo Master Plan 2060. It applies to the entire city and looks far into the future. The master plan shows the city’s strategic development trends and, on a general level, the areas reserved for housing, workplaces, services and recreation.

The master plan is not an implementation plan, but it helps us prepare for the future and reconcile different needs. We need to be able to look at things from many different perspectives.

Having a long time frame also requires being imaginative. What will the world look like in 2060? If you still remember what the world was like in 1990, you can understand how much can happen by 2060.

Master planning is one of the tasks of municipalities and cities. Master plans are updated from time to time to keep the plans up to date. Espoo has been planned in different master plans city district by city district, in accordance with the needs of the city.

• Partial master plans have been drawn up for the construction of station areas with a high density of people and services (Kera, Finnoo and Kaitaa-Iivisniemi).
• The functions and boundaries of Espoo Central Park area have been defined (Espoo Central Park partial master plans I and II).
• The supplementation of the urban structure has been enabled in the busiest parts of the city (master plan for the southern parts of Espoo).
• Preparations have been made for new local centres and rail connections (master plan for the northern and central parts of Espoo).

The Espoo Master Plan 2060, which is now in the works, is a comprehensive overview of every part of Espoo.

A new master plan always brings with it something new, but at the same time it maintains the ongoing continuum. Several major development projects have been included in master plans long before their implementation. These include increasingly more densely built residential areas, new expansion directions of the urban structure, West Metro and the light rail line.

Master planning is a specifying process in which planning and clarification work and public discussion alternate. A lot happens even when master planning is not actively in the news.

The last publicly visible phase of the Espoo Master Plan 2060 was in summer 2024, when the draft master plan was available for public review. Now we are working on a master plan proposal, which will be discussed by elected officials and commented on by Espoo residents in 2026. We master planners have plenty of work to do between the draft master plan and the master plan proposal: we need to plan new things, specify what we have already planned and assess the impact of all our work.

In many ways, the preparation of a draft master plan is a special stage in the preparation of the actual plan. General planning is about the timeliness of long-term plans and the continuity of planning, but at the same time the draft is the beginning of something new.

When the planning work starts, the persons preparing the plan define the plan questions and different solution options, and assess their effects. The preparation of a plan always starts with the current situation in the area, so each start is different. In order to get started in planning, it is necessary to decide on things such as the themes to be addressed in the master plan, the definition of the area, the target year of the plan and the presentation method.

The draft phase is characterised by a wide variety of options, the scope and possibility of changes, and partly unresolved issues. In addition, the boundary between the possible and the impossible is not always clear at the start.

In the proposal stage, the planners’ feet are more firmly on the ground and the direction of the planning work is clearer. While the draft stage presented several different solutions, now is the time to use them to form a synthesis that takes different perspectives into account. Sometimes it is necessary to return to previous thoughts when it is found that the chosen path does not lead to the desired result.

The preparation of a proposal includes feedback on the draft, which includes the opinions issued by authorities as well as the opinions expressed by the residents and other stakeholders. From the point of view of us master planners, this is a very concrete part of the planning process: the ideas that we have sketched on the drawing board become a common cause through decision-making and interaction.

Master plans concern big things and big plans for the city’s future, so we often get a lot of feedback. It is impossible to say what kind of impact an individual opinion will have, as so many things affect the changes that are made in the planning of the master plan at different stages.

We process all feedback and compile the opinions into a response in which we explain the city planning responses to the comments presented. The response will be published when the plan proposal becomes available for public review.

Impact assessment is an important part of the process. The assessment is often a difficult task, as the plan creates opportunities and limits for many different futures. This means that the master plan will never be implemented as such; instead, it allows for many different developments – making the possible impacts more difficult to assess.

Preparation and decision-making related to a major master plan takes several years. Social changes go hand in hand with the work, and it is not possible to foresee in what kind of world the completed plan will actually be used.

The world has changed over the decades at an unprecedented pace and legislation has followed suit. So changes the work of the master planner, too.

Participation and interaction, opportunities for residents to follow planning and decision-making through the Internet, the level of education and other learning of municipal residents have all developed tremendously. This has strongly shaped the way we plan the city and communicate about it.

As late as the 2000s, for example, plan maps were hand-drawn and then coloured with pencils. These old plans are still valid and can be explored by anyone through services such as the city’s map service.

A lot of other interesting material can be found on the city’s planning website, and we in city planning hope that Espoo residents will find information that is of interest to them in the ever-increasing offering. You can also get tips from the texts of this blog series.

Essi Leino

The author is Master Planning Manager.

Learn more:

• Master Planning in Espoo
• Espoo Master Plan 2060