METAscales Workshop „Coastal Protection in Spatial Planning“ by IREUS of the University of Stuttgart

On 3 December 2025, 15 stakeholders from spatial planning, environmental ministries,

coastal protection authorities, and academia met in Hamburg to assess and discuss coastal protection measures as well as current adaptation strategies and concepts along the German North Sea coast from a spatial planning perspective. The aim of the workshop, led by the Institute of Spatial and Regional Planning (IREUS), was to identify land-use conflicts in the context of spatial planning together with experts from different fields and federal states, and to develop optimisation approaches and solutions based on these conflicts. These will be presented as recommendations to decision-makers at the planning level in the further course of the project.

The workshop opened with keynote presentations on spatial planning, adaptation strategies, flood risk management, and scenarios in coastal areas. Building on this, three integrated coastal protection systems, including measures presented on pin boards, were evaluated against various indicators such as effectiveness, feasibility, and acceptance.

Subsequently, participants worked in small groups at the pin boards and discussed practical examples related to the conflict areas of land availability, competing land uses, and planning and approval procedures. The insights gained and the identified conflict area were then discussed in plenary, and potential optimisation and solution approaches were debated. In addition to identifying best-practice and worst-case examples, several key fields for optimisation and action were highlighted: the need for stronger integration between water law and spatial planning, the necessity of strengthening communication between governance levels, and the need for a reality check regarding the practical feasibility of measures.

In a next step, the results will be analysed and further evaluated in detail. Initial

recommendations will be distributed to the workshop participants at the beginning of next year and will then be further examined and refined through site-specific case studies and a second stakeholder workshop.