We arrived by train during one of the strongest storms of the year, but the weather soon improved. Oslo, like Gothenburg, is clearly a leading edge city, but is able to rethink itself from a position a greater economic strength. It has many progressive elements such as the longstanding toll road system, a green and blue network below the protected forest line. It has a progressively redeveloped waterfront including a new opera house and an approach to progressive densified redevelopment at key nodes over time. There is a growing multi-ethnic population as a result of economic success, and a range of measures and policies to try to deal with this expansion, sometimes integrating the work of several national and city departmental services. It is certainly one of the most stunning of European cities in its setting, and retains a very Nordic feel whilst becoming ever more international.

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