In 2005 an open and dramatically staged  popular meeting proposed time-out as a response to the plan for Tromsø city centre forwarded by the Planning Office. Tromsø City Council shortly thereafter supported such a time-out and proclaimed the Year of Urban Development as a form of comprehensive public debate headed by a think-tank from the competency milieus outside the established planning administration – an alternative source of knowledge.
This constituted an open break with convention that was aimed at re-establishing  a creative and independent critical position. City architecture and public space were put on the agenda: the role of the city centre in a new strategy for the circumpolar North was stressed and the thesis was proposed that City Hall is a possible leading force in the city’s development – again.