The title of the book „Inventer de nouveaux territoires“ (Humeau/Long 2011) refers on the (re-)invention of new territories. The analysis of how territories define themselves in times of globalization and localization in a sometimes new and creative manner may come as one of the main legacies of French Geographer Jean Baptiste Humeau1. Behind this question lies his deep interest in the transience of spaces, in perspectives of territorial restructuring or redistribution, in related functional changes of space and place in the face of a fundamental local or global change, or simply – a broad interest in questions of structural transformation and its socio-economic implications. Such processes are generally accompanied by territorial (re-)invention. Spatial reorganization is always associated with corresponding processes of negotiation between the actors involved. Their role and position is not least defined by power constellations, which in turn manifest themselves in everyday local geographies. The permanent variation of resulting spatial configurations will be analyzed in the following contribution with Bamberg as an example. It can be shown how bottom-up principles of urban planning subsequently shifted into a top-down perspective due to given power constellations.