Summary
Text: Hans Fuchs
Expand and densify: that’s Amsterdam’s urban growth strategy starting from 2030. The aim is to realise vital neighbourhoods in consultation with residents. The 2035 Development Strategy identifies the most promising development locations for this city co-creation.
Towards a just city: city co-creation
City co-creation is one of the 2050 environmental vision’s five strategic choices. Together with residents and other stakeholders, Amsterdam is using this form of co-creation in area development to build a just city with vital neighbourhoods and equal opportunities for all.
According to planologist Floor Zwiers of the Department of Urban Planning and Sustainability, co-creating the city offers opportunities to create vital neighbourhoods in an inclusive city. City co-creation involves working together with residents and users to develop the city. It involves working together as equally as possible and as early on in the process as possible. And it involves working transparently, openly and honestly, with all stakeholders having access to the same information. This helps identify where residents’ interests lie and contributes to the thinking and development process. Co-creating the city like this also helps improve planning quality.
Using the example of constructions plans for K-Midden, the heart of Amsterdam Zuidoost’s K-neighbourhood, Ria Braaf-Fränkel of WomenMakeTheCity outlines the power of city co-creation. Initially, 750 homes were to be built here, without resident involvement. Eventually, co-creation with residents resulted in the development of a complete housing, development and living concept, with as many as 500 additional youth housing units and a vibrant square that offers space for hospitality venues, as well as space for meeting, learning and working, entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurship and crafts. As young people can continue to live in the neighbourhood, the close-knit social structures are not torn apart. City co-creation transformed K-Midden from a dormitory neighbourhood into a vital neighbourhood in which development is central.
Focus 1: 2035 Development Strategy
Since 2010, much of Amsterdam’s urban development has taken place along the Ringzone. That’s the zone around the city centre that, south of the IJ river, follows the A10 Ring Road and north of the IJ, comprises the northern IJ banks. This is where Amsterdam builds most of the capital’s 7,500 (on average) new homes each year.
However, according to Rick Vermeulen, Development Strategy Project Leader at the Department of Urban Planning and Sustainability, as many projects in the Ring Zone will be nearing completion over the next decade, it’s time to think about where in the city there is still space to build.
The Department formulates the answer to that question in its 2035 Development Strategy. Its strategy is based on infill and densification. The municipality wants to find a new way to grow responsibly and realise an inclusive, sustainable and healthy city, with equal opportunities for all.
Area development and housing are being used to shape this broad task. The Development Strategy offers a package of promising development locations: new districts, existing neighbourhoods, station areas and service centres. Densification provides opportunities to link house construction to neighbourhood improvements, tailored to both the location and to resident and user wishes. The Development Strategy’s great value is the shift in emphasis, with an increased focus on places where people already live and with current residents benefitting more from the city’s growth.
Focus 2: vital neighbourhoods
Creating vital neighbourhoods is one of the pillars of the 2035 Development Strategy. This starts with the question: what are vital neighbourhoods? Chief urban planner Jos Gadet of the Spatial Planning & Economy Department conducted research and went on a tour of eleven Amsterdam neighbourhoods. His research resulted in two figures and a handful of recommendations that provide guidance for developing vital neighbourhoods.
Empirical figures from professional literature indicate that, in a vital neighbourhood, a minimum of 35% and a maximum of 65% of the gross floor area should offer functions other than housing. Surveys in the eleven Amsterdam neighbourhoods showed that this is a workable measure, provided additional requirements are met, such as the ratio of employed to non-employed people, good connections and facilities for neighbourhood residents as well as visitors.
In the Vital Neighbourhood Handbook, Jos Gadet made several recommendations to the Spatial Planning & Economy Department, planners, developers, designers and project managers. The first recommendation is to ensure integrated commissioning at all stages. Make creating vital neighbourhoods the goal of area development and link the construction challenge to ambitions and tasks including equality of opportunity, sustainability, social cohesion, climate adaptation, the 10-minute city and economic empowerment.
This results in city co-creation, without a blueprint, together with external parties and with the municipality taking on a different role that involves letting go, customisation, flexibility, transparency about risks and choices - but with a clear ambition.
According to Gadet, this enables you to cultivate a broadly-shared commitment to the task instead of a project in which everyone wants to see their own interests realised. This commitment should lead to the three conditions for a vital neighbourhood: residents and entrepreneurs must be able to develop socially, develop economically and in a physically resilient neighbourhood.
Summary
Inhoud
Text: Hans Fuchs
Expand and densify: that’s Amsterdam’s urban growth strategy starting from 2030. The aim is to realise vital neighbourhoods in consultation with residents. The 2035 Development Strategy identifies the most promising development locations for this city co-creation.
Towards a just city: city co-creation
City co-creation is one of the 2050 environmental vision’s five strategic choices. Together with residents and other stakeholders, Amsterdam is using this form of co-creation in area development to build a just city with vital neighbourhoods and equal opportunities for all.
According to planologist Floor Zwiers of the Department of Urban Planning and Sustainability, co-creating the city offers opportunities to create vital neighbourhoods in an inclusive city. City co-creation involves working together with residents and users to develop the city. It involves working together as equally as possible and as early on in the process as possible. And it involves working transparently, openly and honestly, with all stakeholders having access to the same information. This helps identify where residents’ interests lie and contributes to the thinking and development process. Co-creating the city like this also helps improve planning quality.
Using the example of constructions plans for K-Midden, the heart of Amsterdam Zuidoost’s K-neighbourhood, Ria Braaf-Fränkel of WomenMakeTheCity outlines the power of city co-creation. Initially, 750 homes were to be built here, without resident involvement. Eventually, co-creation with residents resulted in the development of a complete housing, development and living concept, with as many as 500 additional youth housing units and a vibrant square that offers space for hospitality venues, as well as space for meeting, learning and working, entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurship and crafts. As young people can continue to live in the neighbourhood, the close-knit social structures are not torn apart. City co-creation transformed K-Midden from a dormitory neighbourhood into a vital neighbourhood in which development is central.
Focus 1: 2035 Development Strategy
Since 2010, much of Amsterdam’s urban development has taken place along the Ringzone. That’s the zone around the city centre that, south of the IJ river, follows the A10 Ring Road and north of the IJ, comprises the northern IJ banks. This is where Amsterdam builds most of the capital’s 7,500 (on average) new homes each year.
However, according to Rick Vermeulen, Development Strategy Project Leader at the Department of Urban Planning and Sustainability, as many projects in the Ring Zone will be nearing completion over the next decade, it’s time to think about where in the city there is still space to build.
The Department formulates the answer to that question in its 2035 Development Strategy. Its strategy is based on infill and densification. The municipality wants to find a new way to grow responsibly and realise an inclusive, sustainable and healthy city, with equal opportunities for all.
Area development and housing are being used to shape this broad task. The Development Strategy offers a package of promising development locations: new districts, existing neighbourhoods, station areas and service centres. Densification provides opportunities to link house construction to neighbourhood improvements, tailored to both the location and to resident and user wishes. The Development Strategy’s great value is the shift in emphasis, with an increased focus on places where people already live and with current residents benefitting more from the city’s growth.
Focus 2: vital neighbourhoods
Creating vital neighbourhoods is one of the pillars of the 2035 Development Strategy. This starts with the question: what are vital neighbourhoods? Chief urban planner Jos Gadet of the Spatial Planning & Economy Department conducted research and went on a tour of eleven Amsterdam neighbourhoods. His research resulted in two figures and a handful of recommendations that provide guidance for developing vital neighbourhoods.
Empirical figures from professional literature indicate that, in a vital neighbourhood, a minimum of 35% and a maximum of 65% of the gross floor area should offer functions other than housing. Surveys in the eleven Amsterdam neighbourhoods showed that this is a workable measure, provided additional requirements are met, such as the ratio of employed to non-employed people, good connections and facilities for neighbourhood residents as well as visitors.
In the Vital Neighbourhood Handbook, Jos Gadet made several recommendations to the Spatial Planning & Economy Department, planners, developers, designers and project managers. The first recommendation is to ensure integrated commissioning at all stages. Make creating vital neighbourhoods the goal of area development and link the construction challenge to ambitions and tasks including equality of opportunity, sustainability, social cohesion, climate adaptation, the 10-minute city and economic empowerment.
This results in city co-creation, without a blueprint, together with external parties and with the municipality taking on a different role that involves letting go, customisation, flexibility, transparency about risks and choices - but with a clear ambition.
According to Gadet, this enables you to cultivate a broadly-shared commitment to the task instead of a project in which everyone wants to see their own interests realised. This commitment should lead to the three conditions for a vital neighbourhood: residents and entrepreneurs must be able to develop socially, develop economically and in a physically resilient neighbourhood.