Designing from the Cross-Section

The Subsurface as a Building Block for the Future-Proof City

The approach to urban transformation tasks is undergoing a major overhaul. After all, there is insufficient space to accommodate today’s major challenges – in the areas of climate, energy, circular economy, mobility and housing. It is high time we learned to look at our cities through three-dimensional glasses and to view the public space and buildings in relation to the subsurface. By tackling tasks from the cross-section (instead of the plan view), new and surprising solutions are brought to the table, which not only lead to an improvement of the living environment but also encourage multifunctional use of space.

Urban design, architecture, and landscape architecture student teams within the City of the Future Lab, and multidisciplinary design teams from practice have set to work in Amsterdam, Leuven, Maastricht, Mechelen, Ostend and Rotterdam. Together with academic and municipal experts, they have developed design propositions and exemplary solutions for city making in times of major transitions, and they have reflected on the importance of the subsurface and designing from the cross-section.

This design research resulted in a publication in Dutch. ‘Ontwerpen vanuit de Doorsnede’is the result of a collaboration between TU Delft, the COB Platform of Subsurface Construction, the Environmental Department of the Flemish Government, and the Delta Metropolis Association.

Title:
Ontwerpen vanuit de Doorsnede
De Ondergrond als Bouwsteen voor de Toekomstbestendige Stad

Order here: Donner Bookshop online

Partners:
Centrum voor Ondergronds Bouwen / COB Platform of Subsurface Construction
Departement Omgeving Vlaanderen / Environmental Department of the Flemish Government
Deltametropolis Association / Vereniging Deltametropool

Designing Domestic Places

Public space is the place to play, move and meet. This applies to our rich city center with all its shops and restaurants, but just as much to residential areas. But how can we make these public spaces even more attractive for all types of users?

At the beginning of February, students from TU Delft, The Hague University of Applied Sciences, and Inholland University of Applied Sciences developed various ideas for the public space in the Tanthof district. In various teams, the students have investigated how existing routes or routes to be designed can be provided with ‘stopping points’: places where you can rest for a while, look around and chat with other residents.

During this meeting of Delft Design, these design sketches will be briefly explained and we would like to discuss these design sketches with you and, among others, Tako Postma (City Architect of Delft), Eveline Berghout – van der Schee (urban designer, City of Delft), Maurice Harteveld (researcher, Design of Public Spaces, TU Delft), Ben Kuipers (landscape architect) and Flip Krabbendam ( architect) in a discussion about the preconditions for successful public space.

The discussion starts with a lecture on
Designing Domestic Places
by Maurice Harteveld

Afterward, there is an opportunity to chat and view the different designs. This while enjoying a snack and drink.
The challenge is organized by Delft Design in collaboration with the City Deal Kennis Maken Delft, study association POLIS and architect Flip Krabbendam.
 De openbare ruimte is dé plek voor spelen, bewegen én ontmoeten. Dat geldt voor onze rijke binnenstad met al zijn winkels en horeca, maar even zo goed voor woonwijken. Maar hoe kunnen we deze publieke ruimten nog aantrekkelijker maken voor alle type gebruikers?

Begin februari hebben studenten van de TU Delft, De Haagse Hogeschool en Hogeschool Inholland verschillende ideeën uitgewerkt voor de openbare ruimte in de wijk Tanthof. In verschillende teams hebben de studenten onderzocht hoe bestaande of nieuw te ontwerpen routes kunnen worden voorzien van ‘halteplaatsen’: plekken waar men even kan uitrusten, kan rondkijken en een praatje kan maken met andere bewoners.



Tijdens deze bijeenkomst van Delft Design worden deze ontwerpschetsen kort toegelicht en gaan we graag met u en onder andere Tako Postma (stadsbouwmeester van Delft), Eveline Berghout – van der Schee (stedebouwkundige. City of Delft), Maurice Harteveld (onderzoeker, Design of Public Spaces, TU Delft), Ben Kuipers (landschapsarchitect) en Flip Krabbendam (architect) in gesprek over de randvoorwaarden van succesvolle openbare ruimte.



De discussie wordt geopend met een lezing over
Het Ontwerpen van Huiselijke Plekken
door Maurice Harteveld

Na afloop is er gelegenheid tot napraten en het bekijken van de verschillende ontwerpen. Dit onder het genot van een hapje en drankje.
De challenge wordt georganiseerd door Delft Design in samenwerking met de City Deal Kennis Maken Delftstudievereniging POLIS en architect Flip Krabbendam.

The Public Space as Meeting Place
De Openbare Ruimte als Ontmoetingsplek

where:
Prinsenkwartier en online

when:
2 March 2020
open 19.30, start 20.00 untill 22.00

More: Delft Design, City Deal Kennis Maken Delft

Design Challenge for Students

City Deal ‘Kowlegde Making Delft’ is organising a challenge about the use and design of public space for ambitious students who would like to push their boundaries. How can we make the public space more attractive for all types of users as a place to play, move and to meet?

More: Design Challenge: Public Space as a Meeting Place

Partners:
the Municipality of Delft
The Hague University of Applied Sciences
Inholland University of Applied Sciences
Delft University of Technology
Delft Design

Expo SubTerra

New Roots for Underground Urbanism – Exhibition


photo by Joran Kuijpers

City x Space: Cross-Section Thinking

How can the integral and multifunctional use of public space, subsurface, and buildings -within a densified urban environment – create space and value that contribute to an attractive and future-proof living environment?

“This seminal question generates various answers depending on the specific context and location of asking. International interdisciplinary students from Delft University of Technology have outlined various design solutions. Manifest in all cases are the spatial bottlenecks on the level of public space. Connecting the intervention areas with the surrounding socio-spatial networks, therefore, forms the basis of all solutions. In addition, in the densification challenges we see the attention for the multi-layered space: on the one hand, a train or metro station, for example, generates flows of people at several levels; on the other hand, building in higher densities and/or living and working in collectives, generates new shared spaces.” As Maurice Harteveld explains in the exhibition; “The hybridization of the urban and architectural program also requires a cross-section thinking. This can be seen in future-proofing both large-scale sports or industrial areas, as well as small-scale residential houses in neighborhoods where work is shifting to local entrepreneurs and home workers. Finally, the subsurface plays an important role in greening the living environment and in water storage.”
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Post-Pandemic Public Spaces

Exhibition ‘What have we learned?’
Preview on Post-Pandemic Public Spaces

How do you think our the design of public space, thus our cities, will change under influence of the pandemic? The answering of this question has been explored in nine engaging interviews with representatives of the Dutch practice and presented in a documentary. Key players in urban design, at the municipality, active in city-making, and/or working in the public domain differently have given their views.  In addition, this question has been leading in a survey given to undergraduates and graduate students of our faculty, as well as to a few students in other programmes concerned with the public space (like human geography and planning, urban studies, and metropolitan analysis design engineering). Stimulated by innovation and creative thinking, a vast majority wants to explore new directions, against those preferring ‘back to normal’.

The documentary is made by Matt van Kessel, Hanlin Stuer, and Olivier Wiegerinck, embedded in the research group on public space of Maurice Harteveld, Birgit Hausleitner, Claudiu Forgaci, Tanja Herdt and Ioanna Karadimitriou. A preview of the documentary is presented on the large screen at the exhibition ‘What have we learned?’, on display during the month of September 2021, in Delft. Please feel welcome to have a break, and watch!

where:
Delft University of Technology
Faculty of Architecture
Julianalaan 134
2628 BL Delft
The Netherlands

Inclusive Urban Design

In this introduction video, MaartenJan Hoekstra and Maurice Harteveld introduce the issue of urban design and inequality on the neighborhood level and its public spaces. They look at the theory behind the question “does the increase of social mobility and mixing housing add to the inclusivity on the level of the neighborhood?”

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Designs for Boston and Amsterdam

Propositions under Continuously Changing Urban Conditions

Massive urbanisation puts pressure on public space and demands new programmes along with alternative gathering places such as public interior spaces and a variety of forms of collective spaces. Moreover, in the rapidly changing city, infrastructure and mobility remain of vital importance. A co-evolving diversity of programme cannot be planned, but interventions in the city need constantly to be grounded on sharp design approaches to respond adequately to the necessities of the time: While being environmentally sustainable, given the available resources.

In general, infrastructure, mobility, and public life manifest themselves in various forms as carriers of such urban development. Design experiments, as put forward in our new book, show how to work with continuously changing urban conditions, with mobility transforming cities whilst with public spaces taking various forms, with programmes which hybridise, and with new technologies to keep up with the urban dynamics. Given these themes, designs should carry awareness of the inclusiveness and accessibility of various systems and places, facilities, and technologies. Spatially this means questioning how to keep the city open and connected, attractive, and liveable?
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Architecture in Urban Change

Designers are questioning what architecture of relevance could face ongoing change over a longer period in today’s most dynamic urban areas. Of course, answers are always specific and the search on how to respond to constantly changing urban conditions may be the only issue that is shared in all cases. Yet, still, there must be more commonalities in the wide range of answers. The set of design propositions as presented at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Versailles (ENSA-V) underlines this, while designs display a few recognisable approaches. Projects put the emphasis on the importance of intervening at strategic locations, of programming adaptive and responsive, hence flexible, and of imagining and creating expressions that will enhance public interaction and experience over a longer period. As a guest of the school, I have the opportunity to review these thoughts and discuss emerging approaches with prof Nicolas Pham.

l’Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Versailles
Champ disciplinaire de Théories et Pratiques de la Conception Architecturale Urbaine (TPCAU)
5 Avenue de Sceaux, Versailles
20 December 2019, 9:30-17:30h

Public Space in the Entrepreneurial City

New public spaces have emerged in the entrepreneurial city. Their existence relates to entrepreneurial action of public governments, of the people, inhabitants of the city, and of entrepreneurial alliances of civic actors. The entrepreneurial way of governmental action led particularly to new spatial conditions and typologies as governments delegated the responsibilities for the production and management of public space to private actors. This extended the debate to the city’s public space in its ubiquitous shopping malls and private residential estates. Secondly, the opportunities which the city offers for the entrepreneurial contributions of general citizens, migrants, and refugees, relate to its public spaces too. Characterised by the proximity of mixed land-uses and flexible building typologies, as well as a well-connected street network and high density, the new urban typologies, effecting public space in their socio-economic nature, are found in many places, using the same models concerning citizens initiatives and popular action. Lastly, new emerging alliances of actors form the relationship of the ‘entrepreneurial city’ and public spaces. These alliances of civil society groups comprise old and new NGO’s, academics and activists, and start-ups of social enterprises launch own initiatives to co-designs alternative community spaces, more affordable and communicative workspaces, and build capacities. Such trends can be seen in cities worldwide too and start to create new forms of public spaces, which facilitate social interaction while creating more micro-economic opportunities.

Read full editorial online:
Maurice Harteveld and Hendrik Tieben (eds) (2019) ‘Public Space in the Entrepreneurial City’, In: The Journal of Public Space (Special Issue), 2019, Volume 4, Number 2, pp. 1-8
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Moving and Meeting in the Boston Metro

In a flying visit to Greater Boston, particular urban design themes related to the city of the future have become manifest once again. On the one hand, thoughts on infrastructure and public space need to be interrelated. People move in various ways, yet the faster they move (most likely by individual or collective transport), the less exchange between them will happen. Although highways and rail tracks increase accessibility and connectivity, and are of extreme importance for the metropolis, it is known that these bundles may cause barriers for those present locally, on both sides to meet and greet. The impact of the Central Artery tunnel project and Rose F. Kennedy greenway on the Boston downtown waterfront is a classic example in showing the importance of designing public places and creating walkable space in a dense urban development. Pedestrian spaces, preferably supported with undergoing public transit or smart hubs alike, is only not less space consuming, but also serves the gathering of people in a better way, hence it serves coincidental exchanges between them. The images of a ‘before’ and ‘after’ the dramatic transformation are a clear witness of this. The same is true in the recently developed business improvement districts. In a opposite way the surplus of fast lane infrastructure generated a lack of public place thus human exchange. The transit hubs of the North and South Station areas may be multi-layered centrality hubs which easily could follow the same strategy, yet here little of this is visible here. Current transformation may be just a first step in improving the stations’ premises. With their high potential in the public spheres, they will be definitively the next challenging urban transformation areas in need to be directed by the City. On the other hand, the City as the public government is not alone in this. Other non-gov stakeholders and pro-active citizens join in the urban development too. Historic Washington and Summer Street areas show what can be the impact collaborative improvements and community development. In fact every citizen has impact simply by being present in the city. People are the prime actors in the urban networks and physical systems. They make the urban space public. It is omnipresent when one would simply walk from School-Franklin, Bedford West, and Park Plaza to City Hall, and trace whatever they do and sense in the city. It adds another perspective to future intervention areas.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Maurice Harteveld

Boston, 15-17 May 2018
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Boston Planning & Development Agency (BPDA)
Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD)