After successful completion of the course, students are able to...
to recognize the potentials and complexity of the built environment, to derive guiding planning questions from this and to answer these questions through the specific formulation of a conceptual urban, architectural design. Urban and spatial production is to be experienced as a holistic, transdisciplinary examination on the basis of a design-oriented task. Architecture and urban planning should be understood as a cultural practice with social relevance and as a design challenge including its social, economic, ecological and process-related implications. The teaching of adequate methods of analysis, design and representation and the introduction to relevant discourses are an essential part of the course.
Productive City - A Good City has Industry!
The European city was originally a reservoir of the most diverse uses: Work of all kinds, commerce, industry, trade, life and pleasure - all this somehow found a place - parallel, one behind the other, one above the other as well as hybrid. But the dense juxtaposition of different uses reached its limits. For the period of industrialization, where living and working were closely interwoven, led to severe health problems and social conflicts. As a result, most industrialized cities turned away again from the ideal of density. A trend toward disentanglement and a turn toward functionalist separation took place. From now on, people lived in a residential area, they recreated in a recreational area, and production took place in a commercial or industrial area outside the city. In order to connect these enclaves, the public urban space was predominantly transformed into a traffic space. But it is precisely this separation of uses and the lack of communal and public spaces that promotes the fragmentation and individualization of society. For it is precisely social real experiences - namely interacting with different people every day - that are the basic prerequisites for the development of a basic understanding of democracy and solidarity (Thomas Sieverts).
The current discourse of the productive city counteracts these developments and advocates a return to a constructive and lively coexistence and togetherness. The city of short distances is more ecological, with an increasing density the land consumption per capita decreases and the utilization as well as the offer of social infrastructure and cultural facilities increases . If goods and food are then also produced and traded locally, this leads to the city once again becoming a close-knit network of living, working, social and cultural life. This reality of life can specifically counteract the diverse challenges of our time.
Rotterdam - A fertile Ground for Architectural Experiments
To understand the architectural landscape and urban fabric of Rotterdam, one must know its history: Rotterdam is the second largest city in the Netherlands and is home to the largest container port in Europe. Located in the Rhine-Meuse Delta, the port city experienced a tremendous boom in the early 20th century as a global transshipment point for goods. During World War II, the flourishing city and parts of the port were almost completely destroyed in a bombing raid. The old Rotterdam largely disappeared, and the post-war reconstruction represented a new beginning for the city in terms of urban planning: in keeping with the modern functionally separated city, Rotterdam was divided into monofunctional residential, working and leisure areas. To this day, the cityscape of the inner city shows hardly any reminiscences of a historically grown European city. Rotterdam is intentionally modern and ambitious, and its historical context and large-scale reconstruction have provided plenty of room for architectural experimentation. Meanwhile, Rotterdam has also emancipated itself from its industrial image to become a modern port city. The city is growing and expects a demand for about 50,000 apartments in the next 10 years alone. However, not only the demand for housing is increasing, but also the demands on the port and its industry, which is expanding more and more towards the west and the North Sea. This has the advantageous consequence of freeing up former port areas near the city center, which can now be put to other uses.
Merwe-Vierhavens [M4H] - a city port in transition
Merwe-Vierhavens, or M4H for short, is one of those city ports in Rotterdam that is facing a major transformation and is the focus area of this course. Currently, some port uses are still located in the M4H area, but the creative industries, interim uses, social institutions and also R&D have already found their way into the port area and appropriated the vacant buildings and spaces. The urban planning strategy of the city of Rotterdam has undergone a complete reversal in recent decades and is now pursuing a radical mix of uses, rather than a separation of functions. The M4H area is to be gradually transformed, where space is left for the production and port industry located there, but also housing, leisure, new forms of working are integrated and made possible.
Blocks of interaction - design studio content
In order to get a new understanding of the mixture of contemporary forms of living and working, of recreation and production, you will develop and design various 'building blocks of interaction'. During the field trip to Rotterdam you will search forlocations, spaces, squares and typologies in the Merwe-Vierhavens [M4H] and where interaction can arise through mixing. You will document and develop your analysis, for example by trying out new forms of mixing.
Questions that could be answered during the semester include; Which typologies are suitable for this? - which ones need an adjustment? Design and examine several 'building blocks of interaction'; - What does a building block look like? - What should it be able to? - What goes side by side? - What goes together? - What needs to be separated? Where can you mix and where not?
You will work in teams of up to three people on a topic. Everyone in the team develops and designs an interactive building block based on the topic. Using various plans, such as axonometries, explains how your form of mixing is functioning. This creates a common catalog of interactive building blocks with a wide variety of topics.
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The course will offer cross-over workshops and meetings with the course "Going Dutch 010 - Productive City" in order to give students the opportunity to exchange ideas about the resulting research, analysis and design.
In addition to the team of supervisors, the LVA will also include input from the following experts and local stakeholders:
- Susann Ahn - Research Department Landscape Architecture and Landscape Planning, TU Vienna
- Markus Appenzeller - MLA+ / Academie van Bouwkunst Amsterdam
- Annette Matthiessen - City of Rotterdam
- Marthe van Gils - Veldacademie
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Excursion program GOING DUTCH - ROTTERDAM + AMSTERDAM
Start: Sunday 23.10.2022 14:00 (M4H site in Rotterdam)
End: Friday 28.10.2022 18:00
- Monday day excursion to Amsterdam, on all other days the program will take place in Rotterdam.
- Travel + accommodation are to be organized independently
- additional costs of approx. 60€ for group tours and entrance fees are to be expected
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Both GOING DUTCH designs are also open to spatial planning students (3 students per design studio).
Registration:
With portfolio by mail until 29.09.2022
to almar.ruiter@tuwien.ac.at
Credit:
Minor Design (5 ECTS).
= RPL students must complete two 5 ECTS Designing, and can then use it as a Master Project Spatial Planning.
Major Design (10 ECTS)
= Mandatory Module 3: Master Project Spatial Planning (12 ECTS)
(The missing 2.0 ECTS can be supplemented by thematically suitable courses from the range of core and supplementary subjects of the elective modules of the Master's Program in Spatial Planning and Development or the Master's Program in Architecture)
Weekly corrections, excursion, intensive workshops, interim presentations, final submission.
The proof of performance is immanent. I.e. both the cooperation during all course units at the TU, as well as the continuous work between these units, as well as the quality of these and the final delivery are used to determine the grade.
