Pond Urbanism. The second life of the Wijer
Urban design and landscape urbanism
INTENSIVE WORKSHOP

Leuven, Belgium
Department of Architecture, Urbanism and Planning
University of Leuven in Belgium
VLM | Flemish Land Agency

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CONTEXT
The area north of Hasselt in Belgium is mainly known for its coal mining past and its recent, but also extremely dispersed (sub)urbanization. Yet at the heart of this urbanized territory hides a treasure: an impressive constellation of small cascading ponds. This unique water landscape developed incrementally from the 13th century onwards for fish farming. Abandoned and neglect for several decades , the water landscape however re-emerges today in the collective imagery thanks the ambitious regional project ‘De Wijers’. This project aims to develop the ecological and recreational role of the water structure, but also its potential as a carrier of regional identity. More than establishing contemplative relationships, the ambition is to create innovative city-nature interplays, through the re-definition of notions of visibility, accessibility, and complementariness.

WORKSHOP
OSA/RUA from the KULeuven and the VLM (Flemish Land Agency) organize a one week intensive urban design and landscape urbanism workshop that is open to a dozen young urban designers and landscape architects. The workshop will explore the mentioned questions and issues and develop a vision, design development concepts and elaborate a (re)development strategy for the area. The results –concepts, visions, strategies – are co-produced with stakeholders, local and external experts and presented to and debated with various publics. They will finally be developed into a publication and lay the groundwork for future development plans in the region (municipal & provincial structure plans, etc.). The aim is to define strategic interventions for the development of a vast (20.000 ha) regional park project in a highly and dispersedly urbanized context in the East of Flanders/ Belgium (project 'De Wijers').

It takes place from Friday noon 06/09/2013 until Friday evening 13/09/2013 on site, near Hasselt. Practically, graduated architects that are following postgraduate courses in urbanism or landscape architecture or graduated urban designers and/ or landscape architects are invited to participate on free initiative. On-site accommodation, transportation and catering will be fully supported by the organization.
Christian Nolf (KUL/PHL) and Bruno De Meulder (KUL) coach the workshop that is organized in collaboration with the Flemish Land Agency (VLM).