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Department of Spatial Planning

A-Project Excursion Week in Rotterdam, the Netherlands

© Víctor Cobs-Muñoz

During the week of Nov. 14-19th, our lab members Víctor Cobs-Muñoz and Liudmila Slivinskaya as supervisors of the A-Project module A 06 - “Struggle for Place: Community of Rotterdam-Rozenburg between Environmental and Urban Pressures”, led the module’s first field trip to their area of study.

The first-year students carried out the fieldwork in Rozenburg, a sub-municipality of Rotterdam in the middle of an intensively growing area of the largest port in Europe. Part of the objectives of this semester’s activity was to explore challenges faced by the community from rapid urbanization and the intensification of port activities. As an exploratory activity, the group conducted field observations and engaged in collective mapping of their sub-areas of study. Along the same line, the students gathered information about ongoing and planned infrastructure projects and land use changes in and around Rozenburg. 

Following the productive and insightful fieldwork, the students in the course of two semesters will explore how environmental and urban pressures, such as industrial pollution, highway and underwater tunnel construction, and port logistics, might affect the sense of place in the Rozenburg community. The second field trip is planned during the summer semester, where the students with the help of the Place Standard Tool and other methods will work with the community to gain place-based insights and relevant information for their spatial planning training.