type
Programming and public participation
Context
This mission forms part of the redevelopment of Avenue du Parc / Parklaan, as envisaged in the Urban Renewal Contract 4 (CRU 4): "Avenue du Roi / Koningslaan". The ambition is to develop an emblematic urban project that can both address flooding problems with integrated stormwater management solutions, as well as create a new, redefined urban space. This redeveloped public space will offer new places of appropriation on a local scale while, on a metropolitan scale, providing an opportunity to anchor itself to the neighbouring districts.
Mission
The mission consisted of assisting Brussels Mobility (an administration of the Brussels-Capital Region) to plan the transformation and redevelopment of the Avenue du Parc. The aim was to elaborate a collaborative study to define the needs and expectations of the neighbourhood's residents and users, as a basis for guiding the future project. The aim of the mission was thus to:
- foster a positive climate of trust between the diversity of actors involved. This included various profiles of local residents and their vicinities (whereby some were immediate neighbours and others not), shopkeepers, economic stakeholders, associations, cultural organisations and public authorities.
- contribute to the design process of the redevelopment project being conducted in parallel.
Approach
An initial diagnosis phase began with a technical and objective urban planning analysis on several key themes. This was complemented by a social investigation conducted through extensive fieldwork, undertaken with the anthropologist Marie Lemaître d'Auchamp. This consisted of numerous exchanges with local residents, door-to-door visits, collaborative site visits and participatory workshops.
The second phase involved the identification of key issues and challenges to be tackled, as well as the establishment of programmatic recommendations for the avenue's future redevelopment. On the basis of a larger participatory workshop with locals, a series of bilateral meetings with various stakeholders, and several meetings with a diverse "monitoring committee" (specifically constituted for this purpose), the study provided a set of guidelines for a clear and coherent landscape vision - one that is not simply an accumulation of constraints or demands.
In addition to this, we proposed to add a more artistic dimension to the process. At the suggestion of the artist-curator Patrick Carpentier, we worked together with Francisco Manuel Moser, a filmmaker based in Brussels. The resulting film is a poetic evocation of the process. You can watch it via this link: