A broken heart may seem weak but often it has an openness, and the capacity for change. New relationships bring colour to the heart, making it vulnerable and strong at the same time. Who wouldn't fancy having a heart like that? Lucky old Randstad Holland!

This study sounds out the possibilities of an urbanization strategy for Randstad Holland as a critique on current spatial planning concepts (Randstad Holland-Green Heart and the VINEX housing sites). In this strategy Randstad Holland is conceived of as a continuously transmuting landscape with urban influences uppermost. Rather than construing the ever expanding influence of the cities as a threat, the present strategy turns it to advantage. By linking the enormous variety in the urbanization programmes to the variety in the existing spatial structure of Randstad Holland, various regional environments can be built up with an interaction and identity of their own. To that end, the strategy is dependent upon spatial elements capable of giving meaning to urban functions on a long-term basis at a variety of scales.

The intended contrast in the draft plan for Randstad Holland-Green Heart translates into a real contrast between intensive and extensive environments. An unbroken structure of large, as yet relatively empty landscapes is to serve the extensive environments. These sharply differentiated landscapes nestle in the large meshes of the infrastructure where they function as links. The greatest potential for intensification lies in the smaller meshes of the infrastructural network. Here, new environments can emerge that complement the existing urban environments.

Just how an intensive environment might be worked out in detail is illustrated here by Zuidplaspolder, a major reclamation stretching between Gouda and Rotterdam where a number of major infrastructural lines converge. To avoid uniform and fragmented urbanization issuing from the urban peripheries, the scheme constructs a framework that offers conditions for intensification predicated on the structure of the polder itself, granting this structure an autonomous position and identity in the region. The strategy's proposals for the polder include programmes able to function as a link with the existing (agrarian) industry in the South Wing of Randstad Holland. The intertwining of functions (dwelling, work and recreation) is the central feature of designs made for a number of infills.

Place of education: TU Delft
Tutors: Henco Bekkering, Taeke de Jong, Wouter Reh, Anna Vos & Pieter Schrijnen
Specialization: urban planning/architecture.