Farm-Tycoon is a study of density in rural areas and represents a new way of thinking about agro-production. ABC (AgriBusinessCluster) parks offer the opportunity to create new landscapes. This entails removing from the landscape all forms of agriculture that are not ground-based and geographically clustering at 15 locations activities of agricultural affinity. Fourteen ABC parks are projected in the vicinity of population concentrations around infrastructure nodes. The ABC island off the Dutch coast anticipates the possibility of relocating the undesirable effects of agricultural products to the North Sea, possibly combined with an airport. This final-year project seeks primarily to show that research by design may not be scientific but it is most certainly effective. It involves working intensively with professionals in a variety of advisory capacities. The designed ABC park nestles in the crook of the A67 and A73 highways, between Horst and Venlo.

The agricultural production process in an ABC park is rooted in the original principles of a mixed farm. In this agro-production park we find different forms of animal husbandry and plant cultivation, supported by a balanced chain of high to low organisms. This chain is based on the recycling of residual and waste production. Besides actual production, the ABC park performs a number of product-processing functions: slaughter, meat processing, the cutting and packing of flowers and vegetables, conservation and storage. Transportation systems for the flow of products and residual products, animals, people and information require a complex whole that has been well thought through. The scale of an ABC park is in the main based on the need for fresh products by consumers in an area reachable by lorry within an hour.

Farm-Tycoon is a response to the issue of how to reinsert a multi-functional productive landscape into its setting and how this functional programme can be organized in a spatial design. Here, economic factors are tied to ecological provisos. Combining these two features creates a sustainable new object in the Dutch landscape, one that makes space, is less taxing on the environment, makes agriculture more attractive financially and ethically and provides opportunities to benefit other forms of use in the landscape. So Farm-Tycoon holds out new perspectives for the agricultural sector, and for more space in the Netherlands.

Place of education: TU Eindhoven
Specialization: architecture
Tutors: Wim van den Bergh, Han Lörzing & Marco Vermeulen