ePhytoremediation in post-industrial urban design
A strategy for removing soil contamination and improving the quality of areas for urban transformation, as applied to Buiksloterham in Amsterdam-Noord.

The technique known as phytoremediation uses plants to remove contaminant material from the soil. It is a sustainable, inexpensive and attractive alternative to conventional soil decontamination, which requires costly and environmentally-unfriendly techniques such as the transportation of contaminated soil over great distances to the waste site and the use of such soil as road fills and in building projects. The soil is a natural source of great importance ecologically, economically and socially. Industrial activity, the dumping of waste, farming and urbanization contaminate the soil and have a constraining influence on the soil's functioning. Healing Urban Landscapes introduces the potentials of phytoremediation into the practice of landscape architecture. Phytoremediation is to be integrated into prevailing transformation processes, thereby enhancing the quality of public space. The technique fits well with the slow and uncertain process of transformation from post-industrial sites to multi-purpose, dynamic and sustainable urban areas. Buiksloterham is a heavily contaminated post-industrial dockland area in the north of Amsterdam for which a masterplan has yet to be drawn up. Here it is used to test the possibilities of the phytoremediation process, combining it in state-of-the-art fashion with water purification and the production of biomass.
The design steps off from the quality of the plants used in phytoremediation. It creates a sturdy though flexible landscape framework physically connecting Buiksloterham with the surrounding context and is the springboard for developing the area further. Abandoned and released plots are decontaminated and provide biomass for generating energy - and it makes for an attractive outdoor space. Three types of area are distinguished in the decontamination process, based on the degree of pollution. Heavily contaminated areas are closed to the public and to local inhabitants. Clean areas are open to everyone. Areas that are moderately contaminated are partially accessible depending on the nature of the contamination. While the soil in Buiksloterham is being cleaned, its industrial past is exposed by using existing industrial structures and push-barges to decontaminate heavily polluted soil using phytoremediation technology. This anchors phytoremediation in the urban transformation of Buiksloterham, giving a meaningful, enduring and attractive urban setting so that it really is a case of Healing Urban Landscapes, literally as well as metaphorically.

Place of education: Wageningen Universiteit | Specialization: landscape architecture | Tutors: Ingrid Duchhart, Charlotte Buys