The Patchwork Metropolis: Between Patches, Fragments and Situations

The Playground for Radical Concepts: Learning from the Tussengebied

“…The Tussengebied (area-in-between) in between Rotterdam, The Hague, and the new town of Zoetemeer expresses like nowhere else in The Netherlands, where the results of this segmented urbanization, in which the explosive post-war growth of urban and suburban areas, have led to a singular blurring of the distinction between the city and the countryside [12]: a peculiar territorial configuration where the urban borders are fading away, as expressed in Figure 2. Since the Third Memorandum on Spatial Planning in the 1970s [51], the national planning policies have been based upon the concept of the city region.…”

“…A series of initiatives began to explore the potential of design at a regional scale, embracing international discussions and spatial concepts. Organizations such as "Architecture in Within this context, three authors interpreted the peculiar decentralized configuration of the Tussengebied, proposing different spatial concepts all highlighting a "new" metropolis in the size of an entire region and in the form of a field, but each with different specificities: Willem Jan Neutelings with the "patchwork metropolis" (1989), Frits Palm-boom with the "urbanized landscape" (1987), and OMA-Floris Alkemade with the "field metropolis" (Deltametropool project, 2002) [60] (Figure 3).…”

“…Due to an agreement between the national and local governments, this area was selected for large-scale urbanization. The new urban district became nationally known as Ypenburg, named after a former regional airport located in the area [64].…”

“…In this evolving context, urban planning in general and metropolitan planning in particular have shown difficulties in properly conceiving and interpreting the renewed notion of the urban and rural relationship [2,12]. On one hand, several international institutions have attempted to classify the current urban setting on measurable criteria through an almost deterministic approach.…”

The impact of regional design on river agreements: the case of the ombrone river in Tuscany

“…Many conferences, seminars, and literature have been recently dedicated to the topic of RD and on the use of design-led approach in spatial and strategic planning (Neuman, 2000;de Jonge, 2009;Meijsmans, 2010;Balz & Zonneveld, 2014;Förster et al, 2016;Kempenaar et al, 2016;Lingua, 2018;Pisano, 2018b). A large part of the cases raised can be framed under the notion of Functional Urban Regions, as areas that people and businesses refer to in carrying out their activities (Friedmann & Weaver, 1979).…”