Day Three
Trip Start
Nov 02, 2009
1
3
Trip End
Nov 05, 2009
Leiden, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
After an interesting talk on the historical growth of Amsterdam, attention turned to the park
Ypenburg Ecolonia
. The park attracts 5.5m visitors per year and boasts 137km of footpaths. 51m of cycle paths, 50 bridges. 150 indigenous species of trees and over 200 species of birds. A number of which had been stuffed and placed on display in the TCPA venue.The park costs 10k to maintiaian annually.
The park landscape is undoubtly attractive having accommodated about 200,000 new homes from the Amsterdam version,
After 200,000 trees were planted, special artificial lakes created, I sensed that development of the Park continued in earnest. In 1921 Amsterdam city enlarged its borders. In responding to a growing interest in sport and fitness by urban residents, it decided that a plan was needed to have a forest laid out, which fitted with the city's overall expansion schemes. A group of landscape architects drew inspiration from visits to similar parks in England, France and their proposal to plan a forest was drawn up and accepted in 1928. The first section of the park opened in 1937. World War 2 saw the works slow down but this increased in pace by 1970. In 1964 the original construction plans were completed and the objective for the Bos to remain a characterisitically natural landscape park
Ypenburg Ecolonia
. The park cost£10million euro to maintain and remains an important recreation resource.On leaving the Park we returned to the bus, which took us to Amsterdam Sud, where we caught the first a train to Leiden, and then a second train to Den Haag. On getting off the train, we caught the next train to Den Haag where we continued our journey on a coach to Ypenburg.
Ypenberg is another Vinex location, and is a completed new town on a former Dutch airforce base, forming an extension to Den Haag. It demonstrates how the local authority casn take the lead in the development process. After drawing up a master plan, the town was divided into five different districts of around 2,000 homes, each with a distinctive character, makign up a total of over 10,000 units of around 3,000 residents. Facilties include two large supermarkes, around 40 shops, a library, childcare facilities, amedicla centre and sports centre. Fifteen different developer/architect teams were selected to build the neighbourhoods through limited competititions eith 80 teams in all.
It was emphasised that the choice was based on qulaity not price, as it was thought that the better the quality, the greater the demand and hence higher the value
Ypenburg Ecolonia
. As with other schemes the high quality of infastructure, including a tram line, has been made possible through the public sector ploughing back the uplift in land values as a result of changing through limited competititons, with 80 teams in all. It was emphasised that the choice was based on quality not price. Within the centre of Ypenberg, where flats have been built around the old shopping centre, densities ware at their highest. In the afternoon we visited Ecolonia, initiated in 1989, it is a demonstration project incorporating
the environmental themes of energy, conservation,life-cycle management and quality, improvement of design and materials throughout its 101 semi-detached and terraced homes
After returning to Amsterdam at 6.00p.m. we set off again at 18.35 to attend the eco town seminar, led by Graham Bell, but with Henry Cleary CLG, Gideon Amos TCPA and Sir Peter Hall contributing.
After the seminar we attended a reception and dinner celebrating the Grabs Project.
