With several other events happening in the past year, we were really glad to welcome you again to our expo. We were really happy with the enthusiastic responses and look forward to continue this on our next expos!
This expo we welcomed Karlou Westerbeek, an urban designer at PosadMaxwan and Melissa Brunlett, a Canadian urban mobility advocate and advisor working for Mobycon.
Karlou shared her research (which she conducted together with Gintare Norkunaite, Laura Thomas and Maria Kibera) about collective and cooperative living. The results of the research and design guide can be found here. We discussed about the roles of the government and corporations, what tools we have as (urban) designers, how to bridge the gap between designing and maintaining a plan. If the research is continued it was suggested to learn from examples in other countries, outside of the Netherlands which the study focused on, too.
Melissa shared her view and exploration about finding happiness in a low-car city, sharing her inspiration through her personal experiences in Vancouver and The Netherlands. Information about her explorations and books can be found here. We discussed about our own (international) experiences, the possibilities to design for speeds rather than for types of vehicles and what the role of geography/climate is. It was suggested to also show the less good parts of the Netherlands and how that is dealt with (or not), to inspire even more.