Down and Online in Amsterdam Zuidoost

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Down and Online in Amsterdam Zuidoost A Qualitative Investigation Into the Role of Online Public Participation Platform’s in the Redevelopment of the Amstel III Office District

Student Number: 11377542 Program: Sociology (MsC) Track: Urban Date: 10th July 2017 Place of Submission: Roeterseiland Campus, Amsterdam

Word Count: 23,991

Abstract

Platform technology is becoming more ubiquitous in contemporary society, as is the infusing of data and sensing technology into the urban fabric. This is a defining characteristic of the ‘smart city’, a concept pursued by the European Union, nation states and individual municipalities; notably, the municipality of Amsterdam. This thesis intends to understand the implementation of smart city technology on a local, social scale by investigating the role of online public participation platforms in the redevelopment of the Amstel III office district in Amsterdam Zuidoost. This research was carried out by studying the new technology of the ZO! City platform, a project based upon an interactive online map of Amstel III - known as the ‘interactive urban dashboard’ - where individuals can participate in the area’s redevelopment by proposing crowdfunded redevelopment projects. Alongside the study of the dashboard, this project engaged in qualitative analysis, through in depth observation, of the office district in order to compare the online representation of the space to it in reality. To further understand the role of public participation platforms in the Amstel III redevelopment, this project carried out two case studies, one based on participant observation and interviewing members of a local community garden based in Amstel III and secondly an analysis of a soon to begin building of a large scale student housing/public space development carried out through interviews and visual analysis of a concept handbook of the development. These studies highlighted that platform technology is a key component of the Amstel III redevelopment - formerly via the essential use of Facebook and latterly through the connection of diffuse redevelopment stakeholders enabled with platform technology - yet, the ZO! City interactive urban dashboard did not feature as a main component of the redevelopment. This project identifies three reasons for this - an absence of participation monopoly, lack of essentiality and through its infrastructure, poor usability. This project concludes by looking towards the future of the ZO! City interactive urban dashboard and ruminating on its potential uses as it develops, whilst also recommending that for platforms such as the ZO! City dashboard to be successful, they need to be an essential component to fulfil their intended function.

Key Words: Smart City, Platform, Participation, Amsterdam

Contents

Acknowledgements p3 Introduction p5 - Methodology p6 Literature Review - Smart Urbanism p8 - Platforms p11 - Urban Planning Participation in the Netherlands p13 - Participation on the ZO! City Online Dashboard p19 - Conclusion p21 The Amstel III Office District: Online and Offline A Building or a Blank Canvas? The ZO! City Online Interactive Urban Dashboard p22 - The Use of Colour on the ZO! City Dashboard p25 - Henri Lefebvre and the Dashboard p27 Where the Atypical Shall be Typical: The Amstel III Office District p31 - The Courtyard et al: Confined and Private Space p32 - Amongst the Office Buildings p34 - A Space of Reflection p36 - Conclusion p38 The Green Shoots of Transformation Sowing Seeds in Sand: Ubuntu Stadstuin p39 - The Role of the Municipality p41 - Ubuntu Stadstuin and the redevelopment of Amstel III p43 - Participation at the Garden p44 - The Online Ubuntu Stadstuin Garden p48 - ZO! City and Ubuntu Stadstuin p53 The Anatomy of a Catalyst: The Community Campus Amsterdam p56 - The Redevelopment p57 - The Community Campus Amsterdam: Built Environment p59 - “They Call it a Social Community”: Public Space at the Community Campus p60 - Public Park at Amstel III p63 - Public Participation p65 - Conclusion p67 A Platform for the Future? p69 Conclusion p71 Endnotes p76 Bibliography p79 Image Bibliography p83 Appendix p84

Acknowledgements

It is no underestimation to say that I have worked harder on this thesis than I have any other project. It has been a great challenge. A challenge which has only been accomplishable with the support of many people. Firstly, to those who agreed to be interviewed for this project, I am incredibly thankful, for without your kindness and cooperation this project would not have existed. Secondly, Dr Adeola Enigbokan has been a fantastic supervisor for myself, as well as Elli and Elisa. Thirdly I wish to thank JPI Urban Europe, specifically Dr Colette Bos, who offered me the amazing opportunity of working on this project with them, as well as the chance to participate in their conference in Brussels, which was an incredible experience. Also I have to thank the incredible friends I have made here, but especially Elli and Darren, who have been incredible people to get to know (over numerous coffee’s and unfathomable quantities of small beers of course). Finally I have to thank my mum and dad, who despite being in the U.K, have been a great deal of support.

Introduction

With the importance of ‘smart growth’ emphasised in “the EU’s growth strategy for this decade” (Europe 2020, 2016), smart technology is becoming a common feature in European cities. Amsterdam, ranked highest in the EU for the implementation of smart urbanism (Manville et al 2014, p71), is a city “with a large number of [smart] initiatives, each covering a variety of characteristics” (ibid, p75), in order to help achieve the city’s own sustainability targets (See: Structural Vision Amsterdam 2040, 2013). One of these targets is the transformation of “various mono-functional business parks [...] into areas with an urban mix of residential and business functions” (ibid). An example of such transformation is ‘ZO! City’ at the Amstel III office district in Amsterdam Zuidoost (Southeast). ZO! City is a digital platform which intends to encourage both companies and individuals to propose projects, from landscape transformation to sports facilities, via an online ‘interactive urban dashboard’ where interested individuals are able to view an interactive map with information and data concerning potential projects and spaces in the area; reaffirming this motive by stating that “urban development is not something exclusive for the government and developers anymore, but for everybody” (ZO! City, 2017).

However a number of questions are raised which makes the area an interesting place to study. Firstly, why has a project such as this been started and how useful is a platform in facilitating the intended spatial transformation in Amstel III? Secondly, does the platform replace, or change notions of public participation? Thirdly, how does the ZO! City online dashboard, portray the Amstel III office district? Thinking through these questions and issues has led this project to investigate following: what is the role of public participation platforms in the redevelopment of the Amstel III office district?

These questions will be answered through in depth investigation into two prominent projects in Amstel III. Firstly this project will look into the Ubuntu Stadstuin community garden, located at the southernmost section of the office district. The garden is premised upon notions of ‘permaculture’, “the conscious design and maintenance of agriculturally productive ecosystems which have the diversity, stability, and resilience of natural ecosystems” (Mollison, 2002, p ix) and, according to a respondent for this project, the “empowering” capability of people growing

their own food. The garden stands out against its surroundings of office buildings and neat hedgerows and shows an example of the office district moving beyond its mono-functional usage.

Secondly, the first large scale regeneration project to take place in Amstel III will also be investigated. This is the Community Campus Amsterdam, a ‘public-private’ development soon to begin, between the municipality and two real estate firms. When complete it will be comprised of 950 student dwellings (to facilitate the nearby University of Amsterdam Academisch Medisch Centrum (AMC) hospital) and 450 apartments for the general public, as well as spaces for startup businesses. The Community Campus was investigated through analysing a design book for the build, which was supplied by a representative of the municipality who was interviewed for this project as well as attendance at a public demonstration of the project. This was included to highlight the differing approaches to urban transformation and to highlight both how public participation is fostered through this project and the role of ZO! City in its completion.

This thesis begins with a chapter concerning the background information necessary to answering the above questions. This commences with a literature review of smart urbanism by highlighting the diffuse and broad scope of the concept through the interpretation and comparison of the different definitions of smart urbanism in the academic literature. Leading on from this investigation will be a brief application of theoretical literature concerning platforms to the ZO! City platform. Thirdly the history of public participation in urban development in the Netherlands will be unpacked in order to portray the different means of participation as well as how it is changing and developing. This, along with a demonstration of the public participation element of the ZO! City ‘interactive urban dashboard’.

The second chapter consists of a comparison between the ZO! City online ‘interactive urban dashboard’ and the Amstel III office district in its physical reality. The ZO! City dashboard represents the office district as an interactive map, where individuals can place their own crowdfunded project ideas and click on spatial representations of buildings and public spaces to obtain information about them. The sociological understanding of the dashboard is interpreted

through French philosopher Henri Lefebvre’s ‘spatial triad’ of ‘perceived, conceived and lived space’ (Lefebvre, 1991, p39).

After the dashboard is covered, the second section of this chapter concerns the Amstel III office district. Data for this analysis has been obtained through systematic and in depth observations of the space, with a subsequent entwinement of theory and literature spanning from the art work of Giorgio de Chirico to the seminal sociological works The Fall of Public Man by Richard Sennett and Michel Foucault’s Discipline & Punish. This is to represent in as concise a manner as possible the experience of those who use the Amstel III district and how the environment physically appears in order to compare and contrast the online representation of Amstel III with it in real life. The third chapter revolves around the two aforementioned case studies of the Ubuntu Stadstuin community garden and the Community Campus Amsterdam, before moving into the concluding chapter which begins with a look to the future of the ZO! City platform before a discussion of findings and conclusion.

Methodology An overriding aspect of this project is to highlight the ways in which the theoretical idea of the smart city influences physical urban reality, which explains the rationale for this project to investigate the ZO! City platform. To understand the role of the platform in Amstel III, this project draws upon the data gathered through qualitative methods. Specifically the use of participant observations and the interviewing of those involved with the two case studies and the ZO! City platform. Participant observation - “the process of learning through exposure to or involvement in the day-to-day or routine activities of participants in the research setting (Hennink et al, 2015, p179) - was used at the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden, in order to gain a nuanced and detailed understanding of how the ZO! City platform functions beyond its own boundaries, how individuals use and interact with it in order to understand its role in the Amstel III redevelopment. To obtain the ‘emic’ - or the ‘insider’s’ point of view (ibid, p18) - participant observation was the only course of action.

Whilst carrying out participant observations, potential interview participants were asked whether they would like to participate in this project by conducting an interview. These interviews were

recorded and took place on site in order to obtain further understanding of the role of the ZO! City platform in Amstel III and to build upon my own observations. The interviews concerning the ZO! City platform and the Community Campus Amsterdam both took place at a cafe of the respondent’s choice and were also recorded.

Literature Review

Smart Urbanism Emine Mine-Thompson (2016), states that “outside academia, the general ‘smart’ concept [has become] a generic term fused with data collection, sensors and various monitoring technologies, big data and the IoT” (p358) (Internet of Things: See Rathore et al, 2016, p64). However, for sociological purposes, the smart urbanism concept is not just about smartness ‘jumping scales’ (Harvey, 2012, p69) from the TV to the city, for instance; there is an inherent human element too. Additionally, there are a range of infrastructure-focused definitions of when a city becomes smart, such as when

the use of ICT [makes] the critical infrastructure components and services of a city – which include city administration, education, healthcare, public safety, real estate, transportation, and utilities – more intelligent, interconnected, and efficient (Manville et al, 2014, p22)

While this definition works to describe the physical dimension of smart urbanism, as well as its intended positive outcomes, it clearly doesn’t cover the social ramifications of such a melding of technology and infrastructure. Ezra Ho’s (2016) claim that “on a basic level, a smart city is characterised by the extensive and systematic incorporation of digital networked technologies across the urban landscape and population” (p2), tracks a similar path to the the above indented quotation. Yet by including the human actor in the frame, the latter definition serves this project better. Concilio et al (2013) advance the importance of the human actor in the smart city further by propagating the ‘human smart city’, stating that beyond the above definitions of smart urbanism, “the notion of empowerment of citizens and ‘democratized innovation’ should be added” (p270). This results in a focus upon the “‘softer’ features of ‘smartness’ such as clarity of vision, citizen empowerment [and] participation” (ibid, p271).

Yet, there is another school of interpretation, one which revolves around the economic concerns of smart urbanism (See: Angelidou, 2014, p53 & Batty et al, 2013, p486), with Rob Kitchen asserting that “a smart city is one whose economy is increasingly driven by technically inspired

innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship, enacted by smart people” (Kitchen, 2015, p131). He further elaborates by claiming that

It is posited that smart policies and judicious investment in appropriate fiscal measures, human capital and technological infrastructures and programmes will attract businesses and jobs, create efficiencies and savings and raise the productivity and competitiveness of government and businesses (ibid)

This forms the rubric of smart urban intervention at the policy level. Words such as “efficiency, effectiveness or competitiveness [...] appear to be very popular in smart city literature and marketing materials” (Thomas et al, 2016, p5) - a prescient example of this rhetoric lies within the reportage and scope of the European Union (EU). The EU is investing heavily in smart urban technology to reach its own self-imposed sustainability goals.

Andrea Caragliu (in Thomas et al, 2016) promotes the notion that a city is ‘smart’ “when investments and human and social capital and traditional ICT infrastructure fuel a sustainable economic growth and a high quality of life, with wise management of natural resources” (p2: emphasis added). Sustainable and economic growth is the cornerstone of ‘The Europe 2020 strategy’, where climate change features heavily, with “the EU [aiming] to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20% (or even 30%) compared to 1990 levels, and [aiming] to get 20% of its energy from renewable energy sources and increase energy efficiency by 20%” (Europe 2020, 2016). A considerable part of the Europe 2020 strategy, 3 of 7 ‘flagship initiatives’ (ibid), is the promotion of ‘smart growth’ and the ideal of a ‘digital society’ (ibid). The digital society is premised upon the notion that “ICT can improve energy efficiency and reduce energy use in our homes as well as in factories, shops and offices” (EU Smart Living, 2016).

The ‘digital society’ (ibid) sits within the EU’s broader ‘strategic energy technology plan’ (SET- Plan), which, “by 2050, [...] intends to slash [the EU’s] greenhouse gas emissions by 60% to 80%” (SET-Plan, no date, p3). To achieve such a large cut-back in emissions, the EU’s plan is to “bring the next generation of renewable energy technologies to market competitiveness” (ibid, p5) whilst also striving to “achieve a breakthrough in the cost-efficiency of energy storage technologies” (ibid). What this analysis of European Union directives shows is a portrayal of the

rhetoric bound up in the utilization of the ‘smart’ concept. The EU can also provide up to 12 million euros of funding to municipalities and cities which install smart urban programs. [1] There is a financial incentive for a municipality to invest in smart urban technology, yet, how is greater sustainability achieved in a smart city?

A key feature in the search for increased sustainability via smart urbanism is the involvement of the citizenry feeding back information into central data sets. This practice is a “primary way in which sustainability is to be achieved within smart cities [...] through more efficient processes and responsive urban citizens participating in computational sensing and monitoring practices” (Gabrys, 2014, p32). Batty et al, interpret such participation as positive, viewing the development of “technologies that ensure informed participation and create shared knowledge for democratic city governance” (Batty et al, 2012, p481) as a challenge for the successful implementation of smart urbanism.

The increased level of participation in the urban environment may change what it means to be a citizen (Gabrys, 2014, p30). For increased sustainability, “monitoring behavior and generating data is the basis for making sound decisions to advance everyday sustainable practices” (ibid, p41), yet, “in order for these schemes to function, urban citizens need to play their part, whether by partaking in transport systems or by generating energy through their continual movement within urban environments” (ibid). This ‘citizen sensing’, means that

Urban citizenship is remade through these environmental technologies, which mobilize urban citizens as operatives within the processing of urban environmental data; citizen activities become extensions and expressions of informationalized and efficient material–political practices. (ibid)

However, in juxtaposition to Batty et al’s (2014) optimism, participation is not necessarily open to all. For instance the “extension of ICTs are far from being socially, geographically or culturally neutral” (Graham, 2001, p53). Vanolo applies this lack of technical neutrality to the smart city by proclaiming that “the citizens that are expected to live in a smart city are supposed to be rather homogeneous: s/he is digitally educated, s/he possesses a smartphone and a pc, s/he constantly generates data and feedback about everything in her/his daily life” (Vanolo, 2016,

p34). If this is to be the case, “non-digital citizens have apparently little room and a limited voice in the city of the future” (ibid).

Whilst the general level of internet usage in the Netherlands is high, questions still remain over whether those who are not ‘smart citizens’ - individuals “well equipped with tools, skills and organizational formats” (Niederer & Priester, 2016, p138) [2] - will be able to actively participate. Also, the smart city has ideological undertones, associated with “the agenda of emerging liberal- progressive political groups [who] employ discourses of civic entrepreneurialism and smart growth” (Savini & Dembski, 2016, p140: See also: Marres, 2012, p68). Thus, are those who participate in smart urban projects all of the same ideological makeup? Is everybody, in this case, solely made up of an IT literate, liberal-progressive persuasion?

Through the implementation of smart urbanity via the use of an online platform, the ZO! City interactive dashboard appears to “[facilitate] a mode of participation that requires only a minimum of effort” (Marres, 2012, p74), a form of what Niederer & Priester (2016) deem ‘lightweight means of participation’ (p139). However, before delving into participation on platforms, it is of importance to situate the ZO! City platform in relevant literature to understand just what a platform is.

Platforms The word platform has many different uses across the spectrum of the English language, where it spans the ‘computational’, ‘architectural’, ‘figurative’ and ‘political’ realms (Gillespie, 2014, p349-50). [1] Platform businesses have become a central component of the contemporary economy, according to Nick Srnicek’s Platform Capitalism (2017), “numerous companies incorporate platforms: powerful technology companies (Google, Facebook and Amazon), dynamic start-ups (Uber, Airbnb), industrial leaders (GE, Siemens) and agricultural powerhouses (John Deere, Monsanto)” (p43) to name a few. Yet, what is a platform?

In the broadest of terms a platform is a “digital infrastructure where two or more groups interact. They therefore position themselves as intermediaries that bring together different users” (Srnicek, 2017, p43). ZO! City does not take part in the transformation of space in Amstel III by

physically altering things, but they play a part, according to Saskia Beer - the project manager and creator of the ZO! City dashboard - as a mediator who are “exactly between bottom-up and top-down. So on the one hand, we connect citizens and businesses and different stakeholders and local initiatives, whatever things to do with each other, also to the municipality and to the railroad company or to the water company, whatever is going on in the area”. This interview extract shows the positioning of a platform as ‘between’ entities, which ‘connect’ different users, something which Saskia views as an essential characteristic in fostering the redevelopment of Amstel III

We needed a digital platform because it became way too complex and we became the spider in the web, and the whole network that we built became in a way, just as fragile and not as resilient as the original one, even though our community was larger, we were in the middle

According to the extract above, the complexity inherent in Amstel III, with the diffuse ranges of stakeholders involved, makes a platform an essential and efficient means to manage the redevelopment. Srnicek argues that platforms have four ‘essential characteristics’. Firstly, as alluded to above, they provide “the basic infrastructure to mediate between different groups” (ibid, p44). Secondly, platforms “produce and are reliant on ‘network effects’” (ibid, p45). Network effects are “the more numerous the users who use a platform, the more valuable that platform becomes for everyone else” (ibid) - i.e. people use Facebook, for instance, rather than alternative social media platforms because the majority of those who use social media use Facebook. [2] For ZO! City, the more people use the platform, the more useful it becomes as a means to connect people.

Thirdly, “platforms often use cross-subsidisation: one arm of the firm reduces the price of a service or good (even providing it for free), but another arm raises prices in order to make up for these losses” (ibid, p46). ZO! City has a number of companies and governmental organizations signed up to be a part of their ‘community’, [3] with according to Saskia, each of these actors paying a subscription to the platform, yet on the other hand, for the public to sign up and participate on the platform is free. This is to “ensure that more and more users come on board” (ibid) in order to broaden the network effect, thus to improve the platform. Finally, “platforms

are designed in a way that makes them attractive to its various users” (ibid). Despite platforms “presenting themselves as empty spaces [...] the rules of product and service development, as well as marketplace interactions, are set by the platform owner” (ibid, p47). For instance, for an individual to propose a project idea for the regeneration of Amstel III, vis-a-vis ZO! City, the platform needs to accept the project, therefore acting as judge and jury. An individual can propose what they like, but there are rules to what will go through. [4]

These four characteristics each sum up a component of the ZO! City platform. The purpose of this section has been to briefly position in and explain the ZO! City platform with relevant literature concerning the rise of platform technology. The following section will be concerned with public participation in the Netherlands by focusing upon how it has changed in the last 50 years, how new policy may prompt change in how participation is carried out, how smart technology can facilitate participation.

Urban Planning Participation in the Netherlands From the 1990’s onwards, the notion of public participation in the urban planning process “has been promoted as a necessary component of public service delivery at [the] local level” (Docherty et al, 2001, p2226). Notions of post-war public participation revolved around what Hajer and Zonneveld term ‘end of pipe’ forms of participation (Hajer and Zonneveld, 2000, p351). This is in reference to the rigid hierarchies of top-down forms of interaction between state/municipality and resident (See: Hajer, 2003), where the public is viewed as recipients of a plan, with “politicians [complaining] about the ‘hinder power’ of public participation” (ibid). An example of this can be found in the history of Amsterdam’s famous Jordaan district.

Today the Jordaan is a popular, although expensive district of Amsterdam. [1] However in the 1970’s the housing stock was “cheap and crowded and rents [were] low. Many of the houses [were] in poor structural condition and over the years some have been demolished leaving rubbish-strewn gap sites” (Hague & McCourt, 1974, p146). However, the Jordaan has always been characterised by a sense of ‘liveliness’. According to Hague and McCourt, this essence of liveliness, “derives from a heterogeneous mixture of people living and working together, people who need to be there financially, or because of its central location-low-income residents, traders

and small businessmen” (ibid, p147). Yet in 1969, the municipality of Amsterdam proposed an unpopular redevelopment of the Jordaan.[2] Herein lies “what might well be regarded as classic ingredients for conflict between the city authorities on one hand and the residents, or individuals and groups with interests in the area, on the other” (ibid, p148).

Subsequently, the municipality produced a document favourably outlining the proposed regeneration of the Jordaan. Despite a diverse response from the local population, “the general tenor was undoubtedly antagonistic, and within a few months a number of action groups had formed in the area to protest against the plan” (ibid). [3] The antagonistic dialogue between the municipality and the ‘Jordaaners’ would take place at large scale public meetings and discussion groups, where upwards of 300 residents would attend (ibid, p149). However, those who took part in the discussion groups “found it almost impossible to criticise the plan without also criticising the scope for participation which they had been allowed” (ibid). [4] Ultimately after much wrangling and opposition, a new municipal council was elected in 1970 and the project was scrapped. What this historical example shows is that there was a “clear rejection by the activists of the idea that the municipality should define the problems, decide on a solution and then invite the inhabitants to participate in approving that solution” (ibid, p150).

Hajer and Zonneveld (2000) have argued that the “Dutch system of spatial planning needs to be rethought in order to remain effective and legitimate” (p351). This requires a rejuvenation of planning practice (ibid), which will “require a different approach than ‘end of pipe’ public participation” (ibid, 350) via “a new generation of intermediary practices that do not only allow for the public to have its say (as in the participatory practices) but approach the variety of ‘stakeholders’ as knowledgeable actors in the plan making process” (ibid, p350).

In the years that followed, participation in the Dutch planning process changed. The example concerning the Jordaan above is characterised by the heavy ‘top-down’ (the imposition of a plan by an authority) approach to urban planning, with the municipality believing that the area needed renovating and the citizens should be consulted, but their local knowledge and nuanced insight was not used as an integral aspect of the intended change. Yet, the approach to the interaction between policy and polity shifted during the late 1970’s and into the 80’s. University of Utrecht

political scientist, Maarten Hajer, states that “the constitutional rules of the well-established classical-modernist polities do not tell us about the new rules of the game” (Hajer, 2003, p176).

The game here is the interaction between policy makers and how the public is consulted. Hajer observes a shift from ‘classical-modernist’ forms of governance - “representative democracy, a differentiation between politics and bureaucracy, the commitment to ministerial responsibility and the idea that policy making should be based on expert knowledge” (ibid) - to ‘new political spaces’, that “the ensemble of mostly unstable practices that emerge in the struggle to address problems that the established institutions are, for a variety of reasons unable to resolve” (ibid). The classical-modernist institutions are unable to address the issues of contemporary society alone, “that the ongoing modernisation of society, with its double features of globalisation on the one hand and individualisation on the other, erodes the self-evidence of the classical-modernist institutions as the locus of politics” (ibid, p176). This creates an ‘institutional void’ (ibid, p175) where the previous rigid rules of participation have dissolved. The above example from the 1970’s highlights the rigidity of classical-modernist institutions, where the municipality would solely carry spatial renovation. In the case of the Amstel III redevelopment which this project revolves around, the opposite is apparent.

The ideal of blanket participation, “regardless whether you are a big company or an individual” (ZO! City, 2017) is an apparent cornerstone of the ZO! City transformation. According to Saskia Beer, this intended equality is achieved by each project, regardless of who initiates it, receiving

the same; they get a same sized pin, and every idea gets the same attention, in the sense that we on the website, but also on the social media and the newsletters that these ideas and projects are shared with the community, and they are shared based on the content of the idea and of course it is visible who comes up with the idea because you see the project owner, so if you have a question you can connect with this person

The ability for an individual to propose a project in the area entails direct participation in urban planning, in juxtaposition to the Jordaan example. Korthals-Altes (2016) has written about the new integrated Environment and Planning Act (Omgevingswet) which will abolish “local land- use plans and [replace] them with a system of by-laws” (p420). This intended policy shift

included ‘the concept of planning-by-invitation’, which “can also be described as ‘planning by request for proposals’, which implies that the authorities would still retain a crucial role in evaluating the proposals brought forward by societal actors when current land uses are changed” (Korthals Altes, 2016, p428). Essentially, the municipality would issue a policy and interested parties would apply to facilitate it. ZO! City fits this notion perfectly as “planning-by-invitation [which] involves the organic development of areas and locations, i.e. with no precisely defined blueprint, but with a preferred development direction based on a vision for the area” (ibid, p429) - the municipality has a ‘vision’ for Amsterdam Zuidoost, “does not dictate a plan, but invites other players to put their ideas forward” (ibid). This is the case with the ZO! City project.

Another facet of the Omgevingswet, according to the ‘Digital Government’ website of the Dutch House of Representatives, is the centrality of data collection. For

municipalities [will] digitize their products and services and explore the possibilities of big data. By linking data sets and analyzing them with innovative tools, municipalities can get new insights. Insights that may help solve social issues (Digitale Overheid, 2017)

According to Saskia Beer “with the Omgevingswet there will be a lot of data, a lot of information, enclosed digitally and we are aiming to be the local, sort of the last local interface where all these data can be implemented, both either on list views or on maps”. The ZO! City platform is, therefore a portal to accessing the reams of information coming from the municipality, [5] one which allows participation in the analysis of statistics concerning the Amstel III district. However how is this data utilized by public actors?

A currently popular method of interpreting the urban realm alongside the utilization of ‘smart’ city systems whilst fostering public participation is the ‘urban living lab’, [6] a concept “which is considered as a user-centred, open-innovation ecosystem” (Nevens et al, 2013, p115). Living labs “operate in a territorial context (e.g. city, agglomeration, region) where they integrate concurrent research and innovation processes [...] within a public-private-people partnership [where] user communities [participate] not only as observed subjects or stakeholders that are enabled to have a say in the matters, but also as a source of creation” (ibid). This correlates with

Hajer and Zonneveld’s (2000) aforementioned call for “a new generation of intermediary practices” (p350).

An example of a living lab in Amsterdam is the aptly named ‘Amsterdam Smart Citizens Lab’ (ASCL). [7] The ASCL project revolved around notions of ‘citizen science’, [8] which according to the lab itself:

could be considered a form of social innovation, or strategies, concepts, products and services that meet the greater needs of society while generating social capital by fostering new relationships and collaborations between scientists, designers and everyday people that would otherwise not occur (Henriquez, no date, p21)

This entwinement of local knowledge and scientific expertise would focus on environmental urban phenomena [9] which could be sensed “with an out-of-the-box, low cost, sensor kit” (ibid, p24) which was built by volunteers at the project’s base: the Waag building at Nieuwmarkt, Centraal Amsterdam. This location served an intended double function. It was not only a physical fulcrum point from which the project could run, but

along with the goals of increasing technological proficiency and creating greater community awareness of urban environmental issues, it was hoped that the workshop would function as an inclusive design space where citizens could organize around urban issues they care about, propose meaningful solutions, and create a fruitful interplay between citizens, researchers and policy makers that would translate the will of the community into progressive public policy. (ibid)

The space was essentially a physical platform, where citizens, experts, policy makers for example could meet. As stated in the above quotation, the ultimate intention of the lab was to obtain useful information concerning the local population and apply it to future policy. Yet, a problem persisted in the lab which has been a common feature of public participation:

A quick scan of the faces around the room revealed most to be of an older stock, about 30 years old and above. Half were internationals and tended to be male (3:1), highly educated, and coming from professional, but not necessarily IT, backgrounds. (Henriquez, no date, p54)

The participant demography first of all chimes with Vanolo’s (2016) observation of smart citizens in the opening section of this chapter, and also raises an issue with how ‘public’ the participation is. For, if the majority of the participants are homogeneous groups of well educated, middle aged men, then the living lab will gather information which represents this small segment of the overall population, which could in turn influence and produce policy gendered towards those who take part. Michels and De Graaf (2010) highlight an “absence of some groups, minority groups and young people in particular, from active participation” (p488). In the Netherlands, public participation in the planning process has revolved around partaking in neighbourhood panels (Uitermark & Duyvendak, 2008, p124) and meetings with various actors, from residents to local professionals and neighbourhood organizations (Michels & De Graaf, 2010, Uitermark & Duyvendak, 2008, p125, Hague & McCourt, 1974, p149). The addition of urban living labs has not influenced or altered the narrow representation of the population as a whole.

According to Patrick Bresnihan, “participation [is] understood to be a formal activity separated from daily life [and] is turned into a specific exercise for those who decide they want to 'make a difference'” (Bresnihan & Dawney, 2013, p129). This notion of wanting to make a difference is furthered via Michels & De Graaf (2010) interviewed citizen participants who “indicated that the reason to participate was driven by self-interest alone: citizens participate because they feel that they have something to win or to lose” (p487). The ability to participate in meetings, living labs or to organize as residents associations (ibid, p483) requires the usage of time away from work or family commitments, for instance, and is therefore an option to those who have spare time.

However, theoretically the ‘lightweight’ (Niederer & Priester, 2016, p139) participation of the ZO! City platform may overcome these issues, owing to the interactive urban dashboard facilitating direct involvement. The use of the platform theoretically, to paraphrase Niederer and Priester’s article, results in one not needing to understand the complexities of town planning or

structural engineering to engage with urban transformation on a daily basis through the use of a dashboard (ibid).

Participation on the ZO! City Online Dashboard To show how the ZO! City dashboard functions, I have placed a project upon it. An observable feature of the Amstel III site is an apparent lack of public space or seating, therefore I added a project, called ‘Water side Park’ (right). The idea is to change a quiet and relatively unkept corner of the district (below), into a small park. To implement a project, a user is asked to provide a name for the project, ‘Water Side Park’, a description of the project - “This is a nice and shaded area, which would be a really nice place for a park of some sort. Somewhere people could relax and enjoy a quiet corner of the area” (ZO! City, 2017) - and an external link to the project’s website (if necessary). A user can also add images. This is where the ‘lightweight’, strictly online, facet of participation ends. For, almost instantaneously as one submits their proposal, they will receive an email from ZO! City - in both Dutch and English - explaining a number of things. Firstly, after the project appears to the general public, within the next working day,

other people and companies can like and comment on your idea. Besides, the idea is visible for the city officials who can also comment on its desirability and feasibility. You are responsible for managing the conversation about your idea, so please don’t forget to check the ‘subscribe’ button at the bottom of the comments section of your idea page on the website. By doing so, you will get notified when somebody comments on your idea and you can respond timely (ZO! City: email - see appendix)

After this initial step, ZO! City will contact you “to discuss how we can help you to bring your idea further” (ibid) and will offer potential “advice from the city officials” (ibid). However, the third stage of proposing a project is where the potential differences between the ‘lightweight’ (Niederer & Priester, 2016, p139) participation of the platform is replaced by more traditional ‘heavyweight’, for “when your idea is desirable and feasible but an investment is needed for its execution, we can help you to set up a crowdfunding campaign and generate support within the local community” (ZO! City: email - see appendix). At this stage the individual, for their project to become a reality, needs to engage in a crowdfunding campaign, which is far from easy. In fact, Hui et al (2014) in their article Understanding the Role of Community in Crowdfunding Work state that:

We find that many people underestimate the work involved and find themselves overwhelmed with the responsibilities of coordinating and answering to a large crowd of supporters (p12)

For crowdfunders to overcome the overwhelming aspect of crowdfunding, they would foster a ‘community of collaboration’ “where creators rely on mentorship, support tools, and outsourced help to accomplish their goals” (ibid). This highlights that for an individual to participate in the physical regeneration of the Amstel III office district through the ZO! City dashboard, they will still be required to partake in ‘heavyweight’ forms of participation, which requires the same relative luxuries discussed above when concerning more established forms of public participation. Therefore, the ZO! City platform does not alleviate the time constraints of participation, if an individual intends to start a project.

This section has investigated the changing nature of participation in urban planning in the Netherlands. This has been done through a historical analysis which displays how the public have been involved in the planning process at various intervals throughout the latter half of the 20th century, up to the present day. The major shift is apparent in how the public have gone from being a collection of actors with little influence in the initial planning of urban space - as evidenced by the Jordaan in the late 1960’s - to being a cornerstone in how the physical city is realised; the Amsterdam Smart citizens Lab. This analysis has led this project into further

analysis of the ZO! City urban interactive dashboard, beyond the role of participation and into how the dashboard works and how it represents the area it portrays.

Conclusion This chapter started out on a large scale and ended up small. Initially the broad, diffuse and multi-faceted concept of the smart city was interrogated to provide a theoretical background to the technological entwinement of the ongoing Amstel III transformation with the ZO! City project. By providing this background, the initial section also showed how the macro-scale, EU support for smart urbanism - through sustainability goals and funding incentives - funnels down into the city level. Also a cautionary flag was raised to highlight the possibility of exclusion from participating in the smart city. After discussing the smart city, a brief overview of ‘platform’ technology was provided to situate the ZO! City platform in wider literature, in order to theoretically position the platform.

What followed was an investigation into how notions of public participation have changed over the post-war years in the Netherlands, from a bureaucratic ‘modernist’ manner to ‘Living Labs’ where local ‘stakeholders’ are a central component of urban developments; however who participates is still an issue. This led towards how the ZO! City online dashboard could alter notions of participation through its ‘lightweight’ means, facilitated by taking participation online. Yet, once a project is set up, the same ‘heavyweight’ forms of participation reign, meaning that the physical notions of participation still remain. This theoretical background provides a base from which an investigation into the platform, specifically the user interface of the interactive urban dashboard’ into how the Amstel III redevelopment is represented by the platform.

The Amstel III Office District: Online and Offline

A Building or a Blank Canvas? The ZO! City Online Interactive Urban Dashboard

The first thing one is greeted with after pressing the enter key and being whisked to the ZO! City ‘interactive urban dashboard’ [1] (below) is the softly coloured interactive map which fills the screen. In the top left floats the logo, omnipresent with its lettering reminiscent of a thumbprint and tag line of ‘Transforming Amsterdam Southeast’ remaining visible and superimposed throughout usage. Underneath the logo, in the bottom left corner sits the timeline feature of the dashboard. With this, a user can virtually go back in time to 2010 and witness, according to the platform, how empty the area previously was and slide chronologically into 2025 and witness 15 years of urban transformation; both actual and envisaged. As one may expect the platform’s resting state, i.e. when it is initially loaded, is in 2017, with the map centered on a completed ‘project’.

The map is dotted with individual projects. Each is represented by a coloured pin - somewhat reminiscent to the pins used on Google Maps to denote location - orange for a project focused on ‘area transformation’, violet for a mobility project and green for sustainability centred initiatives. Each pin starts out as hollow, an outline with a figure in the same colour in the centre, for instance an orange outline with a coffee mug to highlight the project as one rooted in providing food and drink. The pin incrementally fills with colour in accordance with the amount of funding each project has received, for the business model of each project on ZO! City platform is rooted in crowdfunding. The more funding a project gets, the less

of a shell its pin appears and the fuller, healthier it is. Each pin, when clicked (page above), produces a page containing basic information relating to the project, from the date of its inception to the project type, a link to the project’s website if applicable and a brief description of what the project is - the information requested when a project is set up. At the bottom of the information page is a comments section where users can provide feedback to the proposed idea, whilst also a la Facebook, being able to ‘like’ and ‘share’ each project.

The project pins are not the only information containing entities on the dashboard, for a number of white angular shapes also contain information. Each shape represents a building in the Amstel III office district, and the ones with ‘shadowing’ (below) are clickable and contain statistical data. At the time of writing, the data contained within the buildings mostly concerns property focused statistics, however as the platform further develops, Saskia Beer, intends to

make the data more actionable, so if you click on a building, you get the different data but you also will be able to make combinations and maybe add some small calculations

These calculations are in order to allow a user to “very easily make informed decisions because they really get the right information”, an idea which follows the same logic proposed by Gabrys in the previous chapter, in how “generating data is the basis for making sound decisions to advance everyday sustainable practices” (Gabrys, 2014, p41).

These shadowed buildings are a part of the ZO! City project, buildings to be given a new means of use in the name of the Amstel III redevelopment, while those unshaded are not included within the project. Another representation of buildings in the area are the coloured project buildings. Much like the aforementioned pins, buildings are also undergoing a process of transformation and completion. A white building with shadowing is a building awaiting a start in its transformation process, then as a project is started it starts to change in colour - from a translucent pink into a rose purple when complete. This same formula also highlights any ‘mobility’ developments, such as cycle lanes, and ‘environmental’ changes, such as parks and enhanced walkways.

It is of importance however, to point out that the ZO! City dashboard is still in the initial phase of its existence. According to Saskia Beer, the dashboard is developed in accordance with the principles of ‘lean’ software development. Mary and Tom Poppendieck, the authors of Lean Software Development: An Agile Toolkit state that “design is a problem-solving process that involves discovering solutions through short, repeated cycles of investigation, experimentation, and checking the results. Software development, like all design, is most naturally done through such learning cycles” (Poppendieck & Poppendieck, 2003, p31). In the words of Saskia, ZO! City utilises

instead of a linear process, you have this sort of circular processes and we definitely should have done here, because there is so much new here, there is so much like, assumptions that we made, how people would interact with the platform, how they would understand the platform and that’s the thing where you don’t have an equal information position

The knowledge embodied by the developers of the ZO! City dashboard elevated them above, in terms of knowledge, those who would use the dashboard. Saskia, for instance

thought it was perfectly logical that people would understand how to use the platform, so one of the quick fixes that we will add is a planning page with more like leading people into, you know as now they just end up on the map, and if you are just a random person here working in the area you have no idea, some people were afraid to use it, so immediately that was such a fundamental mistake in a sense that all those things that are in there, people don’t even get there

As well as the “customer journey”, “the data part will get a, quite an upgrade” also. These apparently small development issues or oversights, can create a real barrier between user and platform - where a lack of technical skill, knowledge and, with some being ‘afraid’, confidence in using a map such as this - can be a prohibitive block between a user and the information concerning Amstel III contained within.

The above paragraphs explain the dashboard and how it functions, yet how does the platform work on a theoretical level, and what does this mean for the Amstel III transformation? To investigate this, the preceding paragraphs will delve into the use of colour on the dashboard by melding artistic colour theory and user experience literature, and then will, through the work of Henri Lefebvre, look into how notions of space are represented via the dashboard.

The Use of Colour on the ZO! City Dashboard A theme with the ZO! City dashboard is the choice of colours. The choice of colour may seem something removed from this study, but it does reveal a subtle, yet inherent feature of the dashboard. On the subject of colour there is no finer authority than Johannes Itten, [2] who “was considered one of the greatest teachers of the art of colour of modern times” (Birren [in Itten] 1961, p6). Of the colours used on the dashboard, there is an absence of the three primary colours of blue, red and yellow: the exception being the light blue canals - in reality they are a khaki- brown. According to Itten, the primary colours “represent the extreme instance of contrast of hue” (Itten, 1961, p33) and this abrupt demarcation of colour results in

the effect [being] always tonic, vigorous and decided. The intensity of contrast of hue diminishes as the hues employed are removed from the three primaries. Thus orange, green and violet are weaker in character than yellow, red and blue” (ibid)

The colours prominent on the ZO! City dashboard are the three colours which equally draw from the three primaries: orange, green and violet. Colours which are ‘weaker’ in character, in boldness and strength than the absent primaries. Therefore, they pose as less

influential than the primary colours. This is of importance for the dashboard, for the project exclaims that its purpose is for individuals to “share [their] own ideas and wishes for the area and convince the community to join in”, whilst also claiming that “urban development is not something exclusive for the government and developers anymore, but for everybody” (ZO! City, 2017).

The use of ‘vigorous and decided’ colour would be juxtaposed this ideal of individual, grass roots participation, as bold and sure-footed primary colours could be manifested as an affront to the user, something to combat against, a potential barrier to applying an idea to the dashboard. For instance, psychologists Sevinc Kurt and Kelechi Kingsley-Osueke (2014) argue that “strong blues stimulate clear thought and lighter, soft blues calm the mind and aid concentration” (p4). In the Johannes Itten quotation above, he states that the “the intensity of contrast of hue diminishes” (Itten, 1961, p33). This results in a less stark difference between colours - owing to a less intense hue. These colours react less with a white or pale background, meaning they produce the same effect as if they were analogous (colours next to each other on the colour wheel - such as blue and green) which, according to user experience blogger Hannah Alvarez, “have lower contrast, and they can be used to create a sense of harmony and continuity in a design” (Alvarez, 2014).

A sense of harmony is a key facet to the dashboards design. Saskia Beer, during her interview for this project, would refer to the platform and dashboard as a ‘pub’, short for a ‘public house’ which is the preferred place to go for social drinking in the United Kingdom. One of the most famous pieces of writing to cover the pub is George Orwell’s ‘The Moon Under Water’. In this essay, the author of Animal Farm and 1984 describes his ideal drinking place as somewhere where “its clientele, though fairly large, consists mostly of ‘regulars’ who occupy the same chair every evening and go there for conversation as much as for the beer” (Orwell, 1946). This ‘atmosphere’, in the words of Orwell, is the ideal of the ZO! City platform, where different ‘regulars’ can come and discuss the Amstel III site in a harmonious setting, much like a local pub which one visits regularly. In short, the more one uses the pub, the more they get out of being there.

Another feature of interest in the visual representation of the area is the use of soft grey and pale

pea green (to represent grass) as background colours. These colours represent a sanitised reality of the Amstel III district, their softness belies the physical reality of the space. However, this colouration was not chosen by accident. According to Saskia, the relatively dull greys and mute colours of the dashboard’s background was chosen to “highlight the pins, so they can stand out more”.

According to Brenda Huang, graphic designers should “separate primary and secondary [to] get the sense of clarity” (Huang et al, 2009, p1728), a practice which has been followed in the creation of the ZO! City dashboard. This is an interesting decision, one which gives visual priority to the redevelopment of the space and not the space itself, a representation which therefore purges the area of a historical context, as if the entire site was built in 2010, which as the age of buildings reveals, is not the case. The assemblage of soft colours, muted greys and white squares amount to a blank canvas, with the relative vibrancy of the redevelopment intentionally ‘standing out’ from the map. This is a representation of space which can, be interpreted through the work of French philosopher Henri Lefebvre’s ‘perceived-conceived-lived triad’ (Lefebvre, 1991, p40).

Henri Lefebvre and the Dashboard Lefebvre argues there are three types of space - that of the perceived, the conceived and the lived. The perceived (also considered as ‘spatial practice’) refers to how “the spatial practice of a society secretes that society’s space; it propounds and presupposes it, in a dialectical interaction; it produces it slowly and surely as it masters and appropriates it” (ibid, p38). This is the production of societal perception of space, the placing of a marker or the typecasting of space. In the case of this research, despite the presentation of an ongoing ‘transformation’, Amstel III is currently functioning primarily as an office district, by virtue of people primarily using the area as a place of work and seldom using the public spaces within. Thus, it is considered an office space, yet, with public interventions - such as the Ubuntu Stadstuin community garden, which will be discussed at length in the following section - a dialectical interaction is taking place between those who use the current Amstel III and the idea of it's transformation in the future, thereby turning the area into an office district undergoing change.

The conceived space is the domain “of scientists, planners, urbanists, technocratic subdividers and social engineers, as of a certain type of artist with a scientific bent - all of whom identify what is lived and what is perceived with what is conceived” (ibid). The dashboard provides the virtual space for individuals to be the ‘certain type of artist’, as it presents the concrete, stone, grass and water, the infrastructures and asphalt of the Amstel III office district as a malleable entity, with the buildings appearing on the dashboard as representations of real structures.

However, in the case of the ZO! City dashboard, the conceived space is literally and figuratively a ‘top-down’ approach to understanding an area, it paints pictures of spaces, but how does one grasp the actuality of a space? This question falls within the realm of Lefebvre’s final corner of the conceptual triad, that of ‘lived’ space. This is “space as directly lived through its associated images and symbols, and hence the space of 'inhabitants' and 'users’” (ibid). For instance, the Ubuntu Stadstuin community garden is perceived as a space which is a community garden, vis-a- vis those who initially enquire about the space, through the associated discourse surrounding it, be that online or in person. Yet, these types of space only cover the removed standpoint of understanding the space. A garden from the point of view of a map or online dashboard, is different to a garden which is experienced firsthand; even the most intricately designed representation of a space cannot replicate the smell of soil or the strong winds which grace a garden. This physical and tactile experience with the space graces it with a different meaning in comparison with the perceived and conceived representations of it.

However, it is important to stress that these three spatial standpoints are not to be understood in isolation: They all interrelate and influence each other. Lefebvre argues that

“we may be sure that representations of space have a practical impact, that they intervene in and modify spatial textures which are informed by effective knowledge and ideology. Representations of space must therefore have a substantial role and a specific influence in the production of space. Their intervention occurs by way of construction - in other words, by way of architecture, conceived of not as the building of a particular structure, palace or monument, but rather as a project embedded in a spatial context and a texture which call for 'representations' that will not vanish into the symbolic or imaginary realms. (ibid, p42)

According to this logic, the ZO! City dashboard acts as a form of mediation between the conceived space and the lived. The dashboard provides a medium through which the idea of spatial change can be displayed; converting it from the domain of individual perception into a “project embedded in a spatial context and a texture” (Lefebvre, 1991, p42). Yet the actual experience of adding an idea to the project, despite being carried out via the representation of the area, is a ‘lived’ experience. The conceptual triad with which this section is entwined was written in the late 1960’s. A common aspect of contemporary urban life is the fusing of the offline and the physical reality in which individuals are present (See: Boy & Uitermark, 2015) and the ZO! City dashboard is an example of this. Yet, it occupies a curious position within the spatial triad offered by Lefebvre. Despite it being argued that these conceptions of space are not to be viewed in isolation, the dashboard is facilitating an environment in “which the imagination seeks to change and appropriate” (Lefebvre, 1991, p39), yet it is not “[overlaying] physical space” (ibid), which is a central feature of Lefebvre’s conception of lived space. The dashboard is straddling the two conceptions of conceived and lived space. For one can ‘live’, by ascribing “symbolic use of its objects” (ibid) within the dashboard, yet the objects with which this symbolic use is being applied are composed of an overlaying representation of physical space, a conception of a physical entity, which, in turn and by virtue of participation within the dashboard, may be physically realised.

The plan inside an individual's head is still within the realm of imagination, but through the platform these conceptions are something “which the imagination seeks to change and appropriate” (ibid). Changing and appropriating a representation of the space that the project ultimately intends to change in physical space. Therefore, the individual who proposes a project is using the conceived space as a lived space. The spaces are not influencing each other, but are an example of a melding of the two in a lived-conception of the Amstel III office district.

This discussion of the ZO! City interactive dashboard has served two purposes. Firstly, it highlights the way in which the area is represented to those who wish to submit an idea and change the Amstel III office district. Secondly, through using the dashboard as an example, the Lefebvrian conceptual triad has been interrogated and expanded upon, thus highlighting a new way of understanding the influence of the online realm upon the physical world. Yet, to

paraphrase Michel de Certeau, the ordinary reality of urban space happens on the ground level (de Certeau, 1986, p93), therefore the next section of this chapter will take the form of an ground-level description of Amstel III.

Where the Atypical Shall be Typical: The Amstel III Office District

The Amstel III office district lies due south of the Amsterdam Arena. Built in the 1980’s as a component of the renewal of Amsterdam Zuidoost, [1] the area covers a total of 920,000 meters squared and contains 1,200 businesses where 50,000 employees work (Gemeente Amsterdam, 2016). The district stretches from the Hoogoorddreef, a major road that runs through Bijlmer Centrum, down to the Academic Medical Centre (Academisch Medisch Centrum (AMC) and contains an Ikea furniture shop. This section outlines the physical space of Amstel III and is composed of systematic observations obtained by walking through Amstel III whilst taking fieldnotes and photographs. The physical description is an auto-ethnographic representation of my fieldnotes where observation and theory are entwined.

Locking my bicycle to one of the many metal hoops under the shade of the Atlas Arena office building, a distinctive concrete block, horizontally intersected by the dark bands of its windows (left), I couldn’t help but notice the amount of greenery which offsets the light grey building. This space sits at the very north of the Amstel III office district, next to one of the three hotels which permeate the office district, a Courtyard Marriot hotel which has a gym as well as Gard - a restaurant self- described as a ‘Nordic Kitchen’. The Atlas Arena building is also marked out by the large logos present, from Adidas and Reebok set atop a glass wall - both international trainer company's occupy large and visible parts of the building.

The Courtyard et al: Confined and Private Space Under the main bulk of the Atlas Arena building, lies a walkway which gifts itself to a courtyard, a space used by individuals in small groups conjoined by the individualist uniform of smart casual office wear, as well as those leaving their desks for a cigarette break. The courtyard, which is looked over from three sides by the Atlas Arena building (below) is in keeping with the pale concrete of that which watches over it. For there are no curved features, solitarily trees are planted in square wooden boxes, the benches/seating areas are angular wooden creations, hedges are well kept and uniform - seemingly echoing the dress code of those who use the space. The distinctive feature, however, is the ‘Absolute Taste’ restaurant, a green and black banded, low slung building. The alfresco seating arrangements hide from the sun under six square umbrellas and are separated from the rest of the courtyard by neatly trimmed hedges and black framed perspex barriers.

When the sun would shine on this space, as I looked out from one of the angular wooden benches in a corner surrounded by concrete, I could not but help be reminded by the work of Italian metaphysical artist Giorgio de Chirico, especially his painting ‘The Enigma of the Arrival and the Afternoon’ (1912 – page below). Not least because there is, much like in de Chirico's image, a checkerboard imposed on the floor intended for ‘giant’ chess games - although the chess pieces were not seen - but due to the way the sun hits the concrete and how the shadows from the rectilinear furnishings of the space are clear cut, presenting a perceivably sterile environment in keeping with de Chirico’s work. Much like the courtyard where this example is drawn, de Chirico refrained from representing curved surfaces, rather focusing on sharp angles and clear brushstrokes to show the world in a “clear and mordant light [that] embalms objects, never caressing them, never providing the illusion of well-being” (Hughes, 1981, p149). His artwork takes place in a frozen reality, embalming the actions of everyday life, with the inevitable effects of time non-apparent. This is true of Amstel III in its entirety. The district is

neatly maintained, sanitized, with the wear and tear brought on by the natural elements removed or fixed and replaced, to the extent that when one does notice the imposition of natural elements, it is markedly out of place.

De Chirico paints his scapes [2] one step removed, as if they are within reach but out of grasp, with a level of familiarity that is distant. The artist is a lonely observer of empty spaces (ibid, p150) where “there is plenty of evidence of human existence [...] but nobody is there; the place is deserted” (Gompertz, 2016, p252). There is plenty of ‘evidence’ that people use the area - the chessboard, the table tennis tables under the arches (left in the image below), parked cars - but owing to the space’s current formulation as a place of work and not as a place to stay, for the majority of the day the people who do use the area are inside. Thus the outdoor public space of the office district is empty. Therefore the courtyard is used either as a place to have a smoking break, or a space of transition, of fleeting use, a space revealed as somewhere to cross; to quote Richard Sennett, “to sit on one of the few [benches] for any length of time is to become profoundly uncomfortable, as though one were on exhibit in a vast empty hall” (Sennett, 1977, p13).

Another characteristic of the courtyard is the manner in which sound travels across the space. It is eerily quiet. Owing to the nature of an office space as discussed above, I would often find

myself traversing these spaces devoid of other people. Therefore any sound which was produced, by either I or another entity is noticeable - the distant trickle of an obscured fountain would wash over the soundscape, in counsel with the static-like rustle of the wind disturbing leaves and the occasional whine of an electric motor propelling a train from the not too distant, but out of sight Bullewijk station. All which provide an oddly soothing but removed audible backdrop to the creaking of dislodged concrete paving slabs under foot. As mentioned before, there are a number of trees in the area, but these are located just beyond the courtyard and are in the periphery of sight. The sources of sound are removed from view, a somewhat disorientating experience, you are aware of their presence, but are unsure where they are; “the hidden [...] is present in its own way. It is in my vicinity” (Merleau-Ponty, 1964, p14).

These phenomena continue as I moved on from the square, exiting along a narrow, square-hedge lined path, towards a freshly constructed bridge which spans the largest canal in Amstel III. Staring across the murky brown water sit six public benches, a rare sight in the district, from which a user can look across the water and onto one of the numerous mirrored buildings (left). At the base of the equally separated trees sat a table-tennis ball, an escapee from the courtyard perhaps. To the left is a wooden jetty hanging over the water, which appears seldom used, owing to the large amount of bird excrement which adorns it. Much like the seating in the courtyard behind the bench, there is a sense of being on display. The building above stares over anyone who uses these benches. The overall lack of public seating space becomes overt when one crosses the canal and enters the next section of Amstel III.

Amongst the Office Buildings South of the canal sit a web of office buildings, car-parks, square hedges and various forms of fencing and barriers. Each office building is surrounded by the painted asphalt of demarcated car parking spaces, which are in turn separated from the public footpaths in a number of ways. One example (below - far left) is the use of low-rising metal bars. These objects sit around the

perimeter of a number of the car parks, and appear to have been installed to prevent cars from driving across grass to get into the car park. Another means of distinguishing space is achieved through the use of angular hedges, a common sight in Amstel III, which add a splash of foliage to contrast the steel and glass of the buildings behind. A form of nature pruned, but still constantly growing; yet not beyond a certain size. A third, and the least subtle example of spatial separation is exemplified with the red and white automatic barriers which allow, or deny, vehicular access to the space. These are devices which create closed-off spaces, which either by design or coincidence, have the same effect: to not allow unauthorised access.

These three examples, which surround the majority of the spaces in the district, are included in this section because they are typical of office spaces; but atypical of residential areas. Yes, hedges are a common sight in suburban areas, but automatic barriers are not. Neither is the conspicuous presence of security workers who wander around the area, keeping watch over a space which is often devoid of people. Yet, the most overt form of spatial demarcation can be observed with the steel gates - some crowned with sharp spikes (right) to prevent pigeons from perching and humans from scaling. Such fencing is a clear and abrupt means of stating that an area is not for public use. These examples are overt methods of separating the public and the private space - private as a lack of easy access to the space by the general public - from one another, however there are more subtle means to achieve separation.

A Space of Reflection As referred to above, a number of the buildings within Amstel III - the majority - feature a common architectural feature; the extensive use of mirrored glass. Mirrored glass is an efficient means of keeping space private (below). This is achieved by visually removing what is behind the glass from the realm of the visible. It conceals whilst “[achieving] a peculiar and placeless dissociation of the [building] from its neighborhood: it is not even an exterior, inasmuch as when you seek to look at the [its] outer walls you cannot see [in] itself but only the distorted images of everything that surrounds it” (Jameson, 1991, p8). Fredric Jameson argues that the use of ‘reflective glass’ is manifest in buildings aspiring “to [be] a total space, a complete world, a kind of miniature city” (ibid, p7), buildings that “turn their back” on the context which surrounds them (ibid). [3]

This phenomenon resembles the Foucauldian notion of ‘the panopticon’, a “mechanism [that] arranges spatial unities that make it possible to see constantly and to recognize immediately” (Foucault, 1975, p201). The panopticon concept was formulated [4] when designing the ideal prison, in which a central guard tower would be surrounded by cells, which were dazzled by a bright light, resulting in “one [being] totally seen, without ever seeing; [where] in the central tower, one sees everything without ever being seen” (ibid) - resulting in

the major effect of the Panopticon: to induce in the inmate a state of conscious and permanent visibility that assures the automatic functioning of power. So to arrange things that the surveillance is permanent in its effects, even if it is discontinuous in its action. (ibid)

Foucault based his observation upon a historical analysis of discipline and punishment, therefore it is essential to clarify by using this theory, this project is not referring to the Amstel III district as a form of an incarceration facility; but there are parallels, intentional or otherwise, between

the architectural appearance of Amstel III and that of the panopticon. For an imprisoned individual under a panoptic system “is seen, but he does not see; he is the object of information, never a subject in communication” (ibid) - this is the same with a space composed of mirrored glass.

There are overt forms of surveillance in the area - aforementioned security guards and a plethora of security cameras - but the mirrored buildings offer an unsettling form of surveillance. Unsettling because, when one is walking amongst the reflecting facades they are potentially being watched, but due to the nature of the buildings, that same individual is unaware whether they are being watched and from which building, which results in an uneasy reality amongst the space.

Therefore, by sheer virtue of the overt demarcation between public and private space in Amstel III, the latter is hardly used as an area of recreation or as a place to stay, but rather as an area to traverse. The aforementioned Richard Sennett describes this spatial phenomenon as “public space [which] has become a derivative of movement” (Sennett, 1977, p14). Sennett argues that these forms of public space “[parallel] exactly the relations of space to motion produced by the private automobile” (ibid), for the primary function of the private automobile is to facilitate movement from A to B (ibid). Another feature of the automobile is the relative detachment from one’s surroundings, to the extent that “one ceases to believe one’s surroundings have any meaning save as a means towards the end of one’s own motion” (ibid, p15). With the topographical layout of Amstel III being designed for favourable automobile access - a grid system and the abundance of car parking spaces separating building from pavement (above). The foot paths in the area also follow a similar logic. They form a function of either following the roads or by being detached, but linking adjacent roads or other paths to the metro stations. And with the buildings set back from

these foot paths being private spaces, these public spaces are either facilitating access to a private space, or as thoroughfares through the district. They are spatial derivatives of motion.

Conclusion The purpose of this chapter is to highlight the current reality of Amstel III, both how it is represented online via the ZO! City project and their interactive urban dashboard, and the physical experience of the space. The analysis of the ZO! City dashboard displayed how, through the use of colour and interactive features such as the ‘project pins’, the ZO! City ideal of blanket participation is embedded in the visual and interactive aspects of the dashboard. It also, through embedding and using Henri Lefebvre’s ‘spatial triad’, argues how different notions of space are represented by the dashboard and how it functions as a mediator between the physical ‘lived’ space, and conceived space, bringing together the ability to act and interact with a conception of a space.

In the physical realm, this project’s observations concerned the inherent functionality that arises with any office district and how that influences spatial experience. Be it the conjuring up of the metaphysical art of Giorgio de Chirico, or the seminal texts of Jameson, Foucault and Sennett, various sources have been applied to offer a detailed and nuanced understanding of the office district. However, one could argue that it does not matter if public space within an office district is solely used for getting from A to B, that the buildings are spatially, visually and accessibility demarcated from the public spaces and that it is eerily quiet; it is a place of work.

Yet, this area, within the next five years, will have residents, people who could call this area home, and they will live amongst the sea of car parks and alongside the mirrored glass which obscures the world around them and secludes the actions of international companies. The promise of transformation appears distant, yet there are some green-shoots of the shift from mono-functionality to the desired multi-functional sprouting up in the Amstel III district. The next chapter will focus on two such examples: the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden, a small scale community led project and the large scale regeneration of the Community Campus Amsterdam, in order to observe their involvement with the ZO! City platform.

The Green Shoots of Transformation

Sowing Seeds In Sand: Ubuntu Stadstuin

The eastern flank of the Amstel III office district is separated from the surrounding area by the arterial 54 metro line, with metros and trains leaving the station and heading towards or away from the centre of Amsterdam. This movement can be heard clearly from the cafe at the Ubuntu Stadstuin community garden. Sandwiched on a patch of land between the metro line and station at Holendrecht and the concrete office block of the Holendecht Centre, sits the garden (left) [1] a different sight to the reflective mirrored structures which festoon the district. From the outside a visitor can see, through a wire fence, a collection of shipping containers in the distance at the rear of the garden, rows of vegetable beds and a bright orange structure; the cafe.

The name is Southern African (Bantu) in origin and translates as ‘I am because we are’ in English. Nelson Mandela [2] explained in an interview how “Ubuntu does not mean that people should not enrich themselves. The question therefore is: Are you going to do so in order to enable the community around you to be able to improve?” (ibid). Ubuntu, as a philosophy, was ideologically entwined with the anti-Apartheid movement in South Africa and across the globe: owing to how it as a concept, “offered a counter-force in the form of a normative frame of thinking that placed primacy on non-racialism, non-sexism and democracy, stressing the need for restoring human dignity” (Qobo & Nyathi, 2016, p423).

The garden was started by Annet, a local resident who has a history of establishing community

gardens in Amsterdam, with a focus upon supplying the local area with what she refers to as ‘pedagogic spaces’ - spaces for children:

It was important in our view that there would be many small gardens spread around the whole of south east so that there will always be one near the children’s home and also where there could be one bigger place for inspiration and sessions to show and for demonstrations’

The centrality of children to the garden is apparent. There are frequent children and family focused events taking place throughout the year as well as an abundance of scarecrows that were built by local school children out of painted wood for the body and CDs for the eyes, which are dotted around the space (below). Another facet which characterised the garden’s creation is the idea of connecting people to the creation of their own food, for Annet argues that “it is important to have an environment through green things, because it is empowering for people to grow their own food”. This sense of empowerment appears to be a driving factor for individuals to participate in the garden. Heidi, a fellow south east Amsterdam resident and founding member of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden, laughs when she mentions that “people are already asking for more space” to grow their own food. This notion is backed up by Annet’s personal experience in running community projects such as the garden in the past

I have experienced that again and again in all of the gardens that I have done, it is automatic, you don't have to do anything else then offer this type of environment and people will start to delve into ‘what is my basis of existence, how do I eat right’

A third characteristic of the garden is the belief in notions of permaculture. [3] The adherence to permaculture is visibly entrenched via a mural on the side of the chicken coop (page below). The mural shows a system where food waste is used to feed chickens, which in turn provide eggs and meat that is then eaten, with the scraps and waste then being used to feed more chickens. This is

an example of a ‘circular’ ecosystem. Environmental activist Herbert Girardet notes that natural ecosystems are formulated out of a “‘circular metabolism’ in which every output which is discharged by an organism also becomes an input” (Girardet, 1999, p33). [4] The ideals of permaculture permeate every pore of the garden. For instance, any harvested weeds from the vegetable plots are collected and given over to the chicken run, where they will be eaten or will break down and provide nutrients to the soil. Another example is the garden’s toilet. As there is no running water at the garden, any waste is collected in a large container filled with sawdust and will eventually be turned into compost. Ideally nothing goes to waste. Yet, some things cannot be recycled or added to compost. In a somewhat ironic turn the municipality provided the garden with a coffee machine, one of the ones which presses a paper bag and squeezes out filter coffee. However, the bags which contain the ground coffee are not biodegradable and, therefore, run against the permaculture ideal as they cannot feed back into the natural metabolism. [5]

The Role of the Municipality The supplying of a somewhat out of place coffee machine is not the only role the municipality of Amsterdam Zuidoost has played in the formulation and running of the garden. According to Annet, the garden came into existence as part of a much larger scale project:

This particular place was acquired by the Gemeente, in 2010 there was a plan that we would have this major horticulture exhibition in amsterdam south east, they had been making a bid book for it, with plans, it is a real big thing, once every 10 years and it means a lot of economic development and money going to a place, so Amsterdam tried to get it but they lost. But, in the plans they found a lot of inspiration for the place of urban agriculture in southeast [6]

Yet, despite Amsterdam being unsuccessful, the municipality did obtain some influence to transform the space where the garden currently sits:

For this area, they [the municipality] picked some ideas from this bid book to realise in practice, even if we didn't get the thing, and then they had some money and manpower to give this garden

The municipality approached Annet and enquired whether she would participate and create a garden on the site. However, she initially at first “didn’t want it, this place, because it is only sand”. Anyone who holds even a basic understanding of horticulture will be aware that sand contains zero nutrients, therefore you can’t grow anything. Useless for a community garden. For two years the site was composed of sand, so Annet

asked for a lot of cooperation on their side, otherwise i wasn’t even willing to discuss it. Then I said yeah, if you want us to do it, then I need money to start it off with, at least some money to get some proper soil, you know, it's pointless almost’

The municipality had someone working for, according to Annet, “half a day a week for two years” to clear all of the hurdles to allow the implementation of the garden. The municipality

Annet - had to go through all the officials who have a say in this area to do legal Heidi - the red tape Annet - yeah, the tax office, and how it can be in the books, how to deal with the planning permission, whatever, according to the rules Interviewer - So there's a lot of bureaucracy? Annet - Yeah, that was their contribution [Laughter]

The municipality did also contribute a “gate, and the [water] pump and the electricity”. However, according to Annet, the gate has been a source of contention between the garden and the municipality, for “it was so expensive this gate and it is for such a short time, now it is, we have to break out this gate because nobody can enter and yeah it is maybe protecting the vegetables, but if anyone wants to get in they can climb over it. There are gates that look so much more friendly and cost a tenth of this so. We have tried twice, three times to change it”.

Despite the garden’s disliking of the gate, the municipality have refused any request to change it. An interesting feature that the gate provides to the garden isn’t through its function as a barrier

between the surrounding area and the garden, but it is one of the few features of the garden which relates it to the surrounding office district. As mentioned in the previous chapter, the prevalence of gates were apparent to those using the area, and the garden is the same. However, the Ubuntu Stadstuin community garden is interconnected with the office district in other ways than sharing the same type of gate.

Ubuntu Stadstuin and the redevelopment of Amstel III The Ubuntu Stadstuin garden is a component of the Amstel III regeneration. In order to receive funding and the aforementioned support from the municipality, the garden signed an ‘overeenkomst’ - a contract

of what was permitted and what was not, it wasn't in the form of an overeenkomst only but also in the form of an assignment, because for some legal reason they couldn't give us money for the management of the land, but they wanted to give the assignment to us if we give a service

Two things can be taken from this above quotation. Firstly, for the municipality to offer its support to a project, it must offer a service - the garden cannot only exist as a community space, it must also provide something. This inherent entrepreneurialism, foisted upon the Ubuntu Stadstuin by the municipality highlights the second feature of this quotation: the division of the garden’s role. On the one hand it is a community space for people to grow their own food, bring their children and learn about permaculture, yet on the other it is a business. This is apparent with the garden’s positioning as a mediator between the local community of Holendrecht and the international businesses which are resident in Amstel III. The garden was

Annet - to help with the place making to make this office area to a multi-functional city Interviewer - So the garden is a part of that Annet - Yes that is what we are meant to do here.

The garden is a member of the local business cooperative - the Empowerment Coöperatie Amsterdam (ECA) - as well as a local business association, which’s “aim is also the social life, they want to have an organization to work on the social items”. The ECA cooperative facilitates a link between the surrounding neighbourhood of Holendrect [7] and the office district

It was also part of our own ambition, because the cooperative office, in which this is a part, we have the strategy that all of these big companies headquarters or whatever, they have never entered the other side of the railway, that it would be very fruitful if they did and the other way round, that we could have a role as a cooperative

A means of linking the large companies of the office district and the local community is attempted to be forged through the garden. Although in early stages there is an impetus to use the garden as a physical platform to bring two very disparate groups together, with the garden, according to Annet having contact with international companies. [8] When asked how the garden wants to bring the Office district and the local community together, Annet responded:

Well, that hasn’t really materialized actually because we, it was our view that this would be open during lunch hours, today it is very quiet but yesterday there were lots of people here from different walks of life who were working and volunteering, and in the cafe that can be office people having lunch or coffee and we would do events, that has actually happened here, we organized work sessions for the researchers at the hospital and we are now doing the same for a political party (Groenlinks - the Dutch green party)

However despite this goal, Annet holds the notion that the local businesses view the garden as a volunteer community programme, for, in her view, “the companies don't understand that we want to make business from them and not have them as volunteers. We want them to understand that yeah they do have worth, but it is more interesting if we could work for you, eventually we have to say, ‘Ok what’s your budget’”. This overview of the role of the Ubuntu Stadstuin community garden in the Amstel III regeneration shows the dual role of the space, with its function of providing a community space supporting its role as a mediator between the office district and the local community. Yet, to understand what this means in practice, one must put on a pair of ill-fitting gardening gloves and participate in the garden properly.

Participation at the Garden Aside from the journey to and from the garden and the occasional rumbling of a train in the periphery, one could easily forget that the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden is in an office district.

Arriving at the aforementioned gate, you are greeted with a quaint view of vegetable lots, handmade scarecrows and the bright orange cafe at the rear. The cafe functions as both a space for the gardens users to socialise around a large wooden table and drink tea - which is often composed of the Camomile grown on site - whilst sat on unstable wooden chairs on an uneven floor. It is also used as the store shed, where tools, signs and boxes of flowers and vegetables are kept.

The cafe is made up of two used shipping containers which are bridged by a wooden sloped roof (left), which sometimes leaks during heavy rain. Interestingly it is referred to as a cafe, but rarely is it used as such by the general public. What is noticeable about the space is its ability [9] to transport one away from being in Amsterdam and to a farmhouse in the countryside (below). The bare roof beams, the way the wind whistles through gaps in the cafe’s construction, the lights hanging from the rafters with their bare wiring, the camping stove, all are in juxtaposition to the cool, detached sleekness offered by the surrounding office buildings.

For instance, the nearby ‘Coffeemania’ cafe, which was established in 2010. This space is located in the ‘Carteblanche’ building - a location which houses numerous startup companies, including the ZO! City project - and has followed the same aesthetical path as a number of cafes in Amsterdam. Both the Ubuntu cafe and Coffeemania have a ‘rustic’ interior, with Coffeemania ascribing to the tripartite of hipster interior design - Edison lights, bare brick walls and stripped wooden furnishings (See: Chayka, 2016) - the cafe in Carteblanche attempts to tap into a recycled

aesthetic, for instance lemonade is sold in used jars. However, the Coffeemania cafe is used by local employees, whereas Ubuntu Stadstuin is not, according to Annet, the office workers have a “presence here but not that there is a lot of interaction, they don’t frequent us”. These spaces, in the context of the Amstel III redevelopment fulfill the same function, they are both social spaces where individuals can consume coffee in a cafe setting, but they provide this function from completely different perspectives.

The office workers rarely step into the garden, but those who live ‘on the other side of the railway’ do. When asked “the people who come here, are they mostly from the surrounding area?”

Anett: You're not [talking to Heidi] Heidi: no i'm from Venserpolder, but there are people who garden here that are from Holendrecht, some are from holendrecht, some are from Reigersbos - like Mira who has a garden here but she hasn’t come yet [laughter] - i think maybe 50/50 or 60/40, yeah 60/40 from Holendrecht

This quote is really interesting, for not only does it give an interpretation of the geographical dispersal of who uses the garden, but it also highlights a scale of locality when talking about the garden and the community it is entwined with. Venserpolder, where Heidi resides is still in Amsterdam Zuidoost, it is in the same municipality, and Reigersbos is the next stop on the metro from Holendrecht. Yet these places despite objectively close geographical locations, are not considered within the ‘surrounding area’ - the surrounding area is Holendrecht. This is in difference to the Amstel III redevelopment as a whole. For, a central aspect of the redevelopment is the notion that this office district on the periphery of Amsterdam is becoming a new neighbourhood of the Dutch capital. Therefore, those who run the garden (Annet and Heidi) think about its position within Amsterdam in very specific local terms, where the municipality, who worked with the garden on the terms that it be a ‘place making’ entity in the area’s regeneration, view the project it serves in much broader terms.

Much like Amsterdam Zuidoost as a whole (See: Smets & Uyl, 2008, p1446), those who use the garden are from a broad range of diverse ethnic backgrounds, with Dutch, Surinamese, Italian, Iranian, Irish, Syrian and Nigerian individuals all being encountered during this fieldwork.

Where there isn’t as much diversity, however, is in the ages of those who use the garden. Aside from one or two exceptions, the majority of those who participate in the gardening were older and had mostly held an interest in gardening or permaculture previously. Yet, this apparent homogeneity was useful, because as a researcher who is a novice at anything to do with gardening, I could learn the tactile, physical element of participation in a useful manner from experienced and committed individuals.

The garden itself is in a relatively exposed position, yet on a clear and sunny day, the space is a nice place to be. Once again it is easy to forget that you are technically still in Amsterdam. The tasks for those who participate at the garden mostly revolve around planting and harvesting different vegetables and herbs for the ‘packages’. A package is an assortment of produce (herbs, veg and tea) that the garden collects together and distributes weekly to customers who pay a one off annual subscription of 150 euros for a standard package (left) or 250 for the large ones. The selling of food packages is a new addition to the garden and at the time of research had 7 customers, all of whom either participated at the garden or were relatives of those who do so.

When outside there is a convivial atmosphere amongst the participants. Despite effectively working to produce packages which are to be sold, the garden is still focused on ensuring people enjoy themselves and learn whilst planting or harvesting the produce. The established members of the garden - those who are the most vocal and are greeted the most by the other members - talk freely amongst themselves and are open to give advice and validation to any gardening based query that might appear in one’s head. The garden is, much like the previously mentioned Amsterdam Smart Citizens Lab, is not only a space of production but also a social space. Annet states that at the garden, participants

can meet people and speak out about [their] battles, what’s inspiring them, their memories about

their parents and the place where they grew up and how they miss something or what they would like to do… That’s actually what happens when people come here

A striking feature about this quote is the strong sense of an emphasis on memory and the past. In Annet’s view, participants at the garden recollect and reflect on what has been, whilst ruminating on the future. This places the physical and social participation at the garden in opposition to participation on the ZO! City dashboard. The dashboard is a space where individuals can post project ideas that are yet to be realised, as discussed earlier. Yet, owing to the setup of the conversational features on the dashboard - conversation revolves around commenting on proposed projects within the district, a discussion that is based in experience, but geared towards the future; it revolves around a specific topic. Whereas at the garden, to participate in the types of conversation Annet is describing above, the subject is rooted in experience. This sharing of experience is also apparent online for the garden, via its Facebook pages.

The Online Ubuntu Stadstuin Garden The garden has an online presence which is formed of four components: the Facebook public page and public group - which one requests to join, website and its presence on the ZO! City dashboard. The website provides a broad overview of the garden and contains a ‘news’ section - which provides an overview of the most recent Facebook posts from the garden - an ‘about us’ page that situates the garden’s position within the ‘Empowerment Coöperatie Amsterdam’, pages of information for entrepreneurs and businesses and a page called ‘join’ which displays the various activities and events the garden offers.

On every page of the website there is a link to Facebook, which highlights a feature of the garden which on the surface is unexpected: the importance of Facebook in its running. The garden’s Facebook presence can be divided into two sections: the ‘like’ page and the ‘group’ page. According to

Heidi, “the like page is more of a front and the group is for community building”. The like page (above) is the public face of the garden and from it a visitor can find contact details and the location of the garden, as well as opening times. Much like any other Facebook page, the garden has a sidebar on the left hand side where a user can find out other details such as potential and past events organised by the garden (left) as well as the services it provides - the packages, the cafe and team building (below - left). The like page is the place where images and photos of the garden are posted. According to Heidi, the use of imagery is important for the garden, “because people have to see, it is all about the pictures it's an image culture, yes you have to be able to visualise something”, thus, the like page has a wide array of photographs showing a range of recent events (below - right). This helps effectively advertise the garden to individuals, for

if you came last year there was nothing, it was barren ground and it was difficult to get people here to get people involved because they could not see what was at the end of the road, they could not see what we were planning to achieve

The use of imagery shows, not only past events and other individuals participating in the garden, but also its narrative of community cohesion around the ideas of permaculture. The majority of the images on the page portray individuals working on the ground or socialising, presenting a sense of collaboration, individuals participating in groups to achieve an end goal which is in keeping with the gardens nomenclature; ‘I am because we are’. The like page therefore advertises the garden to a wider audience, which for Heidi is an important feature:

Facebook is very important to us because people can follow us even if they don't even if they

don’t have the opportunity to come over here, they can follow us and sometimes they can get in touch with us to involve others

As referred to above, the Facebook has two uses for the garden, the like page and the group page. The group page functions as the ‘community’ page, which according to Baart, the volunteer caretaker of the garden, is “not about attracting people, but it is about making people feel good about being here, to make people feel a part of the group”. Much like the like page, the group page largely consists of updates on the garden’s progress, but the images and posts focus on much more specific projects. For instance, the ongoing narrative revolving around the chickens.

The chickens used to roam around the garden freely, but one day they escaped and were found wandering around the streets of Amstel III by concerned students. Thus, the chicken coop was erected to house the beasts. Yet, just before this project’s fieldwork started, three of the four chickens were eaten by an unknown assailant, leaving one chicken left. The surviving chicken was locked away in the coop at night in order to protect it, until a new was installed to prevent any intruders from entering the chicken run. The completion of the updated chicken enclosure was celebrated on the group page by saying the garden can find new ‘girlfriends’ for the chicken (above). This specific example shows how the sharing of experience is a central feature of the group page as well as updating the 300 plus members of the group on specific areas of progress.

The group page also is used as an ‘organizing

tool’ by the garden. Upcoming work days are posted on the group page (page above) as well as the posting of other local events from different community groups. Facebook serves as a means to connect individuals to other local groups and to connect them to the garden, as Heidi explains below:

Heidi: there is a lot of information to be found and it is a really good communication tool, to communicate and inform each other about the things that are playing in the neighbourhood and I think different communities in south east have discovered it also because they are more visible online, you cannot do without almost

Interviewer: Would you say it's essential?

Heidi: Yes

The ‘essential’ use of Facebook is observable in that Facebook is prevalent in every step of participation. John McCarthy and Peter Wright (2004) argue that there are ‘six sense-making processes’ when an individual experiences technology. McCarthy and Wright state that “people actively construct or make sense of experience—reflexively and recursively—in a way that seems to fold back into the experience itself” (p42). The steps consist of anticipating, connecting, interpreting, reflecting, appropriating and recounting the experience (ibid). Facebook offers and provides a platform for these six steps in experiencing the garden.

After anticipating the garden, bringing personal experience to what might be contained within the garden (ibid), a user of the group page will connect with the page, which includes “assessment of place, such as a Web site being loud and the subsequent stressful feelings, or the sense of a social space being welcoming and the warm feelings that go with it” (ibid). The Facebook group page, as referred to above, conveys and endeavours to present a sense of community, which is then interpreted by “discerning the narrative structure, the agents and action possibilities, what has happened and what is likely to happen” (ibid) by the user and reflected upon as they “examine and evaluate what is happening in an interaction” (ibid). These stimuli provided by the group page are subsequently internalised and appropriated by the user which “involves making an experience our own by relating it to our sense of self, our personal

history, and our anticipated future” (ibid).

The group page is a space which ‘recounts’ physical experience in the online realm. The recounting of events, the portrayal of physical participation serves to provide, according to Baart, “through Facebook I think that you give people the chance to participate, by sitting behind their screen. So people feel connected just by watching pictures”. However this is interpreted as an issue as this excerpt of conversation shows:

Baart: I think that most people use Facebook to have this feeling of connection in these projects, so it's not realistic Heidi: Realistic to what? Baart: Well, it's virtual Interviewer: So you feel there is a real difference between supporting the group online and coming here? Baart: Well giving likes is different from an actual physical act HeidI: Yeah it's different from physical participation, but again it can lower the threshold I think, it can stimulate people to eventually come personally. Baart: Maybe I shouldn’t say this but, there is a lot of announcements of workshops and happenings here through Facebook which haven’t taken place yet and it seems like a lot [of attendance] but it still has to happen and in the end it may not live up to the announcements so I think there is a chance of creating an image which is not realised in the end Interviewer: so you think there is a gap between… Heidi: Yeah, that is a part of the Facebook

This excerpt highlights a divide between physical and online participation. For the garden to function, it needs volunteers to work there, to plant the seeds, to harvest the herbs, to feed the chicken - however in Baart and Heidi’s experience, interest in the Facebook group page does not correlate to physical participation. The gap between the two forms of participation does not perturb the gardens use of Facebook. This is due to the difficulty that the garden would face without using the platform:

Interviewer: How do you think it would work if you didn’t have facebook?

Baart: it would be through word of mouth

Heidi: yeah word of mouth, it would be more difficult, we would talk to people personally and phone, so yeah, much more difficult

What the above paragraphs portray is the central role of Facebook in the organizational and external operations of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden, yet it is not the only platform in use in the area.

ZO! City and Ubuntu Stadstuin There has so far been a conspicuous lack of reference to the ZO! City project in this section. The garden is on the dashboard (right) yet the link to the website does not work. This can be explained by Annet misplacing her password to access her profile on the platform:

I couldn't find my code, because you could not say that you forgot your password, so I cannot enter anything or new information

This infrastructural oversight (below) is very frustrating. There is no obvious way to obtain a new password - a very common feature of any online platform - which resulted in Annet having “the feeling that it is not used very much, so I don’t know, I haven't spent a long time on it to find out”. If this scenario is attributed to McCarthy and Wright’s ‘six sense-making processes’, Annet’s reflection on the ZO! City, when an individual will “examine and evaluate what is happening in an interaction” has led to her to potentially reflect on “why it was not possible to carry out a very similar action in two related applications” (McCarthy & Wright, 2004, p43). If you are in the position of running an organization, such as Ubuntu Stadstuin, not being able to update an entry on a platform is a significant obstacle to using

it. For, as can be displayed through the analysis its Facebook activities, the garden is a space which is changing rapidly, with weekly building and planting sessions necessitating regular updates of the platforms it uses to reach its own community as well as potential new participants. The garden is in contact with the ZO! City project away from the platform however. According to Annet the garden was present at the launch of the dashboard and Saskia Beer has adopted the surviving chicken.

Yet, is the lack of access to the ZO! City dashboard a problem for the garden? When asked if the dashboard is useful, Annet responded with a resounding:

Annet: No [laughter] I have not heard from anybody or been seen from the map Interviewer: Ok so there’s no link at all Annet: No...

This isn’t an issue because Facebook fulfils the same task, from the standpoint of the garden, as the ZO! City platform, but with a broader audience able to participate. This is a clear example of the power of the ‘network effects’ (Srnicek, 2017, p43) described previously. Facebook has “become the default social networking platform simply by virtue of the sheer number of people on it” (ibid). When asked “because you use facebook more you don’t really need to use the map [of ZO! City]?”; Annet simply replied “Yes”.

Successful platforms can be seen to be an essential means to use or participate in a function. For instance, the Mobike ‘dockless bicycle scheme’, “China’s biggest public bike-hire operator” (Pidd, 2017) is “described as the world’s first cashless and station-free bike-sharing platform, [which] has expanded to 99 cities across Asia” (ibid). For a potential rider to use a bicycle, they must download an app, from which “users locate the nearest bike using GPS and the Mobike app then unlock it and pay using their phone” (ibid). For a user to obtain a bicycle, they must go through the platform; it is essential to using the service. In Amstel III, the ZO! City interactive urban dashboard is not essential to participating in the areas redevelopment, because you can participate through other means.

However, those behind the ZO! City platform are aware of their lack of essentiality. Saskia Beer provided an illuminating, although innocent example of the platform getting in its own way with regard to notions of essentiality

Our community manager in the beginning she responded [to projects] by emails, commenting on the projects and the idea is that you keep the conversation on the platform. it wasn't a mistake I had thought of, that it would be a threat that somebody with the best intentions would start to respond via email and take the whole discussion away from the platform, because the whole idea is that you use email and social media and newsletter to reach them and then they keep the link and you get the platform as a place to keep the conversation on

This example shows how the platform model can only be a true success if it encompasses the entirety of interaction which revolves around its intended field of use. An innocuous action, responding via email, quickly became a serious issue for the platform’s own wellbeing. The Ubuntu Stadstuin community garden demonstrates the green shoots of area transformation, but it is not the only agent of change in the area. The following section of this chapter looks towards a larger scale transformation, one which is happening just the other side of a bicycle path from Ubuntu Stadstuin.

The Anatomy of a Catalyst: The Community Campus Amsterdam

The Holendrecht Centre appears worn out. The off-white concrete exterior betrays its age, clearly displaying and extenuating the cracks, chipped paint and copper brown water marks which become the norm after ten years of vacancy, and the lack of maintenance which it entails. The office building (left - as seen from the garden), shares its name with the housing estate on the other side of the metro tracks. It is Located opposite the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden, and is separated from the same land by a dijk, which effectively works as a moat, with the employee entrance accessible by the way of a bridge. Yet, the bridge itself is not one to be crossed.

This is owing to the graffitied metal barriers erected in front of the bridges entrance (left). These barriers are often found fixed to the outside of repossessed or abandoned buildings as a means to prevent intruders from entering the location. [2] The employee bridge entrance to the Holendrecht Centre is visually unique on the Amstel III site. It is a rare example of natural flora reclaiming the built environment. As can be seen in the adjacent image, weeds and dense brambles have grown around the fence which encases the entrance, whilst the paving slabs are chipped and are crumbling. As referred to in the subchapter concerning the physical Amstel III site, the office district appears to not age - owing to the perpetual upkeep of any horticulture - therefore the relatively ruinous state of the Holendrecht Centre is pronounced, in contrast with the mirrored glass and angular green space of that which surrounds it. A

combination of its current condition, as well as the architectural philosophy it embodies [3] has rendered the Holendrecht Centre the ideal site for spatial transformation.

The Redevelopment In 2011 Greystar, an American global real estate firm who specialise in large scale redevelopments and the building of apartments in cities such as London and Los Angelis (See: Knowles, 2017 & Day, 2017), submitted a bid for the site after the municipality tendered the contract for the Holendrecht Centre. According to a municipality representative who was interviewed for this project, the municipality

decided that they should do something about the area because there was lots of empty buildings, there were, lots of offices, i think about 30% were empty and that's a problem for the municipality because it's not really nice to be there but also they don't get income because they don't pay taxes

After plans to redevelop the Holendrecht Centre fell through - failing and according to the municipality representative, always “[coming down] on the money, it was always to expensive to do something about it, to realise a plan, to be really going to happen” - the municipality accepted Greystar’s bid. However, the real estate firm wanted more than what was on offer. Block A, the location of a new student accommodation campus (see page below) owned by LSI, a real estate firm based in Amsterdam, was not initially available to be built on (currently it is the site of a beach volleyball court) led to Greystar to “[ask the municipality] can we have this part too?”, stating that “we will buy this and then we have enough volume to make the project possible”. As alluded to in the preceding section, the Dutch planning department is a bureaucratic system with lots of red tape and regulations, yet rather than following the normal and well established channels, Greystar stated

Municipality representative: ‘don’t do that just give it to us’. Normally they [the municipality] wouldn't do it, but we had strict questions that we gave to them if we do it this way

Interviewer: What were the sort of questions asked?

Municipality representative: we have this whole contract, an agreement and it was about

sustainability, about prices of rent, the quality, and then lots of things we wanted there, like some refugee places. So a few things we wanted to get that we could get if we gave this land to them and they said ok we can make this be. They are also going to make a nice park in between the buildings, which is nice, it is something that they are also going to pay for and do

This interview extract highlights both the demand of Greystar to build on this space and the willingness of the municipality for it to happen. Despite the strict questions, the rules and regulations of the city’s planning department were bent out of place to facilitate a deal.

Although nothing has commenced yet, in October 2018, the first step of the transformation will take place on the adjacent green space which is current location of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden. The garden will see its lease on the land come to an end on the 1st of January 2018. During

2019 the demolition of the Holendrecht Centre will commence, thus beginning the process of turning a vacant office block, into a section of Amstel III which will contain 950 student apartments, 450 apartments for the general public, startup incubating spaces and a public park. The name will change as well, from the locally situated Holendrecht Centre, a name which focuses on the city as a whole; ‘Community Campus Amsterdam’.

The new development (next page) will feature three buildings: Block A, a building characterised by a number of multi-coloured surfaces, is the student accommodation building. Block B, along with Block C will function as housing and as a space for startup companies. Those involved with the Community Campus Amsterdam project - the municipality, OZ Architects, Blauwhoed (the real estate company in charge of its creation) and Greystar - all highlight the developments location, but barely refer to the project being located in Amsterdam Zuidoost, but the proximity to two local features; the ‘railway station’ and the Academisch Medisch Centrum (AMC). The Community Campus design book, from which all images are being taken does not reference

Holendrecht once. According to a representative from Blauwhoed - spoken to at a public event outlining the Community Campus Amsterdam regeneration - each building has been designed by three different architects, who all work for the same organization, OZ Architects, in order to provide a unique aesthetic to each building, whilst retaining an overall uniformity. OZ Architects describe the ‘new campus’ as “the catalyst that ignites the long desired change process from mono-functional office area into a multifunctional city district” (OZ Architects, 2016), yet what form will this catalyst take?

The Community Campus Amsterdam: Built Environment The design book for the Community Campus Amsterdam was supplied to this project by a respondent and all the images used are concept images. Yet they do offer a valuable insight into the proposed future of the Amstel III office district. Block A (below), the student housing building, is the most visually striking design. Despite its angular appearance, the addition of coloured aluminium squares, which will be illuminated at night, marks it out from the surrounding spaces. The 950 student homes, intended to house the students of the AMC (although students from other universities will also be able to live there), will be comprised of the ‘studio’ apartments, i.e. dwellings with bathroom, kitchen and living space all contained within. [4] Despite the interior image appearing vacant, it is telling of the characteristics of the proposed development. Firstly, the interior (page below) is fashioned in a ‘minimalist’ manner, with slim-line tables, chairs and even the bed all presented as white, angular “straight-edged and [...] austere” furnishings (Gompertz, 2016, p334). This, rather intelligently, distorts the presentation of space.

The bed, sofa and table, as can be observed, are all sat flush against the walls of the apartment which inherently leaves floor space in between the furnishings. In this space a shadow is cast from the French- doors, which divides the floor between light and dark, a diagonal division which distorts the sense of depth in this space. Another feature of this representation of a studio - again the only representation of an interior of a living space in the design book - is the absence of the bathroom and kitchen. Thirdly, the view from the large doors stares out over the Amstel III district, with the high rises of the Amsterdam ArenA area and the national stadium in the distance. This studio faces north, looking out towards Amsterdam and away from the local space which can serve as a subtle means of removing Block A of the Community Campus Amsterdam from its Zuidoost location.

Blocks B and C do not show the interior of any of the dwellings, but instead focus upon the exterior of the buildings. What makes block B distinctive is the ‘superimposed grid’ which adorns the exterior of the building. This motif is, according to the design book intended to “[generate] an intermediate zone between private balcony and public park. The prefab balconies are placed in the concrete prefab grid system. The raster creates sun shading in summer” (Community Campus Amsterdam Design Book, 2017, p38). The ‘raster’ - “a rectangular pattern of parallel scanning lines followed by the electron beam on a television screen or computer monitor” (Oxford Dictionaries, 2017) - serves its direct purpose by shading the sun for the block’s residents, but, it also visually works as a cage. It acts, intentionally or not, as a physical break from the surrounding area, a dividing of private and public space. Yet what is it separated from?

“They Call it a Social Community”: Public Space at the Community Campus Aside from the three new buildings being constructed, the land where the soon to be ex- Holendrecht Centre, will be converted into a public park. Nestled in and amongst the new

buildings will be a public space, comprised of cycle ways, foot paths, as well as the use of excavated residual soil which is, according to the architects, to be “used to make small-scale hills that render local quality, give the area a strong identity and inspire people to make use of it” (OZ Architects, 2016). Underneath blocks B and C will be a car park. According to the municipality representative, the public space is intended to serve as a social space for the emerging community:

Well lots of people who will live here don't have their own outside space, they have a balcony, but hopefully they will use the parks

The park space amongst the buildings is certainly represented as being a social in the design book (below). This image shows an apparently active outdoor space. Couples go for a stroll, cyclists cut across the paths, a young lad skateboards and someone hoola-hoops, whilst in the background, the white silhouettes of the yet to be built student housing block watches over the

whole scene. This rendering, the apparent future for Amstel III, appears to indicate that the Community Campus will be built either in a vacuum or as an island set in thick fog, for the grey background removes the development from its surrounding context. Another rendering does relate to the development beyond the confines of the three buildings, but only by referencing a speeding train in the distance, but nothing beyond the tracks; Holendrecht need not exist here (page below).

Another way these concept images are removed from their context is in the way diversity is depicted. As referred to in the preceding section, Amsterdam Zuidoost is a diverse area (Smet & Den Uyl, 2008, p1446), yet these renderings of the future are distinctly white. The ethnic diversity of the area is betrayed. What these images do highlight, however, is the intended future residence of the Community Campus Amsterdam.

According to the renderings, those who will use the new public spaces will be mostly white, youthful, fashionably dressed and active individuals who congregate in groups no larger than three. Now, architectural renderings of public space often present a crystal clear portrayal of the project which commissioned them, which can stretch the boundaries of the conceivable, but there is some truth in these observations. For, the aforementioned municipality representative stated that “lots of young people are going to live here”. This isn’t a premonition or a feeling, but something of a fact. The student housing is by its sheer existence focused towards young people, yet so are the dwellings available to the general public, for

we do have people at marketing and communication, and they were looking at this area, thinking what is the potential for this area, because we wanted it to be a mixed use area, for the companies it is the best to make this an urban innovation district with a health and wellbeing theme because there are already lots of offices who have this theme and also the hospital and also we know that lots of people who are building here are building for quite young people so all these things together makes us want to exploit those facts even further

This market led approach fits the Community Campus within a local context, but one defined by the boundaries of Amstel III - not Holendrecht. This can be interpreted through Kees

Christiaanse’s notion of island urbanism, the

sites that are relevant for investments are planned as projects, while the territory in between disappears from the public consciousness. Enclaves develop where everything is planned down to the last detail [...] What was once a continuum of urban space ultimately disintegrates into two areas with virtually opposing characters. (Christiaanse, 2014, p11)

This drive for building to attract and ‘exploit’ the local ‘health and wellbeing theme’ extends from the campus surrounded public space out to the land between the current Holendrecht Centre and the metro line, to the land currently occupied by the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden. Whereas the campus garden is the responsibility of Greystar as it is a part of the Holendrect Centre’s conversion, the park on the site over the cycle path is the responsibility of the municipality.

Public Park at Amstel III The new park (below) will run from Gaasperdammerweg, one of the roads which severs Amstel III, to the AMC at the very south of the district whilst being in parallel with the metro tracks. The park will according to the municipality representative, contain “some spots facilities and

some other places”. Yet, what will become of the garden? When asked about the apparent end of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden, Annet responded that

It will not end, because when this land is given back we are doing a campaign on several levels because we want to remain present in this very land, not with a fence and things, but with some

items and to have a place and a new destination, that's what we want. And for the mean time, until 2021 or 2 we have to find an alternative location and that is also what we are discussing with other people and we want it to be near here because people can find us back it's taken a lot of time for people to know where we are, so it is important to not go too far

It is apparent from this above quotation that Annet and the garden are intent on staying in the Amstel III/Holendrecht area, owing to its established position in the area. However, despite the established and well attended garden serving the local area, the municipality found the opposite to be true when researching the demand for what would be going into the park. For the municipality asked three groups - office workers, students and the residents of Holendrecht - at a public meeting on the 30th of January 2017, what they would like to see in the park. According to the municipality representative

We asked everyone from around this area what they wanted on the 30th of January, we had a meeting, with lots of people from the neighbourhood and not many people wanted gardening

Instead, those who participated in the meeting mostly desired ‘sports facilities’ - indeed in the concept images of the Community Campus, a multi-purpose sports court is in the place of the garden (right circled). However, despite an apparent lack of desire for the garden by those interviewed for the future Amstel III, the garden in the words of the municipality representative “might have some role in the park”. As of the time of writing, it is uncertain what the future of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden will be in Amstel III

Aside from the January 30th public meeting, the municipality also organized a public demonstration of the Community Campus and public park, which was held at ‘Amsterdam Connected’, a light, well-lit building adjacent to the location of the Community Campus, on the 23rd of May 2017 and 3:30pm. The event was sparsely attended, despite every office in the district receiving a poster (below) and an email about the event (none of these posters were

visible in the Amstel III district) although Annet and Heidi from the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden were there discussing the new park. In the well-lit glass building, several stalls were set up representing different projects in the area. These projects were the Community Campus itself, with a representative from Blauwhoed (the real estate firm behind the physical design and development), the new park and a project called ‘Lichtkunstwerk in Stationstunnel’ (Light Artwork in Station Tunnel). This project, according to its ZO! City dashboard entry:

The station tunnels in the area can be much more pleasant - and more interesting! We present a light artwork in every tunnel under the track. This provides an interesting welcome to the area, a nice connection between the districts on both sides of the track and a much more pleasant feeling when you return to the station in the dark! (Lichtkunstwerk in Stationstunnel - ZO! City, 2017)

Despite the project not receiving any funding yet on the ZO! City dashboard, the project need not worry. This is because the Lichtkunstwerk in Stationstunnel is a municipality spatial transformation project. The plan is to install LED spotlights in the floors of the underpass at the Holendrecht metro station, although according to the project leader, not blue lights “because there are studies linking blue public lights and drug abuse”. Alongside the lights, the slanting walls in between the train tracks will have their chipped yellow tiles replaced by hardy plants and the equally chipped blue walls which greet any passenger will be replaced by locally produced street art.

Public Participation The Community Campus has involved the public at numerous stages in its development so far. However, much like with the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden’s case, the ZO! City platform took a back seat. When asked about the role of the ZO! City platform in the Campus redevelopment, the municipality representative stated that

It mainly has a role in the bigger development of Amstel III, we do of course include them in the

initial story, they are really important in the area in having a network of people wanting to change something here

What this quotation highlights is the role of ZO! City as an organization in the Amstel III redevelopment, but not of the dashboard. The casting of ZO! City as having a role in the ‘bigger development’ implies that it is focused on the more macro aspect of the area’s regeneration, rather than focusing on specific cases. This is true if one looks at the dashboard, as discussed earlier. However, the ZO! City project as a whole focus on, what this respondent terms, the ‘soft side’ of the regeneration, which comprises of “the communication about it, I think that's where their [ZO! City] strength is”. ZO! City use their ‘network’ of local actors is used to advertise local events, with an example of this being when the municipality installed beach volleyball nets and organized a beach volleyball tournament in 2016. The nets

are on the ZO! City platform (right), and they tried to help us get to the people, and I hope they will do the same this year, by their platform, but also by email and different ways

The dashboard in this instance was used in conjunction with other means of communication such as email, which is typical, according to Saskia of the ZO! City project:

the online and offline is a whole range of communication channels that support the platform role, whether it is social media or the online platform or newsletters

Yet, the area specific dashboard, which is placed front and centre as a means of public participation by the project itself, is once again but for different reasons in the preceding section proven to not be an essential means of public participation. The dashboard is also not the only section of ZO! City's online aspect to not touch the ground, for the ‘smart’ city ideal embodied by the project, according to the Municipality is not apparent either:

Well, they have talked about it a lot, I haven’t seen much I have to say, I think that’s mostly inside of the buildings, they want this to be young and therefore the technology is important, but i haven't seen that much yet. I think that ZO! City is much further with this concept and they would like to develop this part of the smart city more but they are not really there yet. In this project, it mainly comes from ZO! City, we say great, but for us it's not yet here.

The ZO! City project embodies the three ‘soft’ components of smart urbanism - “clarity of vision, citizen empowerment [and] participation” described by Concilio et al (2013, p270) - through the focus of the ZO! City project on ‘the bigger development of Amstel III’, which provides an overriding interpretation of the redevelopment and through its network of local actors, ZO! City fosters participation by helping the municipality to ‘get to the people’, they are according to Saskia Beer, “where stakeholders themselves and the municipality they are bringing in the contacts, the projects, the questions and we’re just coordinating it and connecting them and making sure that people can respond to it, so, less contact more platform”. Yet, the actual ‘smart’ aspect of the project does not feature.

Conclusion This chapter has delved into the two most prominent examples of the Amstel III office district’s transformation, in order to understand in nuanced detail the role of the ZO! City platform in their function. Initially, it started off by highlighting the location of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden and how it turned seemingly useless land into a community hub which provides a service to the local area. Subsequently the role of online platforms and the relationship between online and physical participation was explored, exposing the lack of requirement for the ZO! City online dashboard. Yet there is an an essential requirement for platform technology, which is manifest in the two Facebook pages run by the garden, both to advertise and organise the space. These pages are also important through how they bring participation in the garden on to the online realm, away from the physical space which, according to one member, can give those absent a ‘connection to the projects’ run by the garden.

After displaying the garden and it's community participation, this chapter stepped into the world of the Community Campus Amsterdam. Highlighting how the means of public participation - meetings, surveys and public events, which are all held in physical space - do not revolve around

the ZO! City online dashboard. Yet, the ZO! City project, aside from the online element, is considered to be an integral part of the Amstel III regeneration by the municipality, with the ability of the platform to foster networking amongst the different stakeholders who are a part of the Amstel III redevelopment. The role, in this case of the dashboard is currently that of a message board, where events and spaces supported by the municipality are advertised for people to attend and use. This is a role that, in the case of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden for example, that established platforms such as Facebook perform much more efficiently. Before this thesis is concluded, a small section on the perceived future of the ZO! City platform is portrayed and supported by data from the interview with Saskia Beer, after which, these findings will be discussed in the concluding chapter of this project.

A Platform for the Future?

This penultimate section serves as a glance towards the future of the ZO! City dashboard and where its founder, Saskia Beer sees the direction of the platform. The ZO! City interactive dashboard is a perpetually developing platform which will allow individuals to propose redevelopment projects and access different streams of data concerning Amstel III. Yet, what does this method of participation entail for the future of urban participation? Saskia Beer, when asked about platforms such as the ZO! City dashboard being the future of urban participation, responded by stating that

Yes I do think so, but I have to admit one big disclaimer, which is that it won’t replace physical meetings and some other forms of participation and communication, because like any form of communication, you have a form of exclusivity, so you will always have you're places where you invite the less tech savvy or the elderly, so you will always need a more holistic implementation and communication strategy around it, I don’t believe you can throw it online and that’s it.

This quotation highlights a facet of the ZO! City platform, that it is not intended to replace physical participation. Much like experience of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden and its use of Facebook, the dashboard is there to mediate a connection between the project and its users, not to replace it as a means of participating. In this sense, the platform is very much an organizing tool. This notion is backed up by Saskia, owing to her opinion on how notions of community will change and how

the future, I believe, is about this shared ownership and this distributive organizational structure, because that's the only way I believe that we can survive the rapid changes that we are subjected to, whether that is ecological or demographic, it doesn't really matter, so we need to be able to cope with shocks and crisis [Interviewer] Do you think these shocks can be facilitated through online means? [Saskia] I think so because, you know if something happens we need to meet in the pub and sort it out, so it is like a pub for places that are too complex. [interviewer] So it's an organizational thing, that's where the change will be? [Saskia] Yeah I think so, and to do that we need new tools because it's too complex, they don't fit

in the pub, there's too much information, too many different things, it’s too complex.

I have cited this interview segment at length due to the manner in which Saskia views the platforms role in facilitating interaction. However, this view of the platform is only starting to be taken up by other actors, noticeably the municipality, who through their own experiences, according to Saskia, view the dashboard as “getting more important, with this new planning law coming out, there’s more going on now, the smart city thing, which makes our platform more easily recognisable for what it’s doing, I think”. What is of interest here is the perceived view of the platforms future use is rooted in its function as a vehicle to display data sets, not as a means of changing public participation directly. Whilst the ZO! City dashboard was in it's infancy, Saskia interpreted the municipality’s reception of the project as them “[liking] the idea but it was more of a gadget, an extra thing”, but through time, adding to what is displayed above, “I think that over time, they were bumping into questions or into needs that can be met through a platform”.

With the centrality of the collection and storing of data in the new Omgevingswet planning law, the platform’s potential function of being a portal to information for local users is an attractive means of delivering municipal information to the population. However as evidenced previously, the municipality still “don’t really see” the smart city aspect of the ZO! City platform. Therefore, the ZO! City project is working to being able to facilitate the municipality’s expectations of the platform, by “[having] to catch up so the platform can reach their demands”, because in the words of Saskia “I can say, it has been over promising and under delivering”.

This section outlining ZO! City’s own conception of the future use of its platform and dashboard provides a backdrop for the subsequent concluding discussion section, where the role of the ZO! City interactive dashboard in the Amstel III regeneration will be summarised in conjunction with the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden and the Community Campus Amsterdam.

Conclusion

This project has investigated the role of online urban participation platforms in urban development by analysing the ZO! City platform, with a particular focus on its ‘interactive urban dashboard’. This dashboard is presented to be the primary means of participation in the nascent Amstel III office district redevelopment and, as described above, offers a user the ability to propose a regenerative project and submit it with the intention for it to become a reality via the means of crowd funding. The dashboard is premised on an interactive map which displays the Amstel III office district in a two dimensional manner, with the physical landscape of the area represented in mute colours to give the colours of the projects primacy when the dashboard is viewed.

The area which it replicates has been extensively analysed through a series of observations in order to uncover the reality of the space. This revealed the lack of clear redevelopment. On the surface, Amstel III is very much still a ‘mono-functional’ office district: the gates, barriers, trimmed hedges, mirrored buildings and lack of public space use all combine to embalm the area in an atmosphere characterised by an eery quietness. As of yet, the district appears as somewhere far from its intended goal of becoming a new community in Amsterdam. However despite this, there are two examples representing spatial change in the area.

The first was the Ubuntu Stadstuin community garden. This locally focused project was initiated by the municipality and is premised around the ideals of ‘permaculture’. The project transformed a patch of previously unusable land into a community hub where the residents of Holendrecht and the broader southeast have the opportunity to grow their own food and participate in numerous projects and social events. An aspect of the garden is the extensive use of Facebook, with the platform facilitating not only the outreach elements of advertising the garden and making it visible to the local community, but it is, according to one respondent, essential to the running of the garden.

The second case study centered upon the Community Campus Amsterdam. This large scale regeneration project is the first example of physical, and wholesale use change in the area. The

Campus is also intended to act as a catalyst for further regeneration in the area. Unlike the online, local network based public participation at the garden, the Community Campus represented a more traditional means of involving the public in urban planning. This can be evidenced via the use of surveys and public meetings where the public are consulted, but not directly involved in the redevelopment. Yet what is the role of the ZO! City platform in the redevelopment of Amstel III?

From the position of ZO! City, the platform is an essential technological means of orchestrating and managing the broad scope of activity bound up in the redevelopment. In the eyes of Saskia Beer, the platform is key to maintaining the ‘fragile’ community network that the ZO! City project has accumulated over the recent past, whilst also providing a space for different groups invested in the Amstel III redevelopment to communicate. As evidenced in the previous section, the interactive urban dashboard is “over promising and under delivering”, with issues still present in the dashboards make-up: no means to recover forgotten passwords, no guidance for first time users and the use of email taking conversation away from the dashboard. However, from the perspective of the two case studies, the dashboard has proven to be of little use.

Firstly, the dashboard is not an essential component for an individual to participate in the transformation in Amstel III. This can be seen in the approach the Community Campus took to participation. In this scenario, the dashboard isn’t relevant for public engagement. For instance, the ‘Water Side Park’ project I set up. This was set up before I was aware of the extensive plans for the park which runs alongside the metro line. The imposition of the park means that the space this project selected is already being worked on, thus rendering it obsolete. For the park, the public were consulted on what they wish to see in the space which is a completely different means to approach the public. With the authority of the municipality, its form of participation is more influential and above that of the user of the dashboard. Therefore, for the dashboard to be truly successful, it needs to have a monopoly upon participation in the area it covers - in the same manner as the Mobike platform. This example shows that the platform is something which one could use, but it isn't essential to participate. Which leads to the second finding.

The essentiality of a platform ensures its use. The example of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden highlights how platform technology is a central component to the organization, marketing and running of a project; platform technology already has its place in Amstel III. However, the ZO! City dashboard is not suited to this task in two regards. Firstly, the infrastructure of the dashboard is not setup to facilitate what is required for the garden. The only way individuals can communicate is through commenting on project proposals, it is not possible to have open and general conversations, like in the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden’s Facebook ‘group page’. In essence, Facebook offers more options for use. It is more versatile for the garden to use, whilst also having the essential ‘network effects’.

Facebook is considered to be the “default social networking platform” (Srnicek, 2017, p45), meaning that the majority of social network users are using it, which therefore means the garden has maximum reach by using Facebook rather than the ZO! City dashboard. Also, the sheer fact that the majority of the garden’s users are on Facebook emphasises in its effectiveness as an ‘organizational tool’. In short, the essentiality of Facebook for the garden renders the ZO! City dashboard an extra means of advertising, but not as a key component in its functioning. Therefore, this thesis recommends that for a participation platform such as the ZO! City dashboard to be successfully implemented, it is required to be essential for participation, otherwise potential users will shift to more widely used platforms. In short, the ZO! City is currently too limited in its scope for it to be used as a meaningful platform to foster public participation.

Another finding which holds relevance for the implementation of smart solutions to public participation is that it is essential that the basic infrastructure of the platform is as close to perfect as possible. Annet’s experience of not being able to use the dashboard because she lost her password has tarnished her view of it. Events such as this could also bleed away from the online realm and into the offline, for example in McCarthy and Wright’s (2004) ‘six sense-making processes’ theory. Annet’s negative view of the dashboard, as expressed in her interview for this project, could severely impact a potential user’s likelihood of posting a project on the dashboard. This is obviously in juxtaposition to the ‘lean development’ practices utilized by ZO! City,

where the digital infrastructures are improved piecemeal, in small steps, as if the platform is in constant development.

However, as displayed with the Community Campus Amsterdam, the ZO! City project is able to reach its ‘community’ and spread the word of events to the diffuse stakeholders in Amstel III who are subscribed members of the project. This highlights a clear role of the ZO! City project as a platform, not the dashboard, in the redevelopment of Amstel III. Another realm where the platform is of use, and in time will perhaps be essential, is the presentation of data. The dashboard’s current limited function as a hub for real estate related information is ideal for potential investors for it clearly and cogently displays information that is relevant to investment. With the impending implementation of the Omgevingswet planning law, and its focus upon the storing and gathering of data, the ZO! City dashboard’s intended function as “the last local interface where all these data can be implemented” could render it an essential component of the Amstel III redevelopment. It would be of great interest to research the impact of this extra data, and its use in the future redevelopment of Amstel III, in order to observe whether greater access to data would shape and alter the course of redevelopment.

The overriding intention of this research project has been to see how the ‘smart city’ interacts on a social level by seeing what role an example of smart urban technology - the ZO! City platform and its dashboard - in urban transformation. As can be seen throughout the third chapter of this work, the ZO! City dashboard is seldom used by the two case studies researched. This project has identified three reasons for a lack of participation and use of the interactive urban dashboard - an absence of participation monopoly, lack of essentiality and through its infrastructure, poor usability. However, the ZO! City platform does indeed function as a platform from which the different actors within the Amstel III redevelopment can be coordinated. Therefore, the role of online urban participation platforms in the regeneration of the Amstel III office district is as a organiser and as a medium through which different and diffuse stakeholders can connect. The public participation aspect of the dashboard currently takes a back seat to the organizational features of the platform which is removed from the visual interface of the interactive urban dashboard, as shown above, and is facilitated through a broad range of communicative means. However, with the rise of platform technology and its prevalence in contemporary society,

coupled with the ongoing development of the interactive urban dashboard and its intended function as the last interface between the individual and the data of the Omgevingswet, there is still potential for the technology to become a central aspect for individuals to engage with the Amstel III redevelopment; rather than its current role as an organizational structure.

Endnotes

Literature Review Smart Urbanism 1. “Ambitious cities could receive funding for technical assistance to facilitate access to loans and risk sharing loans. Pioneer cities, taking much greater risks through radical technology and organisational transformations, could in addition receive funding in the form of grants to support the implementation of the proposed package of technologies and measures.” (European Initiative on Smart Cities, no date) 2. Or those who have, according to Frank Kresin’s ‘smart citizen manifesto, “appropriated the tools to connect at the touch of a button, organise [them]selves and make [their] voices heard. [...] Who know how to measure [them]selves and [their] environment, to visualise and analyse the data, to come to conclusions and take action” (Kresin, 2013)

Platforms

1. Gillespie (2014) points out that there are four main categories of use for the word platform: computational - “an infrastructure that supports the design and use of particular applications” (p349), architectural - “A raised level surface on which people or things can stand, usually a discrete structure intended for a particular activity or operation” (OED, 2006), figurative - “the ground, foundation, or basis of an action, event, calculation, condition, etc. Now also: a position achieved or situation brought about which forms the basis for further achievement” (Gillespie, 2014, p350) and the political - “a political candidate or party endorses as their ‘platform’” (ibid). These different uses of the word platform “all point to a common set of connotations: a ‘raised level surface’ designed to facilitate some activity that will subsequently take place” (ibid). 2. According to Facebook, the website has “1.94 billion monthly active users as of March 31, 2017” (Newsroom FB, 2017) 3. The members of ZO! City include the bank ABN Amro, Ikea, numerous real estate companies, Amsterdam Smart City and several government agencies (See the community section of the ZO! City website) 4. Contained within the terms and conditions of the ZO! City platform: “By posting Content to the Service, you grant us the right and license to use, modify, publicly perform, publicly display, reproduce, and distribute such Content on and through the Service” (ZO! City, 2017)

Urban Planning Participation in the Netherlands

1. An area characterised by characterful town houses, narrow cobbled streets and arching bridges which span the numerous canals of the the Dutch capital. Where a three bedroom apartment can cost over 2.5 million euros (Engel & Voelkers, 2017)

2. Within these plans typical modernist ideals reigned, such as large swathes of demolitions in order to make more public space and the separation of motor vehicular and pedestrian use by elevating roads and the widening of streets 3. These groups spanned the political spectrum, from the ‘Marxist’ ‘Actiegroep Jordaan’ to the “'Blijvend Jordaan' (Stay in Jordaan) [which] mainly represented the small landlords and businessmen” (ibid). 4. “The Jordaaners claimed they had not been given the information they needed to evaluate the plan. They had not, for example, been told what the implications of the plan would be for rents, nor had they been given any clear idea of what would be the fate of the 6,000- 7,000 Jordaaners who would have to move” (Hague & McCourt, 1974, p148) 5. Currently the ZO! City platform contains the infrastructure for data concerning Policy, the Environment, Mobility and Property data, each with sub sets of data ranging from ‘air quality’ to ‘zoning destination’ 6. Currently the Joint Programme Initiative Urban Europe, an EU member state joint research project launched by the European Commission in 2008 (JPI-Urban Europe, 2017) has seven research projects revolving urban living labs, with funding reaching a total of 8.4 million euros (JPI Urban Europe, 2016). 7. A project with a tagline of “what would happen if everyday Amsterdammers were empowered by technology to make the city they love an even better place to live in the future?” (Henriquez, no date, P3) 8. Dictionary definition for ‘Citizen Science’: “scientific work undertaken by members of the general public, often in collaboration with or under the direction of professional scientists and scientific institutions” (OED, 2017) 9. Such as wind energy solutions as well as noise and air pollution

The Amstel III Office District: Online and Offline

A Building or a Blank Canvas? The ZO! City Online Interactive Urban Dashboard

1. As a matter of housekeeping, the word ‘platform’ is used to describe ZO! City as a whole, whereas ‘dashboard’ is used to specifically describe the online interface through which users access the platform 2. Johannes Itten taught at the first incarnation of the legendary Bauhaus school of design (Gompertz, 2016, p208)

Where the Atypical Shall be Typical: The Amstel III Office District

1. See: Bakker, 2013, Bijlmermeer Renovation Planning Office, 2014, Helleman & Wassenberg, 2004, Smets & Uyl, 2008, Aalbers, 2011 and Montgomery, 1992 2. De Chirico based his artworks on physical spaces, notably the Italian city of Turin (Hughes, 1981, p149) 3. This architectural effect works in the same manner as an individual who wears mirrored sunglasses, those “which make it impossible for your interlocutor to see your own eyes and thereby achieve a certain aggressivity toward and power over the Other” (ibid). One

can look out, but others cannot peer in (Jameson, 1991, p7) 4. By the Philosopher Jeremy Bentham

The Green Shoots of Transformation Sowing Seeds in Sand: Ubuntu Stadstuin 1. This google maps screenshot shows the space before the garden was created 2. Who was born into the Xhosa/Zulu culture from which the word was coined (Oppenheim, 2012, p369) 3. “the conscious design and maintenance of agriculturally productive ecosystems which have the diversity, stability, and resilience of natural ecosystems” (Mollison, 2002, p ix) 4. This is in opposition to how contemporary cities are structured. For, the urban metabolism is “‘linear’, where resources [are] ‘pumped’ through the urban system without much concern about their origin or destination” (Girardet, 1999, p33). 5. The users of the garden cut open the used bags and add the resulting grainy coffee solution to a compost container which contains worms that break down its contents 6. The event being referred to is ‘The Floriade World Horticultural Expo’, a once in a decade event that takes place across the Netherlands. It is a vast exhibition of the Dutch horticultural industry and paves the way for large scale building projects in the host area. Amsterdam lost to Venlo, a city in the south-east of the Netherlands, which would witness the ‘Venlo Green Park’ be constructed for the Floriade 7. A place often referred to as the ‘poorest in Amsterdam’ by those who use the garden 8. Such as BMW, Ikea and Dolby Laboratories 9. Through both its aesthetic and the sensory stimuli it produces, it smells of earth and somewhat of flora, especially when the tea is being brewed

Anatomy of a Catalyst: The Community Campus Amsterdam

1. The Holendrecht Centre has been abandoned since the bank, ABN Amro, left the site in 2007 (Stil, 2016). 2. Although these barriers have proven futile, as the glass sides of the bridge have been smashed, meaning the site is accessible to anyone able to vault up onto the bridge’s sidewall and skirt around the edge of the barrier. 3. Echos of a brutalist past reminiscent of the previously discussed Bijlmer; large scale, concrete and imposing 4. There are three different sizes available for students (21, 25 & 27 meters squared) which come in six different styles. The smallest is ‘type A’, at 21 meters squared, and is the only type of apartment displayed in the design book.

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Chapter 1: Screenshots of ZO! City interactive urban dashboard taken from www.zocity.nl [Accessed 12/06/2017]

Chapter 2: Screenshots of ZO! City interactive urban dashboard taken from www.zocity.nl [Accessed 12/06/2017] Photos of Amstel III taken by author Atlas Arena 2012 [online] Available at [Accessed 12/06/2017] ‘The Enigma of the Arrival and the Afternoon’ [online] Available at [Accessed 12/06/2017]

Chapter 3: All images taken of the Ubuntu Stadstuin garden were taken by the author Venlo Green Park [online] Available at [Accessed 12/06/2017] Ubuntu Stadstuin Facebook screenshots [online] Available at and [Accessed 12/06/2017] All images taken of Holendrecht Centre and the Community Campus public meeting, were taken by the author Images of the Community Campus Amsterdam taken from: Anon, 2017., Community Campus Amsterdam Design Book, Blauwhoed, Amsterdam

Appendix ZO! City Email:

Saskia Beer Interview Schedule: The ZO! City project: 1. How did you first, through TransformCity, get involved in the Amstel III district? 2. What was the initial brief from the municipality when you started the project? 3. How close, would you say, is the working relationship between the ZO! City project and the Municipality? 4. How much freedom are you allowed from the municipality? 5. Is there more interest from the municipality in physical redevelopment over the social? If so why in your opinion?

Amstel III & Holendrecht: 1. The project is focussed on the redevelopment of Amstel III, but does the ZO! City project interact with the broader community, in Holendrecht for example? 2. Other than through the dashboard, how does ZO! City influence the transformation of the Amstel III area? 3. How influential on the area’s transformation are the areas big institutions, such as the AMC or Ikea? 4. For you, how will the area be different when the whole transformation is complete? 5. The words ‘mono’ and ‘multi-functional’ are used extensively in the Amstel III transformation, for ZO! City what do these phrases mean? 6. How will the new Amstel III be multi-functional?

The Platform 1. The dashboard presents the Amstel III district in a minimalist, stripped back way, why do you represent the area in this way? 2. There are no primary colours used in the dashboard, why? 3. How is the dashboard necessary for the interactive dashboard to the transformation of Amstel III 4. How busy is the dashboard? 5. If someone is starting a project in Amstel III, will the ZO! City project actively seek them out to put them on the dashboard or do people post themselves? 6. After a project is set up via the dashboard, how involved is ZO! City in that project?

Crowd Funding and Finance 1. A large percentage of the companies which feature in the community section of the dashboard are real estate companies, how significant is the role of these companies in the project? 2. On your website, the project claims that everybody can participate, from big companies to individuals, how do you ensure that this remains even? 3. With regards to crowdfunding, are there any set rules into who can donate to projects?

The Smart City and Urban Data 1. How central to the area’s redevelopment, do you think is the idea of data and sensing? 2. In the TransformCity promotional video, the use of ‘user generated data-sets’ is portrayed, what will these data-sets consist of? And how will they be accessed? 3. Will the new residents of Amstel III be encouraged to contribute to these data-sets? 4. Do you think the focus on smart urbanism attracts interest to the area's transformation?

Ubuntu Stadstuin Interview Schedule:

Ubuntu Interview Schedule How you as a group interact with the changes being carried out in the Amstel III area. How the community garden was first established in the area 1. Could you describe to me the process that led to the garden becoming a reality? 2. What were the reasons for choosing the location? 3. What was the role of the municipality in the garden’s creation? 4. What were the original goals of the garden? - Have these objectives changed?

How your organisation interacts with the community as a whole. 1. Could you describe the relationship that the garden has with local schools and the area outside of the office district? 2. Could you describe the relationship the garden has with the surrounding office district? 3. From your position as an established member of the gardening community, where would you say the makeup of the group is? 4. How important is the Facebook group and other online means of communication to the organization and running of the project?

How you as a group interact with the changes being carried out in the Amstel III area. 1. What is the relationship between Ubuntu and the ZO! City transformation? 2. You previously said to me the other day that the map isn’t very useful, could you elaborate on that? 3. I have been informed by other members of the garden that it will be closing down later this year, if that is the case, then why?

Is there anything else you would like to discuss?

Interview Schedule for Municipality Representative 1. Why this area? 2. Are there any initiatives to connect the project to Holendrecht? 3. What role did the municipality have in deciding what the building would become? 4. How important, in your opinion is the campus’ role as a ‘catalyst’ for the area’s transformation? 5. How is this catalyst function going to be activated? 6. Also, is it an essential feature of the development for it to be a distinguished site? As in the creation of distinctive architecture and man made landscapes 7. Was the idea of regenerating or redeveloping the current building considered? Or has demolition always been the primary means of spatial transformation? 8. How relevant is the ZO! City platform in the buildings construction? 9. Did ZO! City, as the drivers of the area’s redevelopment, play a role in the development? 10. There was a segment of the information of the OZArchitect website which peaked my curiosity ‘the shared terraces (which belong to the homes) complement the wide range of places that the park already offers and make people part of the public space within the security of their own home’ - does this mean that the spaces within the campus are public or are they closed off spaces? 11. According to Phillip Smits the general manager of Blauwhoed, the new apartments at the campus will be ‘smart’ - what will make them smart?