Zoekresultaten

Preference for different urban greenscape designs: A choice experiment using virtual environments.

Nature in cities serves a multitude of purposes, one of which is that it provides citizens opportunities to recover from stressful daily urban life. Such stress recovering effects of nature can be experienced through urban green, which in urban planning and design contexts can be divided into large natural areas - urban green space - and small scale elements in urban streets: the urban greenscape. The current study aims at finding the extent to which various small scale natural elements in residential streets and their possible configurations influence citizens' preferences for those streets. The research was conducted through an online survey in four cities in the Netherlands (n = 4,956). It used stated choice methods in a virtual environment street design. The method yielded high quality data, indicating that the use of virtual environments and imagery is suitable for stated choice research in the built environment. The results show that especially trees very strongly influence preference, indicating they deserve more attention and space in cities. Grass, which is typically favored by local governments, and vertical green have the smallest effects in residential streets. Furthermore, the concept of greenscape intensity is introduced as the intensities of both the element and the configuration were found to be highly relevant. The results clearly show that the higher either of these intensities, the more likely a respondent will prefer the greenscape design. Furthermore, low intensity on the one can be compensated by high intensity on the other. With these results, urban design professionals and local governments can better trade-off the different aspects of costs versus positive effects of urban greenscape designs.

Connecting physical education lessons and urban sports facilities in the urban space surrounding schools

Purpose: Adolescents are insufficiently physically active and spent too much time sitting, which provides a health risk. In the current study the municipality of Amsterdam, secondary schools, experts in urban sports and researchers work together to stimulate healthy exercise behavior of adolescents. The urban sports facilities in the city of Amsterdam are at the center of this project. A variety of urban sports facilities have been realized over the last years. It remains however unknown which adolescents actually use these facilities. When urban space planning and physical education (PE) lessons at school are aligned and adjusted to the needs and preferences of adolescents, adolescents probably feel more competent to use the urban sport facilities surrounding their schools. The goal of this project is twofold: 1) findings working principles for designing urban sports facilities in the urban space surrounding schools 2) identifying elements in secondary school physical education lessons that motivate adolescents to use the urban sports facilities.Methods: This was investigated by applying design thinking methods and co creation sessions with adolescents, PE teachers, school boards, municipality and experts in urban sports.Results: First results indicate that needs, wishes and barriers of adolescents with regard to the use of urban sports facilities are currently insufficiently documented. Moreover, physical education teachers lack a feeling of competence in providing urban sports classes and there is insufficient coordination between schools, the municipality and providers of urban sports. Next steps in the design thinking cycle will be discussed as well as implications for the municipality with regard to planning of urban sports facilities around school, and how to connect physical education programming inside and outside secondary schools.

Uncovering the potential of urban culture for creative placemaking.

Purpose: The authors provide a personal insight into how they see the potential of urban culture as a vehicle for creative placemaking. The purpose of this study is to highlight the opportunities for the tourism industry to embrace this global youth culture now that one of its pillars, breakdance, is on the brink of becoming an Olympic discipline in 2024, thus nudging this youth culture from underground to mainstream. Design/methodology/approach: The authors interviewed two Dutch pioneers in the field of urban culture: Tyrone van der Meer, founder of The Notorious IBE (IBE), an international breaking event, and Angelo Martinus, founder of the urban scene in Eindhoven and initiator of EMOVES, an urban culture and sports event. Findings: The authors illustrate the added value of urban culture to creative placemaking by addressing the initiatives of previously mentioned Dutch pioneers. Their urban culture events on Dutch soil, yearly attract thousands of participants and visitors from the urban scene, covering over 40 nationalities, to the South of The Netherlands. Originality/value: This study provides a glimpse into a global youth culture that is primarily invisible to the tourism industry and a foresight in how the tourism industry and other stakeholders (e.g. policy makers, city marketeers, tourism managers and event organisers) can pick up on this evolving trend. The study is meant as a wake-up call.

Constructing authenticity in contemporary consumer culture: The case of lifestyle sports

For twenty years, typical outdoor lifestyle sports like rafting, snowboarding and rock climbing, which used to be exclusively practised in natural environments, are being offered in controlled artificial settings. This process can be described as 'the indoorisation of outdoor sports'. With this development, questions of authenticity arise. Are these new, commercial forms still authentic lifestyle sports? And can we consider the participants in these indoorised lifestyle sports as authentic? There has been a discussion about authenticity in lifestyle sports since its worldwide popularisation and it is worth to reconsider this discussion against the background of new, commercial versions of lifestyle sports. Therefore, in this paper a qualitative analysis is offered about the consumption of a constructed authenticity in a cultural context increasingly characterized by artificialization.

Utilising urban or street culture to develop future-proof cities: a practice approach.

Utilising urban or street culture to develop future-proof cities: a practice approach.