Photo by Fred Ernst

“Flagship Developments demonstrate a big symbolic capacity: not just through huge icons and mega events, but also as strong symbols which relate to urban histories. It is therefore important to take the individual identity of cities into account when implementing these type of projects.”

“Flagship projects exist due to the public debate surrounding them: public participation, at the right scale, combined with media, cultural and social organisations is what keeps them alive.”

“The La Défense story illustrates how, for first time ever, the working scale was altered. Unlike before, where developments were strictly run by the dominating axes, developments were now created through connections: connections between local centres of activity and between local drivers of development. For La Défense, this was a whole new way of thinking about the area: its changed the scope and perspective of development and highlighted the importance of the interdependencies between people in the local area and Central Paris. The lesson thus shows that scale can change according to the work you plan to do.”

“Seoul Downtown Renaissance has hugely impacted mobility in the city. Although there is less traffic, there is now more mobility. The city managed to achieve this primarily by working on their traffic management: they changed their bus system and introduced a new rapid transit bus, improved parking and introduced incentives to walk or use the transit bus, such as taxing cars with less than 2 passengers.”

The report of the lecture and expert meeting held at the University of Amsterdam on Novembre 03 and 04, 2011. can be downloaded here.