The Netherlands is reputed to have the highest average density in the world. Yet nowhere in the country itself is there impression that this really is the case. Certainly not when compared to Hong Kong, New York or Rio de Janeiro. The Netherlands may be well populated generally but not unduly so. Vast areas of it seem to be filling up with a suburban 'matter' of low cost housing-with-gardens, low rent offices, warehouses, factory-style farms, motorcycle scrambling areas and other elements with a lowish density.
The country can steadily be regarded as a city-state, a northern Monaco of sorts, filled with this low-density, lightweight urban matter lacking a clear form of organization, consisting as it does of development that has to be varied all over and perhaps as a result, ends up looking the same. This urbanity is more concerned with quantity than with quality. How then are we to dope with an urban matter that cannot be considered entirely valuable? Accepting this condition as fixed and simply continuing the present trend will cover most of the areas still open and envelop our entire society in a greyness. Is it possible to reconsider this situation by carrying densities to an extreme and rufflling the texture with inserts or polarities?
Is it possible to imagine ultra-dense areas that can soak up program like a sponge and save our pastoral landscapes from being totally suburbanized? Might we go so far as to regard our territories as a confluence of areas with a dense and more permanent, near monumental status and others with a much lighter mode of urbanism? Can we examine the possibilities and impossibilities of these extremes and discover their prospects and limitations?
Strong idea and visual impact, effective numerical performance.
Can this be a solution for suburbanization in Poland, too?
On the photo a new office building in
Utrecht-Alendorp Business District
