Future proofing late post-war neighbourhoods - urban patterns for a socially sustainable Zevenkamp

This graduation project concerns the translation of aspects of social sustainability to the context of the existing city. The result of this project comes in the form of a pattern book, which can be used by designers and other actors such as housing corporations and local residents, when dealing with these issues. The researched context is that of late post-war neighbourhoods, and the neighbourhood Zevenkamp in the city of Rotterdam is used as a case for study and design. Since the project is concerned with the relation between social use and physical properties, and strives to take an eye-level perspective to sustainability, a lot of emphasis is placed on incorporating the perspectives of local residents, with a particular focus on youths and elderly persons living in the neighbourhood. About sixty intervention patterns are developed, at different levels of scale, concerning built-up area, program, and particularly public space. Patterns deal mostly with two social sustainability aspects that were deemed most relevant within the specific context of late post-war neighbourhoods. These are firstly social safety, since aspects related to this appear to be the greatest threat to the future value of these neighbourhoods. Secondly, possibilities for social interaction, since this is the most important (potential) quality of these neighbourhoods. Preconditions for these two aspects are also strongly correlated. Urban design proposals are made for three crucial neighbourhood parts, namely an individual building block, the main traffic structure, and the central axis consisting of the neighbourhood centre and park areas, to test if and how these patterns can be translated into a coherent design.UrbanismArchitectur