Urban Planning

Urban planning remained an underdeveloped discipline for many years. Building lines and gutter heights were the only determining factors for construction in the Netherlands. But Soeters Van Eldonk architecten started to take a visual approach to urban planning, as architecture alone proved an insufficient means of solving identified problems or adequately responding to the demand put before us. Architecture may be capable of delivering good buildings, but it says nothing about the quality of public space. It is increasingly becoming clear that thinking properly about high quality, sustainable urban structures delivers greater results than the shape of the building alone.

The classical town is a more important paradigm to Soeters Van Eldonk architecten than the modern city. The classical town is structured by public spaces - its streets and squares. By contrast, the modern city is no more than a collection of buildings that have loosely been placed in open space. As a result, the modern city lacks both intimacy and a sense of security.

A good town is more than a mere collection of buildings. By elaborating or transforming classical principles, it should become a series of clearly defined public spaces. A good town accommodates a large collection of urban functions and it is the intensive interaction of these functions that make a town come alive.

But it is likewise true for urban planning that the starting point must always lie in consulting and listening to clients and users. After all, the town belongs to everyone.