The elective course “UNDER PRESSURE – Sustainable urban growth scenarios for a metropolitan corridor between Vienna and Bratislava (Marchfelder Ast)” aims to enable students to deeply engage and critical reflect on contemporary issues of the metropolitan context Vienna. In this course the students have the opportunity to work on scenarios for an urban transformation zone alongside a rail corridor, connecting the capital cities Vienna in Austria and Bratislava in Slovakia with each other. The aim is to develop a variety of possible future scenarios for the settlements with the intention to contribute to the evolving Viennese debate about how to territory should develop, while taking into consideration population growth, ecology, agricultural production, shift in economies, land consumption and mobility.
Thus, the course content focus on the holistic understanding of the metropolitan territory in a cross-disciplinary manner of integrated working approach including spatial planning, landscape design and environmental design, housing and climate adaption.
Prominence
Vienna and Bratislava are the closest capital cities in Europe, divided through a transnational border. The metropolitan context of Vienna is part of this complex transnational zone. Even though Vienna is ranked as the city with highest life quality in the world, the metropolitan context of Vienna is missing a regional strategy for the sustainable development of the metropolis. Complex governance structures with several involved provinces, the status of an international border region, as well as insufficient planning instruments on regional and local scale contribute to on-going unsustainable development.
The particular case area in this metropolitan context of Vienna is characterized by small historical dispersed settlements, agricultural land and ecological corridors. The region is growing in terms of land-use and in terms of population growth. Hence, land and settlements are under pressure to host the increasing population. Moreover, despite of urban growth and large-scale infrastructure car-related investments affect the historical, small settlements in dispersed territorial condition, resulting in urban sprawl, extensive land consumption, which causes further environmental and social unsustainable development in the car-related environment. One of those villages expected to be most affected is the settlement Leopoldsdorf im Marchfelde. In the course we will concentrate on this settlement as local zoom-in case study area.
Environmental challenges
Moreover, obvious potential for sustainable and concentrated node development alongside the rail corridor has hardly been recognized in planning. The on-going, partially already implemented, large-scale car-related infrastructure projects will boost fast growth of the small-scale villages. Growth is expected to happen by the typology of detached single-family houses resulting in extensive land consumption. In addition, the agricultural platform, suffers from soil erosion, ecological patches and corridors, part of the European wildlife corridor, would benefit from urban development strategies taking into consideration deer exchange, ecology and provision towards energy transition and climate adaption.
Societal challenges
Vienna as well as Bratislava are growing capital cities. Related to this, the metropolitan context in-between those two capitals reflect the population movement from the cities in the regional urban context. Whereas this population dynamic is characterized by social disbalanced population distribution in the region, reflected in unsustainable land use patterns of detached single-family houses in the dispersed territory. On the other hand, low income group remain in the cities. The communities in the metropolitan region are lacking affordable social housing options.
Themes
The course content covers the following themes for the holistic analysis and the understanding of the metropolitan challenges:
- urban growth, population dynamics and resulting unsustainable land-use patterns
- large-scale infrastructure implementation on metropolitan scale (S8, Lobautunnel, S1)
- current status-quo of unsustainable urban development (meaning land consumption, car-related environment, lack of ecological permeability and demand of sustainable concept for local communities)
- underused densification potential of node development along the public transport corridors (light rail to Bratislava)
- under-performing territorial governance
- insufficiency of planning instruments to tackle unsustainable development
- challenges evolving due to demographic change and societal shifts
Research Question addressed in the Course
Based on the earlier stated urban challenges in the metropolitan context, the course aims to address the following research question:
Which scenarios for the future urban development of settlements along a rail corridor in metropolitan context of Vienna contribute to a social and environmentally sustainable metropolis, while taking into consideration population growth, on-going large-scale infrastructure projects, and the urgent demand for climate adaption?
Work Settings
The students will work in groups. During pre-assignment 1 and pre-assignment 2 students have the opportunity to work in groups of two persons. During the workshop week in Vienna the students will work in mixed groups of approximately 5-6 persons per group (expected number of groups: 8) , whereas approximately 3 students of Amsterdam and two students of Vienna should be team members of one group. The exact group size will be defined according to the final number of participating students.
Final Product
In group work the students will produce a set of scenarios during the workshop week. Presentation of the workshop outcomes (group scenarios) during public event in Vienna in form of exhibition walk. Format: Poster with sketches, schemes and drawings produced during the workshop week will be presented (please note this does not need to be digital!). During the event a public debate (fish bowl debate on the outcomes and the metropolitan region and its challenges as such) – with invited guest (invitation by the students during the field trip) will be organized.
Final assignment:
1. One scenario out of the four earlier in-group developed scenarios will be selected. The assignment is to deepen the selected scenario and finalize visualisation and concept for the intention of website publication. It is possible to work on this task alone, or alternatively to work in groups of two persons.
Format final product:
The final product should provide information on:
- Findings analysis,
- scenario parameters,
- argumentation why this image of the future is relevant (based on analysis) and what it can contribute to the future of the territory,
- contribution of the scenario to environmental and social sustainability,
- addressed urban challenges,
- stakeholder engagement,
- scenario timeline in phases
Presentation in web-format (details on format to be announced).
Parts of final product web-compatible:
- reflection on intermediate scale of the territory (rail corridor)
- descriptive text on the developed scenario,
- reflection text - comparison with the earlier assignment of international dual-city corridor examples (reflection task, see course day 2)
- conceptual drawings scenario
- map(s) relevant for scenario explanation
- collage(s) to imagine the future outlook
- pictures field work
- other material such as stakeholder interviews during field work
2. Course reflection paper (applies for students from Amsterdam)
A4 page - Reflection on individual learning outcomes, topic, methodology, case area and course setting
