Master Class 120% Brussels

18
sized European city (1,1 million
inhabitants), it hosts both
highly skilled, cosmopolitan
population groups and more
fragile population groups that
continue to migrate to the city.
While being one of the top
European cities in terms of
quality of life (Mercer, 2010), it
is also confronted with multiple
challenges. Next to demographic
growth, Brussels has to tackle
the shortage of schools and other
public facilities, as well as
an unemployment rate that
is close to 20%.
These challenges,
far from being unique, are
representative of the process
of continuing urbanization
and metropolisation that
affects most cities throughout
the world. Compared to Latin
American or Asian cities,
such growing contrasts of
very discrepant income levels
and employment rates are a
new trend within European
metropolitan areas. The fact
that these global tendencies
manifest themselves so clearly
within a limited, tangible
territory allows us to consider
Brussels, once again, as a
laboratory for the European city
of the future.
While the demographic
challenge is at the core of urban
and territorial planning studies,
the capacities of the existing
urban fabric to accommodate
these demographic changes
are also a crucial question
in the field of architecture
and urban design. How can