A+287 Article: Building bridges by Hanne Mangelschots and Serafina Van Godtsenhoven

12 Building bridges: designing processes for acceleration
a+287
in a co-creative manner. If governments were
to make these investments tax-deductible, the
investors would have more impact and more
return with their dormant capital than if their
money stayed in the bank. It sounds logical.
But it requires a complex interplay of local
and supralocal stakeholders in which local
networks, district ambassadors and stimulating,
framework-providing authorities each play
their part.
The next big thing will be
a lot of small things
How do we activate the bottom-up energy into
a swarm of projects that speed up change?
After all, we can see that things need to be
tackled in many places at the same time, and
preferably together, so that they reinforce each
other. Together, the provided examples form
a call, not only to designers to conceive new
projects and processes, but to new coalitions,
new arrangements between supra-local authorities,
municipalities, businesses and citizen
organizations that can implement the necessary
change in many places at the same time.
Parts of this new approach are already taking
shape in some places. Too often, however, the
above examples remain exceptions to the rule,
while we need the systematic and structural
roll-out of future places if we wish to achieve
our objectives.
This is where platforms such as the Delta
Atelier come to the fore. They are eager to
bundle and link disseminated knowledge and
initiatives and to represent the potential impact.
These learning environments can serve
to string together many ground-breaking but
– in the light of the major challenges – small
initiatives so as to form an ambitious movement.
This article was written by Architecture Workroom Brussels on
the basis of conversations with Mariska Vogel, Ronald van der
Heijden, Elise Steyaert, Arie Lengkeek, Koen Schoors, Jandirk
Hoekstra, Philippe Vandenbroeck, Hans ten Hoeve, Jan Verheeke,
Koen Wijnants, Joost Schrijnen, Eric Corijn, Bob
D’Haeseleer and Floris Alkemade (by order of appearance
during the online Delta Atelier Conference on 3 July 2020).
More info: www.deltaatelier.eu
© Thomas Legreve for the Delta Atelier
Delta Atelier
Conference 2019 in
the Atelier
Bouwmeester