Shadow City

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the shadow city

freezones in Brussels and Rotterdam

Urban Unlimited Rotterdam with o2-consult Antwerp, MUST Amsterdam, dS+V | OBR Rotterdam and VUB Brussels

May 2004

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De schaduwstad

TABLE OF CONTENTS 1

Introduction 1.1 New challenges for the metropolis 1.2 The paradox of creativity 1.3 The approach of this report

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2. Definition of concepts 2.1 History - flee, fight and reconnect 2.2 Theory - the elusive freezone 2.3 Definition of the issue getting beyond planning misconceptions

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3 The Brussels Capital Region 3.1 Governmental context 3.2 Freezoning Brussels 3.3 Urban impact

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MAP AND TEXT-BOXES 4 The Rotterdam region 4.1 Governmental context 4.2 Freezoning Rotterdam 4.3 Urban impact

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MAP AND TEXT-BOXES

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5 Models for comparison 5.1 Breeding-ground policy in Amsterdam 5.2 Five experiments in nomadic use 5.3 A Mad Tea Party in Manchester 5.4 New York-Free Williamsburg 5.5 Interim conclusions

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6 Recommendations 6.1 Guarantee targeted niche space 6.2 Promote accessibility and tolerance 6.3 Prioritise the encouragement of intermediates 6.4 Encourage temporary or permanent portals 6.5 Practise shadow planning 6.6 Use temporariness and extend it

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Footnotes, illustrations and bibliography

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Colophon

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table of contents

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1 INTRODUCTION Since time immemorial, cities have been melting-pots where people can encounter one another, where dissenters can gather, and where new ways of thinking, adventure and creativity can ferment. In contrast with the countryside and the suburbs, for example, where peacefulness and spaciousness prevail and people meet their likeminded fellow-citizens in orderly communities, cities, especially metropolises, are often equated with business, tolerance, simmering cosmopolitanism and continual innovation. Cities are therefore often seen as the drivers of the economy, of knowledge and of cultural boom. 1 This situation has now become a little more complex. Urban features are now frequently also found in the countryside, while some places in the city are characterised by a certain rural quality.

Countryside and city are in any case connected effectively with one another with the new transport, computer and telecommunication networks, which have grown faster.2 At the same time, life is fragmenting and reclustering around specific centres of residence, work and temporary accommodation, according to need, business profile or lifestyle. This is not to say that the familiar metropolis has had its day - quite the reverse. Provided the metropolis profiles itself effectively in these new networks, it has enormous potential in terms of population base, available reserves, infrastructure, and so on, to exploit them profitably.

1.1 New challenges However, this poses new challenges for the metropolis. The freedom of choice of inhabitants (especially the better-off ones), businesses and visitors has increased enormously in the network society. In addition to the traditional questions concerning the city’s infrastructure (number of homes, m2 of business premises, optimal accessibility, number of parking places, frequency of underground services, etc.), soft, difficult-to-quantify criteria are increasingly relevant, such as general well-being, attractiveness and international profile. Three new questions thus arise: • The first question is an internal one about how to avoid and remedy the unmistakeable drawbacks of city life as far as possible, in areas such as crime, poverty, anti-social behaviour, exclusion, segregation, lack of amenities and so on. These challenges are to do with ensuring basic standards in areas such as safety, amenities, general well-being, health, etc., without adversely affecting the positive elements of city life we have already referred to - in other words, without throwing out the

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baby with the bathwater. This calls for a balanced deployment of resources, in which district and neighbourhood contracts entered into with local residents and businesses appear to be an efficacious approach. 3 • The second, externally oriented question is to do with the development and extension of a unique urban profile. The metropolis has become part of a much larger network, in which it competes with other nearby metropolises and new urban environments to attract an economic, cultural and social elite. One tried and tested strategy is ‘enticement-based urban planning’ based around specific, trend-setting urban development projects. However, closer investigation reveals that such projects need to be in harmony with existing local potential in order to be effective, and must also avoid deteriorating into global uniformity. 4 • This brings us to the third question. This has been expressed more precisely elsewhere: ‘There’s no such thing as a good key project if they mean that all metropolises start to look the same’ or ‘no culture without subculture’ 5. A link with the existing creative potential in the city is needed in order to make a difference and, over and beyond that, to promote precisely that unique urban climate that makes the city attractive to the global knowledge economies. In principle, this is also the centre of focus of the ‘sense of place’ research carried out in Rotterdam 6, together with the present report about the functioning and possible effect of cultural freezones in the city.

1.2 The paradox of creativity This approach ties in with the rising tide of theorising about the creative city, but also adds nuances to it. 7 Rather than stressing ‘creative industries of the high brow culture’, the main startingpoint here is the fact that in the global network world, creativity in subcultures and on the shadowy side of the city have become a decisive driver of social welfare, general well-being and hence the attractiveness of the city. This cuts both ways. On the one hand, it implies that economic growth and competitiveness do not just depend on the presence of high-value production, services or flows of goods and investments in the city, but also rely on the city’s innovativeness and creativity. On the other hand, it suggests that economic competitiveness could also bind creativity to it by offering

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work and developmental opportunities, which in turn attract creative people and innovative knowledge environments.

In practice, however, this process turns out to be very subtle.

According to Richard Florida, there are just three criteria which are of crucial importance for the development of creative milieus: technology, talent and (social) tolerance 8. On the basis of these criteria, Richard Florida and Irene Tinagli recently found that: - Belgium and the Netherlands lead the field in Europe for creativity, together with Finland: almost 30% of employment lies in the creative economic sectors (i.e. more than in the industrial sector, for example); - Belgium and the Netherlands, together with the three Scandinavian EU countries, have specific qualities and characteristics which enable them to compete on technology and attracting top talent from all over the world; - compared with these three Scandinavian EU countries and a rising star such as Ireland, however, Belgium and the Netherlands are increasingly losing ground, something that has been true of the UK and Germany for quite a long time already; - loss of (social) tolerance as a result of current ‘no-nonsense policies’ is an especial factor in this. 9 Other factors also turn out to be crucial. In cities such as Amsterdam and London, the availability of suitable niche and other space, the possibility of improvised, self-organising networks, and a generous amount of local tolerance have proved crucial. Innovation that has yet to make a profit, in addition to willingness to invest in good research and development (R&D), i.e. high-quality technology, also benefits from inexpensive research and living conditions, extensive opportunities for experimentation and numerous (often undefined) meeting-places. The continued growth of the city turns out to put pressure on precisely these aspects. Often, they fall victim to economic pressure for improved returns, the minimisation of safety risks or the need for a precise definition of public space, and often even for its privatisation. In other words, booming creative cities and metropolises often prove to be devouring their very economic basis.

The challenge for the Netherlands and Belgium, and especially for their metropolises, therefore seems to be as follows: how can the existing potential in terms of creative power continue to be bound to the city as that potential is further developed? Besides the need to focus on areas such as education, R&D and to reconsider tolerance levels in mainstream politics, it is also unhelpful to designate 8

specific zones for the so-called ‘creative class’, or to award grants to ‘creative workers’ on the basis of specific criteria. We shall return to this point later on. The reason is that the hallmark of ‘the creative class’ is precisely the fact that it cannot simply be pinned down in a so-called ‘breeding-ground ghetto’ or in bureaucratic regulations. 10 Thus the recently published ‘eight ways of enhancing the conditions for creativity in urban networks’ are also too general, too abstract and expressed at too high a level for the formation of a rational metropolitan freezoning policy. 11 In other words, mainstream urban development and planning have hitherto seemed ill-adapted to incorporating this subject on their agenda. They have primarily focused on the formal rather than the informal side of the city. Moreover, there seems to be a paradox here. How can urban planning and development - which are primarily oriented towards imposing and regulating - possibly be expected to come up with an effective, appropriate response to something like the fostering of creative milieus? The belief thus forms that creative milieus simply happen, and basically cannot be planned.

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1.3 The approach of this report The present study’s roots lie in this paradox. In order to even make an attempt to go beyond blind liberalisation and fatalism, and to be able to discuss the desirability or otherwise of a freezoning planning policy, we need to gain a more detailed picture of what freezones actually are, the nature of their internal and external organisation and the contribution they actually make to the city’s creativity. Can common features be identified which are relevant to the reinforcement of creative potential in metropolises? More specific and detailed information is required in order to answer this question.

We have focused on the current situation in Rotterdam and the Brussels Region. In recent years, initiatives have developed here which have been made possible by the tolerant climate in both cities and/or had been pushed out of other cities by a rise in urban revitalisation projects. We call these freezones, as they survive or are tolerated despite the regulations.

We have also focused on a wide range of freezones. Creative milieus and freezones are often equated with the more artistic and cultural climate in the city (in some cases associated with ICT and multimedia). In addition, though, the cities in question also have economic, political, social and urban planning freezones which make a crucial contribution to the creative metropolitan settlement pattern in both cities.

For this reason, finally, we have also drawn a distinction in this survey between freezones which exclusively feed off the city, and those which, through their activities (whether underground or otherwise), also return significant value or quality to life in the city. The latter are of particular interest to us, as the link between freezone and city becomes the most direct here, whereas the former have to prove that they contribute added value to the metropolis.

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freezone culture and networks, and their respective impact on urbanism in the city.

Before considering what conclusions can be drawn, a number of other examples from the rest of the world are examined for best practice, and the lessons that can be learnt from them are considered.

Finally, we conclude with a number of general and specific recommendations for Rotterdam and the Brussels Region.

Thus this survey is structured as follows: -

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It starts with a historical and theoretical look at freestates and freezones. What has been the role of freezones in urban development, and what are the identifying features of a freezone?

On the basis of this, an initial hypothesis for the survey is formulated within the context of current ideas about creative cities and urban policy.

The metropolises of Brussels and Rotterdam are then described, both in general terms and with reference to a number of cases of various types. The description includes the specific context, the

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1 introduction

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2 DEFINITION OF CONCEPTS 2.1 History - flee, fight and reconnect By origin, a freezone is a locality or set of localities in which protection and living space are offered to dissenters and freethinkers. Its existence is confirmed by a declaration by the freezone of its independence and autonomy, which is not disputed by surrounding or dominant parties (for various reasons), but is also not embraced - in other words, it is tolerated. History contains many examples of political freezones which have come into being for various reasons. They have been subject to a noticeable shift in scale in the course of history. Freezones started out as bastions in a hostile world, but they later also became outposts and pioneers in the new world, havens for dissenters and, finally, breeding-grounds for innovation. Metropolises emerged as a relevant force precisely as part of this process.

2.1.1 Bastions in a hostile world Around 1000, the Cathars lived in an extensive area of Cathar villages. They were Gnostics who believed that their knowledge could only be transmitted orally. Their teachings attracted a considerable following from the new free citizens who rejected the old feudal structure. When an inquisition was instituted against the Cathars, a network of sympathising castle barons formed in Southern France.

Montségur was a Cathar castle which boldly withstood Christian domination for a while, after which the Cathars took flight, taking with them - the story goes - the Holy Grail. The bastion was breached, but the socio-cultural network of the Cathar Gnostics has never completely disappeared. 12 Similarly, there arose in Central Persia at the same time a strong network of castles controlled by the Assassins, the Moslem adversaries of the Crusaders, who held the stronghold of Alamut, a paradise described by Marco Polo in dissolute terms. The Assassins formed a network of castles and fortifications, connected with one another by courriers and letter-writers. In this way, the Order held out against a hostile, stronger world for around 200 years. 13 In a sense, these bastions could even be described as the forerunners of the first Western European cities which sprang up during the mercantile revolution. These too started out as bastions, which were tolerated by the feudal lord, then became subject to his income tax levy, and finally became the subject of violent dispute on occasion.

For its occupants, the city was literally and figuratively a freezone, the shadow city

and after staying in the city for a year they became free of the control of the liege lord. ‘The city air is emancipating’ was a common expression at that time.

2.1.2 Outposts and pioneers of a new world This situation occurred again during the colonisations of the 17th and 18th centuries. However, there was an important difference here.

Whereas the Assassins, the Cathars and first mercantile cities had been oriented towards the defensive preservation of civic culture and trade, colonists were seeking to extend power and physical territory.

On more than one occasion, colonists such as the settlers in America, the Boers in South Africa and the conquerors of the Far East declared the independence of the territory they had just occupied, whether or not in separation from a ‘mother country’. The mother country was too far away to impose its control and its law on the colonies. The Great Trek in South Africa consisted of Calvinist Afrikaans-speaking families taking flight from the liberal English-speaking Cape, who would conduct armed-to-the-teeth expeditions and relieve the indigenous inhabitants of their lands. Before an organised state arose, these Boer states were improvised, temporary states with their own laws and leaders. 14 In North America, by contrast, the settlers formed a network of farflung towns which were ultimately responsible for conquering the New World. ‘Filibuster expeditions’ against Mexico were, after the formation of the United States, a semi-authorised combination of trade expeditions and adventurous quests. Quite a few private raids were launched from the USA against neighbouring friendly countries.

This was how the USA fixed its southern frontier, conquering Texas from Mexico for example. These conquered territories represented a type of free state in the initial period: flight from the mother country and the latter’s relative remoteness encouraged the emergence of autonomous regimes. 15 2.1.3 Refuges for dissenters Thanks to diplomatic inviolability or a policy of tolerance on the part of the formal government, some freezones also constituted potential places of refuge. This should not be underestimated for the development of a city. A city such as Amsterdam, for example, ‘grew up thanks to an unstable balance between government, freedom and trade. Tolerance was not so much a principle as a practical requirement: an open trading city is a meeting-point for a great

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many cultures, and cannot permit itself large-scale persecutions of non-conformists,’ argues Geert Mak. 16 The tolerant climate ensured a colourful collection of refugees: Portuguese Sephardic Jews who set up the diamond and tobacco trade, immigrants from the Southern Netherlands who stimulated the growth of the silk industry and of sugar refining - the whole world practised commerce in the city of Amsterdam. It was not just this tolerant climate that led to enormous growth: the ‘city of outsiders’ also maintained contacts with the inhabitants’ towns and villages of origins, ensuring it a powerful position in an extensive network. By contrast with the kind of territorial conquest and war referred to earlier, in this case ‘the daily conquest was achieved by means of trade’. And trade could only flourish through the application of liberties. Here is the historical proof that a freezone is the source of opulence and urbanism, rather than vice-versa.

A similar process occurred in cities such as Antwerp, Brussels and so on. Alongside this development, the 19th century also saw the genesis in Central and North America of widespread ‘maroon nations’, in which runaway slaves found a safe haven and which have sometimes preserved their own cultural characteristics, such as Moore Town, Jamaica, which is now protected by Unesco as a unique living cultural heritage. Finally, there is also the example of Britishoccupied Hong Kong, where the existing Chinese military post grew up to be an enclave under Chinese jurisdiction where fugitives were welcomed. Ultimately, it grew to be the most densely populated minicity in the world, with a large trading market: Kowloon Walled City.

It was demolished in 1992.

2.1.4 Urban breeding-grounds Former freezones were primarily akin to ‘new nation states’, in which the striving to gain a separate set of rules was translated physically into a separate constitution in a separate territory. Today’s freezones, however, are on a smaller scale. A lively squatters’ movement arose in the Netherlands in the Seventies. The shortage of housing that prevailed at that time led young people to occupy properties which were usually standing vacant for speculation purposes. The squatters’ movement had a clear cultural character in addition to its housing ideal. Numerous artists, musicians, students, foreign dissidents and refugees formed a new mixed, activist and dynamic culture.

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A squat is characterised according to ‘De vrije ruimte’ by: • Its desire to determine its own housing conditions and other living conditions • Its initiative-taking • Its collective element, its mutual solidarity • Social concern, engagement. 17 Squatting represents the appropriation of locations from the Establishment, and can be regarded as a contemporary, small-scale variant on the settlers or the port of refuge. In addition to these (usually temporary) appropriations from the civic order, squatting led to reforms of housing legislation (the anti-speculation clause), and in the Nineties people finally discovered the economic and cultural qualities of ‘breeding-grounds’. Breeding-grounds have become an element of the creative city. However, breeding-grounds always turn out to be the forerunners of commercially developed urban outgrowths (see the example of New York, section 5.4). Thus an urban planning paradox has arisen: cheap, autonomous premises are important for many activities of this type, yet success itself makes this very thing increasingly hard to find.

2.1.5 Interim conclusion In conclusion, historic freezones turn out to have been of particular importance for the origins of urban culture, the expansion of states, the protection of minorities and the renewal of the city. In short, they have been essential during all phases in the development of urban society. It is thus remarkable that they have been so overlooked in mainstream urban planning and development planning, or indeed have been hindered by regulation and formality. The reason for this is that freezones are associated with a ‘non-conformism’ which strives to assert its own right to exist as well as contributing to metropolitan life. Their hallmarks are flight from an oppressive society (bastions and safe havens), the marshalling of forces in a fight for the right to exist (conquest and reconquest), and the re-establishment of links with the surrounding world in one form or another. The current trend towards fragmentation and reclustering is thus on the agenda to an intensifying degree. And it is precisely in this reclustering process that the new planning is created. 18 Hence freezones are not just a feature of the history of the city: they are also of crucial importance for its future.

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2.2 Theory - the elusive freezone

2.2.2 Control avoidance

Given this background, it is remarkable that theorising about freezones has been limited. This may have something to do with the fact that a freezone is full of contradictions. It exists both thanks to and despite the world around it, it can continue to exist without any physical presence, it plays a tangible role in urbanism, yet at the same time it is intangible. Moreover, the development of the network society means that the freezone can no longer be identified with a single location, as was the case in the past. As mentioned earlier, creative people do not wish to be locked away in a specific definition or a so-called ‘breeding-ground ghetto’. The concept of the freeZONE seems for this reason to have been outstripped by that of the freeNETWORK. The ever more extensive wireless computer and telecommunication networks are proving of increasing importance for the traditional freezone players, subcultures and creative people.

On this point, theories are now sporadically emerging, among which that of Hakim Bey remains the most original. 19 He describes the characteristics of the current freezone (or freenetwork) above all in terms of its field of tension, with respect to what it is not.

The next associated characteristic of the autonomous zone is, according to Bey, the avoidance of control. The autonomous zone is essentially anti-planning and anti-bureaucracy. Relative shelter, obscurity and eccentricity are a historical requirement for experimentation and the undisrupted unfolding of (innovative, informal and not yet prevalent) activities. Technical control of locations has made great progress in recent decades thanks to ICT, however; communities can screen their own residential space with checkpoints, and the urban public space is full of observation mechanisms. The avoidance of control has most recently depended not so much on the creation of geographical enclaves (such as Christiania in Copenhagen, AVL-Ville in Rotterdam), as on an active avoidance behaviour in which certain locations, which may or may not be controlled, may play a role, but are used in a new, eccentric and often temporary manner. Despite this, certain activities need publicity, so a selective media approach is used. For each subculture, there are optimal locations for the distribution of stickers, flyers, posters and oral promotion. The new media also plays an important role in this, i.e. the internet and mobile phones, being used to define encoded or unencoded subdomains.

2.2.1 Virtual locations in networks Firstly, there is the tension in terms of place and location. Bey regards the relative elusiveness of a freezone as the key characteristic of what he (for want of a better term) simply calls the ‘autonomous zone’. This ‘autonomous zone’ may acquire a location somewhere at some point, but it primarily owes its existence to its fleeting network, which is only accessible to initiates (for example those who belong to a particular creative class). Breeding-grounds, churches of refuge, squats etc. are, Bey theorises, merely traces of where a freezone or autonomous zone has been. Autonomous zones therefore consist, as stated earlier, of a network of like-minded participants, who use a kind of database or pool of potentially suitable places. As a result, an autonomous zone is usually not a single physical place (by contrast with the traditional freezone or breeding-ground) but multiple locations, possibly in various cities, on different scales and in different capacities. Numerous initiatives start out with conspiracies and networks, before ‘ending up’ in a physical space. A location plays a role for the freezone as a podium, place for celebration, safe haven, meeting-place, workshop or production space. Depending on its role, it may have a more or less public significance, of either a permanent or a temporary nature.

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2.2.3 Isolation/participation The freezone’s third main characteristic is thus its relative isolation.

In principle, the freezone places itself outside mainstream society.

It is convinced of its own rightness and of the need for innovation, as otherwise the drive for innovation and individuality cannot be maintained. In an increasingly open and interdependent world, however, that isolation is increasingly coming under pressure.

Moreover, in order to implement this renewal and innovation, it will be necessary to participate in the mainstream world at specific moments. The need or impulse for autonomy is thus superseded on various fronts by a step towards serious participation. The manifestos of the cultural entrepreneurs in Rotterdam and the creative class in Eindhoven illustrate this. 20 Whereas invisibility used to be a key advantage at one time, nowadays the (municipal) authorities are actually expected to keep an eye out for small-scale experiments, and periodic visibility is important if a project is to flourish.

Additionally, the scale of the network has changed. Instead of a local context of properties, most freezones are now associated with a regional or even global network of like-minded participants. Half of a former squat such as the Poortgebouw in Rotterdam’s Kop van Zuid

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is occupied by foreigners, whether temporarily or permanently. The occupation of Leopold Station in Brussels during Belgium’s European presidency was used as an international forum for alternative European politics.

2.2.4 Interim conclusion These theoretical characteristics compound the difficulty of the search for freezones. After all, how can one actually propose fruitful interaction between city and freezone on the basis of characteristics such as permanent elusiveness, guerrilla tactics, fundamental uncontrollability and relative isolation and frontierlessness? We therefore need to impose a few restrictions. In this study, we have confined ourselves to those places, people and networks which are accessible and detectable and also generate added value for the city. In our search, we have confined ourselves to locations where living and working arrangements have momentarily run wild, to areas of illegal building, residual spaces and demolition areas, red-light districts, temporary occupations and/or attention-catching events, but we have then attempted to discuss the nature of the organisation behind these locations, in order to get an idea of how they are organised, how they are developed over time, with what intentions and/or (metropolitan) objectives, and with what image. In some cases, we ended up being referred on to freezones in an intriguing quest for the shadowy side of the city. Because what was crucial for us was those freezones (or freenetworks) which establish a link with improving conditions in the cities of Brussels and Rotterdam, i.e.

- Imparting identity to the city - Creating a lively environment - Generating public activities for the city, neighbourhood or network - Providing identity and/or space for an unusual or special lifestyle - Motivating people in time and space for a specific purpose, such as a festival, debate or meeting.

This calls for engagement more than it calls for isolation. In addition to their distribution across various focuses (economic, political, social, cultural and spatial), these criteria actually formed the key factors in the selection of the cases described in what follows.

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2.3 Definition of the issue - getting beyond planning misconceptions 2.3.1 The nature of freezones To sum up, freezones have always been of importance for the development and maintenance of urbanism, not vice-versa.

Amsterdam, Antwerp, Brussels and other cities have achieved greatness thanks in part to their international status as free havens and freezones for non-conformists and dissenters, who in addition to their radical lifestyle have also engaged in lively commerce and hence built up a global trade network. The tension between order and freedom is a central thoroughfare in the development of the city, not a blind alley (see Geert Mak et al.). This is no different today, but the context has changed. The information revolution has given businesses and households more freedom in their choice of location.

A lively urban environment thus becomes an important locational criterion, meaning that creative environments are of importance for the city’s economic development (see also Richard Florida et al.).

Hitherto, however, such creative environments have been examined mainly on the basis of mainstream and formal data (Kloosterman et al.). At its best, this means that only a simple, pared down aspect of the creative city is investigated. Because creative environments are not just patterned by the formal creative industry, but also and above all by informal creativity in the city. In addition it turns out that such informal activities may take shape in specific locations, but mainly depend on autonomous networks of like-minded participants. The condensation of freezone activities is not particularly determined by physical conditions, but rather by societal and informal forces in local and global networks of innovators.

2.3.2 Four planning misconceptions The way the planners and policymakers approach freezone activities is usually unsuitable. Familiar mechanisms and conceptions are often taken as the starting-point. The following four misconceptions are therefore often in evidence amid the growing interest in creative cities:

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1 Creative environments do not spring into being as a result of topdown measures: - by attracting multimedia and knowledge businesses, - by enticing events scheduling - by creating high-quality architecture and public space.

The key lies in bottom-up, spontaneously germinated initiatives which contribute to the genesis of creative environments. This requires space and freedom from constraints - ‘freezones’ - which cannot be planned or designed in advance. And this represents a paradox for urban policy and design.

2 Nor do creative environments come about by using subsidies to ensure cheap premises or offering a neatly pigeonholed function for government policy. The presumed contribution of freezones to the welfare and well-being of the urban living, working and residential climate often remains implicit, offering little foothold for policy assessment. Government attempts to directly stimulate new subcultures often run adrift on a preoccupation with regulations and initiatives which are merely temporary in duration. Cultural officers and municipal coordinators often have more of a role to play in internal fine-tuning rather than in the promotion of promising, truly innovative actions.

3 At the same time, though, creative milieus which are relevant to the city and city life equally do not come about via a laissez-faire policy or through deliberately leaving freezones to it. Pleas for such an approach are usually to do with opposition to the overtidy, over-regulated Netherlands rather than a genuine means of stimulating freezone activities. However, the situation in Belgium also demonstrates that deliberate restraint may stimulate numerous bottom-up initiatives and activities, but does not bring about a creative milieu that will make a difference. Between the Netherlands and Belgium, between stringent laws and inaction, there lies a whole range of possibilities which offer better prospects. We shall return to this subject later on.

represent the more nomadic element of society. An innovative attitude towards freezones as an indispensable factor for urbanism thus does not imply rivalry between cities, but rather the mutual interchange of knowledge and tactics, connecting with the creative networks which are developing right now (see also: DNA van Eindhoven).

2.3.3 Challenges Sensitivity thus needs to be developed in urban and planning policy regarding the conditions under which spontaneous bottomup initiatives arise. In our network society, creative milieus are increasingly decisive for a city’s metropolitan status. The formal, regulatory, ossifying, territorially-based aspect of urban policy needs to be complemented with far greater attention to the informal, pioneering, elusive, network-based, but equally quantifiable freezone issues. The question is no longer how we can free up a space for these issues, but rather what we actually have to offer the creative class (both the formal and the informal one). And this may require urban development and planning to be turned on its head. This forms the central issue of this study. In the first instance, it necessitates a greater understanding of the organisational capacity of freezones, their use of space and their potential contribution to the city or to urbanism.

This is the subject of the next two chapters, after which we shall return via a brief excursion into some practical models to this challenge: how to achieve a meaningful freezone policy which leaves planning misconceptions behind.

4 Finally, the presence of creative milieus does not represent a crucial factor in the competition between cities anyway. As mentioned earlier, the informal part of the creative class is not so much organised around places as around networks. Moreover, they the shadow city

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3 THE BRUSSELS CAPITAL REGION 3.1 Governmental context In the Brussels-Capital Region, an intricate interplay of balances holds sway in the area of urban policy. Since 1970 (when the first element of autonomy was introduced at sub-state level) and especially with the review of the constitution in 1993, Belgium has evolved from a unitary state to a federal state. However, that federation is not founded on a single principle, but is based on a compromise between two opposing starting-points: a geographicaleconomic one and a socio-cultural one. From the geographicaleconomic viewpoint, Belgium is subdivided into three Regions (Flanders, Wallonia and the Brussels-Capital Region), which hold powers in the areas of regional planning, housing, energy, employment, the economy, trade, development cooperation, public works and transport, and the overseeing of the municipalities and provinces. From the socio-cultural viewpoint, the country is likewise subject to a three-way division, but this time into Communities (the Flemish, French and German-speaking Communities), whose composition is slightly different and which hold powers in the areas of cultural affairs, welfare, health, education and language use. Alongside these there remains a Federal Government, which is gradually being depleted of its powers, but which decides on justice, police affairs, state finance, defence, foreign affairs and trade, as well as pensions, social security, public health and social integration. So it is that Belgium is currently run by 48 ministers and 5 secretaries of state: 15 ministers and 2 secretaries of state at federal level, 7 ministers in the Walloon Region, 9 ministers in the French Community, 10 ministers for the Flemish Region and the Flemish Community (these state bodies have merged), 3 ministers in the German-speaking Community, plus 5 ministers and 3 secretaries of state for the Brussels-Capital Region. At a lower level, the country also has 10 provinces and 589 municipalities, which hold different powers in each region. 21

Region lacks a provincial layer of government, because of which it has - alongside the regional powers - a number of agglomeration powers, yet the leaders of the Flemish and the French Communities concern themselves with socio-cultural affairs in Brussels.

Obtaining governmental consensus (particularly for cross-sectoral matters) is a recurrent (and multilingual) item on the agenda. To make the situation even more complicated, Brussels consists of 19 municipalities which still hold considerable autonomy with respect to the Region, and is also the headquarters of the European Union, the Belgian Government, the Flemish Region/Community, the French Community and the Brussels-Capital Region. All of these want to make their mark on their capital. At the same time, significant components of the capital lie outside the powers of the Brussels Region. For instance, Brussels Airport lies outside the territory of Brussels, and just 12 kilometres of the 72 kilometre-long Brussels Circular Road with virtually all the important motorway sections, including the stops for the regional public transport network (the GEN) and the associated housing conditions for apartments, offices and high-quality employment lie outside Brussels’ area of competence.

Flemish community french community Brussels capital region

3.1.1 Institutionology of Brussels

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In principle, this state system may look complex on paper; in practice, it leads at times (especially in Brussels) to breathtaking institutional sleight-of-hand. For example, the Brussels-Capital Region has an urban administration based on equal representation, consisting of 5 French-speakers and 3 Dutch-speakers drawn from 6 different political parties (La Mouvement RĂŠformateur, Parti Socialiste, Front National, Christen-Democraten Vlaanderen, Vlaamse Liberalen & Democraten, and the Socialistische Partij Anders). Moreover, the the shadowcity

Flanders

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3.1.2 Brussels as a mirror As a consequence, this development can at times prove a serious impediment to effective, open, decent government. The Regional Development Plan (GEWOP) for the Brussels-Capital Region may seek to come up with a comprehensive mobility concept, new development focuses and the protection of quality areas which are under high pressure (price and otherwise), and attempts may be made to follow on from this by coming up with inventive neighbourhood contracts which give space for local people’s initiatives. Yet a situation has arisen in which developments mainly come about through bilateral agreements, with a high degree of pragmatism and problem-solving through personal contacts.

Brussels planners may find this exasperating, but it is increasingly an everyday reality for the Brussels-Capital Region. Moreover, in view of the network-driven shifts which have taken place recently, this in fact appears to be becoming the institutional future for more and more metropolitan regions all over the world. 22 3.1.3 The recent planning history of Brussels in three phases A picture of the current situation is thus required. Since modernism and the top-down ‘planners model’, which left a considerable mark on the historical, geomorphological and social fabric of the city, Lagrou identifies three phases that have brought about this situation: • The period 1968-1985, which (as in other parts of the world) was characterised by the ‘small is beautiful’ approach, focusing on reutilisation rather than new construction, prioritising slow traffic, public transport and representation via local committees. During this period, partly in response to public pressure, foundations such as Inter-environment Bruxelles, the Brusselse Raad voor het Leefmilieu (BRAL), Ateliers de Recherche et d’Action Urbaines and the St.Lukasarchief were set up. These foundations and councils were partly publicly funded and were even able to appoint some of their governors to the minister’s personal staff. Nevertheless, when the expansion of the European Union site kicked in and a stalemate threatened between local action groups on the one side (supported by the green and left-wing parties) and the flexibility desired by the European Commission on the other side, the federal government intervened by giving planning permission for the European Parliament in 1987.

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• Under the influence of increasing mobility, however, this period also saw a growing exodus on the part of the more prosperous inhabitants and businesses towards the periphery, the Flemish and to a lesser extent the Walloon Region. The second period (1985-1998) was thus characterised for Brussels’ leaders (as elsewhere) by measures to stem this exodus and impart a new economic impulse to Brussels; partly in order to maintain a sufficient basis for the metropolitan facilities. According to Lagrou, this occurred via two main strategies: 1 Using the public-private partnership approach to provide the broadest possible multifunctional urban facilities, for instance in the areas around the European district, the HST-terminal Bruxelles Midi and the Noord-Station; 2 Extending the focus on vulnerable groups in society with a focus on middle and higher incomes: for example, project developers were compelled by planning guidelines to create 1 m2 of residential space for every 5 m2 of office space.

• To an extent, this political strategy was successful. However, because of the concentration of institutions in Brussels, there have also been many exceptions to the rule during each period.

In addition, the multinational companies and developers have now discovered Brussels as an attractive investment object. The current situation thus tends to be that the private sector invites the government to participate in specific projects, rather than vice-versa. According to Lagrou, one example of this is the initial skirmishes concerning a possible new HST terminal Noord, the forthcoming expansion of the European district and the T&T music centre (on the Thurn & Taxis complex). The liberal climate is said to encourage this. Personal networks are increasingly being incorporated into global planning networks, which may bring forward the prospects of further economic revitalisation, but only serve to make the chances of a much-needed integral, comprehensive regional development increasingly remote 23.

3.2 Freezoning Brussels This development is now also in evidence in other metropolitan parts of the world. The central pillar in the thinking behind this is that the ageing Keynsian welfare state, along with the associated hierarchical approach to cities and planning, has had its day. Under the influence of the global network economy and the network society, a new type of planning and urban policy is emerging, based on a relational

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approach to urban planning. This approach says that the city is in a relation, and hence also in competition, with numerous other localities in the world. Unique urban development projects should therefore be embarked upon in order to meet this rivalry with these other cities and the surrounding areas. Examples include projects such as Adlershof in Berlin, Ørestad in Copenhagen, the Olympic Village in Athens, the Central Business District in Birmingham, Abandoibarra in Bilbao, Donau City in Vienna, the Leopold District in Brussels or key projects such as the Zuidas and the Kop van Zuid in the Netherlands. Every European major city, and in fact every mid-sized city too, wants to develop at least one such project in order to achieve an international profile. Supposedly, this could result in an improved migration pattern, welfare and growth, for both the upper and the lower layers of urban society. The essential criterion is that these key projects must address the so-called economic, political and cultural elites of today’s frontierless network society, and that these elites and their milieu should bring the projects to life. According to the principles of ‘metropolitan governance’ this means that the hierarchical master planning and quality planning of the city as a whole is increasingly superseded by fragmentary project planning in horizontal alliances with project developers, international investors and designers from all over the world.

3.2.1 Glocalisation What is special about the situation in Brussels, however, is that alongside this practice of metropolitan governance, the practice of bottom-up development has also emerged, seizing upon the nooks and crannies and residual areas in the city in an unheard-of fashion.

Although partly informal and concealed in nature, these contribute to an inspiring and exciting urban climate. In the terminology of Erik Swyngedouw, one might say that in addition to the infiltration of global elites, along with the frequently associated privatisation of the public space at crucial locations in Brussels, new developments are also in progress which respond to a redefinition of the urban public space and local networks in other parts of this selfsame city. Swyngedouw connects this with the strange and paradoxical uniqueness of a metropolitan culture. On the one hand there is the marginalisation, separation and sometimes even oppression of specific population groups (more than in the countryside); and yet there is also a unique melting-pot of differences and of nonconformists which determines the power of the metropolitan culture.

In Brussels in particular, this power became particularly evident from the mid-Nineties. This may be connected with the unusual pattern the shadow city

of government in the Brussels-Capital Region, which in principle offers broad opportunities for self-activation and initiative in order to make something of hitherto overlooked parts of the city. Possibly it also had something to do with the choice of Brussels as European Cultural Capital 2000, which seems to have awoken potential which was apparently dormant. In any case, the creative climate of Greater Brussels no longer depends exclusively on the extent to which the global economic elite and the cultural highbrows can be locally tied in and facilitated. Increasingly, the cultural (sub)economy, spontaneous activities in specific locations and the reinforcement of local identities also play a central role in the strengthening of a positive metropolitan development dynamic. 24 3.2.2 Network Brussels This informal creative network in Brussels now consists of a large number of more or less temporarily constructed and more or less informal parties, sub-networks and initiatives, with, on occasion, specific relations and networks with other metropolitan freezones in Belgium and above all abroad. After the formation of NGOs in the Seventies, which tended to be motivated by residents’ organisations and based on the welfare state (BRAL, the St. Lukasarchief etc.), the years 1996-1998 in particular saw a rise in new, spontaneously emerging activities in the city. As well as art platforms and artists’ collectives such as Constant (1997), les Bains Connective (1997), Les Corsaires (1998), L’Emploi du moi (1998) etc., in the space of just a few years there was the creation of social freezones such as the Universal Embassy (1998), economic incubators such as Alter Ego (1998), action groups with an interest in planning issues such as Recyclart (1997) and Disturb (1998) and multimedia freezones such as ACSR (1996), Nova Cinema (1997), Foton Records (1998), etc. In their wake, numerous more or less temporary activities were generated, to the point where, around the turn of the millennium, Brussels could rightly claim to be the Bohemia and freezone capital of Europe. A great many of these action groups have since disappeared, but some remain active in the city, in some cases partly funded by the Flemish or French Community or the King Baudouin Foundation. Alongside these, current and in some cases past initiatives also seem to mean that the venerable BRAL and City Mine(d), which was established in 1997, also play a stimulating and activating role in the network.

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3.3 Urban impact

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The map depicts part of the situation of the dynamic freezone network in Brussels around 2002, with further descriptive notes on a selection in accompanying text boxes. Characteristic of virtually all these projects and initiatives is that they are still ruggedly independent, plus their maintenance of a firm (often antagonistic) distance from mainstream institutional or private (planning) practice.

The actions of the European, national, regional or local government are frequently regarded, rightly or wrongly, with suspicion. The initiatives of private-sector developers are seen as even more suspect. Public funding is only used to a limited extent, and as far as possible the attempt is made to remain autonomous, via independent channels. The amateur character of these groups is pronounced, and the innovators sometimes have a regular job alongside their freezone activities. This may be because only limited resources are available, or because great importance is attached to autonomy and informality. This does not detract from the fact that maximum results are achieved with limited resources: the leverage effect is considerable. New initiatives come into being from small beginnings, further contributing to an attractive, cultural metropolitan climate, which in turn attracts further creative potential.

At the same time, as in many other metropolises, multiculturalism in the Brussels-Capital Region has been making great strides forwards.

Belgium in general and the Brussels-Capital Region in particular is experiencing a decline in natural population growth and a rise in immigration. Almost 30% of the population of Brussels now consists of foreigners. This group, by contrast with many other metropolises, is of very mixed composition, however. The biggest group is formed by the Moroccans, followed closely by the French, the Italians, the Spanish and finally the Turks. With the recent expansion of the European Union, it is expected that this mix will become even more pronounced. Various freezone initiatives (such as the Zinneke Parade or Limite Limiet etc.) take advantage of this multiculturalism. The idea is to give the European capital a new identity, working from the bottom upwards, evolving, perhaps, from a fragmented, multicultural capital into a kind of ‘Mediterranean Capital of Europe’. 28

3.3.1 Contribution to a metropolitan climate?

3.3.2 Network stoppage?

A direct link of this nature can never be established and is of course not particularly active; yet since the late Nineties (the point at which freezone activities came strongly to the fore in Brussels), Brussels has also experienced a remarkable revival in several areas: - After going into steep decline during the Eighties and early Nineties, the city’s attractiveness to current residents and prospective new residents has grown strongly again since the late Nineties. Compared with 1998, the number of newcomers (mainly international) was up 12.5% in 2002; the increase in overnight stays was nearly 15%. 25 - At the same time, Brussels’ business position in the world has grown stronger. Since 1999, for example, Brussels has become the number two city in the world in terms of the organisation of international congresses, after the market leader Paris, but ahead of cities such as London, Vienna, Singapore, Berlin, Amsterdam and even Washington. In 2002, nearly 200 international conferences were organised in the Brussels-Capital Region; this means about four conferences per week, partly in combination with tourism, as discussed above. 26

Despite all these encouraging figures and high expectations, a wide abyss can still be observed between freezone practices and actual governmental practice in the Brussels-Capital Region. The abundance of bottom-up cultural freezone activities presented here gains scarcely any attention and/or headway within the mainstream planning machine. This may have something to do with the institutional two-way split between regions and communities, which also has the effect of splitting the policy areas of regional development and cultural policy. But it may also be related to the cultural activities themselves, which in point of fact are all doing their own thing, without exception. CityMine(d) appears willing to set up a certain amount of coordination here, but for all that gives the distinct impression that mutual connectivity and connection are mainly generated on the basis of personal and opportunistic networks.

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In addition, the economic situation in the Brussels-Capital Region has also markedly improved, at last. After decades of lean years, the region has experienced the greatest economic growth among the three regions since 1998. This growth is mainly situated in business services and the creative employment sectors. 27

This very factor thus seems to constitute an obstacle to further cultural development in Brussels. Because as Erik Swyngedouw has pointed out, interactive networks play a crucial role in both layers of urban culture (both that of the global elite and that of

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the subcultures). Just as weak cities are currently characterised by poor accessibility or insufficient connectivity to global networks, so weak neighbourhoods in the city are characterised both by the absence of the global elites and the absence of networks, especially those which establish contacts and relationships beyond the confines of local groups or interests. It therefore seems necessary to give these networks renewed attention, in terms of both their articulations and their various parties and stakeholders (see also our plea for intermediates in section 6.3). Following the pioneering phase, freezone practice in Brussels now seems to be facing its next challenge, in which, now that the stage is past where genuine freezone status had to be proven, a new meaning has to be given to new projects at both strategic and district planning level.

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MAP Freezones and sympathizers in Brussels 2002 based on interviews and internetresearch

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MAP

Freezones and sympathizers in Brussels 2002 based on interviews and internetresearch

p. 24 p. 26 p. 28 p. 29

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BOX 1 PORTAL: City Mine(d) as a priming device Who, what, where ‘City Mine(d) was set up in 1997 in order to support, initiate and/or produce socio-cultural projects, mainly in public spaces, in squares and neighbourhoods characterised by typical big-city problems, such as poverty, exclusion and a weak identity. Its organisational structure is flexible, network-oriented and rhizomatic, and its interventions are temporary in nature.’ City Mine(d) is convinced that the current trend in favour of market-oriented urban development has turned public space in Brussels into a marginal residual space. This is particularly apparent in weak neighbourhoods. As well as helping create a negative image, this compounds the already weak local identity. The projects of City Mine(d) are thus primarily oriented towards bringing about a process of positive identity-building, in order to increase local people’s involvement with the city, strengthen their image and hence, if possible, stimulate economic prosperity in the long run.

Network In order to achieve this, City Mine(d) has now set up a wide-ranging network with six members (both within and outside the city, both nationally and internationally) and has organised various projects, meetings, seminars and studies in the city.

It operates on the basis of five key principles: 1 a multi-faceted positive social vision of the city, 2 a qualitative response to the dreams and desires of local people, 3 provocative action in the city, 4 the use of residual spaces and urban fault-lines and 5 the ever-wider exploration of the city, centred around three fields of action, also referred to as chambers of action: • Het Steunpunt (The Support Point), which residents, artists and action promoters can contact with questions, requests for legal assistance or advice on the feasibility and practicability of their wishes and dreams; • De Katalysator (The Catalyst), in which City Mine(d) takes an active part in or facilitates projects, or sets them up in the city, or conducts studies of innovative forms and methods of urban development; • De Netwerking (Networking), in which it brings together various local people and project groups, facilitates international exchanges and brings local people and users into contact with formal bodies such as businesses and public services.

Since 1998, City Mine(d) has received a structural grant from the Flemish Community Commission via the Social Impulse Fund, but also receives supplementary financial support on an individual project basis from other parties such as the Brussels-Capital Region, the city of Brussels and the other Communities.

Projects which have been carried out in this way over the last six years include: Bunkersouple (a network of informal initiatives in the city), HUGO (a light-hearted caravan which travels through the city, bringing new life to somber locations). Limite Limiet (the construction of a lighthouse in the Brabant District in order to enhance the neighbourhood’s image and reinforce local communication), PleinOPENAir (the organisation of free open-air cinema, music and entertainment for residents who remain in the area during the summer months), Passerelle (a footbridge through the Leopoldstation to create a link between the European District and the city of Brussels) and the Uitrolbaar zebrapad (‘The Roll-Out Zebra Crossing’ - a mobile action facility in the city).

It also organises and contributes to debates about the city and facilitates various independent projects which partly continue to operate under the aegis of City Mine(d), such as PRECARE. This (sub)organisation of City Mine(d) supports young, eclectic and often informal cultural collectives with negotiations concerning the temporary use of empty buildings in the city. To this end it provides legal and economic advice, mediates between potential users and owners, maintains an up-to-date database and gives tips

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BOX 1

PORTAL; City Mine(d) als aanjager

or guarantees concerning the proper collective and safe management of the premises. Another element of PRECARE involves the generation of increasing synergies between the temporary use of buildings and the acknowledged enrichment of urban life. To this end there are now plans for PRECARE itself to start managing and using a building.

Impact With very slender resources, City Mine(d) has achieved a maximal result. The number of its cultural and social initiatives is quite extensive. Moreover, the importance of subcultures now also seems to be gaining recognition within the government.

To this extent, City Mine(d) has been a success story. However, this has now led to a closer reconsideration: should the current approach be continued, which can only be achieved by means of thoroughgoing formalisation, or should City Mine(d) cling to a more informal, activist and spontaneous status, in order to maintain the city’s critical engagement and creativity? An additional problem for PRECARE in particular is that the city is now proving attractive, which means that niche space for activities has become drastically restricted.

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BOX 2 URBAN CULTURE: the Hotel Tagawa squat Who, what, where Hotel Tagawa now consists of around 40 people who began squatting in the hotel in question on the Avenue Louise in early 2003.

They now have an oral agreement with the owner that they can remain there for the time being. In return, they pay him a token rent.

As well as providing the squatters with accommodation, the building’s cellar and the ground floor offer wide possibilities for meetings, parties, theatre and exhibitions. These activities are now being further developed and expanded. The group’s main objective is to highlight the lack of decent housing for the lower classes on the Brussels market and to develop alternatives. Its story started long before Hotel Tagawa, however, and arguably reached its climax earlier.

History of the network The forerunners of the group emerged from local committees which were active as far back as the Seventies in Brussels. In response to the building frenzy that was crushing everything in its path, these local committees took action against the associated loss of affordable rental accommodation in the city. When the results of such action proved disappointing over the years, a more radical form of action emerged. This was a type of ‘owner-squatters cooperative’, which, in addition to the social objective of housing, also set its sights on improving living conditions in local areas and even on setting up and operating a number of community facilities such as a crèche, an inn, a street-cleaning service, a shopping service, a local hairdresser and a local festival. The first project was run just behind the Berliamont building in the European District. As a result, social housing and neighbourhood contracts were included in reconstruction and redevelopment plans.

Once this result had been achieved and redevelopment plans had been presented with a more social face, part of the group relocated to the Complex Drapié, named after the main street within a block at the start of the Avenue Louise, opposite the Hilton Hotel. This location, where a few of the original inhabitants still remained, had been purchased by an international project developer, which wanted to create a shopping centre, luxury apartments, a theatre, cinema, restaurant and so on there. The group squatted in a number of strategically located premises and developed a programme similar to the one at the Berliamont site. It received increasing support from the existing residents, who became more active as a result. At the same time, a sort of development cooperative was created from among the local residents, who had sufficient know-how and manpower to undertake the renovation work themselves. Part of the group also had cultural interests, and set about organising cultural events in the district.

Impact The club had four spearheads: • the owner-squatters cooperative • the neighbourhood committee of local residents • the neighbourhood renovation developer and • the cultural action group.

This movement became so powerful that it also entered politics (especially the Green Party), enabling greater pressure to be applied on the international project developer. Thanks to the squatters group, the municipality’s hand was actually strengthened, and the project developer finally climbed down and devoted a part of the project to social housing. Its condition for this was that the squatters should leave. Around twenty members of the group then squatted in the Hotel Tagawa with the aim of setting up a follow-on project in the city.

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BOX 1

PORTAL; City Mine(d) als aanjager

Since Hotel Tagawa, the group has attracted increasing attention from the outside world. The current situation is described by one of the group’s sponsors as a crisis, however. There are several reasons for this: • in the current project, the group has lost contact with the neighbourhood and local residents • the building is so big that it really has to be regarded as a large-scale communal housing project, whereas it used to be a collection of individual dwellings • splits are now starting to prevail within the group itself about how to use common funds. One part wants to promote individual housing, while another wants to highlight the importance of ‘freezone activities’.

In addition, a number of members are now starting to become settled. At present it is still unclear which direction developments will take. However, it seems likely that the group will move in two divergent directions. One part may commence new activities elsewhere, while Hotel Tagawa will then be able to offer cheap housing to artist-squatters, possibly with a flourishing and creative cultural community on the ground floor and in the cellar.

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BOX 3 SPACE: DiStUrb urbanism as protest Who, what, where DiStUrb is a more or less informal (internet) network of, at present, seven committed urban developers, architects, geographers and historians of architecture, who are interested in development issues in Brussels. They are primarily taking action against a number of urban projects which are being developed on the margin of urban public space and are often based on a one-sided or inadequate treatment of the urban context. Its objectives are: • to defend and promote healthy debate about Brussels • to combat facile preconceptions about the city • to promote the idea that the city is complex and requires action of a more specific nature • to facilitate the exchanging of ideas about possible alternatives • to publicise this exchange and where necessary prompt action This is done mainly via its website, the press (newspapers, radio, television), the organisation of debates and the holding of competitions.

Network DiStUrb (di-Stedebouw Urbanisme) has existed since 2001 and during this time has crank-started the debate in the city about: • Brussels’ policy on tall buildings in connection with the Justice building • the disneyfication of the Van Kuyck building • the renovation of the Champs de Mars • the demolition of the Lotto tower and the Martini tower • the renovation and future of the European District Recent projects include: • the renovation of Place Flagey, for which a competition was organised. This yielded numerous alternatives to a proposal whose main point of focus was the underground reconstruction of the metro and carpark; • the debate about the redevelopment of the Rijksadministratief Centrum (RAC) on the edge of the city, which was actually given away by the Region to the Dutch project developer Breevast (the RAC’s current owner), which had virtually been given carte blanche for the redevelopment.

DiStUrb organises these actions on a non-profit basis. Each action is therefore organised in conjunction with other parties, such as City Mine(d) for the debate about the RAC and the neighbouring College and relevant area of the City for the competition about Place Flagey.

Impact With regard to the latter three projects especially (European District, Place Flagey and RAC), diStUrb has exerted a growing influence. With regard to the European District, the minister-president has now agreed that the redevelopment of the European District will be undertaken on the basis of the wishes and requirements of the local community, with regard to Place Flagey questions have now been asked in the municipal council, despite the fact that the zoning plan and building permission had already been granted, and with regard to the RAC, the redevelopment plans are now being reviewed. Among both the city’s inhabitants and users and its politicians, there are signs of increasing interest in better, more context-specific planning. However, the initiators are now also being given projects themselves and roles in the revitalisation of Brussels, and there is a danger of self-interest affecting their impartiality.

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BOX 4 SOCIAL: The Universal Embassy for network people Who, what, where Universal Embassy owes its origins to an action which occurred in 1998. At that time, a number of asylum-seekers occupied a church to draw attention to their hopeless situation. Various native-born volunteers united around this action, who wanted to give these people legal help and financial support.

They believed that in the age of the frontierless network society, the concept of citizenship needed to be reformulated, rather than remaining tied to the state’s outdated criteria.

At the time, this action caused quite a stir, with the result that the people concerned were allowed to remain where they were for the time being. However, a fire broke out in the church in 1999, making their continued presence there impossible. By chance, the Somalian Embassy in Brussels was vacated at around the same time, due to internal troubles in that country. The departing ambassador handed over the keys to the embassy to one of the people involved in the asylum-seekers’ action. It was decided to house the people in the embassy.

Network Around eight households now live in the embassy, which has also developed into a centre for impartial help and advice in connection with asylum and deportation procedures. An attempt is also being made to draw attention to the struggle for a fair global citizenship via demonstrations, pamphlets and a website. The group also seeks to set up cultural activities with other freezone groupings. Thus in January 2004 there was an event that was organised jointly with NOVA CINEMA. The Somalian Embassy has thus become a pressure group or embassy for the universal rights of the network citizen.

Impact However, one of the sponsors behind the Universal Embassy recognises the fragility of the set-up: • Firstly, the embassy remains the property of the Somalian government. Once this has set its own house in order, it will reclaim the building for its own representatives, at which point the initiative will have to disappear.

• Secondly, the initiative is based entirely of the disinterested cooperation of a number of activists. Should these depart for any reason, the asylum-seekers will be left to fend for themselves again.

• Thirdly, the politicians and police are currently turning a blind eye to the initiative. Should internal strife break out or a less tolerant political climate develop, eviction by force is not out of the question.

• Fourthly, the small-scale nature of the initiative means that it is primarily confined to the embassy itself. It has so far proved impossible to create a broad-based movement or network in the city of Brussels itself, let alone to promote or activate the potentially multicultural climate as a powerful force for the good in the varying fortunes of the city.

Thus the future of the initiative remains uncertain and its scope limited.

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inleiding

DE SCHADUWSTAD

4 THE ROTTERDAM REGION 4.1 Governmental context The second case is that of the metropolitan region of Rotterdam. By contrast with the Brussels-Capital Region, a powerful planning and urban development tradition has been in place for a long time here, deployed and driven by the metropolitan authorities. Moreover, the outlook was until recently (albeit with a few variations here and there) very clear. The metropolis was seeking to transform itself from an exclusive port city into a more varied knowledge city with associated business services and creative milieus. This aim was high up on the policy agenda right from the early Eighties.

A long-standing reconstruction process had left the city with a modern image and a high-quality architectural environment, but the cultural climate was disproportionately limited. The first steps towards improving this climate were taken with the enhancement of the cultural institutes and the reprofiling of city-centre districts with cultural potential such as Waterstad and Museumkwartier. In 1982, the AIR event attracted attention to the development of Kop van Zuid, which was subsequently upgraded under the inspirational leadership of Riek Bakker into an urban ‘grand project’. For the development of the leisure industry, Rotterdam’s development agency, the OBR, set up a unique department that is often advanced as a national textbook example of city promotion. This department represents a unique combination of economic development with leisure industry and planning issues.

One element of the approach used was the promotion of festivals.

The current successes in this area contrast strongly with the difficult start experienced by Rotterdam’s festivals. The promotion of Rotterdam Festival City was on the agenda for a long time, but the image appeared to have turned sour, thanks in part to the bankruptcy of Rotterdam’s 650th anniversary celebrations (Rotterdam 1990).

However, things took a turn for the better with the establishment of the Rotterdam Festivals Foundation, which has now created a range of successful regional and international festivals. This should also not be allowed to disguise the fact that during this period festivals also emerged on a bottom-up basis, such as the phenomenal hype around 1995 concerning Gabberhouse, which has been responsible for parties attracting enormous crowds in the region ever since.

A third sector which has received strong encouragement from the government is that of film, multimedia, graphics, product design and architecture. By contrast with the situation in cities such as Amsterdam or The Hague, the main favourable factor in Rotterdam the shadow city

was the presence of an outstanding breeding-ground thanks to the availability of good, inexpensive premises and the open, unpolished working atmosphere. In this field, Rotterdam is a serious rival to the Dutch capital. However, the sector is also heavily promoted by the municipality itself. For instance, Schiecentrale/25kV was set up with the help of a municipal grant, and is also operated with contributions from the municipality. At the same time, the multicultural society is also being increasingly profiled in the municipal promotional policy, and in specific locations a select group of (multi-)cultural entrepreneurs is being encouraged to set up trendy establishments in the hotels, restaurants, cafes, catering and clubs sector.

4.1.1 The end of an era?

Whereas the phenomenon of the cultural capital (and especially the build-up to it) marked a new beginning in Brussels, the same occasion represented the end of an era in Rotterdam. The numerous cultural facets that had come to the fore in Rotterdam over the course of 20 years were aptly summed up in the year of the cultural capital 2001 under the motto, ‘Rotterdam is many cities’. 2001 was an ambitious project which experienced numerous hassles in the run-up period. However, the power of 2001 lay in the combination of the local and the global, of establishment and anarchy, with the versatility of the youth culture and the full breadth of the city on display.

Yet at around the same time it was becoming increasingly apparent that the city was unable to simply shed its roots in industrial labour.

Despite all the forces behind the turbulent growth of the transit city, the modernity of the reconstructed city, the (social and physical) innovations within the city, the revitalised city’s ‘grand projects’ and the impulses towards creating a city fit to be lived in, Rotterdam has ceased to simply fall in with the wishes of the local authorities. The city is emerging from a deep abyss, but is still regarded as the least attractive of the four major cities in the Netherlands. 29 Of these big four cities, it is still the traditional tail-ender in socio-economic terms.

Along with Amsterdam, it has the highest proportion of homeless and prospectless people. Whereas Amsterdam (as well as cities such as Brussels) is able to rely on a very wide array of foreigners, Rotterdam is notable for its large proportion of non-Western ethnic minorities (33%), including a relatively large group of underprivileged people. The high percentage of the underprivileged in particular makes Rotterdam one of the most crime-ridden, violent cities in the Netherlands.

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4.1.2 From top-down to bottom-up?

This has raised new issues in terms of quality of life (i.e. freedom from the fear of crime) within the city in connection with the planned large-scale Urban Development Projects (UDPs). Leefbaar Rotterdam (Liveable Rotterdam), the leading party in municipal politics, has made safety and the maintenance of law and order (zero-tolerance), the integration and distribution of ethnic minorities and if possible even a summit on ethnic minorities its top policy priorities. As a result, some metropolitan projects (such as the development of the station area) have been put on hold, while others have been fast-tracked. The same has been true for bottomup projects. One example here is the “groeibriljanten” (or growth diamonds) project, in which the municipal authorities actively invited the city’s residents and stakeholders to come up with creative proposals for improving the urban milieu. To fund this initiative, the municipalities earmarked 25 million euros in 2003, originating from a hereditary lease conversion, to finance up to 10 projects. The criterion was that these initiatives must already have been started, and that they should involve an equivalent private-sector input with the maximum possible economic spin-off. Moreover, the projects had to contribute to the enhancement of the social fabric, and have a strong geographical significance for the city and a high degree of innovativeness. The call for projects resulted in 73 applications, 7 of which have now been proposed for funding and 1 of which has been voted by the public as its favourite.30 In short, a powerful realisation is now emerging in Rotterdam’s government that the existing city must be the starting-point for its actions. However, consideration is now also being given to a new policy on the part of the planning authorities of holding back from intervention. The point has been taken on board that the city no longer needs to be ‘made or planned’ in every case. Rather, the task now is to channel more energy from the city itself. The municipal authorities’ current vision for the city now emphasises two notions in connection with a living Rotterdam: • knowledge (and especially mutual influencing, convincing and enrichment) as a raw material for the urban economy and • the art of living together in a city in various respects (binding and bridging).

How this will be elaborated remains to be seen at this point. However, there seems to be a growing appreciation that for both notions, bottom-up activities and freezones (as defined earlier) and above all their underlying strategies and ways of operating should play 32

a crucial role in the city’s development. Nevertheless, the central question remains, ‘What can it do for the city (or the municipality)?’, rather than ‘What can the city do to bind the more nomadic, elusive sectors to it?’. Given the importance of creative milieus for its attractiveness in a frontierless network society, the last question seems to be becoming increasingly important. It requires a new outlook with a far more nuanced approach to concepts such as safety, liveability and cultural policy, for the simple reason that context and milieu - rather than direct financing - are such vital factors for the emergence and persistence of creativity.

4.2 Freezoning Rotterdam This is particularly true in the case of Rotterdam. Because while we were surveying Rotterdam’s cultural, economic, political and social freezones, we were surprised to stumble on a virtual inexhaustible supply of initiatives in this metropolis. These initiatives also extend over a broad range. Only a restricted, representative sample has been included in the accompanying text boxes. In part, perhaps, this is the outcome of the persisently pursued cultural policy of the last twenty years. Additionally, the ungenerated gentrification in Amsterdam also appears to have played a role in shifting creative initiatives from Amsterdam to Rotterdam. Again, Rotterdam profiles itself as a business-friendly city with a relatively inexpensive stock of housing and business premises. Much is possible, thanks also in part to the temporary availability of unoccupied buildings due to (delays in) the planned major projects, such as in the Kop van Zuid formerly and the station area at present. Since the early Nineties in particular, when the new policy began to bear fruit and space for new initiatives was starting to decrease elsewhere, we have seen vigorous development in the innovative creative sector in Rotterdam emerging; firstly within the trend-setting graphic sector, in product design, urban development, architecture and landscape design, and later on too, after the gabber parties referred to earlier, in the multimedia and club scene.

4.2.1 The specific character of freezone practices in Rotterdam Among those in the know, accordingly, Rotterdam has long since been recognised as the place to be. However, this has by no means always been appreciated by the outside world and by the man in the street. Amsterdam is still seen as the cultural freezone of the Netherlands, not Rotterdam. So far, Rotterdam has had trouble in

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shaking off its coarse working man’s identity, its image of sunbeds and late-night shopping, of rolled-up sleeves and ‘deeds, not words’.

Despite this, the city is teaming with creative life beneath the surface, something which, incidentally, says something about the relationship between policy and the positioning of Rotterdam on the international agenda.

In business-friendly Rotterdam with its record of small independent entrepreneurs, freezones and breeding-grounds have a strong presence on the informal and alternative circuit. You have to be in the know, otherwise a lot passes you by in this city. Yet in comparison with Brussels, the relationship between the government and the freezones is often much more direct. Partly due to targeted government intervention and the associated possibilities for grants and so on, adversarial initiatives are much less in evidence against mainstream planning or policy practices: rather, an attempt is made to obtain as much government support as possible right from the outset, or to arrive at mutual working and implementation arrangements through dialogue. The wide availability to date of inexpensive living, workshop and working premises (especially on abandoned port and industrial land) has also meant that the squatters’ movement is not so highly developed in Rotterdam as in cities such as Amsterdam or Nijmegen. There are also various portals supported in part by the government - such as the residential commune store - which help alternative cohabitation groups to find accommodation.

This characterises Rotterdam’s freezone network, in both a negative and a positive sense. Compared with Brussels, freezone practices in Rotterdam are far less original, defined according to the terms of theorists such as Hakim Bey. Projects soon enter into direct arrangements with the municipality and/or come within the scope of a policy of toleration, as for instance with the AVL-Ville and the Quarantaine area. Another telling example here is the Manifesto 2002, drawn up by the cultural and creative stakeholders in the city in order to encourage the city to take a number of creative measures. 31 On the other hand, this produces far more possibilities for interaction with the local area and a contribution to the socio-cultural metropolitan climate in Rotterdam, albeit in alternative circles.

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4.2.2 Circuits in networks In short, by contrast with Brussels, freezone practices in Rotterdam are far less rooted in civil or multicultural and planning-issue resistance to intentional or unintentional injustices. The freezone approach in Rotterdam consists to a much greater extent of the alternative circuit, which is partly also maintained with government subsidies. That circuit consists of a number of alternative clusters based around particular themes (such as art, the club circuit, multimedia, product design, etc.) or geographical areas (such as Charloise, Stadshavens, AVL-terrein, etc.) which transform specific locations in the city into interesting production sites, podiums or condensation points. The Poortgebouw, Locus 010 in the Hufgebouw, the Quarantaine land and the B.A.D. foundation described in the accompanying text boxes are all inspiring buildings in special settings. The temporary use of an old cinema as the Calypso encounter point during R2001 is now outdone by Off_Corso, an events organisation with a strong intermediary function for upand-coming DJs, VJs, multimedia and sound and light laboratories, also temporarily housed in an old cinema. Moreover, amid the club circuit is situated a nationally renowned Rotterdam social safety net, the Rev. Visser’s St. Paul’s Church, as a special type of freezone in a network of (in)formal care institutions. Each of these freezones is located in specific places, but derives its significance above all from extensive, frontier-crossing networks. In addition, Rotterdam’s festivals play a significant role, especially for the multicultural groups in the city. Ethnic freezones are characterised by a double locality: a local cultural expression in festivity venues or similar locations and the Solero Summer Carnival, and international trading and the maintenance of contacts with locations far removed from Rotterdam.

This results now and then in remarkable import and export businesses or hotel, restaurant, café and catering businesses which source raw materials from abroad.

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4.3 Urban impact The accompanying map and text boxes describe this specific characteristic of Rotterdam’s freezone practices in more detail with respect to a number of initiatives. Those initiatives turn out to have a high capacity for self-organisation, but a considerable number of business organisations are also in evidence. Philanthropy is combined with an independent income wherever possible, and the generation of broad-based support.

Although a direct link is hard to establish in this case too, the impact of the freezones on Rotterdam thus seems relatively high. The city’s attractiveness may be the lowest among the Big Four cities according to Nyfer’s municipal atlas, but compared with the early Nineties it has come on in leaps and bounds. Among young people in particular, Rotterdam is now highly rated. This is clear not just from the power of attraction of the city’s vocational training opportunities on young people, but also from the relatively high number of business startups. 32 In addition, the number of visits to the city has risen sharply over the past ten years. After Amsterdam (approx. 8 million), Rotterdam attracts the most visits (approx. 6.5 million). The figure has grown by almost 35% since 1992. The number of overnight stays in Rotterdam has nearly doubled in the same period. It may be added that Rotterdam also has the highest visit frequency in the Netherlands (meaning the number of visitors who return for a second visit). The big crowd-pullers are Diergaarde Blijdorp, Ahoy Rotterdam, the Casino, the Marathon and the Solero Summer Carnival, as well as attractions such as the cinema. Thanks to the Rotterdam film festival, the city can claim the title of film capital of the Netherlands. But the level of visits to museums such as Boymans van Beuningen, the Kunsthal Rotterdam and the Nederlands Architectuur Instituut is rising fast. 33 At the same time, with around 1 million visits a year, Rotterdam has one of the biggest club circuits in the Netherlands. 34

bodies in the Netherlands. When it comes to urban development firms, Rotterdam outstrips Amsterdam somewhat, whereas Amsterdam leads in the other design sectors. 35 Rotterdam’s current economic growth forecast for the next five years may be 0.2% less than the year before in European Prospects 2003, but with an expected annual economic growth of 2% still scores significantly better than cities such as Amsterdam or Brussels (both around 1.6%), or indeed Berlin (0.2%). 36 After business services and transport and distribution, this is also due to the sector of ‘Culture, recreation and other services’. The number of jobs in this sector in Rotterdam has grown by nearly 50% over the past ten years, incidentally. 37 Thus there is definitely a Bohemian side to Rotterdam. Although this is scarcely visible, and tends to be identified with below-thesurface activities and closed circuits, the freezones’ contribution to the urban milieu is beyond dispute, and these freezones also have various possibilities open to them for forging direct links with more widely accepted forms of cultural, artistic, social and even economic expression. The question that one may ask, therefore, is what the city’s significance can be for these sectors. The question is particularly relevant in view of the climate of decreasing tolerance in the Netherlands (in terms of environmental protection and crime, but also in socio-cultural terms) which tends to exert a repellant rather than a binding effect on the more elusive element of the creative sector. New issues thus appear to be on the agenda in areas such as forestalling frustrations, binding and anchoring creative growth potential to the city as effectively as possible and patterning those activities with a view to promoting urban life. In view of the sensitivity of these issues, examples of success stories are sought. In the following chapter we will therefore take a look at how other cities handle their freezone policy.

Furthermore, the municipality has become strong in multimedia, graphics and the design and building sectors. Renowned representatives of the Droogdesign movement are based in Rotterdam, and architectural firms originating in the city such as OMA, MVRDV, WEST 8, etc. are now world-famous. Along with Amsterdam, Rotterdam also has easily the most architectural, landscape design, interior design, graphic design and industrial design firms, to judge from registrations with the relevant official 34

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MAP

Rotterdam formal culture (gray), squatters (blue) and mentioned casestudies (pink)

Off_Corso p. 39 Area OIO p. 42 Pauluskerk p. 43 Pier 80 p.40

Stichting B.A.D. p. 36

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BOX 5 SPACE: The building as source of inspiration - foundation B.A.D. Who, what, where Foundation B.a.d. is an artists’ collective which was set up around 15 years ago by a number of students at the Willem de Kooning Academie in Rotterdam. Each member of the collective works individually, jointly or with other parties from outside. The original idea with regard to these activities was and remains to create sufficient studio space for projects and for mutual exchange, inspiration and the common use of expensive facilities and equipment. The collective started out squatting in a bathhouse, and subsequently moved to somewhat more practical premises on Van Mekerenstraat in Crooswijk. However it has now relocated to a squat in a school in Charlois, where it has more space for its own studios and for joint project development, as well as offering six guest studios for artists from elsewhere who want to work and stay in Rotterdam for a while. Since 1991 this has led to a steady influx of artists, at first from within the Netherlands and then later from abroad too. Some of these artists have now settled permanently in Rotterdam. The collective has also loaned out the school’s gym to the VPRO for occasional filming purposes.

Network The Foundation B.a.d. network is relatively straightforward. The foundation consists of the eleven founding members, each with his or her own circle of friends and networks. Three of the eleven members live in the collective as well as working in it. Thanks to its guest studios, this network has been expanding massively every year. B.a.d. Enterprise has now also been created, consisting of a network of artists, organisers, analysts, editors, fashion designers, DJs, architects, experts, stylists, photographers, technicians and designers, who by working together create more possibilities than Foundation B.a.d. would be capable of on its own. This example is now starting to have an impact elsewhere, and similar locations have now been set up elsewhere in Rotterdam, as well as in Breda, Den Bosch and The Hague.

Impact This freezone is not particularly held together by a well thought-out, consistent social, political or even cultural ideology. B.a.d.’s main goal is entirely pragmatic: to offer sufficient practical space for its own and joint projects. Inexpensive space for both private and collective work and for living purposes is thus central. The collective has appropriated this space for itself - in other words, squatted. Government support was not needed for this. Yet B.a.d. is not parasitical in nature. On the contrary, with the development of its premises (for example the playground and the hang-out place for young people), plus projects in and around Charlois, it contributes to the well-being and the rising reputation of the South. And with its guest studios, it is also providing input to Rotterdam’s (inter)national artistic profile.

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BOX 5 SPACE: The building as source of inspiration - foundation B.A.D.

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BOX 6 SPACE: surgeries for alternative lifestyles

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BOX 7 CULTURE: the event as generator - Off_Corso Who, what, where Off_Corso - located in the former Corso Cinema on Rotterdam’s Kruiskade - is regarded in the first instance as a four-person project with an extensive network. It is described as a ‘next generation entertainment environment’. What this means is that Off_Corso is an intermediary between artists in the fields of audio, video, computers and culture on the one side and business, commerce and the general public on the other. With this purpose, Off_Corso organises dance events, product presentations, fairs, debates, exhibitions, cultural festivals, concerts, parties, weddings and office parties. At the same time, its facilities include a lounge and, within the building, workspace for project development and innovations. Off_Corso receives sponsorship for these activities, but also stands on its own two feet to a significant extent. It also offers the possibility for alternative and up-and-coming artists in Off_Corso’s vicinity or network to ensure their livelihood.

Network Off_Corso is the centre of an extensive network of graphic and digital designers, events, organisations and artists. Depending on the event, business party or exhibition in question, Off-Corso creates a platform where artists, designers and commercial technology can come together to develop original ideas and cultural concepts. The aim is to promote a new dimension in the field of multimedia, design and communication, as well as to develop new entertainment concepts which appeal to the business sector and inspire the general public.

Impact Although Off_Corso cannot be described as a freezone itself - the building is properly sublet (temporarily) from its actual owner, Pathé, and its operating licences have been acquired properly - it nonetheless provides space for other freezones to carry on developing their innovative and creative activities, concepts and inventions with modest means. In fact Off_Corso makes some of these activities possible, encouraging artists and bringing them into contact with the consumer and with potential backers. Thus it is not so much its space or building that is crucial, but rather its cultural platform function and the associated wide-ranging innovative network. It could also be regarded as a virtual network with events at varying locations. Moreover, it is highly effective at what it does. In barely three years it has, along with other initiatives, made a significant contribution to Rotterdam’s positioning as a cutting-edge city in the fields of dance, multimedia and alternative design. The big challenge now seems to be to hold on to this innovativeness and further develop it via open networks.

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BOX 8 ETHNICITY: the transnational locality - business and festivities Who, what, where The multicultural make-up of Rotterdam’s society is definitely a living reality. The influence of this society on the use of urban space has been the subject of only scant coverage, let alone in connection with multicultural freezone activities. However, there have been a few studies which serve as a starting-point, looking at ethnic citizenship, festivity venues and the summer carnival, as well as at phone centres, entrepreneurs and trading markets.

Business: network Entrepreneurs from ethnic minorities, compared with those of native Dutch extraction, have more of an orientation towards family and ethnic networks and are characterised by a combination of (informal) production and trade. There would be no economy without informal trade (to adapt a saying of Saskia Sassen). The informality on the Pier 80 market in Rotterdam includes informal employment of family members, moonlighting and smuggled or pirated goods; the market is awash with all kinds of illegal trading, according to a research of Engelsbergen. These activities are not the exclusive preserve of the ethnic minorities, however, and illegal practices, to use the name applied to freezones by the tax department, are not considered in further detail here. Transnational migrant entrepreneurs create an off-the-record advantage out of their ties with the country of origin. One example of a transnational business is the phone centre, recently brought into disrepute through criminal telecom practices, money-changing and ‘hawala’: money-laundering.

Business: impact Businesses run by migrants are one of the most striking facets of the multicultural street scene. Over the years, a shift has taken place in Rotterdam whereby mainstream chains have moved to the Lijnbaan, Zuidplein and Alexandrium and the former shops have become dominated by migrants. This was what prompted the AIR event ‘Stad op straat’ (‘City on the street’), which focused on the West Kruiskade in an attempt to enhance the multicultural street’s profile. In informal practice, barbers, cafés and phone centres turn out to fulfill an important social role in terms of mutual contact within an ethnic group. These are partly combined with other functions and forms of public meeting-places for particular ethnic groupings. The ‘dispersion’ study of the Cap Verde community in Rotterdam and the phone centres traces in detail how a member of this community who steps in off an anonymous Rotterdam street to make a phone call to a remote family member can also choose from a growing number of facilities in the phone centre, which doubles up as hairdresser, shop, video hire centre, internet café, media store and bureau de change. These locations are held together powerfully by both the ethnic culture and the entrepreneurs’ family ties. The network on the street or between different ethnic groups is weak.

Festivals: network The attitude of the municipality of Rotterdam to ethnic festivities has varied. In 1986, the summer carnival came to Rotterdam to stay, partly thanks to an active, cosmopolitan attitude on the part of the municipal authorities. Previously, the festival had been made possible, after a number of false starts, by the Antillean community, in some cases together with criminal sponsors. In 1986, the carnival was embedded in the local culture of the Kunstmarkt and in an international movement of summer carnivals (with the Notting Hill Carnival in the UK as a major example), and became profitable for the first time. The summer carnival with its parade and the battle of the drums is not the only event: it is preceded by the election of the queen (and the Tumba and Calypso king), and the drumband rehearsals. In Rotterdam, these preparations usually take place in festivity venues. Most of these turn out to be ethnically divided, culture-specific circuits. A Turkish festival is unlikely to be held in a festivity venue run by a Hindustani. As well as events with bands and DJs, these venues are also the location for religious and traditional celebrations, music and dance parties, presentations and private family parties. Virtually all of them are located in or around the Spaanse Polder, away from

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residential areas and public transport. Despite this, they are important meeting-places for a large area around Rotterdam and constitute an organic link between supply and demand. Communication is routed via the flyer circuit in barber shops, tokos, migrants’ organisations, on the streets and via the relevant ethnic radio station.

Festivals: impact The influence of the summer carnival on the city’s attractiveness is obvious. The summer carnival has now become the city’s biggest event, and one of the biggest in the Netherlands. The informal character it displayed during the early years, and which still exists at Notting Hill, has been replaced by an autonomous Caribbean-Dutch bonanza.

The festivity venues have an important role to play among the various ethnic groupings. The main cultural feast days such as carnival, keti koti and holy phagua are often booked up years in advance. However, the impediments are often considerable. The venues sometimes fall foul of fire and safety regulations, and despite their peripheral location, vandalism, resulting in the closure of some venues. The role of the venues is obvious, and their location should play a more important role in the city, comparable with the importance accorded to mosques, for example. After all, they represent important meeting-places now and in the future.

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BOX 9 ECONOMY: Shoot for the moon - incubator Area 010 Who, what, where Area 010 started out as an initiative of two students at the Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam, set up as a Small Business Link to promote mutual exchange of know-how and the tapping of mutually suitable facilities for business start-ups from the university. Area 010 has evolved to become a project of the Stichting Startershuis, in which the INHOLLLAND College, the Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam, the Rotterdam College and the municipality of Rotterdam have joined forces. The purpose of the foundation is to encourage innovative, knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship in the region. As well as offering cheap premises for a one-year period, Area 010 focuses on three things: giving advice about business affairs, enhancing market legitimacy with a view to winning the first customer and offering early information about market trends. In addition, Area 010 can be used for mediation with financing proposals and the development of a business plan. There were also plans to create a link with the Twinning Centre. Partly with this in mind, Area 010 is now housed in the World Trade Centre, although the Twinning Centre failed to get off the ground in the end.

Network The Area 010 network consists of the various sponsors behind the Stichting Startershuis, together with the start-up entrepreneurs who contact Area 010. For its external ties and knowledge, Area 010 still depends heavily on the knowledge held by the Foundation’s four sponsors. Although the manager claims that Area 010 is continually building on a network of experienced entrepreneurs, specialist consultancies and investors, it gives the impression of remaining confined to a specific sector and/or the alumni of the Colleges and University concerned and their friends. Even the contacts with existing global entrepreneurship at the WTC appear to have been put to little use as yet.

Impact Strictly speaking, Area 010 is not a freezone. It has a professional business plan and is subsidised by a number of reputable institutions, which has meant that it has even found premises in a prestigious location. In this capacity, Area 010 has by now ‘turned out’ a number of businesses which are pursuing their activities profitably on an independent basis. A number of these even performed well in the national entrepreneurs’ competition. Yet the contribution of Area 010 to the well-being of the municipality of Rotterdam has so far been limited. No innovative links are sought with other elements in Rotterdam’s innovative climate - such as art, culture or multimedia - as an organisation like Off_Corso or Worm has done. Even relations with other upcoming incubators (e.g. in the field of medical technology or with the 25 kV building) remain marginal in character. Thus the group’s contribution to a sustainable economic climate of entrepreneurship (after all, who or what can guarantee that the businesses will not simply depart after their incubator phase?) or for greater urbanism in Rotterdam remains limited. The question is whether this should not have featured more prominently in Area 010’s original blueprints.

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BOX 10

SOCIAL: from social safety net to network - St. Paul’s Church

Who, what, where ‘St. Paul’s Church sees itself as a social movement which seeks to develop solidarity networks for a wide range of groups such as addicts, the homeless, illegals, refugees who have been refused permission to stay, sexual minority groups and so on. Within these solidarity networks, forces can be developed to resist political bureaucracy which often has an oppressive effect on life.’ The Rev. Hans Visser of St. Paul’s Church on Mauritsweg attained national renown with the establishment of Perron Nul. That has been discontinued, and the catchment function is now focused around the pivot of St. Paul’s Church, although its activities fan out through the city. As a result of the extramuralisation policies of care institutions and crackdowns on beggars, drug-users and refugees, the influx to St. Paul’s Church has increased, and it has become necessary to apply the limit of 1,300 registered members. For the location itself around St. Paul’s Church, Calypso and Holiday Inn, plans are being developed for a big hotel. The location of St. Paul’s Church and the form its activities will take in the future are thus still a matter of uncertainty.

Network St. Paul’s Church has a large network of voluntary foundations which organise various projects and activities. The financing derives in large measure from donations from churches and private individuals, and in part from grants from the municipality and GGD. St. Paul’s Church is also home to the Diaconal Centre, the Refugee Work and the Nico Adriaans Foundation. Outside the church, the Street Pastoral Service is mainly active in and known for its street magazine and activities to help people return to mainstream society. One example is Sandford & Son, a repair business, the art gallery and Stichting Dagloon, a foundation which looks for work for the unemployed. Sites for the temporary housing of refugees and drug-users are also managed. St. Paul’s Church also cooperates in numerous ways with Bouman/Delta Hospitals, which provide care for psychiatric patients and drug addicts, with the Salvation Army for day or night shelter work and with Humanitas for youth work and work shadowing arrangements.

Impact This freezone is held together by the powerful ideological, ecumenical and social commitment of volunteers. Regardless of the current flavour of politics at the Town Hall, the authorities implicitly rely on this social safety net. What is determined by the current political approach, though, is the extent to which those requiring care are repressed and the level of subsidies the institution receives. It is clear that the current approach does not make the role of St. Paul’s Church any easier. The demand for care is on the increase, but the supply is partly determined by the location where this can be provided. If St. Paul’s Church falls victim to the new development plans, the question is where it can be set up again. After all, its impact on the public space is huge: the church and reception centres are ports of call for the urban nomads who wander through the city during the day. But these locations also provide opportunities for the medical and psychiatric services to keep an eye on those who use them, and hence help ensure that public and personal nuisance is minimised. At the same time, the plan is to use a number of promising projects such as the repair shop and the art gallery to make the care service more independent and give something back to the local community. However, this is not much in evidence at present, partly because the economic spin-off has been subordinated for the time being to mental and primary healthcare. Nevertheless, this could be developed further, since Rev. Visser’s unusual, tolerant approach is increasingly in the public eye and has already attracted international attention.

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BOX 10 SOCIAL: from social safety net to network - St. Paul’s Church

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BOX 1

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inleiding

DE SCHADUWSTAD

5 MODELS FOR COMPARISON Freezone and breeding-ground policy is currently a hot issue. Several cities are trying to ensure that creative milieus and industries become attached to them on a permanent basis. In line with the arguments we have presented, creativity is regarded as an asset in the competition to attract and hold on to growth and above-average businesses and households. However, this is no easy matter to achieve. By contrast with highbrow culture, subcultural creative people cannot simply be pigeonholed or pinned down with subsidies. In any case, the question arises of whether such an approach will bring about a genuine longterm renewal. Facilitating individual artists becomes ineffective at the point where they have come up with the expected goods and performed innovative work. If an effective freezone policy is at all possible, it will at the very least call for a more subtle approach. We offer an outline.

5.1 Breeding-ground policy in Amsterdam Since 1998, there has been a debate in Amsterdam about the importance of an breeding-ground policy. It was recognised that these locations, which arose on the margins of urban and social developments, were always of particular value and significance in the past for the development of the city. Despite this, it was felt that since the early Nineties, urban life had become ‘noticeably more barren’ as a result of gentrification and the associated displacement effect. The number of freezones had drastically decreased in the Eighties and Nineties, with Amsterdam’s image as a creative culture city suffering as a result. This is why at the end of 1998 the remaining freezones in Amsterdam, united in the ‘Gilde van werkgebouwen aan het IJ’, sounded the alarm. As a result, since 1999 the municipality of Amsterdam has earmarked 2.8 million euros of its annual budget for the promotion of breeding-grounds, supplemented by a one-off cash injection of 15.9 million euros in 2001. 38 5.1.1 Policy The aim of Amsterdam’s policy is above all to ensure, now and in the future, the requisite supply of affordable living and working premises for the city’s informal art and culture sector. A rent level of between 27 and 45 euros per m2 per year is regarded as acceptable

projects of its own, and wherever possible the construction of residential and working premises, studios, studio apartments and rehearsal rooms for dance and music is encouraged. To this end, an breeding-ground policy coordinator has also been appointed.

To prevent a situation where the subsidies are abused or owners or landlords who are motivated by greed profit from the breedinggrounds, an elaborate set of rules has been drawn up. In part, these appear to be derived from the recommendations developed by the ‘de Vrije Ruimte’ (‘Free Space’) Foundation. These stipulate among other things that collective businesses should be given preference, that the optimal size is between 20 and 25 stakeholders, that the maximum transparency should be sought, that a freezone must not have a commercial character, and that the idea is not that the freezone should be sold off by a small group. Additionally, the building must have a functional and sober layout and meet minimum safety requirements; in short, requirements which are heavily based on familiar socialist goals. 39 5.1.2 Evaluation The breeding-ground policy is evaluated every year. The most recent evaluation found that out of the original target of 1,400 to 2,000 freezones, a good 400 have by now been created in 18 projects. It is expected that this number will have increased to 870 freezones in 32 projects by mid-2004. However, the evaluation says nothing about what this policy has delivered in terms of the desired urbanism, creativity and the anticipated economic welfare for the city. Nor does it say anything about the withering criticisms and accusations of meddlesomeness levelled by current breeding-ground occupants. 40 Furthermore, the concept of breeding-ground is tightly restricted to art and culture in this policy, thereby working against the hoped-for breadth and variety of urban life right from the start. In short, the breeding-ground policy appears to confine itself here excessively to a self-spun web of quantity targets, over which a cultural officer holds sway.

for premises with an breeding-ground function, but such prices have long since ceased to be customary in the centre of Amsterdam.

The municipality therefore tops up rental payments and makes one time payments to a maximum of 682 euros per m2. It also develops the shadow city

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5.2 Five experiments in nomadic use

5.2.2 Evaluation

A second example is a European (INTERREG IIC) experiment by Urban Catalyst in five European cities (Berlin, Amsterdam, Vienna, Helsinki and Naples) on the theme of the temporary use of inner-city areas in transition. The purpose of the project was to investigate actual and possible forms of temporary use and to consider to what extent and in what way this can lead to strategies which can be incorporated wholesale in the mainstream planning process. The hypothesis was that temporary use is in any case economically more profitable than temporary vacancy. It was also posited that temporary use can enhance the liveability of the area and the surrounding districts during the transitional period. At the same time, the purposes for which these areas are used would contribute to the well-being of the city as a whole. Finally, it was argued that temporary use and especially the milieu that is generated as a result could help ensure a better end-product with a greater sense of identity. It might even be possible to include elements of the temporary use on a more permanent basis in the final plan.41 Thus it was felt that a static, more or less negative approach to temporary use as parasitical squatting might be transformed into a positive and more dynamic approach, in which the nature of that use might ultimately even have an influence on the final situation.

The results from the five cases reflect the variety of the five situations.42 The impact of the five cases varies greatly. The city of Berlin is now bankrupt, and Berlin Ostbahnhof is one of the many freezone areas which are springing up there, whether temporarily or otherwise. In Vienna and Amsterdam, the projects have now gained more acceptance, and the temporary use has been positively incorporated into further mainstream planning for the area. In Helsinki too, the temporary use now appears to be producing a positive and more fruitful impact on the final product, which was otherwise set to be a typical real estate project. Premises have now been included for dynamic creative use by the innovative element of society. This is in fact the most important outcome of this initiative.

Because freezones and squatters’ collectives are not set in stone, but sometimes also develop from pure freebooter status via recognition to, in some cases, commercial activity. And if this development corresponds with the move from temporary to permanent use, this adds an extra local identity to urban revitalisation.

5.2.1 Five cases Five cases were studied during the project: - Berlin Ostbahnhof, which is developing into a temporary cultural and economic platform for a wide variety of entrepreneurs and socio-cultural programmes; - Helsinki Main Station precinct, which is focusing on temporary use for a flea market, open-air concerts, art exhibitions and leisure activities; - Naples, where the theme is how to respond to past illegal settlements near the centre and how to include these in future plans in a positive fashion; - Vienna, former cable factory AG, where cultural and sporting activities already take place, but a temporary theatre, cinema, radio station, school projects and social initiatives have now also been included in the plan; - Amsterdam - Noordelijk IJ area, where a revitalisation is being advocated for the period 2003-2028 and in the mean time, partly with help from the breeding-ground policy described earlier, temporary functions are being activated.

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5.3 A Mad Tea Party in Manchester Thirdly, Manchester. This city, where the industrial revolution originally started, has been focusing for some time on culture and art in creative freezones as one of the key elements in an urban revitalisation strategy. After the economic decline in the Seventies and Eighties, during which over 200,000 jobs were lost in the city, a new course was embarked upon at the start of the Nineties. The central concept was creative industry, meaning entrepreneurial activity in which economic value would be coupled with cultural and artistic content. Creative industries would connect the artistic and creative value of culture with more entrepreneurial skills and the new knowledge talent of multimedia and telematics-based activities.

By contrast with the customary strategies of cultural giants such as Warner Bros and Walt Disney, creative industries would concentrate on experiment and engagement with contemporary culture, as they would otherwise be unable to renew and revitalise themselves on an ongoing basis. These industries would thus be a source of innovation and competitiveness in an ever faster-changing, dynamic and global world. 43

economy and cultural marketing. For the implementation of the associated programme, among other approaches the City Council uses so-called cultural intermediates to bring budding creative and innovative potential in the city into contact with investors and the general public. 44 5.3.2 Evaluation The effect of the new course adopted in the Nineties is remarkable.

After London, Manchester now has the biggest cultural industry in the UK. This in turn is attracting new students, creative people and artists, who are crucial for feeding and staffing the new knowledge industry. At the same time, this boost has raised economic confidence in the city, which has in turn stimulated investment in other economic sectors. Finally, it has given a significant boost to cultural tourism. It is estimated that an average 150,000 tourists now visit the city every day. It is also now estimated that 1 pound of public investment yields 4-5 pounds of private investments and that the cultural industries now contribute 1.4 billion pounds a year to the gross urban product, and account for 6% of employment in the city.45

5.3.1 Cultural strategy In recent years, Manchester has accumulated positive experiences, culminating in an all-embracing cultural strategy which is given a central role in the urban planning of the city, ahead even of flanking strategies for the economy, transport or care, as the cultural strategy is supposed to affect these. It is argued that the cultural strategy has a direct impact on policy in areas such as the economy, employment, the environment, education, participation, sense of community and healthcare. With its cultural strategy the City Council aims to: - increase the level of creativity among the populace - increase the effect on sound economic development - enhance the city’s international image - offer broad possibilities for active participation on the part of local people - offer opportunities for social interaction and well-being for locals - emphasise difference and social diversity, via (inter)cultural entrepreneurship.

In line with the above, the strategy focuses on five areas: cultural infrastructure, cultural education, cultural participation, cultural

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5.4 New York - Free Williamsburg Finally, New York Williamsburg. This district is one metro stop across the East River from Manhattan. It had a large number of waterdependent manufacturing businesses along the river front. For a long time, it was a centre for the textile industry. Behind the businesses, a workers’ district was built up, which during the post-war period was home to Poles, Italians, Hassidic Jews and a large Spanish-speaking community. The industry relocated or disappeared, after which the district (including its housing) went into decline. Since the Eighties, its proximity to Manhattan, the special architecture of the housing, the large warehouses, the ample public space and above all the low rents led artists, squatters and hipsters to settle there. This represented the starting signal for a gentrification process that had previously taken place in Greenwich Village, Soho and the Lower East Side. At present the area appears to have come up against a limit: ‘We can’t handle much more coolness without losing our cool’.

This refers to the problem that Jane Jacobs described, whereby the necessary diversity in a neighbourhood becomes the victim of its own success: ‘The selfdestruction of diversity’. 46 Rapper Busta Rhymes recently bought a 1 million dollar apartment in Williamsburg. The cheapest rented studio now costs 1,100 dollars.

5.4.1 Strategies A study by Hans Pruyt compares the squatters’ movement in Amsterdam with that in New York. 47 To a much greater extent than in Amsterdam, vacant buildings in New York enter a downwards spiral, resulting ultimately in a stripped-out ruin. Despite this, the market regime in New York offers few opportunities for squatters. The story often runs as follows. Firstly, government-driven urban renewal rarely occurs in New York. This means that starters in a district such as Williamsburg are usually construction companies, which try to create a location where people can live. This autonomous process whereby buildings and neighbourhoods become more attractive then attracts investors. In the odd case such as Banana Kelly in the South Bronx, the squatters’ organisation metamorphoses into a renovation business and finally a property developer and service provider.

and the river bank is opened to the public and transformed into mixed use and residential zones. In this way, more properties enter the housing market, and a quality improvement is ensured.

Property developers have been quick to spot the rising popularity of Williamsburg. To prevent rapid gentrification from squeezing out the district’s ‘hip’ character, temporary contracts are entered into with artists and squatters who can remain another ten years at fixed low rents. As a result, low rents are being maintained for a while at least.

5.4.2 Evaluation Gentrification in New York is thus primarily driven by entrepreneurial motives. Bottom-up initiatives are rarely stimulated or anticipated.

However, if they prove successful, they are cashed in on, yet the displacement of low-income occupants is rarely offset by any policy of compensation. The planning framework thus becomes a mainstream planning instrument that makes no space at all for breeding-ground activities or production milieus. What is interesting, though, is the degree of coopting involved, whereby the authorities take over those aspects of a squatters’ movement, for example, which are of interest for development policy. And the response from the squatters’ movement is interesting too: they assume the authorities’ and the developers’ entrepreneurial tactics and exploit them to their own advantage. This may often mean that they are cured of their alternative objectives for good; yet they do succeed in retaining an element of initiative and their innovative approach.

The NY Department of City Planning then responds to these initiatives by pursuing the gentrification further in a planning framework. It proposes a waterfront development of the down-atheel river bank, where manufacturing premises stand vacant or are used for storage. Manufacturing is concentrated in two small zones, 50

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5.5 Interim conclusions In recapitulation, these four examples show that thinking and strategy-making about freezones and cultural industries as a factor affecting the quality of city life is still in its infancy. So far, it has yielded a number of experiments and trial-and-error approaches, on the part of both the authorities and of initiative-takers and other stakeholders. Until recently, after all, freezones were primarily regarded as places for freaks, which represented at best an amusing attraction on the mainstream tourist programme (the fate of Christiania in Copenhagen being an example of this). Culture was regarded as a sector for public investment, with little prospect of ever generating economic revenues, apart from the sale price of the tickets and merchandising at major cultural events. The examples show that this thinking is starting to change. However, some of the examples are more successful than others, and some seem more worthwhile models for Rotterdam and Brussels than others.

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Amsterdam’s breeding-ground policy is largely based on the question of facilities. It focuses on low rents and sufficient space, and where these are not present they are created by the authorities, with extensive subsidy measures and an extensive set of regulations. The first signs suggest that the Rotterdam authorities are in favour of this approach. But the question is whether it makes sense. Quite apart from the fact that it is very expensive, it is scarcely effective (and may in fact tend to produce a sluggish, complacent cultural climate). In any case, Rotterdam is not Amsterdam, and there seems to be plenty of inexpensive niche space still available in the former. We shall return to this point later on.

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The initiative of the Urban Catalyst Group in Berlin, Vienna, Naples, Helsinki and Amsterdam seems both inspiring and worthy of emulation in economic, planning and socio-cultural terms alike. Temporarily vacant buildings receive a function during the interim period (which is good for both municipal revenues and the local neighbourhood). At the same time, an attempt is made to incorporate the temporary use in a positive and more long-term sense in local planning practices. However, this approach remains highly neighbourhood- and districtspecific, and its contribution to the welfare of the city as a whole and its surrounding area is definitely implicit rather than explicit.

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This is not the case with Manchester’s cultural strategy. This focuses on the contributions that cultural breeding-grounds and cultural industries can make to the city as a whole. However, the drive still remains highly entrepreneurial and economically oriented, and it is unclear how initially experimental, uneconomic, yet potentially crucial initiatives will fare in the cultural industries, especially in times of recession. Nevertheless, the phenomenon of the intermediates is an innovation worthy of imitation: they are able to both uphold this artistic and ‘underground’ creativity and where possible exploit potential and opportunities in a flexible, dynamic fashion.

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Finally, much is left to the underside of the market in the enterpreneurial climate of New York. A targeted innovation policy is not conducted here, but the authorities are quick to get in on the act when bottom-up initiatives appear successful. This coopting of bottom-up initiatives may be of interest, particularly when it is combined with compensation for those who are forced out and services and financial and other forms of facilitation for innovation platforms in other locations. An approach of broadening out the initiative with alternative building and contracting activities by the freezoners themselves has also been imitated in Brussels (see the Hotel Tagawa story). Although this produced positive results for local people there too, it has so far scarcely led to any alternative continuity.

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6 RECOMMENDATIONS What can we learn from the foregoing about a possible alternative freezone and breeding-ground planning policy? How should such a policy respond to bottom-up movements and how should the desired freezones be facilitated in a way which preserves their own dynamics and characteristics? If one thing has become clear here, it is that, more than with other functions and activities, any suggestion of social engineering is both passé and absurd. Proposals by municipalities to offer space in certain locations in the city for so-called breeding-grounds and freezones are often rejected outright by ‘real’ creative people or freezoners with the answer that they want neither to occupy space in a creative ghetto nor to become a ‘battery farm’. Where such an approach does meet with success, it often amounts to no more than a variation of production function: where there was once a bicycle repair shop, you now have a computer game producer.

The same goes for targeted subsidies for individual artists, their production conditions or freezone locations. Where the authorities deliberately and controllingly engage in promoting freezones in this way, they inevitably end up doing the splits. Because freezones and breeding-grounds basically dwell on the policy margins, and thus cannot be encapsulated in the rules needed to ensure proper democratic accountability to the electorate, or prevent abuses, misappropriation of public money and parasitic behaviour.

Moreover, generic solutions obviously will not do. The freezones we have considered differ so greatly in terms of aims, organisation, significance and impact that only highly specific and targeted interventions or supporting actions are desirable.

But, it may be asked, is an breeding-ground policy at all relevant in any case? Does the specific nature of such activities not mean that one should not attempt to make any pronouncement about them, let alone make plans about them? This attitude is short-sighted. The increasing importance of creative milieus for a strong positioning in the network society is enough to knock down this idea. At the same time, the situation in Brussels demonstrates that such an approach does the most justice to the idiosyncratic attitudes and characteristics of freezones, as well as eliciting an enormous variety of initiatives.

Yet it turns out in this case to primarily result in an adversarial stance against urban policy and private investors, with stalemates which, while instructive, often prove unfruitful. And big business often comes out on top in the long run.

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On the basis of our study, our interviews and our analyses, we therefore tend in favour of a position somewhere in between, with the following recommendations. These recommendations are provisional in the sense that they need to be sounded out in more detail for their implementation value. Consideration should be given to pilot projects in each field, in which the proposals can be tested out in real freezone situations.

6.1 Guarantee targeted niche space It emerges clearly from all of the research and analyses that a plentiful supply of inexpensive niche space is vital for a flourishing freezone and breeding-ground milieu. The relentless, all-embracing gentrification of Amsterdam city centre has had demonstrable effects in this regard for the city’s genuine, creative urban climate.

In Rotterdam and Brussels (or the post-war districts of Amsterdam), however, this is not at the top of the agenda. By contrast with Amsterdam, reconstruction and large-scale post-war intervention have turned Rotterdam and Brussels respectively into metropolises with plenty of suitable niche space on the faultlines. However, there is an important difference between the two cities. Whereas the price per m2 and pressure on space in Brussels are among the highest in Europe, they remain relatively modest in Rotterdam. Despite this, even in Rotterdam the economic recovery in the Nineties meant that much suitable niche space in the city centre has disappeared due to new urban development projects, or is on the brink of doing so.

New projects are in the pipeline: in Rotterdam, these include the further development of Kop van Zuid, the Waalhaven and the Station district and in Brussels, the extension of the European District, the Noordstation and the T&T music centre.

Although the example of Amsterdam demonstrates that the targeted subsidisation of cheap space makes little sense in itself, extra attention for the ‘sense of place’ in this type of location is nonetheless required. This has much more to do with the specific use and organisation of the space than with planning conditions. Specific and above all sufficiently up-to-date information is often lacking here. At the least, it is desirable to create a good database of available space for innovative and creative milieus, which can be supplemented elsewhere as specific sections of the city are revitalised. Depending on the precise situation in Brussels and Rotterdam it might be possible to agree on a specific percentage of the available floorspace. Consideration might also be given, as is done in the film

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industry, to making far more use of the knowledge of special location scouts in drawing up a listing of suitable niche space, which should then be protected or treated carefully. Here, the Urban Explorers who operate in Rotterdam and Brussels deserve a mention. Their expeditions into the downmarket end and the frayed edges of the city and their contacts in the freezone circuit have given them a shrewd sense of interesting locations and suitable properties which may be available. In combination with specifically arising demands, this might even result in a target policy of property lending or granting.

6.2 Promote accessibility and tolerance Richard Florida has pointed out the crucial significance of a tolerant and open climate for the city’s creative and innovative capacity. This has much to do with the acceptance of a multiplicity of compatible or conflicting outlooks, lifestyles, codes of behaviour and urban expressions which are a prerequisite for innovation.

However, this tolerance has in recent times often been at odds with another challenge facing metropolises, namely how to guarantee sufficient basic quality in areas such as safety, restricting anti-social behaviour, preventing street garbage and so on, in short, how to ensure the general welfare of life in big cities in general.

The strict rules on city use and zero tolerance for wild-side activities that this is often accompanied by can snuff out inspiring innovations and even lead to the migration of creative potential. Parasitical growth needs to be tackled, of course, but this does not change the fact that the recent shift in both Dutch and Belgian integration policy and the decreasing level of tolerance in both countries may have contributed to the dwindling lead held by these countries in Florida’s creativity index (see introduction). Environmental policy in the Netherlands only makes the problem worse. With disasters in Enschede and Volendam fresh in the memory, a climate is developing of enforcing strict legal observance of environmental guidelines and legislation. This has far-reaching implications for the possibility of temporary use in the Rotterdam port area, for example, and could even do so for the temporary or permanent use of premises which officially speaking are not completely fit for occupation. More than the level of rents, this turned out to be a point of concern in the freezones we investigated.

Rather than generic guidelines based on presumed general feelings of anxiety about crime or anti-social behaviour, here too a more

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specific and nuanced approach is needed with regard to what the exact nature of the threat is, or exactly which activities are prohibited. It is also open to question whether planning measures ultimately represent a good solution to this problem. The distinction between preventive measures and dealing with symptoms needs to be drawn more sharply, and special agreements and arrangements with user groups should be considered (e.g. specifying that they will be liable in the event of a disaster). The district and neighbourhood contracts drawn up in the Brussels-Capital Region provide a good model here. In consultation with residents and users in the area, it is possible to determine what degree of liability they are actually prepared to accept in the event of a disaster in connection with private or tolerated initiatives in the district.

6.3 Prioritise the encouragement of intermediates Experiences in other countries (including the UK) have taught that in the cultural field it makes little sense to subsidise individual artists or artworks. Often, such a culture/events policy is so fashion-sensitive and dependent on individuals that it makes little contribution to a lasting creative and innovative climate in the city. In a number of British cities, the transition has therefore been made to targeted investment in intermediates, and experiences in this area have been positive. An intermediate is not directly comparable with cultural officers of the kind mentioned earlier, who liaise between the authorities and cultural bodies, and are supposed to give the latter professional advice and support relating to property matters, regulations and so on. The brief of the intermediates extends further than this. They provide the podium and/or link between the individual artist and creative freezone and the general public and global capital. At the same time, a good intermediate will also bring together creative talents from various different worlds (arts, sciences and social sciences) in innovative and inspiring connections which bubble with potential. This makes it possible for freezones and breeding-grounds to continue with their own experimentation, but to draw inspiration from one another and ensure their livelihood in the longer term.

Intermediates may in this sense be • people, such as Jeanne van Heeswijk, who offers artists in her wake the chance of a broad social platform • a building, such as the school squatted in by the Foundation B.a.d in Rotterdam or Recyclart Brussels with its guest studios

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and possibilities for internal encounters and encounters with the neighbourhood, • an organisation such as Off_Corso in Rotterdam, or Beursschouwburg Brussels (BSB), which encourages combinations of creative potential and puts it in touch with the public and the business community, • an event such as the summer carnival in Rotterdam, the Zinneke Parade in Brussels or PleinopenAir, which enable alternative music, dance, cinema and/or performance art to come into contact with other exponents and with the public, • portals such as the residential commune store or the urban explorers websites, which offer expertise and a datafile of unsuspected possibilities.

Rather than individual artists or freezones, these intermediates are especially deserving of ongoing financial and other support or sympathy from the government and other quarters. Points in their favour include, in addition to the points mentioned above, the contribution they make to metropolitan life. The podium’s anticipated urban impact in facilitating experimentation with and by subcultures, combined with a wide public appeal, should be a more important criterion for government support than mere contributions to individual projects. In other words, the intermediate should build bridges, while at the same time to do justice to both the freezone and the public or formal city.

6.4 Encourage temporary or permanent portals Particularly worthy of attention here are the so-called ‘portals’. In both the Brussels-Capital Region and the metropolis of Rotterdam, it turns out that while the various freezones are linked in networks together in one way or another (often through personal contacts), they tend to operate autonomously. Each freezone ‘does its own thing’ and may emerge at intervals only to then withdraw back into their shell (guerrilla tactics). As a shock tactic or a means of temporarily encouraging the public into action against imagined abuses or complacency, this is effective. But it fails to make a more constructive and long-term contribution to the cultural climate in the metropolis. Plus combining different things now and again can prove a more fruitful approach.

The overview, gained by bringing disparate initiatives into contact with one another or promoting surprising temporary coalitions,

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which may even include the outside world, would help reinforce the urban impact of freezones. City Mine(d) in Brussels has already been performing remarkable pioneering work in this regard. Yet even City Mine(d) has its own agenda. It might be worth considering dropping this agenda and concentrating on increasing the mutual acquaintedness of the numerous freezone initiatives operating in the city, and wherever possible promoting temporary or permanent coalitions. This would also have the effect of creating an intermediate forum for the government and other stakeholders, or the possibility of targeted promotion and, where necessary, acquisition.

In Rotterdam in particular, such an initiative is sorely needed.

Rotterdam is scarcely known as a creative freezone, while those portals which do exist in Rotterdam (such as the residential commune store or allabout) are still very much based on a single perspective.

Extending this approach or stimulating something similar to City Mine(d) would therefore seem desirable in Rotterdam.

6.5 Practice shadow planning As our fifth point, we come to the paradox of planning policy: the essential elusiveness of creative freezones. To meet this problem, we would like to introduce the concept of shadow planning. This refers to the need for an increasing awareness of the consequences of what is included in (policy) plans, both in planning terms and in the sense of a profit and loss account for the use and organisation of (spontaneous) urbanism in the city (the case of New York is an example here). By shadow planning we also refer to a practice in which some areas and themes of urban policy are deliberately left unplanned and kept clear of the political, civil and above all investment debate. Because, in addition to its considerable social consequences, development planning also has direct consequences for the level of land and property prices and rents and build-ups of formal and profit-making urban activities. As a result, areas also emerge where this is emphatically not the case, the niches and disadvantaged or neglected areas, as potential milieus for innovative and experimental activities.

‘Practise shadow planning’ thus also means refraining from identifying certain areas where one may have precise breedingground or freezone purposes in mind , in order to achieve those very objectives. However, this does not mean that nothing then needs to be done, and that the government can simply stand back. Precision

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measures will also be needed in areas such as opening up buildings, promoting publicity, encouraging booster measures and so on, which however will not be included in general policy objectives but will deliberately be kept in the shadows of the official policy.

In this regard, incidentally, there is a significant difference between practices in the metropolis of Rotterdam and the Brussels-Capital Region. In the Netherlands, and hence also in Rotterdam, there has been a surfeit of planning and government-driven interventions in the city, whereas this has been far less in evidence in the BrusselsCapital Region. Partly as a consequence of the situation with the Communities, there is little or no reference to the city’s creative potential in the region’s planning and economic policy. This has therefore partly ensured that the interaction between the authorities and freezones, or the government orientation of these freezones in Rotterdam, is far greater than in Brussels. In the latter city, the two parties are far removed from one another, each acting in its own world. Thus whereas restraint is called for in Rotterdam, what is needed in Brussels is targeted precision measures to promote spontaneous cultural creativity. District and neighbourhood contracts may offer a starting-point here, but precision measures are also required across the region, in consultation with or across the boundaries of the Communities.

6.6 Use temporariness and extend it Finally, particular attention appears necessary for the aspect of timing and phasing with breeding-grounds. Now that the economy is slowly but surely evolving towards a knowledge economy, leisure and cultural industries are becoming increasingly important. Until recently, experimental and innovative art and culture were often assigned to derivative, weak economic sectors. However, this is far from always the case nowadays. In cultural sectors as well as in social, planning and other sectors, pure and unconventional freezones are gaining widespread social acceptance and growing to become activities which are able to pay their own way and even make a powerful contribution to the formal economic climate. Thus it may be asked whether Now & Wow in Rotterdam, KVS Brussels or the Zinneke Parade should continue to be regarded in terms of breedingground policy, or whether such activities are not rather starting to become an element of a strategic promotional or business settlement policy.

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Within mainstream planning, there is also a phase difference at development locations. Rotterdam and Brussels are now overflowing with plans which stake a claim in the future prospects of many residents and bodies. These often take a lot longer than planned.

Examples include the developments in the European District or Thurn & Taxis in Brussels and the plans for Rotterdam CS, the Stadshavens and the high-rise building programmes in parts of the centre. In the mean time, a change often occurs in the functioning of the location, in which temporary housing and use generate a much more interesting form of urbanism than the glossy plans which will be carried out later on. Consideration should therefore be given to the extent to which these temporary activities can also be deliberately facilitated, and if they prove successful, find a more permanent place in the mainstream programme of the ultimately intended function.

Evicting successful temporary users may involve destroying creative capital or their ill-planned relocation to supposedly fertile locations.

More detailed pilot studies are needed here in order to consider the extent to which such temporary use may be of interest to the city if incorporated in the eventual plans. The beginnings of such an approach were already discernible in the previous locations of ‘group Tagawa’, although the site ended up being cleared and promising actions disappearing. Consideration could be given to the extent to which suitable rules and procedures could retain such initiatives on a more long-term basis for the city.

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FOOTNOTES, ILLUSTRATIONS AND BIBLIOGRAPHY Footnotes 1 see inter al. Landry, Charles: The Creative City, London 2000 2 cf. inter al. Susser, Ida (ed.): The Castells Reader on Cities and Social Theory, Oxford 2002 3 see inter al. the approach in Rotterdam and Brussels 4 see inter al. Soja, Edward W.: Thirdspace, Oxford 1996 Boomkens, René: De Drempelwereld, Rotterdam 1998 GUST: The Urban Condition, Ghent/Rotterdam 1999 Urban Unlimited: De Grote KAN Atlas, Rotterdam 2003 5 cf. Mayor Schelto Patijn quoted in: De vrije ruimte, Laat 1000 vrijplaatsen bloeien, onderzoek naar vrijplaatsen in Amsterdam, 2001 6 Gemeente Rotterdam: Sense of Place; Atlas van de culturele ecologie van Rotterdam, Rotterdam 2004 7 cf. the special issue of Stedebouw en Ruimtelijke Ordening about the creative city, S&RO 2-2002 8 Florida, Richard: The Rise of the Creative Class New York 2002 9 Florida, Richard and Tinagli, Irene: Europe in the creative age, Demos, February 2004 10 cf. inter al. Thackara, John: Cultural Expertmeeting HST-NWE, Breda 18-19 mei 2004 11 cf. inter al. Hemel, Zef: Creatieve Steden, VROM, Den Haag 2002 12 www.katharen.be 13 Campbell, Anthony: The assassins of Alamut, 2001 14 cf. http://go.to/footnotestohistory, an overview made by James L. Erwin of historical and actual freestates and micronations 15 Texas A&M University: http://www.tamu.edu/ 16 see Mak, Geert: een kleine geschiedenis van Amsterdam, 1994 17 De vrije ruimte, Laat 1000 vrijplaatsen bloeien, onderzoek naar vrijplaatsen in Amsterdam, 2001 18 see inter al. Boelens, Luuk: Sturen door netwerken; voor reclustering van beleid; in S&RO 2-2004 19 see Bey, Hakim: Tijdelijke autonome zone, 1985, 1991 cf. inter al. Oosterling, Henk, De mens als medium der media in ‘Filosofie in cyberspace’ 2002 20 Despite the fact that the parties concerned are highly critical of the so-called ‘breeding-ground policy’ of the municipalities (we are not a battery farm), this does not stop them from giving a few breeding-ground tips: do not demolish too fast, withdraw properties from the market for cultural purposes, put properties under self-management and ensure that the authorities then refrain from interfering in them (Manifest R2002 Rotterdam 2002, Manifest van de Onderkant, Eindhoven 2004).

21 cf. Lesaffer, Pieter (ed.): België blootgelegd; Van Halewijck, Leuven 2003 22 cf. also Salet, Willem, Thornley, Andy and Kreukels, Ton: Practices of metropolitan governance in Europe, New York/London 2003 23 cf. Lagrou, Evert in: Salet, Willem etc., loc. cit.

24 cf. Swyngedouw, Erik et al: Neoliberal Urbanization in Europe; in: Brenner, Neil: Spaces of Neo-liberalism, London 2002.

25 cf. NIS, Statistiek van Toerisme and Hotelwezen België 2004 26 cf. Union of International Associations, statistics 2004 27 cf. CCIB-CERB: Jaarbarometers 1995-2003 28 Corijn, Eric et al.: From a Multicultural and fragmented City towards the Mediterranean Capital of Europe; in: INURA - The contested metropolis, Birkhauser 2004 29 Nyfer: Atlas voor gemeenten 2003, Breukelen 2003 30 see the evaluation of the growth diamonds project, gemeente Rotterdam 2004 31 see Culturele ondernemers van Rotterdam: Manifest R2002, Rotterdam 2002 32 cf. CBS, statistiek startende ondernemers in Nederland 2004 33 cf. OBR: Plezierige Zaken in Rotterdam, vrijetijdseconomie in cijfers 2001, Rotterdam 2003 34 quoted from Rotterdam club circuit cooperation agreement, Rotterdam 2002 35 based on counts derived from members of the BNA, BNSP, BNO and members enrolled on the ArchitectsWeb the shadow city

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36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47

cf. Ecorys press release, 26 June 2003 cf. Centrum voor Onderzoek en Statistiek Rotterdam cf. Begroting Gemeente Amsterdam 1999-2003 cf. Project Broedplaatsen Amsterdam, criteria en richtlijnen Amsterdam 2000 Gemeente Amsterdam: Evaluatie broedplaatsenbeleid Amsterdam 2003 cf. Oswalt, Philipp: Berlin City without form, Prestel, Munich/New York 2000 see www.urbancatalyst.de cf. O’Connor, Justin: Cultural Industries and the City, London 2003 cf. Manchester’s Cultural Strategy at www. Manchester.gov.uk cf. Belova, Elena et al.: Creative Industries in the modern City, Tacis, September 2002 cf. Jacobs, Jane: The death and life of great american cities, New York 1961 cf. Pruijt, Hans: Is the institutionalization of urban movements inevitable?, Rotterdam 2003

Illustrations Covers: Kruiskade - club activities around Off_Corso pending new development plans, day and night 6 Lloydkwartier - audio-visual industry on former port land 8 Freezone Bruxxel flyer in the Leopoldstation, Brussels, November 2002 10 Kowloon Walled City (photo from ‘City of Darkness’) 16 Freezone Bruxxel in the Leopoldstation, Brussels in front of the European Parliament 25 Citymine(d) - HUGO, Bocas Locas (photos from Citymine(d)) and Limite|Limiet 26 Flyer exhibition in Hotel Tagawa 28 Place Flagey under reconstruction (photo from disturb-website) 29 Universal residents’ card (illustration Universal Embassy) 30 Back of St. Paul’s Church Rotterdam 36 Bushalte 67 (photo from ‘something about Charlois’) 39 Club premises for Off_Corso, location outside and inside (photos left and right from Off_Corso website) 41 Phone centres in Rotterdam (photos from ‘Dispersion’ Diego Barajas) 43 Deborah Post of Area OIO (article from ‘A4 magazine’) 47 ADM building Amsterdam (photo from ‘laat 1000 freezones bloeien’) 48 RAW Temple e.V. Berlin (photo from ‘Urban Catalyst’) 49 Madchester music scene (photo from back of ‘Madchester’ music CD) 50 Advertisement wall in Williamsburg (photo from Uwee.de) 52 Vlaardingen De Strip, art project by Jeanne van Heeswijk 58 Illegal advertising on Berlin lamp-post 62 Salsaschool on Schiestraat pending station plans

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Bibliography Air: Stad op straat, 2003 Alice(ed): Het creatieve DNA van de regio Eindhoven, 1&2, Eindhoven 2003 Alice (ed): Manifest van de Onderkant, Eindhoven 2004 Barajas, Diego: Dispersion, a study of global mobility and the dynamica of a fictional urbanism 2003 Bey, Hakim : Tijdelijke autonome zone, 1985 Boudry, Linda et al. (edd.): De eeuw van de stad 2004 Buchel, Hogervorst, Vermaase: Het kerend tij, 1997 Corijn, Eric and de Lannoy, Walter: Crossing Brussels, de kwaliteit van het verschil, Brussels 2000 Campbell, Anthony: The assassins of Alamut, 2001 Culturele Ondernemers Rotterdam : Manifest R2002, Rotterdam 2002 De vrije ruimte: Laat 1000 vrijplaatsen bloeien, onderzoek naar vrijplaatsen in Amsterdam, 2001 Engbersen, Godfried & Burgers, Jack: De verborgen stad, 2001 Erwin, James L .: website footnotes to history, 2004 Florida, Richard : The rise of the creative class, 2002 Florida, Richard & Tinagli, Irene: Europe in the creative age, February 2004 Gemeente Rotterdam : Sense of place, atlas van de culturele ecologie van Rotterdam. Rotterdam 2004 Girard, Greg & Lambot, Ian : City of Darkness, life in Kowloon Walled City, 1993 Heeswijk, Jeanne van : Freehouse, creative forces in your city, Rotterdam West 2003 INURA : Possible urban worlds, 1998 INURA : The contested metropolis, 2003 Jane Jacobs: The death and life of great American cities, 1961 Kardol, René : Proposed Inhabited Artificial Islands in International Waters: International Law Analysis in Regards to Resource Use, Law of the Sea and Norms of Self-Determination and State Recognition, 1999 Laundry, Charles: The creative city 2000 Lesaffer, Pieter et al. (edd.): België Blootgelegd, De Standaard 2003 Mak, Geert : Een kleine geschiedenis van Amsterdam, 1994 O. Hammer, Richard : The history of free nations, 2003 Oenen, Gijs van : Het surplus van illegaliteit, 2002 Pile, Steve e.a.: Unruly Cities, London/New York 2002 Platt, Cameron & Wright, John : Schateilanden, 1992 RKS: Feesten in het donker, May 2001 S&RO 2001/4 special freezones issue 2001 Salet, Willem et al. : Amsterdam Human Capital 2003 Texas A&M University: http://www.tamu.edu/ Urban Catalyst group: analysis report Berlin study, November 2001 Urban Catalyst group: Urban Catalysts, Strategies for temporary uses – potential for development of urban residual areas in European metropolises, 2003 wburg.com website

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1 introductiion

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COLOPHON The research ‘the shadow city, freezones in Brussel and Rotterdam’ is produced in 2003 with support from the Netherlands Architecture Fund and the municipality (dS+V) of Rotterdam.

Contibutions are made by: Frank van der Beuken - Rotterdam region Luuk Boelens - Urban Unlimited Rotterdam Robert Broesi - MUST Amsterdam Gijs Broos - OBR Rotterdam Eric Corijn - VUB Brussels Filiep Decorte - o2-consult Antwerp Stefan Decorte - VUB Brussels Frank D’hondt - o2-consult Antwerp Bernadette Janssen - dS+V Rotterdam Bram Ladage - dS+V Rotterdam Wies Sanders - Urban Unlimited Rotterdam Jan van Teeffelen - dS+V Rotterdam In the advisory board: Tom Frantzen - architect Amsterdam Robert Kloosterman - UvA Amsterdam Marc Neelen - Stealth architects Rotterdam Henk Oosterling - Erasmus University Rotterdam Janny Rodermond - Netherlands Architecture Fund Mariet Schoenmakers - dS+V Rotterdam And last but certainly not least: many thanks to all the freezoners and free-thinkers for their time and effort.

Edited May 2004 Cartography: MUST and Urban Unlimited Photography: Wies Sanders, unless mentioned otherwise French translation: Brussels Capital Region English translation: Ines Galle Tolkwerk en vertaling, Grimbergen Printed by DPP Utrecht Urban Unlimited Postbus 299 3000 AG Rotterdam Digital pdf-version is available at: www.urbanunlimited.nl Search for “Wieslog” on the web for news concerning Rotterdam freezones Contact us at: info@urbanunlimited.nl

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DE SCHADUWSTAD