Stacking Stories to Upgrade the City

Abstract

With the exponential growth of high-rise buildings in Rotterdam over the past decades the city is now the 10th highest city in Europe. The role that high-rise plays in the city of Rotterdam has been developing throughout the years and started becoming more important. Through literature and municipal archival research, the significance of high-rise buildings and their role have been explored through three different aspects: cultural physical and economical. High-rise buildings emerged from the culture of congestion but were merely used as a tool for the densification of the city after World War II. While the early urban planning did not address high-rise buildings it laid down the urban foundation for the designated high-rise zones in the city. With the exponential growth the municipality set up policies for high-rise buildings to keep the built environment in check. Because of the lack of historic city value of Rotterdam, the high-rise buildings and structures form the iconic image of the city. While high-rise buildings fulfil their role of accommodating people it also functions as a tool for city branding to not only promote the city but also revitalize the built environment However, high-rise buildings can also have a negative impact on the social wellbeing of its users. Both anonymity and the lack of connection with the public realm high-rise buildings can bring more harm than good to its users. Although the municipality is already addressing this problem in their most recent high-rise policy and urban planning it appears from this research that it is important to explore how high-rise buildings can sustain communities and the future generations.