Wedges of Amsterdam

Amsterdam has a great tradition of investing heavily in green areas with major urban expansions. In the 1940s and 1950s, for example, 50,000 homes were built in neighborhoods such as Bos en Lommer and Buitenveldert, with extensive park landscapes in between: the wedges of the city. Now, more than 70 years later, the hedges are under increasing pressure due to the colossal building assignment and the climate problem. Together with 3 other design offices, Flux has conducted research into the future of the Wedges, where the Wedges as the green counterpart of the city, not only offers space for recreation and relaxation, but can also yield productive, ecological or economic added value. Within this study, Flux was responsible for the Waterland Wedge and the Zaanse Wedge.

Waterland Wedge

Water is essential for the city. Not only as drinking water, but also for CO2 buffer, energy, production and cooling. The Waterland Wedge, with its thousands of ditches, ponds and peat soils full of water, can rightly be seen as the lifeline for the city of Amsterdam! A lifeline that has not always been dealt with properly in the past, it has suffered from landfill and contamination. Amsterdam desperately needs Waterland as a source of life in the future. That is why we call on: improve the ecosystem, move Waterland into the city and use the water to its full potential!

Zaanse Wedge

The characteristic landscape of the Zaanse Wedge no longer exists. The landscape and production in the Zaanse Wedge were once strongly linked to each other via watercourses, ribbons and a thousand mills. Decades of new construction on the edges of the Wedge have driven the industry and landscape apart and left a fussy peat landscape in the heart. That is why we call: Plant 30,000,000 trees to put the Zaanse Wedge back on the map! The development of a new forest in the Zaanse Wedge not only provides a large diversity of products for the biobased economy in the Zaan region, but also acts as a climate buffer and forms a unique recreational landscape, in which the Oerij is also visible again.