Beyond the AUP, expanding Amsterdam along road and rail

The AUP Amsterdam of 1935 sought to plan the new city for the estimated population in the year 2000. As the several parts were elaborated in detailed urban plans reality forced the plans to be slightly changed. This was however foreseen in the AUP, as it was set up as a blotch plan with an indicative functional layout.

From the 1950s onwards the AUP was augmented to keep up with the developments in traffic, industry, commercial space and housing. The planned canal diversion north of the garden villages in the IJ-polders was dropped. Instead a semicircular new canal was planned around Amsterdam North.

The area between this new semicircular canal and the (garden) villages on the north side of the IJ was to be developed further to create a new urban satellite. With the AUP the focus of the urban planners had moved away from the suburban back to the urban, so the additions north of the low and small houses were seen as high-rise housing in a green landscaped setting as an intermediate to the open polder land beyond.

The augmented (and expanded) AUP of the 1960s is a true regional plan that draws the city as fanning out from the historic core around the Canal Belt creating suburban fingers very similar to well known German examples. Urban expansion is concentrated beyond the garden villages (north), in Zaandam (northwest), in Amstelveen (south), in the Bijlmermeer (southeast) and near existing towns (Badhoevedorp, Diemen, Ouderkerk, Zwanenburg) with some smaller developments.

A similar approach was taken to the southern expansion. Here a rural area belonging to the municipality of Weesperkarspel was transferred to Amsterdam in 1966. It included the deep Bijlmermeerpolder (a former lake empoldered in 1626) and the shallow Oost-Bijlmer and West-Bijlmer polders together with the Polder Gein en Gaasp.  This part of Amsterdam, officially called Amsterdam-Zuidoost (Amsterdam Southeast), is best known as Bijlmer, itself a foreshortening of Bijlmermeer. Building work for the Bijlmer started in 1966 on December 13. In 1968 the first residents moved into the new homes.

The design for the Bijlmer, drawn by a team under auspice of Siegfried Nassuth, was inspired by the ideas of CIAM: the functional city and Le Corbusier in particular. The central idea in this high-rise satellite was an almost absolute separation of all modes of transport by means of elevated roads and paths. The idea behind this was to prevent accidents and counter unsightly corners and urban fringes conform the ideas of the Swiss architect Le Corbusier who stated that mankind in the modern era had a right to a green, quiet and uncluttered living environment free of traffic.

In the original plans a motorway would dissect the area and several wards consisting of high-rise buildings would be created.  A height of ten building layers was the norm in both the northern and southern parts, with the exception of Reigersbos and Gein where 6 storey apartment block were envisaged. The best known part of the southeastern satellite are the honeycomb apartment blocks in the Bijlmermeer. Each ward (wijk) has been subdivided into neighbourhoods indicated by a letter (A, B, D, E, F, G, H and K). Originally the streets and apartmentbuildings would be named according to the letter of the neighbourhood. This principle has however been abandoned in the renewal of the area. South of the A9 motorway the southern part, known as Gaasperdam was divided into four wards: Holendrecht, Nellestein, Reigersbos and Gein. The neighbourhoods named L, M, N, P, R, S, T, V and W are located here. Much of the planned high-rise buildings were scrapped due to new insights and replaced by low-rise apartment blocks and terraced housing.

The new wards that were constructed around Amsterdam after 1965 aren't exclusively located within the municipal boundaries of this city. The second AUP resulted in the construction of housing in: Diemen-Noord (1), Diemen-Zuid and Duivendrecht (2) collectively known as Venserpolder, Bijlmermeer (3), Gaasperdam (4), Ouderkerk-Oost (5), Amstelveen-Zuid (6), Amstelveen-Oost (7), Akerveld Badhoevedorp (8), Zaandam-Oost (9), Molenwijk (10), Buiksloot (11), Buikslotermeer (12) and Nieuwendam (13). Another focus was providing industrial areas. The largest one would be concentrated in the harbour (H). Most of these sites were large scale like for instance, Bullewijk (w), Amstel 3 (iii) and Schiphol-Oost (S). Smaller in size were Zaandammerpolder (Z) and Vogelweide (V). Parks and recreational areas were also incorporated in the expansion plan. The Amsterdamse Bos (A) remained of regional importance. New were the parks in Amsterdam Southeast:  Bijlmerpark (B), Bijlmerweide and Diemerbos (D) and Gaasperpark (G) with the Gaasperplas (P) an artificial lake.

The whole of the Amsterdam Southeast satellite was meant to a model for future urbanisation and living. It was to be a showcase of the ultimate urban quarter for  modern living. The apartment were large, airy and light with easy access to Amsterdam, local amenities and ample green communal space. The dream was defeated by reality however. Within 10 years after completion of the first houses the area gained a reputation for social destitution an high crime rates. As a result of the development of Almere, the middleclass families never moved to the Bijlmer and problem families were relocated here. As a result mostly low skilled, poorly educated and often jobless people inhabited the area. From 1975 onwards large groups of immigrants from Surinam joined them. This reality was far removed from the ideals of the designers and their idealist vision of the modern city with its strict functional separation, turned out to be less than practical, rendering parts of the area deserted and dangerous after dark.

Of the iconic honeycomb-shaped apartment buildings only a few sections now remain. Most of the Bijlmermeer has been redesigned, abandoning the original ideas. Now rows of terraced housing replace the large slabs and the public greenery, replacing it with small gardens, tarmac and parking space. The result is a jumble of architectural ideas without much structure and without much personality: an example of the fractional approach to urban design where urban incidents and localized measures prevail that is now so prevalent. I find it a sign of weakness and an admission of failure to abandon designing the urban environment full stop as a reaction to the failure of the big ideas of the past.