Gateway to Europe
Rotterdam
Urban regeneration is also about business parks
Rotterdam, the largest city of the Netherlands after Amsterdam, is a very industrious city. The enormous harbour is the largest in Europe and one of the world's leaders. Clearly, it dominates the business life of Rotterdam. But there is much more variation these days. So the municipal authorities want to make room for all sorts of businesses in the territory of Rotterdam. To do so, they are building large new, high-grade business parks, and existing parks are being restructured. Since some of those business parks are in the city, urban regeneration and the restructuring of business parks cannot be viewed separately in Rotterdam.
Rotterdam has 600,000 inhabitants and, with almost 2,000 inhabitants per km 2 , it is very densely populated.
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Seven hundred businesses in an urban location
Project manager Lisette Nijs:
'The largest restructuring project in the Netherlands'
Spaanse Polder
A business park in the middle of the city
The City of Rotterdam is home to the largest urban business park in the Netherlands: the Spaanse Polder. Almost 200 hectares, 700 companies, jobs for 10,000 people. The business park was established as early as World War II as part of the reconstruction activities after the German bombardment of 14 May 1940. It is high time for the area to undergo a thorough overhaul. Rotterdam has drawn up an ambitious plan for the purpose: the aim is to renew the entire area by 2015. 'It is the largest restructuring project in the Netherlands. And it was a great idea to split up this big, long-term project into a large number of smaller parts. Otherwise, it is impossible to keep the corporate sector involved for such a long time ', says project manager Lisette Nijs. 'It is a major operation, but you shouldn't describe it as an "extreme makeover": otherwise it sounds as though we are going to demolish, rebuild and move everything. The Spaanse Polder is a business park and that's not going to change.'
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No 'park management'; lots of discussions
Commitment
How can you get hundreds of companies to toe more or less the same line? The Rotterdam slogan is: 'not words but deeds'. But in the Spaanse Polder, lots of talking is what actually make the deeds possible.
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A chapter of the Hell's Angels also moved onto the business park
Problems
The Spaanse Polder has become outdated as a business park. In addition, the area has acquired a bad image: unsafe, a Wild West atmosphere, flounting of environmental regulations, problems with other users and other types of nuisance. More and more shady companies moved in, the second-hand car trade followed, and party centres came into the area. In short, there were more and more companies which did not really belong, and the companies for which the site was intended moved out.
The City of Rotterdam decided to take firm action.
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A reclassification of the largest urban business park in the Netherlands into cluster areas.
Plan
The Spaanse Polder has to be thoroughly overhauled by 2015. The City of Rotterdam took a firm decision in 2001 and put aside millions of euros for the operation. The large plans are being split up into lots of small ones to keep the job manageable and clear for the contractor.
The strategy: the location of new companies over a period of fifteen years in such a way that clusters of related businesses are established. The clusters will give the area a new dynamism.
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Information centre about the restructuring work, right in the middle of the business park
Rotterdam Development Corporation
Rotterdam is a businesslike city and that is also the overwhelming impression made by the Spaanse Polder restructuring project. People are accountable for results and milestones. The city administration also wants to know at all times how much support the project has from the 700 entrepreneurs.
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ReUrbA: Restructuring Urban Areas
ReUrbA partner
The Spaanse Polder project is a ReUrbA partner project. It looks like something of an odd one out because the renovation of inner cities is the central focus for most partners. But the Spaanse Polder has developed during the course of years from a location on the outskirts to an essential part of the Rotterdam urban area. So urban regeneration also includes the restructuring of business parks. The success of the restructuring work in this enormous business park is therefore of decisive importance for the living climate of the city.
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