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Purpose&Agenda
Grand'Place in Brussels

(Photo by Lucien Steil)

Purpose & Agenda

The purpose of the EuroCouncil is three-fold:

1) To bring together the leading American New Urbanists with the best and
 most interested European Traditional Urbanists.

2) To share the experiences and knowledge gained in successfully building
 urban projects in Europe and America.

3) To foster the establishment of New Urbanism in Europe, and to reevaluate
 existing structures, operational  potentials, and  possible synergies between
 European and American New Urbanists.

Rosemary Street, NU Development in the US

The EuroCouncil will be typically organized in working sessions, presentations, discussions and reviews. Invited speakers include, among others:

Europe
Léon Krier, Maurice Culot, Javier Cenicacelaya, Pier Carlo Bontempi, Gabriele Tagliaventi, José Cornélio da Silva, Robert Adam, Duane Phillips

America
Andrés Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, Stefanos Polyzoides, Dan Camp,
 Victor Dover, Rick Chellman, Bob Gibbs, Peter Swift

Reconstruction of the Rue de Laeken, Brussels
(Photo by Lucien Steil)

The most important lessons of the last 10 years for the Americans have been not how to to make their designs better (as important as that is), but how to get them built! To accomplish that, New Urbanists focused on reforming codes that didn't allow traditional urbanism, worked with the banking industry to allow financing New Urbanism, worked with planners and developers to convince them of the virtues of New Urbanism, and made allegiances with traffic ingeneers and other consultants crucial to the building of New Urban developments.

The Americans will present and discuss the strategies and lessons of these successes.

New Neighbourhood of I'On, Mount Pleasant
by Duany & Plater-Zyberk  with  Dover Kohl

In Europe, where there is no organizational structure similar to CNU, there is a need to bring urbanists together to discuss common themes and goals. The presentations will  address New Urbanism practice in very different national contexts and programs, as well as address a series of concrete actions to promote New Urbanism in Europe.

The Americans will present in the mornings, and the Europeans in the afternoons, each sessions allowing for stimulating interaction between Europeans and Americans.

The New Urbanism
by Peter Katz
(Published by McGraw-Hill Professional)

The Council will be hosted and organized by Christian Lasserre, the developer of the famous Rue de Laeken infill project, and Joanna Alimanestianu, the  architectural and urbanist advisor of  the Rue de Laeken project, who now continues her practice in Brussels and New York. They worked and consulted with Andrés Duany, John Massengale and Stefanos Polyzoides, and  the European committee with Lucien Steil, Gabriele Tagliaventi, Javier Cenicacelaya, Duane Phillips and Paul Murrain.

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