DAG HAP: Studio Makkink & Bey: Breaking new ground in Erasmusveld
To return to the DAG HAP page: click here.Erasmusveld is an urban development area in The Hague. If everything goes according to plan, this new district will become ‘the most sustainable neighborhood of The Netherlands'. What can the inhabitants do to promote this sustainability, besides solar panels or waste recycling? Stroom Den Haag asked the designers of Studio Makkink & Bey to introduce one more design tool in Erasmusveld: food and food production.
Studio Makkink & Bey proposed to start up a number of public utilities for and run by the inhabitants themselves, in order to take care of compost, bees and clean water. A matter of shared responsibility. Fun and educational at the same time.
Clean Water utility
Rain water is caught in various containers with their own individual purification system. This way you can make ‘grey water' - lightly polluted waste water - by purifying a water cistern with fish, a cistern with snails and a cistern with bacteria. This produces excellent water to be used for a variety of houshold chores and for flushing your toilet.
Energy Path utility
On the ‘energy path' solar energy is stored in layers of asphalt; a kind of underfloor heating for the neighborhood. Inhabitants and beekeepers work together to make honey, with the bees attracted to the flowers alongside the road. When the energy path is no longer needed, the asphalt can be pulverized into shingle for driveways or paths.
Composting utility
In essence a skateboarding ramp is no more than a well designed hole, perfectly suitable to compost your vegetable, garden and fruit waste. Compost can be used in a variety of ways: as energy for heating or as a fertile ground to grow pumpkins. Chickens scratching around in the compost and picking the seeds, can improve the quality of the compost; and as an added bonus they supply free eggs for the neighborhood.
Interested in the proposals? Come and visit DAG HAP.
