The Urban Room aims to raise the bar for city design in Aotearoa

14 Sep 2022

A new organisation based on a concept from London aims to be a centre for conversation for city design in New Zealand. The Urban Room aims to bring citizens, designers, architects, engineers, urban planners, government bodies and other professionals together to brainstorm urban challenges and promote better outcome for housing, transport and public and private projects.

Auckland’s Fort Street. Photo courtesy of Patrick Reynolds.

The concept is based on New London Architecture (NLA) and is being driven by urban planner Ben van Bruggen. After some time living and working in London and seeing the first-hand benefit of NLA, Ben decided to launch The Urban Room New Zealand, starting in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland and later expanding to other cities in New Zealand

“The NLA has been a success story for London in bringing people together,” says Ben.

“When I came to Auckland I couldn’t find anywhere to go that would show me how the city had formed and where it was going. There are still lots of discussions about what we could do but it didn’t seem that there was a coherent conversation.

“It seemed an opportunity to partner with others more widely in debate and discussion about what we are working towards.”

Ben van Bruggen is the driving force behind The Urban Room.

The Urban Room plans to run a series of free and paid events led by industry professionals and is currently looking for a permanent exhibition space to become a think tank, but in the meantime will be a virtual hub.

A model of Auckland City. Photo Patrick Reynolds.

“It takes a lot to get a permanent space up and running so we’re going to be nomadic for a while,” says Ben. “That has the benefit that we can move around the city and change our focus to the local areas. But ultimately, we need a hub, a place to focus our efforts. It’s important we bring people together in a physical space not just online.”

Photo courtesy of NLA.

One goal of the project is to use a 3D models of the City, similar to the ones of London at the NLA which has led to many interesting discussions.

The Urban Room is an independent, membership organisation and is looking for industry professionals to join the organisation, expand their networks and steer future discussions.

“We will need to engage the expertise of those that fund, develop, consent and construct buildings and spaces as well as those that design and of course all of us who experience and engage with them. We feel that our independence and membership will give us an appeal that means we can engage all types of people, particularly the young who will be most impacted by our decisions today.”

Photo courtesy of NLA

Resene has come onboard as a launch sponsor, and Ben hopes others will follow suit.

“It’s a great time to be involved as we start our journey. Resene’s support is fantastic. Thank you so much. To those that want to be  involved, get in touch and let’s start a conversation.”

www.theurbanroom.com

Published: 14 Sep 2022