For my master dissertation, The summary went as following; ‘We urgently need new future prospects. A collective ecological utopia that we can believe in together. A view of a better, healthier, and safer environment for all of us. Do you dare to search for this ecological utopia?’. 

My master dissertation consisted of 2 big questions. The first questions was ‘Can we activate our roofs in the search for a healthy city?’ and the second question is ‘How can we activate our roofs’. By looking at this problem through a bottom-up approach, I’ve quickly learned that it is not our technical capabilities that discourage us, but it’s the lack of common awareness around this problem and solution. For that reason i designed a typological catalogue, that can help us in creating common awareness around this subject.


Abstract:
Climate mitigation and surface scarcity are two challenges we are facing as Belgian Architects. As our cities keep warming up, adding more and more climatic problems with it, and our permeable surface area keeps decreasing we should look into under-utilised surface area’s.
In Ghent we have an estimated 6.1km² of unused roof surface. How can we start activating these surfaces in our search for the healthy city?


For this research, the Oude-Dokken site in Ghent will serve as a case-study to help analyse and understand the different roof typologies that can be found throughout  the city of Ghent. .
Trying to understand the reason why our roofs have become such under-utilised surfaces, and how we can break down the threshold that discourages us from normalising a multifunctional roof.



Click here for the full master dissertation.