Reaction after PARCOURS II by Anouke de Groot

It was very interesting  to meet each other in aspern Seestadt, a place in  transition with its own timezone between future and past, at the beginning of huge change, as a silence before the storm. To meet in a place for which a master plan is created of becoming new high quality urban landscape, of which there is not much to see yet. Except for a first skeleton of new roads and infrastructure on which many people should enter and leave the area. Where big gravediggers are like mechanic animals  in the fields making first signs of rough destruction and construction visible. It was challenging to talk together about desires what this still invisible city could become, to find a place between utopia and reality. And to question the value of branding in this situation; can you create an identity for that what doesn't exist yet? To name and brand what you want to be instead of what you are? According to which values? The values that are best to sell or most probably to survive longest? Or both. How can you predict the quality of life of people whom are going to live there? At least you can make a choice how to support or facilitate that. But you cant plan the way they will live together, how the neighbours are going to be, the actual human interaction in the area. The soul of a city is not possible to create out of concrete. Has this master plan a real chance to become alive after creating much expectations and putting much effort? I hope the integrity of the values on which the plan is based will be mirrored in its actual life happening there. That the process of creating will show its features in the result. I hope that if these are good, the future might be bright and promising. At the same time, if we don't believe in being able to realise our dream landscapes we will never be able to create new desired urban landscape. Most interesting for me was to go into discussion and fantasise about how our utopia city would look like. To create an open mind for this and be critical at the same time.  To question how you can create identity to the surroundings you live in. And how a place you live in gives identity to you