The Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning

Research Project: City of übermorgen

Project briefing

  • Status Completed
  • Project duration November 2019 – February 2022
  • Programme ExWoSt

The project team played with various individual applications for working with questions relating to the future in collaboration with selected cities. The result is a comprehensive collection of trends consisting of 15 trend molecules relating to questions of the urban future. A method kit was also developed. This supports urban development actors to engage in a dialogue about the “city of übermorgen” (the day after tomorrow) and sound out their options for helping to shape it.

Background

Whether it is AI, robotics, climate change or the energy transition – today urban development is influenced by a wide range of trends and drivers. But which of these developments are locally relevant, how do they affect different urban and spatial typologies and what are the options for design and action on the part of local actors? These questions are of increasing concern to cities and communities, and it is becoming increasingly clear that the future cannot be shaped solely using the means currently available.

Objectives

The project had the following objectives:

  • Initiating dialogue: stimulating and establishing discourse about the future of the city as an instrument of urban development.
  • Using knowledge of trends: making global expertise for the future applicable to local conditions and identifying potential developments, future options and future topics of local relevance.
  • Transfer to real space: projecting future topics into the space and making planning and structural effects the subject of discussion.
  • Activating actors: developing tools for communal actors to independently engage with the future, discover opportunities for action and engender responsibility.

The contractors for the research project were urbanista and Futur A.

Related projects

Contact us

  • Dr. Marion Klemme
    Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development
    Division RS 2 "Urban Development"
    Phone: +49 22899 401-2120
    Email: marion.klemme@bbr.bund.de

  • Katharina Hackenberg
    Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development
    Division RS 2 "Urban Development"
    Phone: +49 228 99401-1323
    Email: katharina.hackenberg@bbr.bund.de

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