Roy
Van Pamelen
Ad-Hoc Expert
Generic Skills
B.1. Understanding of integrated and sustainable urban development:
I have a background in urban planning, project-processmanagement, systems thinking, management, economy and law.
In 2004, as projectmanager I was in charge of developing 100 ha of agriculture land into a sustainable business area for the municipality of Hoorn, The Netherlands. There was also a challenge in integrated and sustainable urban development. The policy was to create a CO2 neutral municipality in 2040 and every new urban development must attribute to that goal. When participating the Master City Developer study, finished in 2007, I used the gained knowledge for my thesis: “The third generation of restructuring business areas. The role of networks achieving gaining acceptance’.
Since 1997 I have been working in urban development. In the beginning the aim of the urban project was just production of houses and business parks. The demand for it was still there, so there was no need for a thorough analysis if the products were sustainable. Around 2004 I made a shift from just producing houses and business areas to integrated and sustainable urban developments.
One of my current projects is working as program manager Urban Renaissance, for both Except Integrated Sustainability: http://except.nl/en/#.en.services.248-urban-renaissance and the program itself: www.urbanrenaissance.nl. The emphasis lies in delivering integrated sustainable solutions in urban development by systemic thinking and working. This can be achieved by consulting, innovation and design.
B.2. Understanding of exchange and learning processes at transnational level:
As program manager Urban Renaissance I lecture on a regular basis, to university students from all over the world. I’ve given lectures at the University of Amsterdam (UvA) in The Netherlands, the Institute of Housing and Urban Development Studies, (part of Erasmus University, Rotterdam, The Netherlands). I’ve given workshops for students from the University of Alabama Birmingham (USA) and to staff from the University of Copenhagen and from Chalmers University Sweden. Furthermore, within the Urban Renaissance program, I’m responsible for the dissimination of knowledge. Our partners are located with their offices across Europe. We have partners based in Italy, Germany, Great Britain, United States, Belgium and Sweden. We execute this by organising events, internal workshops or by visiting each other.
We also work together in various ways in international teams. We participated in an international team a few months ago submitting a propoasal for a tender: redevelopment of an urban area in Rome, Italy. Our part was to implement and raise the quality part of integrated sustainability throughout the urban plan. The same was the case for a project called Greater Kampala Metropolitan Area in Uganda. Now we work on a project based in Detroit USA, Detroit Urban Regen, together with American and European partners.
I have experience in exchange and learning activities at transnational level for SME’s and Universities.
B.3. Proficiency in English:
In my working career, I have had the pleasure of working with and together with international partners. Nowadays working within Except, a collective of 25 international entrepreneurs having different backgrounds, as well as in my daily contacts with our Urban Renaissance partners, our daily communication is in English (oral and written) .
Lecturing international students is also in English (oral and written) and needs to be of a certain level of fluency in order to reach the student and to act on a professional level in the academic world as well as in the professional environment.
Strong knowledge and practice of tools and methods applied to exchange and learning processes in transnational cooperation contexts (e.g. peer reviews, design/implementation labs, interactive learning environment, etc.) from direct experience in transnational projects.
Expertise for the design and delivery of transnational exchange and learning activities:
Thematic expertise:
Theme / Policy:
Urban Strategic Planning
Summary Thematic expertise:
In my capacity as projectmanager, I was responsible for designing urban strategic planning (1 mio m2 sustainable working area, Hoorn-The Netherlands, 900 various houses B&O phase 4, 1.100 various houses B&O phase 5, both Hoorn-The Netherlands, a mixed use city development (shopping mall, health care facility center, various houses in the center of Sleeuwijk-The Netherlands,..). As program manager Urban Renaissance my team and I currently work on integrated urban renewal in a neighborhood (Zevenkamp) in Rotterdam-The Netherlands. In this project we also work actively with inclusion of target groups (a multicultural environment). Creating sustainable housing is also part of our project as is improving the local economic development. For DC4 I am involved in a project where we develop 250 sustainable villas, a hospital and leisure park. When I worked as officer economic development for the municipality of Pijnacker-The Netherlands I actively developed a working area to improve local economic development as well as other areas where the local entrepreneurship can be improved. Sustainable urban mobility is a topic which I currently work on in a research project together with other stakeholders. Overall, I love to work in complex structures where a mission of implementing integrated sustainability or work hands on to realise these goals.
Theme / Policy:
Integrated Urban Renewal
Summary Thematic expertise:
In my capacity as projectmanager, I was responsible for designing urban strategic planning (1 mio m2 sustainable working area, Hoorn-The Netherlands, 900 various houses B&O phase 4, 1.100 various houses B&O phase 5, both Hoorn-The Netherlands, a mixed use city development (shopping mall, health care facility center, various houses in the center of Sleeuwijk-The Netherlands,..). As program manager Urban Renaissance my team and I currently work on integrated urban renewal in a neighborhood (Zevenkamp) in Rotterdam-The Netherlands. In this project we also work actively with inclusion of target groups (a multicultural environment). Creating sustainable housing is also part of our project as is improving the local economic development. For DC4 I am involved in a project where we develop 250 sustainable villas, a hospital and leisure park. When I worked as officer economic development for the municipality of Pijnacker-The Netherlands I actively developed a working area to improve local economic development as well as other areas where the local entrepreneurship can be improved. Sustainable urban mobility is a topic which I currently work on in a research project together with other stakeholders. Overall, I love to work in complex structures where a mission of implementing integrated sustainability or work hands on to realise these goals.
Theme / Policy:
Sustainable Housing
Summary Thematic expertise:
In my capacity as projectmanager, I was responsible for designing urban strategic planning (1 mio m2 sustainable working area, Hoorn-The Netherlands, 900 various houses B&O phase 4, 1.100 various houses B&O phase 5, both Hoorn-The Netherlands, a mixed use city development (shopping mall, health care facility center, various houses in the center of Sleeuwijk-The Netherlands,..). As program manager Urban Renaissance my team and I currently work on integrated urban renewal in a neighborhood (Zevenkamp) in Rotterdam-The Netherlands. In this project we also work actively with inclusion of target groups (a multicultural environment). Creating sustainable housing is also part of our project as is improving the local economic development. For DC4 I am involved in a project where we develop 250 sustainable villas, a hospital and leisure park. When I worked as officer economic development for the municipality of Pijnacker-The Netherlands I actively developed a working area to improve local economic development as well as other areas where the local entrepreneurship can be improved. Sustainable urban mobility is a topic which I currently work on in a research project together with other stakeholders. Overall, I love to work in complex structures where a mission of implementing integrated sustainability or work hands on to realise these goals.
Theme / Policy:
Local Economic Development
Expertise support to local authorities and other stakeholders in designing & delivering integrated and participatory policies
E.1. Knowledge on participatory methods and tools for co-production and implementation of local polices :
The deputy of the province of South of Holland, asked the major of Maassluis if he was willing to work along to raise a closed institution for youth in his municipality. A location in a neighborhood was selected and I was asked to work as projectmanager for this. From day one word got around and I and my team were faced with a very angry mob, living in and near that neighborhood who were willing to do anything to stop this project. We held participation evenings, interactive work shops, we visited pro active the local residents, created a virtual reality animation, a webpage, organized field trips to similar locations in other neighborhoods in other municpalities, a weekly status update in the local paper and more. What I learned from this is that engaging and involving people is a delicate balance between informing and involving. And most important, giving people before a decision is made, at least the time and feeling that their opinion matters. In this particular case, the alderman wanted to pursue his timetable of having a participatory evening two days after the question was addressed to the mayor, even against the negative advice of everybody in the city hall. With this experience of crisis management, I have done several trajectories ever since and all were successful.
E.2. Knowledge on integrated approach for the design, delivering, monitoring and evaluation of urban strategies/policies:
In my experience, delivering succesfull projects needs working with an integrated approach for the design, delivering, monitoring and evaluation of sustainable urban strategies/policies. For Hoorn, I was responsible for the Zevenhuis, a 1 mio m2 sustainable working area which had to be developed from scratch in a short period of time. As the projectmanager I had the lead in the designing and applying monitoring tools for integrated and sustainable urban policies. We looked at BREEAM, LEED and other systems to work with. We did use financial instruments (Grex). Also we used the formal cycle of decision making of the municipality as a monitoring tool. As a monitoring tool for the project itself, we used an internal system of the municipality which monitored the project per phase and Microsoft Projects with which we monitored time, assets and capacity. However, we could only start with this process when we knew who are the relevant and less relevant stakeholders in the process and how can we engage and if needed, involve them. Thorough stakeholder analysis and visualizing them in a matrix helped our team and other key stakeholders recognizing value and interests and even conflicts of interests. Understanding each others positions and sharing common views is imperative to succesfully managing projects / transforming policies into systainable urban strategies/policies.
E.3. Awareness of the main policy and funding schemes for sustainable urban development at EU and national level:
As progam manager UR I can tap into the knowledge, databases and human resources of our partners. We keep each other informed about policies, trends and funds. As the central person, all that information passes my desk and I’m the one who arranges the follow up actions. We also organize workshops for internal and external partners in various topics, which all are somehow connected to integrated sustainability. Furthermore I read a lot of news feeds about sustainable development policies. Since it is in the interest of our partners and of course myself, we keep an open eye on new developments regarding our favorite topics. And by doing research myself in various fields, I also keep up to date about sustainable urban development policies and more. I use Feedly, Flipboard, email and of course the old newsletters from various organizations and governments.
E.4. Ability to understand specific local situations and adapt tools and content to different local realities:
In a recent project, the redevelopment of a neighborhood in Rome we were faced with differences in adapting tools and content at local level. In The Netherlands, we are more used to work in a integrated and systemic approach of challenges. Our Italian team members (from Rome and Milan) were not known at all with working that way. So we had to adapt our knowledge, approach in such a way the working conditions remained the same and improve the results without stepping on someones toes.
Summary Expertise:
As a consultant/process- project-program manager, I have hands on experience with participatory methods and tools. I have been using these in crisis management situations and other trajectories. Working with an integrated approach for the design, delivering, monitoring and evaluation of sustainable urban strategies/policies is in my nature of working towards my passion. In my position of program manager Urban Renaissance I am well connected to the main policy and funding schemes for sustainable urban development at EU and national level. I am able to tap in the knowledge, databases and work force of 11 international partners. Also I can adapt methodologies, tools and content across transnational projects to specific local situations. Familiarity with digital tools, social media and various forms of techniques like virtual and augmented reality is also part of my toolbox which I can use if needed. In my opinion, engaging and involving stakeholders means attracting them with a sound and enthusiastic story which they themselves are willing to pass on. Visuals will help to improve the impact of the story told. Helping municipalities and or regions in designing and delivering integrated and participatory policies is what I like to work on. Learned from failures and implement the learing points from them made me a better advisor/projectmanager. And I’m still eager to learn and experience new cultures, and so on.
Informations
Residence location:
Netherlands
Languages:
Dutch - Mother tongue
Foreign Languages level:
Foreign languages:
Foreign Languages level:
Foreign languages:
Email:
roy@spatiumsupport.nl