By designing the built environment for people instead of cars, a contribution can be made to a softer city, which improves the quality of life for residents as well as their health. Important aspects of such an environment are social infrastructure stimulating encounters, as well as shops and other daily …

Public squares have a huge impact on the quality of life of urban residents, especially in vulnerable neighborhoods. They can facilitate exercise, community interactions, play and climate adaptation, all of which influence the health of locals. However, there are often many questions on how to capture …

Urban densification continues unabated, even as the possible consequences for users’ eye-level experiences remain unknown. This study addresses these consequences. In a laboratory setting, images of the NDSM wharf were shown to university students primed for one of three user groups: residents, visitors …

Flooding continues to be a major problem for informal urban settlements like Kibera in Nairobi, Kenya. The recent heavy rains in early 2024 in Kenya indicate the vulnerability level of individuals living in informal settlements. This thesis explores how effective the current flood prevention, preparedness, …

This research is focused on the circumstances related to rainwater flooding in the Municipality of Valkenburg aan de Geul, located in the south of the Netherlands. The town has been dealing with flooding from rainwater for as long as its inhabitants can remember, but the situation became much more severe …

Previous research largely supports the notion that mediated contact and engagement with minority characters can improve viewers’ real-life minority attitudes. However, it is unclear to what extent different forms of media engagement such as parasocial friendship and wishful identification are linked …

The Thermostaat project aimed to investigate how can we use community creation and citizen science to make people more aware of and more adapted to heat in apartments as a consequence of climate change. To this end, residents in IJmuiden and Amsterdam measured temperature in their apartments and with …

Given the urgency of global energy transition, small- and medium-sized cities often undergo rapid changes. What is often missing, however, is a better understanding of how residents of those places perceive, and relate to the various aspects of local energy transition process and spatial outcomes. This …

Actuele ontwikkelingen maken dat er vanuit verschillende gremia hernieuwde aandacht is voor kansenongelijkheid tussen regio’s in Nederland. Het advies "" Elke regio telt" (2023) vormde hier een belangrijke aanzet toe. Echter, een inventarisatie van de focus bij het onderzoek en het onderwijs aan hogescholen …