My new life as professor at University College Bergen in Norway
Akkelies van Nes
Now I am working as a professor in Land use planning at the University College Bergen, department of Civil engineering in Bergen in Norway. One of my tasks is to make a new master program in land use planning. We aim to start up autumn 2015. The next step is to build up a PhD program for land use planners.
At this moment the university provides education on bachelor level for land use planners. Currently we are 3 professors working at the department. The other two are professors in road building and property rights. The university is growing, and the education capacity will expand due to a shortage of land use planners in Norway.
Currently I am coordinating a BSc course in road and land use planning and a course in transforming industrial areas to highly urban areas. There are no budget limitations, so I arrange people from practice to give lectures on how to construct roads in a very hilly Western Norway landscape, how to make regulation plans for new dwelling areas, and how to use current software for representing their plans. The BSc course in land use planning in urban areas has the focus on transforming old industrial areas to urban areas.
There is an urgent need for land use planners in the various municipalities at the western part of Norway. Moreover, in line with the Kyoto agreement there is a need to plan built environments facilitating higher densities of dwellings in town and village centers, and to plan a settlement pattern promoting lesser energy use for private car transport. Planning and implementing bicycle routes in a hilly landscape is also on the agenda. Since Norway has almost no urban tradition, there is a need for urban planners with the skills of regenerating urban centers and to re-use old industrial areas located close to existing urban centers.
I am still working 40% at the TU Delft. So I am dealing with a build environment located in a ‘vertical’ landscape in Bergen and a built environment with a ‘horizontal’ landscape in the Netherlands. Bergen is one of the rainiest cities in Europe, with in average 2 meters rainfall per year. But when the sun shines, Bergen is a jewel. Here are some nice photos from Bergen and its surrounding hills taken on sunny days.
