Urban planning and territorial development, professional focus in Redesigning post-industrial cities (RePIC)

Programme content

PRESENTATION

A sustainable response to spatial and territorial change

Metropolization, increasing environmental risks, social exclusion... the challenges facing today's urban planners are numerous. Today's society needs professionals capable of understanding the context in which they will be working, in order to propose sustainable solutions that meet the growing demands for environmental resilience, economic competitiveness and quality of life. Focusing on the diagnosis and design of sustainable urban and territorial projects, this new master's degree will address all of these societal challenges: demographic, energy and climate change, mobility, governance, the collaborative economy, territorial equity and solidarity, new technologies... It will deal with the transition to a sustainable and inclusive economy, with a particular focus on the conversion of post-industrial towns and territories, on the one hand, and the conversion of peri-urban/rural areas, on the other.

How can we transform our cities to cope with the heat of summer or the risk of flooding? How can we reconvert former steelworks areas into high-quality neighborhoods? How can spaces and squares be designed to ensure the safety of residents and improve community life? How can we optimize travel, taking into account the development of soft mobility? How can we successfully implement an eco-district project? These are just some of the questions that graduates of this program will be able to answer.

In addition, future urban planners and developers will be keen to comply with European directives on the reduction of building activity and pollution. Biodiversity, in Wallonia as elsewhere in the world, could not be more affected.

RePIC

The Master RePIC is a unique opportunity to obtain a joint Master's degree from Ruhr-Universität Bochum (Germany), University College Cork (Ireland), Universidad de Deusto (Spain), Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam (Netherlands), Koç University (Turkey), Université de Liège (Belgium), University of Oulu (Finland) and University of Zagreb (Croatia).

The program includes compulsory mobility between the universities, so that students can discover the diversity of urban challenges in two or three European cities.

This unique two-year Master's program, taught in English, is focused on research. It aims to build a dynamic community around committed knowledge and innovation, capable of rethinking the sustainable urban future.

Bringing innovative solutions to post-industrial cities

One in five cities in the world has a (post-)industrial heritage and therefore needs corresponding expertise for sustainable, resilient and competitive urban development. The program has been designed to give students numerous opportunities to enhance their employability by engaging with real-life urban challenges.

The English-language RePIC program aims to attract future urban designers, managers and curators from a wide range of disciplines and countries who wish to contribute to the realization of the UN's New Urban Agenda and the urban dimensions of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The program goes beyond existing urban planning offerings and includes topics such as: superdiversity in urban contexts; innovation and digitization of public administration; governance and management of open spaces; resilient cities, healthy urbanism in European cities; cultural economy, heritage economy and tourism; trends reshaping climate and energy transnational migration, urban social movements and the "right to the city".

Find out more about this Master's degree on the UNIC website.

Added value

• Une formation interdisciplinaire
• Un programme accessible à de nombreux profils d'étudiants, en 2 ans ou 1 an en fonction du diplôme
• L'expérience pratique au coeur des apprentissages, notamment à travers les projets
• Des voyages et workshops internationaux
• Des enseignants proches des étudiants
• Des experts professionnels impliqués dans le cursus
• Une multitude d'opportunités professionnelles

Learning outcomes

After graduation you will have broad knowledge of:

• urban transformations and urban design in a global perspective; and are able to apply this knowledge in practice, and across different jurisdictions,

• the interdependent human and environmental urban systems

• sociological and cultural approaches towards urban dynamics and actors, understanding major local and global historical developments influencing urban settings,

• dynamics and processes involved in the revitalisation of post industrial cities from the social science, sustainability, and circular economy perspectives.

Importantly, through the programme courses and hands-on learning activities, you will be able to:

• critically analyse and evaluate data found in the digital space and have insights into the foundation needed to apply data analytics to real-world post industrial urban transformation,

• critically analyse factors influencing different spaces within urban settings but also an ability to compare between different cities,

• deal with modern geospatial data resources (acquisition, maintenance, analysis, and cartographic visualisation of spatio-temporal transformation processes in urban areas),

• communicate and translate between different professional orientations and cultures, learned to build up empathy, work with different social groups, to bring together different perspectives and to work in transnational teams, 

• serve as curator of interdisciplinary transformation processes

• think beyond boundaries and to explore and generate new ideas that can be applied to current and emergent needs.