BUUR (in cooperation with STRATEC) has been assigned by the Brussels-Capital Region to draw up a Masterplan for the Site of regional importance nr 12 RTBF/VRT. This area located between the ‘Reyerslaan’, the ‘Leuvensesteenweg’ and the E40 totalizes 175 ha. It concerns a strategic intervention area where the Brussels-Capital Region wants to concentrate the resources of all the regional strategies in order to create a lever for the metropolitan development of Brussels. The masterplan defines the strategic options for the development of the area. This plan is a tool that will be used to gather in the short and medium term all the players that are involved in the future of the neighbourhood around one common development vision.
To bring the neighbourhood out of its isolation, increase its visibility and improve the connections to its immediate surroundings, the masterplan foresees strategic interventions to achieve a twofold purpose: a better balance between the different activities of the neighbourhood and a better integration in the urban context of Brussels.
The E40 will be transformed into an urban boulevard. The quality of the neighbourhoods in the immediate surroundings as well as the landscape experience when driving into the Brussels-Capital Region will be substantially improved, without reducing the continuity of the traffic. This improvement opens horizons to convert the ‘Kolonel Bourgstraat’ into a sustainable residential area. Two third of the private green space owned by the VRT and RTBF will be transformed into a public park. This green spot will be the powerful force behind the transformation of the neighbourhood, will increase the quality of life in the entire district and valorize the adjacent properties. Along the ‘Leuvensesteenweg’, the masterplan foresees an integrated housing and commerce typology to eliminate the existing urban break and re-establish the strong identity of this axis so it can finally play its role as center and regional commercial axis. The street will get a new profile to solve the conflictual traffic situation between the cars on the one hand and the busses on the other hand.
