Drain covers, manhole covers, and coal-shoots are part of our social history. In a virtual, throwaway world, a sense of nostalgia is conjured by these hunks of cast metal, where bygone foundries are name-checked in lost wax. The product of old technology, these lids on the underworld continue to serve an unromantic purpose – putting a barrier between us and our filth. Yet, it’s this functional character, combined with decorative elements, that creates part of their appeal.

Just like the manhole covers themselves, undercurrents of this hobby are everywhere. Facebook boasts several enthusiast groups, such as Manhole Covers Around the World, with over 500 members posting pictures of their drain discoveries. Variations on the #manhole hashtag on Instagram have been used over half a million times. (And no, before you ask, hardly any of these posts are euphemistic).

‘There’s a joy in finding beauty in something like street furniture, something not everybody notices,’ said one manhole fan I spoke to. ‘It’s like you’ve discovered a secret in plain sight. Plus, you’re communing with a designer-maker from decades ago. Perhaps they took extra care and pride in giving a workaday object some sort of dignity. We should honour that by paying attention.’

Manhole covers often say something unique about the spirit and fabric of their location. Nearly every one of Japan’s 1,719 municipalities has manholes representing its culture. And in Brussels, the home of Art Nouveau, some beautiful examples illustrate the intricate relationship between art, nature and industry abiding in the city.

The post Brussels Hidden Gems: Choose Life. Choose Drain-spotting appeared first on Brussels Express.

Civa Brussels has an exposition, Designed Landscapes, that proposes a new perspective on Brussels’ parks and public gardens through their history. Public parks were indeed invented and actively developed from the 18^th century: before that green spaces were often reserved to the aristocracy. The beginning of Brussels’ parks points to a rather French influence, with geometric designs, sculptured trees and neat gravel paths: think of the Parc Royal (1775) or the Jardin Botanique (1826-1829). But from the middle of the 19^th century a wilder, more natural park landscape was sought: this marks a growing influence of English gardens, visible in parks such as Duden or the Bois de la Cambre.

It was Leopold II that was behind the creation of many parks in Brussels, including the Bois de la Cambre, which he connected to the city through a large avenue populated with large trees: Avenue Louise. More and more parks are created: Woluwe, Laeken, Forest, Josaphat. New tree varieties were planted in the parks to charm visitors, and natural spaces such as the Ixelles and Melaerts ponds were landscaped. A Belgian “excentricity” consisted in building fake mountain features or bridges, cascades and hills, but these were built in Portland cement. The exhibition shows examples: the cave of the Ixelles ponds with its Greek temple, the waterfall of Marie-Louise Square, some elements of the Josaphat Park. Big works continued until the end of the 19th century with the construction of the Parc du Cinquantenaire and its museum. You will also notice that many parks are decorated with outstanding sculptures, making them truly open-air museums.

 

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The 20th century saw a utilitarian urbanism taking over, with room for cars and high-rise building being privileged, but today things are changing. Green spaces are again seeing the day thanks to modern pioneers that are building spaces big and small that respond to the now audible demands of citizens and public powers who want to win their votes.

You can visit Designed Landscapes at Civa, 55 rue de l’Ermitage, Ixelles, until the 31st of March.

The post Explore the history of Brussels’ parks      appeared first on Brussels Express.

Surprisingly or not, the statistic show that the Flemish part of Belgium has a better health compared to Wallonia. Patrick Deboosere explains that socio-economical status has a lot to do with it.

However, in terms of Brussels the self-assessed health results show that people in the northern part of the city are in worse condition compared to the people in the neighbourhoods like Uccle and Saint-Gilles in the South. « Aging in Brussels is good for your health, even though worse neighbourhoods equals worse health.’’

Apparently education plays a serious role into a person’s health. The importance of it showed striking results in Brussels. For the examined 25-year-olds people with a higher educational level, showed that 5% are in bad health. On the other side, young adults with primary education show 25% of bad health.

There are a lot of aspects to have in mind. For example, housing living conditions – damp and overcrowded places can worsen the immune system. A lot of people tend to forget that indoor pollution is just as dangerous as the outdoor bad emissions. “And smoking is your individual air pollution.”

Measures of health can be calculated in many different ways, says the expert. One of them shows the complex reflection in air pollution. While factories no longer produce such high levels deadly fumes, car ownership has drastically increased in the last decades and it shows.

Brussels is above the air pollution norms given by the World Health Organisation. Not only that, but Brussels is above the European Union normal levels.

1/3 of health problems are a result of human activity. The transport and the traffic are the two main pollutants followed by the industry. However, Brussels might not be the flattest and easiest city to cycle but this can really make a huge impact on the overall citizens being. Traffic pollution should be urgently taken into consideration but unfortunately, just as every social change, it takes time.

The post Brussels exceeds the air pollution norms by the World Health Organisation – How unhealthy is it for you to live in the city? appeared first on Brussels Express.

Part of the issue seems to be insufficient funding for municipal waste management. This is clear when you discover that waste collection happens on weekday mornings, usually around rush hour, when it is usually done in the late night to avoid worsening traffic conditions. The lack of garbage containers also contributes to the problem: you are only supposed to take out waste the day before collection. But some people have too much trash and little space, meaning they just abandon it on the sidewalk.

There is also a lack of civic culture or perhaps even love for Brussels. The fact that there are problems with waste makes it harder to try and make an effort about it. Test Achats recommends a mix of incentives, such as deposits for aluminium and glass, as well as giving the city more resources to face these issues, for instance by financing civil society associations that could contribute to cleaning up the city.

But this is Brussels, and of course citizens have taken it to make people aware about the situation. Shown in this article are my two favourite posters, which while humorous, catch the attention and urge people to change their behaviour. We cannot expect the upcoming elections to bring radical change to how waste is managed in Brussels, but it is a crucial part of what makes a city liveable. The survey by Test Achats sheds only a dim light on what needs to be done for Brussels to be as clean as Kigali.

The post Brussels: A very dirty city? appeared first on Brussels Express.

Over two days of workshops, meetings and exchanges, Fearless Cities Brussels welcomes local and international citizens to share experiences, strategies and participative tools for a more open and democratic governance of their city.

The conference will bring together over 300 participants—activists, social workers, cultural actors, entrepreneurs and committed citizens—in a co-creation space featuring fourteen workshops and four plenary sessions as well as cultural entertainment. Speakers from Barcelona, Amsterdam, Naples, and Saillans (France) will relate their municipalist experience and lessons learned. The conference has a highly participatory format, with professional facilitators inviting citizens to explore ideas, issues and solutions.

At the initiative of the citizen movement WeBrussels, the conference will address the principles and good practices of municipalism.

Municipalism is a political project which challenges the current workings of our democracy, and seeks to involve citizens and neighbourhoods directly in policy making. It sees local communities as drivers of change, based on consensus building, feminism, inclusion, solidarity, and sustainability.

Three weeks before the October 14th municipal elections, the topics covered are broad, complex, and decisive for the future administration of the communes and for the life of all Brussels residents: work (creating meaningful jobs at the local level and in alignment with our values), housing (the right to housing, social diversity, gentrification of neighborhoods), public space (planning, use, occupation of the commons), mobility (soft and sustainable transport, micro-mobility), urban ecology (air quality, green areas, urban farming), social and sustainable economy (short supply chain, local currency, local exchange system, social entrepreneurship), migration (hosting asylum seekers and transmigrants, sanctuary cities), feminising politics, citizen participation, government ethics, and public transparency.

Considering that places are limited, interested parties are encouraged to register online.

GOOD TO KNOW: 

• When: from 10:00 on Saturday, 22 September to 18:30 on Sunday 23 September 2018

• Where: Kaaitheater, square Sainctelette 20, 1000 Brussels (www.kaaitheater.be)

• Program: fearlesscities.webrussels.org

• Participation fee: EUR 10 for both days. Registration is free for low-income people. We encourage other participants to “pay it forward” by purchasing a solidarity ticket (an extra ticket that will be offered to another person)

• Children admitted. Daycare will be provided on both days

• Healthy food and drinks available at moderate prices

The post Fearless Cities: Brussels – Two Days to Win Back the City appeared first on Brussels Express.

Some alternatives are already working well in Brussels, including both municipal and private sector bike and car sharing. The STIB has even bought their first electric bus. But greater efforts are needed to make our cities more livable. The European Mobility Week, from the 16th to the 22nd of September, seeks to support these efforts, disseminate best practices and seek commitments from stakeholders, from civil society organisations to government, as well as private companies and NGOs. It will be kicked off by the yearly Car free Sunday this week. It is a great time to explore the city and imagine what a world would look like with less cars.

The Mobility Week’s focus this year is on multi-modality. While Brussels has relatively good public transport connections and train systems, they are not well integrated and few people see them as a viable alternative to driving, especially if they live out of town. Some technologies are coming to the rescue. You have probably spotted the Brussels-based Ahooga lightweight electric and foldable bike, which can easily be taken on public transport, or the futuristic one wheel electric scooter which takes people whizzing past you. This allows you to overcome one of the greatest fear people have from cycling : sweat. You will not avoid the rain but then again you will not be wasting time stuck in traffic.

While efforts to improve public transport are more than welcome, I think that in the end one of the biggest obstacles we face is our love for convenience and aversion to change. But convenience changes meaning : I invite all drivers to observe the amount of time – and temper – lost in traffic, and consider cycling before the autumn sets in. You might be surprised with the time you save and how nice it is to incorporate some sport in your day to day life.

The post Car free Sunday in Brussels on September 16th appeared first on Brussels Express.

Brussels Express team has been busy preparing new projects lately and it was one of those days when all meetings and obligations cram into one.

After an overloaded day, we still had two things to do after work – buy groceries at Chatelain market and meet for a drink with our friends in Marolles. We usually like taking a bike for running errands, but this was not an option this time since we were completely exhausted after a busy day. We didn’t feel like cycling uptown and back again. Thus, we finally decided to give DriveNow a try. We heard a lot about it and now was the perfect time to test it. We have registered online some time ago, downloaded the app, and our DriveNow card was send to us just a few days after. You can simply use  the app or your customer card for unlocking the car. With a simple click on the app, we checked the location of the nearest available car – the network has 300 BMW and MINI in Brussels – and soon we were ready to rock in a super cool MINI. We hoped that we would have a chance to try a super cute BMW – the network has BMW 1 Series, BMW 2 Series Active Tourer, MINI Clubman or MINI 3-door model – but this fancy MINI was also a perfect discovery.

As mentioned previously, we could open the car with the app but for this first time we used the customer card. We were excited that the process went smoothly. We were a bit puzzled with all the questions at the beginning, such as if there are any damages visible on the car, or if we wanted an additional insurance, etc. However, this only took 30 seconds and soon enough we forgot about these questions, as we loved the flexibility that DriveNow provided. We were able to hop on and hop off anywhere around the business area of Brussels, which covers 59 km2. Moreover, the parking is included in your rental fee, which means that you can park on a legal street parking almost anywhere within the business area for free. Our advice is to just pay attention to the parking signs around. Just remember that it is not allowed to leave the car in parking lots or parking zones for special use (e.g. disabled parking, taxi parking, loading zones, red and orange zones, private parking etc).

Without a hassle of finding the pay machine and paying for the parking, we were able to leave the car as soon as we found the parking spot. We were offered an option to keep the car (on park mode) or to leave it off – we decided to end the rental. After spending an hour and a half at the buzzing market and buying tons of necessary and unnecessary vegetables and fruits the time was running out. We had to drop off our groceries at home first, and then venture out to Marolles to meet our friends. The car that we previously drove was already taken, since we parked it conveniently close to the market. We went on our DriveNow app and we found another car just 6 minutes away. We had the chance to try-out another fancy model and this BMW 1 Series was great as well. GPS navigated us home where we stopped and one of us just ran up to our apartment on the fourth floor to leave all the groceries that we bought. Five minutes later, we were off to our next destination: Marolles, where we arrived with couple of minutes to spare.

Our overall experience? Pleasure and the feeling of effortless mobility and flexibility! Great choice for our lifestyles. After a nice evening in Marolles, which is one of our favourite parts of the city it was the time to go home. Since we had couple of drinks, this time around we were not able to hop into DriveNow; instead, we opted to walk home. We were happy to finally try DriveNow and we will definitely continue using it around Brussels.

The post How to move around Brussels? Efficiently, affordably, sustainably. appeared first on Brussels Express.

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J’accuse was played at the beginning of the year in Québec (the French-speaking region of Canada), gathering a significant success and the best critics from the media. As it worked very well in the New World, Annick Lefebvre decided to set up the play also in Europe and it is now in town. She adapted the scenario and the text to make them more in line with Brussels’ life and culture, offering a fascinating insight on our society and the on the way women feel it.

J’accuse will be played at Atelier 210 from Monday to Saturday at night by 9 December. On Wednesday 29^th of November, you will also have the chance to chat with Annick Lefebvre and the staff after the piece is played. The basic price is €16, but you can get a discount if you are a group. For more information, have a look online.

The post Listen to women’s voice! appeared first on Brussels Express.