12 & 13 March 2026 | ETH Zürich
The Spring 2026 NSL Colloquium Working on Transformation – An International Forum on Urban Planning as Learning will bring together specialists from various disciplines to reconceptualise urban planning as a process of collective learning.
How can urban planning be understood not only as the projection of a desired future, but as a shared learning process that unfolds over time? Urban planning is often understood as an individual’s or group’s ability to envisage a certain future and integrate it into the present. However, even if this process is informed by other disciplines, participation, dialogue, collective imagination, and learning rarely lie at its heart. This forum will explore urban transformation as a series of open-ended learning moments that evolve alongside the project itself, enabling agile responses and the constant evolution of the initial question or brief. It will also explore how design education can model such processes.
The forum aims to expand and refine the range of tools and approaches used by architects and urban planners to guide and design processes. It will offer new perspectives from other disciplines and encourage reflection on the role of the architect as a facilitator and mediator. The forum is based on the premise that we can design and develop more inclusive and livable environments by creating a continuous feedback loop between learning and planning.
Various formats will be combined, including keynote lectures offering diverse perspectives on learning, site visits and experimental workshop sessions in which concepts and insights will be applied to case studies. There will also be moments of active reflection. Through these different formats, the forum itself will create learning moments and insights.
Programme
Thursday 12 March 2026
ETH Zürich, Hönggerberg, HIL H 40.4 (Plaza), Stefano-Franscini-Platz 5, 8093 Zürich
INTRODUCTION
09:00 Introduction: Urban Planning as Learning; Lukas Fink, Michiel van Iersel, Freek Persyn; ETH Zürich, NEWROPE chair for Architecture and Urban Transformation
10:00 Learning as Festivity; Katía Truijen
10:30 Break / Exercise
META FRAMING
11:00 Collective Imagination; Tania Zittoun, Université de Neuchâtel
11:25 The Avuncular Institution; Darren O’Donnel, Mammalian Diving Reflex
11:50 On the Relationship between Learning and Changing; Elena P. Antonacopoulou, American University of Beirut Mediterraneo, Paphos, Cyprus
12:15 Q&A; Tania Zittoun, Darren O’Donnell, Elena P. Antonacopoulou
12:30 Lunch break (lunch not provided)
EXAMPLES FROM PRACTICE
13:30 Countermapping as a Tool for Collective Learning; Omar Nagati – Cluster Cairo
13:55 Two Adaptive Infrastructure projects by 51N4E; Dieter Leyssen
14:20 Play the City; Ekim Tan
14:45 Q&A; Omar Nagati, Dieter Leyssen, Ekim Tan
15:00 Coffee
15:30 Travel Time
16:00–18:00 SITE VISITS (in 3 groups)
– Site Visit 1: Europabrücke: Landscapes of Adaptive Infrastructure; David Menzi, Lukas Fink
– Site Visit 2: Dübendorf: Densifying An Accidental Garden City; Angelus Eisinger, Elvira Kinzner (RZU), Jan Engelke, Lukas Raabe
– Site Visit 3: Between Food Production and Public Space: Agroecological Transition in Zurich; Alice Clarke, Jan Westerheide, ETH Zürich, chair Architecture of Territory
APÉRO AND BOOKLAUNCH
ETH Zürich, Oerlikon, ONA Design in Dialogue (DiD) Lab, Neunbrunnenstrasse 50, 8050 Zürich
19:00-20:30 Apéro Riche & Book Launch “Negotiating Infrastructure”
Friday 13 March 2026
ETH Zürich, Oerlikon, ONA E7 (Fokushalle), Neunbrunnenstrasse 50, 8050 Zürich
WORKSHOPS
09:00 Coffee + Gipfeli
09:30 Introduction of the Day; Re-cap Previous Day
10:00 Workshops (in 3 groups, choose same as site visit)
– Case 1: Europabrücke: Landscapes of Adaptive Infrastructure; David Ganzoni (AfS), David Menzi, Dieter Leyssen, Elena P. Antonacopoulou
– Case 2: Dübendorf: Densifying An Accidental Garden City; Jan Engelke, Lukas Raabe, Darren O’Donnell, Omar Nagati, Elvira Kinzner (RZU)
– Case 3: Between Food Production and Public Space: Agroecological Transition in Zurich; Alice Clarke, Jan Westerheide, Ekim Tan, Tania Zittoun
12:00 Lunch break (lunch not provided)
REFLECTION & OUTLOOK
13:30 Reports from the Workshops
14:30 Panel: Planning as Learning; Darren O’Donnell, Dieter Leyssen, Ekim Tan, Elena P. Antonacopoulou, Freek Persyn, Katía Truijen, Omar Nagati, Regula Lüscher, Tania Zittoun, David Ganzoni
16:00 Reflection on the Two Conference Days and Outlook to potential next steps
16:30 Coffee/Apéro
Registration
Registration Deadline prolonged to 11 March 2026.
