Completed in 2022, this PhD project explored how urban planning and design can engage the affective sonic dimensions of urban areas shaped by violence and cycles of redevelopment. Focusing on the conversion of old industrial railway land along Brussels’ Line L28 into new green public spaces, the study demonstrated that decentring the listener in planning and design research opened up possibilities for critical sonic spatial-infrastructure design. By confronting planning and design research with sound studies and youth-led performative practices in inner-city contexts, this practice-led project developed a relational, performative, sonic-material cartographic methodology for mapping these spatio-temporal configurations and integrating them—as “affective geographies”—into the planning and design of transitional urban spaces.
Towards a Decentering of the Listener in Planning and Design Research: Attuning to Affective Sonic Materiality for Transitory Railway Space along Brussels Line 28
Supervisory team:
Prof. Dr. Burak Pak (KU Leuven)
Mr. Peter Cusack (UAL)
Members of the Examination Committee:
Prof. Dr. ir. Monika Rychtarikova (KU Leuven)
Prof. Dr. ir. Sven Sterken (KU Leuven)
Prof. Dr. Maarten Loopmans (KU Leuven)
Dr. Barbara Roosen (Uhasselt)
Dr. Nicola Di Croce (Iuav)
The PhD research was carried out in the Altering Practices (Alt_Shift) Research Group at KU Leuven Faculty of Architecture Campus Sint-Lucas Brussels and was funded by KU Leuven Funds (2017 – 2022).
NYC PILOT STUDY
From August 22 to September 14, 2018, I conducted an ethnographic pilot study in New York City, with a focus on sound art methodologies, bioacoustics, and the redevelopment of Sunnyside Yard. Supported by the KU Leuven Architecture NY-hub, this research visit combined network practice and field study, exploring collaborative approaches to urban sonic research. Through this research, methodologies and tools for analyzing the affective sonic dimensions of Blue-Green Infrastructure (BGI) implementation in old industrial urban environments have been shared and refined.
SONIC CARTOGRAPHY
In my doctoral research, I developed a sonic-cartographic analytical framework grounded in sonic materialism and focused on sound’s informational affect and urban territoriality—work that later underpinned my practice in sonic ethnography.
The analysis proceeded in three stages:
- Tracing – Delineated transitional railway sites appropriated by local youth as performative zones, drawing on literature review, prior planning participation, and longitudinal field observation.
- Mapping – Documented affective relations between discrete sonic events and the acoustic flows linking multiple sound spheres with the wider urban environment.
- Multi-level Analysis – Examined how local, non-local, human, and non-human sonic interactions both affect and are affected by strategic planning processes.
MASTER STUDIO_L28
Master Design Studio_L28 Sonic Urbanism Master Design Studio_L28 (2018-20), a collaboration under the guidance of Prof. Dr. Burak Pak as part of my PhD research, KU Leuven Faculty of Architecture, Campus Sint Lucas, Brussels (BE)
Elective Course on Sonic Cartography (2018-20), collaboration under the guidance of Prof. Dr. Burak Pak and Peter Cusack as part of my PhD research, KU Leuven Faculty of Architecture, Campus Sint Lucas, Brussels (BE)
Vitrien #2 (2020), exhibition with students of the KU Leuven International Master of Architecture, a collaboration with BNA-BBOT, under the guidance of Prof. Dr. Burak Pak as part of my PhD research, BNA-BBOT, Brussels (BE)
