Mecanoo was commissioned by Rijkswaterstaat (part of the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment) to conduct a study, entitled Holland Avenue, about the roadways of the future from the perspective of the road user.
Facts and figures about the past, present and future compiled for this study dealt with technical constraints, ownership, accountability and patronage of roads, the increase in car ownership, cost of cars and petrol, most popular cars, increase of mobility per transport mode, purpose for travel, average distances, speed, congestion, traffic density, pollution and safety.
The research clearly shows that a rich society is a mobile one. Despite good public transport, the car remains the most common mode of transport in the Netherlands with the motorways – as opposed to provincial roads – as the primary routes between Dutch cities.
In spite of this, most of the distances travelled are shorter than five kilometres. For the research, four cameras were placed in a car, capturing everything along the 153-kilometre-long ring road that connects the Randstad between Delft, The Hague, Leiden, Amsterdam, Utrecht, Rotterdam and Delft.
The recordings of the journey shifted between time and movement, landscape and urban views, programme and intersections, petrol stations and advertisements. The images were translated into maps and diagrams that rendered the experience of the road user not only legible but also ‘designable’.
The study was published in the book Holland Avenue 2002-2030 and is divided into two parts: the research atlas presents a strategy for the collection of information relevant to the road user; the design atlas contains proposals and design strategies for the design of motorways and the immediate surroundings from the perspective of the road user.