Articles about AESOP in 2012
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Item Restricted Planning to achieve/Planning to avoid: The 26th AESOP Congress, Ankara, Turkey, 11-15 July 2012(Liverpool University Press, 2012) Peel, DeborahThe 26th annual Congress of the Association of European Planning Schools (AESOP), with its umbrella motto – ‘Planning to achieve/Planning to avoid’ – took place from 11 to 15 July in the Turkish capital city, Ankara. The event was hosted by the Middle East Technical University (METU). Given METU’s pioneering role in contributing to higher education across Turkey and Middle Eastern countries, its commitment to natural and social sciences and its innovative approaches to teaching and learning, this proved an exciting venue for celebrating the Association’s Silver Jubilee. Delegates were welcomed by the Vice Principal and Mayor – both planning alumni of METU and both emphasising the living geography afforded by the campus and the intellectual and professional contributions of METU planning graduates. Indeed, current students were much appreciated by congress delegates – not least because of their bright yellow T-shirts saying, simply, ‘Ask Me’. Established in 1956, METU’s extensive campus now provides a vital green area for the city of Ankara. A significant ‘greening-the-campus’, initiated in 1958, has effectively transformed 4500 ha of barren land into a city forest, incorporating 500 ha of lakes and ponds, that makes the City less dry and less polluted and offers an important recreational facility for students and visitors alike. Professor Taner Oc, an METU alumnus, recalled with affection – and pride – the celebration and festivity involved in this (still continuing) student tree-planting tradition. A commitment to scientific enquiry and maintaining quality of life are more than symbolically rooted in a campus where public art commemorates notable thinkers and where cherry trees blossom. In an entertaining plenary address by Professor Baykan Günay on the spatial history of Ankara, we learned how, inspired by METU’s contribution to greening the city, the region launched its own re-afforestation programme, echoing a Geddesian motif: ‘by leaves we live’. It is not surprising that the very capable 2012 AESOP Local Organising Committee at METU initiated the new Greening Policy for AESOP activities, bringing waste avoidance and planned resource efficiency to the heart of future AESOP congresses.