Use Case

Amsterdam, Netherlands

Resilient Strategic Planning for Transport Network Development

The Amsterdam Metropolitan Area boasts a robust rail system for inter-regional and international connections, alongside a dense network of roads, including a heavily used motorway system.

Despite Amsterdam’s international fame as a cycling city, the region heavily relies on the motorized transport of goods and people (both private and public transport) to sustain its economic vitality and position as one of the most active and dynamic regions in the EU.

Notably, the region is home to the 4th busiest airport in Europe, which virtually connects the area with the entire world. However, Amsterdam’s location below average sea level makes it particularly vulnerable to weather events that can disrupt this key EU region.

Moreover, growing energy consumption due to the increasing electrification of the country is leading to grid congestion and potential power outages. With the increasing likelihood of such events due to climate change, the risks for the region are significant.

The Netherlands, particularly Amsterdam, is also under significant pressure to provide new housing while facing substantial population growth. Simultaneously, it is situated in a delicate region vulnerable to the consequences of climate change and disruptions such as the physical degradation of transport networks.
The city needs to build 325,000 new houses by 2050 in a limited area while contending with the increasing likelihood of major weather events that could strand a significant portion of the population.
In detail, the main challenges of UC3 are due to the following disruption scenarios:
• Extreme Weather Conditions/Climate Change
• Energy Disruptions
• Supply-chain disruptions

Charming view of Amsterdam canal lined with boats and historic buildings under a clear sky.

To navigate these challenges, VRA and RWS will collaborate with TUD as a knowledge partner in the SCUDO project.

Innovative solutions will be used to:

Develop smart algorithms to create guidelines on how to use the available space for expanding urban areas, building new houses and expanding/establishing transport networks under different extreme climate event scenarios

For those purposes, the project will also

The main decision variables – land use and infrastructure design (including the reinforcement of existing arcs) – will lead to altered flows and usage of the existing infrastructure through the multimodal flow model. This creates a bi-level problem, which is notoriously complex to solve. To address this, several methods, including AI empowered algorithms, will be developed. These methods will uncover mid to long-term solutions that maximize the region’s resilience, equity, and safety during major disruptive climate events, potentially resulting in enormous cost savings during disasters.

Design critical scenarios that can heavily disrupt this high-value conurbation in both passenger and freight transport on a regional scale.

Provide an understanding of resilience at a regional scale, including the safe resumption of goods and passenger transport.

Offer methods for medium to long-term planning of urbanized regions, considering the substantial housing needs by jointly planning land use densities and transport infrastructure that are probabilistically more resilient to disruptive events.

Key Performance Indicators

Reduction of

  • Waiting time
  • Door-to-door travel time during extreme events
  • Accidents
  • Costs for infrastructure repairment
  • Time to recover to system status before the event
  • Isolated population
  • Power outages and grid strain

Facts and figures

How many people live in the Amsterdam Metropolitan Area?

Around 2.5 million people live in the area.

How large is the Amsterdam Metropolitan Area?

It spans about 2,500 square kilometres.

How many municipalities make up the Amsterdam Area?

It includes over 30 municipalities in total.