Eranda Janku

Eranda Janku is an urban planner and lecturer at the Department of Urban Planning and Management of POLIS University in Tirana, Albania. Her major areas of interest are spatial and regional planning, landscape and environmental planning, and urban design. She has been project manager on many plans, including regional, strategic and master plans for several cities and regional areas in Albania. On 2014 Eranda was part of the group, who developed the first Albanian National Spatial Vision, namely “Albania 2030 Manifesto”, presenting for the very first time a methodology of spatial planning at national scale for the Albanian planning context. She is also part of the Innovation Factory, which is an innovative and research center, with special focus on the topic of innovation and sustainability, including the social, economic, environmental, energetic and structural areas.
In the meantime Eranda is also a very active actor of the founding and organizing team of TAW (Tirana Architecture Week) and TDW (Tirana Design Week), which are both biennial events that bring a series of happenings on the city, aiming the exchange of knowledge between professionals at national and international level, in order to increase the public’s interest in planning, architecture and design, as disciplines which are closely connected to the contemporary development of cities; as well as increase participation in decision-making and development processes.

Frank van der Hoeven

Frank van der Hoeven is associate professor Urban Design at the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment at the TU Delft. He conducted his PhD research in the field of underground space technology and multifunctional and intensive land-use. Currently he combines his associate professorship Urban Design with the position of Director of Research of the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment. As such he is responsible for the development of the research portfolio of the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment at TU Delft, the policy on open access publishing, and for the position of built environment in the Dutch creative industry. Topics that he is involved in are: urban underground space, multi-functional land use, sustainable mobility, high-rise urban development, greenhouse horticulture, climate change, urban heat islands, remote sensing.