Postdoc on Just Streets

The University of Amsterdam’s Urban Planning research group is looking for a postdoctoral researcher (3,5 years) to contribute to the new European project “JUST STREET” .

The main objective of JUST STREET is to support cities in promoting, improving and converting to just, equal and active mobility by developing innovative and holistic strategies, and most importantly implementing them, aimed at encouraging transformative urban planning solutions with complementary behavioural changes. JUST STREET focuses on marginalised social groups and their needs (and contributions) as fundamental to the process to shape the proposed strategies with a bottom-up methodology applied throughout.

The postdoctoral researcher will be working directly with Prof. Dr. Marco te Brömmelstroet. The candidate will also become part of the JUST STREET consortium, which includes leading research institutes and cities in Europe. The candidate will be embedded in the Urban Planning research group, in the Department of Geography, Planning and International Development Studies (GPIO) at the University of Amsterdam. The postdoc will become part of the Amsterdam Institute of Social Science Research (AISSR) and the Centre for Urban Studies (CUS).

What are you going to do

The candidate will become an active member of the JUST STREET consortium and undertake research activities for four years to support a transition to more just streets in Amsterdam and a range of European cities.

You will

• perform a desk review on measures, best practices and benchmarking analysis on how to get more holistic design guidelines implemented;
• review largescale ideas currently being explored to make streets just;
• develop a synthetic and practice oriented compendium of innovative tools and methods, including for example the 15-minute city, Superblocks, Play Out movement, Kidical Mass, Bicibus, Rewilding;
• develop a state of the art overview of tools and techniques for behavioural change and design of interventions to encourage active mobility;
• do risk assessment of expected increase in active mobility;
• define the profile, needs and requirements of Living Labs in the eight involved cities;
• co-create and engage in living labs with solutions for inclusive, safe, affordable and sustainable urban mobility;
• design a learning/evaluation framework with representative impact-oriented metrics to monitor the progress and effectiveness of implementation and learn from the Living Labs;
• interview policy-makers, mobility experts and representatives over vulnerable social group, develop online questionnaires and do field-observations;
• support the creative of content to get urban stakeholders to act, ensuring that learnings, knowhow and experiences form the project are effectively shared;
• represent the University of Amsterdam as an active and member of the larger JUST STREET community;
• the position is research focused. But for your career development towards tenure positions, teaching experience is crucial. Therefore the department has the policy that post-doc researchers make a contribution to the teaching programme

What do you have to offer

We are looking for an enthusiastic and critical scholar who would like to work on issues at the intersection of justice, design of public streets, and transitions in (European) cities. You have an interest in bridging abstract academic notions with hands-on policy advice. You have an interest in conducting comparative research, as well as bridging different theories and disciplines. You can work independently and you are able to establish contacts within new networks of scholars, policymakers and communities in order to conduct research in a large European consortium.

Your experience and profile

Candidates should hold a PhD degree in urban and regional planning, urban studies, human geography, policymaking, or a closely related field. Candidates who do not hold a PhD upon application will not qualify.

Successful candidates are those who:

• have demonstrated experience doing field research on street design, road safety and/or urban planning;
• have an in-depth knowledge of the literature on street justice and mobility transition;
• have demonstrated experience doing empirical fieldwork in different geographical contexts;
• have demonstrated experience with qualitative research methods;
• have demonstrated experience with conceptual thinking;
• have demonstrated experience with participating in interdisciplinary research projects;
• have demonstrated experience with participating in transdisciplinary research projects;
• have proficient English skills (written and verbal);
• have preferably published at least one or two academic articles, or a promising set of papers in the pipeline;
• are a team player and able to work independently.

What can we offer you

The position concerns a temporary employment of 1 fte (38 hours per week) for a maximum term of 3,5 years. The initial employment is for one year. Following a positive assessment and barring altered circumstances, this term can be extended by a maximum of 30 months. The candidate will have the opportunity to attend training courses and both national and international events. For this position the University Job Classification profile ‘Onderzoeker’ applies.

Depending on your experience, the minimum salary is €4.332 and the maximum salary is €5.090 gross per month based on a 38-hour working week, in keeping with salary scale 11, as per the Labour Agreement of Dutch Universities. We additionally offer an extensive package of secondary benefits, including 8% holiday allowance and a year-end bonus of 8.3%.

The UvA offers excellent possibilities for further professional development and education.

What else do we offer

• a position in which initiative and input are highly valued;
• a research team with a high international research profile, comprising enthusiastic and friendly academics with whom you will collaborate in research and publications;
• a leading research group that is open to new colleagues;
• resources for fieldwork abroad;
• an inspiring academic and international working environment in the heart of Amsterdam.