Exchange Part 1: In March 2025, students and faculty from Morgan State University School of Architecture + Planning (SA+P), representatives from Baltimore Department of Planning, and design professionals travel to Baltimore’s sister city of Rotterdam in the Netherlands. The trip includes visits to innovative design firms and to urban planning schools, workshops, tours of the built environment, lectures, sidetrips to Antwerp, Delft and Amsterdam, and more. Community-centered participatory design, placekeeping, and social sustainability are the key themes for this year’s trip. Professor Cristina Murphy (SA+P) is the lead organizer/curator for this annual trip. Baltimore City Department of Planning (DOP) staff with experience in community-centered development (planners from the Community Planning and Revitalization division) are joining the students on this trip, providing their perspectives and experience.
Exchange Part 2: In early April 2025, community organizers, city planners, and urban designers from Rotterdam and Amsterdam reciprocate the exchange by coming to Baltimore for a workweek. Goals for this research trip: learning how community-led visioning and urban development happens in Baltimore, and alternatives to real-estate-developer-driven development; sharing examples of community-led initiatives in Baltimore, Amsterdam and Rotterdam; how city government can support community-led development; placemaking and placekeeping; how to engage and empower youth in shaping the future of their neighborhood.
The April workweek includes a public lecture on April 10 at MICA hosted by AIA Baltimore (speakers: Thijs van Spaandonk and Zico Lopes), and a virtual lecture on April 8 hosted by Morgan SA+P (speaker: Dr. Roberto Rocco from TU Delft’s Spatial Planning department and the Centre for the Just City).
This exchange is part of a growing ongoing collaboration that started as a joint studio by Morgan State University School of Planning + Architecture and the Rotterdam Academy of Architecture and Urban Design in 2019 around the theme of the Just City.
THANKS FOR YOUR SUPPORT:
– 2025 Student Trip Sponsors –
Platinum
Jeff and Laura Thul Penza
GOLD
Blueprint Café
Silver
brennan+company architects
Greenleaf Construction
Vectorworks
BRONZE
COPPER
– 2025 Supporters –
DONORS
Joe and Margaret Cellucci
Susannah Bergmann and Dave Huber
Chesapeake Tile & Marble
APRIL PROGRAm in Baltimore
The April program is supported as part of the Dutch Culture USA program by the Consulate General of the Netherlands in New York.
In-Kind Support
Contact us to become a sponsor
Email .The Baltimore-Rotterdam Sister City Committee (part of Baltimore Sister Cities) leads the fundraising campaign for the exchange. Baltimore Sister Cities is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit; donations are tax-deductible to the full extent of the law.
