Dr Sarah Scheiber from the Faculty for the Built Environment, with the support of Dr Antoine Zammit, has organised a study trip to Vienna for the Master's in Architecture and Urban Design students together with members from Project Green’s Design Team. The students visited several inspiring urban developmet projects around Vienna. These included the new urban expansion project of Aspern – Seestadt as well as residential neighbouhoods of Neues Landgut, Sonnwendviertel and the Biotope City. These projects promote sustainable design principles and the group were able to experience first hand the development of greener neighbourhoods with car free zones and people oriented public spaces.

Thanks go to Landscape Architect Karl Grimm as well as Prof. Dagmar Grimm-Pretner from the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences who guided the group around Neues Landgut and Sonnwendviertel. In particular the group learnt about the "Sponge City'' principles for trees being implemented in Vienna to mitigate changing precipitation patterns due to Climate Change as well as the Urban Heat Island effect. Thanks also goes to Dr Florian Reinwald who gave the group a talk on the Biotope City – a development based on the principles of designing and developing dense urban neighbourhoods as nature in close juxtaposition with people, their homes, shops, schools and flora and fauna, each with their own, closely interlinked sphere of life.

The group also had the opportunity to participate in a weeklong design workshop, held at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, on Renewable Energy in Public Open Space, led by Prof. Dagmar Grimm-Pretner from the Institute of Landscape Architecture. The study trip was made possible thanks to the support of Project Green who sponsored the students' participation.