Green neighbourhood Tivoli wins eighth sustainability prize

Centered around three remarkable century-old trees and replacing an old industrial neighbourhood, Brussels' new green district, Tivoli in Laeken, has won another sustainability award - its eighth so far.

Tivoli Greencity won its latest prize at the Breeam Awards last week. Each year the certification rewards the people, projects and organisations behind significant achievements in the design, development and management of sustainable buildings.

Last November, the Tivoli GreenCity district obtained the highest score ever achieved worldwide for the Breeam certification. This international recognition was completed on Thursday by an award in the "Regional Award: Western Europe" category, during a virtual ceremony.

From the outset, the citydev.brussels project "aimed to develop a new pioneering district in terms of sustainable development as well as social and functional diversity in urban areas", according to the press release the organisation issued celebrating the recognition.

Tivoli GreenCity is home to an SME park, a fablab, an incubator for sustainable entrepreneurship, around 400 passive and zero-energy housing units, retail businesses, two nurseries and many common meeting spaces.

The district is notably equipped with a dozen collective vegetable gardens on the roofs, an experimental greenhouse, a wooded square and gardens inside the blocks, as well as 663 parking spaces for bicycles and 45 nesting boxes for swifts, sparrows and bats.