In the footsteps of Ebenezer Howard

This walk immerses you in the philosophy of the British garden city philosopher Ebenezer Howard. In his 1898 book Garden Cities of Tomorrow, he wrote: "City and countryside must form a joyful unity from which a new hope, a new life, and a new civilization will arise."

Pascal Verbeken described this garden neighborhood in his outstanding book "Brutopia". This walk allows you to experience the concept of a garden city that is inspired by Letchworth Garden City north of London, the first garden city ever designed. It was created by urban planner Raymond Unwin. The Rad is an open-air museum of a century of social housing, or as Pascal Verbeken puts it: "a red Bokrijk".

The route leads you along many small footpaths nestled between the houses. And they weren't placed there by chance. They were laid out so that residents would meet each other more often and have a chat.

What you shouldn't miss along this walk

• You pass by the Campus of CERIA / COOVI, the second-largest campus in the Brussels-Capital Region. Some famous Brussels architects were involved in the design of the art-deco-style building: Antoine Courtens (Song of Sotternieënpalace in Brussels) and Michel Polak (Villa Empain).
• The Charleroi-Brussels Canal was opened in 1832 to transport coal by ship from the Hainaut coalfields to Brussels and Antwerp. Five kilometers downstream, in the city of Brussels, the canal connects to the Brussels-Scheldt Sea Canal (formerly known as the Willebroeck Canal). Together, from the Samber to the Scheldt, these two canals stretch over a length of 102 kilometers, mainly in the Zenne Valley. Along with the Ronquières inclined plane, the 11 locks that run from Charleroi to Brussels ensure that ships can cross the ridge that separates the Scheldt and Maas valleys.
• Top midfielder from Anderlecht, Pierre Hanon, grew up in the Rad.
• In large letters, the schoolhouse of the Rad states "bains-douches / shower baths" to indicate that local residents could wash there when the houses did not yet have their own bathrooms.

Practical

The route starts and stops at the COOVI metro station (line 5). This station may look familiar to you because the COOVI Metro Station was used in the film "WikiLeaks" The Fifth Estate. The Fifth Estate is a 2013 biographical thriller film directed by Bill Condon, about the news-leaking website WikiLeaks. In the film, top actor Benedict Cumberbatch plays the editor-in-chief and founder Julian Assange, and Daniel Brühl plays former spokesman Daniel Domscheit-Berg. You can clearly recognize the large wall photos at the COOVI Metro Station featuring a man pointing at you. The funny thing is that you hear a background announcement in a Dutch accent (not Flemish). The voice says something about platform 4, which does not exist at the COOVI Metro Station.