The River IJ traverses the northern edge of the historic core of Amsterdam connecting the series of canal rings that define the city. In the 1990's 7 harbour islands across the length of the IJ embankments were seen as obsolescent industrial lands, available for a new generation of urban uses. Ken Greenberg was asked by the City of Amsterdam to chair an International Advisory Committee for the IJ Embankment in 1992 along with a panel of distinguished practitioners including Tjeerd Dykstra (the State Architect for the Netherlands), Wim Crouwel (award winning designer NL), Antoine Grumbach (Grand Prix D'urbanisme, Paris), and Peter Butenschon, (Director of Design Institute, Oslo). The Committee met for over 3 years working closely with the DRO (Physical Planning Department of Amsterdam) and a wide array of actors and parties with a keen interest in this strategic opportunity. The assignment was threefold - strategic recommendations with regard to plan development in the IJ embankment, definition of its importance for the City, and assessment of proposals which had come forward both invited and unsolicited. Key recommendations included the development of a well defined Public Realm Plan for the entire area.