Topos - Issue 96 2016

I N T E R N A T I O N A L

96

2016

T H E

R E V I E W

O F

L A N D S C A P E

A R C H I T E C T U R E

A N D

U R B A N

D E S I G N

Infrastructure

DENMARK NØRREPOR T STATION IN COPENH AGEN · THE NETHERLANDS HOW TO DESIGN INFR ATEC T URE · SWITZERLAND INFR A ST RUC T URE A ND T HE L A NDSC A PE · USA T HE 606 IN C HIC AGO · MEXICO WATER M A N AGEMENT IN ME XICO CIT Y · GREAT BRITAIN T HE G A RDEN BRIDGE IN LONDON · CHINA THE FUNDA MENTA L S OF LOGISTIC S · PORTUGAL WA LK WAY AT THE PAIVA RIVER · JAPAN FLOATING AIRPORT URBA NISM · ITALY BA LESTR ATE SE A FRONT IN SICILY · SWITZERLAND FOOT PAT H A ND C YC LE WAY BE T WEEN FR A NCE A ND SWIT ZERL A ND · THE NETHERLANDS MULTIPLE MODA LIT Y IN EUROPE

2016

96

Infrastructure

DESIGN TANK PHOTO CHARLOTTE SVERDRUP

Enjoying the outdoors since 1947 vestre.com

Vestre April Sun Design: Espen Voll, Tore Borgersen & Michael Olofsson

INFRASTRUCTURE

EDITORIAL

Håkan Dahlström

Tanja Braemer, Editor in Chief

In a globalised world, infrastructure has become nothing less than a basic and inevitable need. Elaborate social, technological and traffic networks represent the actual manifestations of our increasingly interwoven lives. Consisting of systems of limbs and nodes that embody nations’, organisations’ and people’s multi-level interconnections across the globe, they are constantly growing. They represent the threedimensional fabric that infuses us with constant and diverse impulses. And these networks are more than ever before resources of immense power themselves. Without them, we are without any exaggeration, nothing. To refer to infrastructure as an underlying subsystem that functions as a means of transporting goods and opinions from A to B thus seems inadequate. Thinking of landscapes and cities, it is even more necessary to shift how we look upon infrastructural facilities, i.e. with regard to the power they have to change the surrounding open space. On the one hand Topos 96 focuses on these contextual aspects of infrastructure and their impact on the public realm. It adresses the question of how infrastructure itself can interconnect with the other systems and professions that create space. And of how functional infrastructural planning, in the end, can significantly shape space and its atmosphere. On the other hand, this issue of Topos draws attention to how every infrastructural problem is to be seen as a symptom that can

itself be traced back to fundamental societal processes of change. This is where Marc Verheijen comes in (p. 22). He outlines why infrastructure should be considered in a referential and contextual manner – not least because we spend billions of euros to make it work properly. Infrastructure, in his opinion, has the ability to answer questions which go beyond the one short-term solution. Verheijen makes a passionate plea to look at the deeper logic behind infrastructural challenges. One example of coherent infrastructural planning is the newly built Nørreport Station in the Danish capital Copenhagen (p. 14). A former chaotic place has transformed into a lively urban space that emphasises aspects of playful and natural orientation. The project demonstrates how infrastructural facilities can contribute to the rejuvination of a neighbourhood that was known to be a problem area. In his essay for Topos 96, Kees Christiaanse examines infrastructural strategies from both the urban planner’s and traveller’s point of view (p. 96). Apart from its functional and societal facets, infrastructure has always been an element of immense fascination. Masses of moving cars, endless rails to unknown destinations – the romantic attraction of these images is unabated. It provides us with the certainty of permanent movement and never-ending change. And this spirit is capable of spurring infrastructural planning and its developement as well.

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Village Underground

CIPM/Franco Banfi

Rasmus Hjortshøj

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28

Nørreport Station, the most chaotic intersection

60

The BGG, an interdisciplinary advisory group for

Shipping containers are symbols of contem-

porary capitalism. They stand for the efficiency of

a lively urban space. Sculptural structures guide the

visible, above-ground effects of the Gotthard axis in

global logistics systems and can be used for the most

flow of pedestrians and bicycles through the station.

Switzerland to connect infrastructure and landscape.

noble purposes as well as for the most cruel ones.

66

Mauro Filippi

Daniel Kessler

design, is working on the coherent appearance of the

Nelson Garrido

in Copenhagen’s city centre has been transformed into

80

The Paiva Walkway in Portugal is situated in one

The new promenade at the seafront of Balestrate

88

A public footpath and cycleway has recently

of the contry’s most beautiful and pristine landscapes.

in northwestern Sicily consists of few elements and

opened in a border region on the River Rhine. The

The structure is a gentle intervention that respects the

is built with local materials. The subtle design of the

new infrastructure opens up a section of the riverbank

landscape and promotes sustainable tourism.

space enhances the natural features of the site.

that had been inaccessible for the public for decades.

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INFRASTRUCTURE

Cover: Øresund Bridge Design: Georg Rotne, i.a.w. engineering firm Arup Photo: Håkan Dahlström

L Æ R K E SOP H IE K EIL

TABLE

OF

CONTENTS

L AU R A C IP R IAN I

14 A Flow through Copenhagen

74 Floating Airports

Lively space: Nørreport Station in Copenhagen

Fragile systems: Airports and water

M AR C VER H EIJ EN

ST EFAN T ISC H ER , F R A NC E S C A A R I C I

22 Infratecture

80 Sicilian Minimalism

Improving mobility: How to design infratecture

Longing for the sea: Balestrate seafront in Sicily

PAL L E P ET ER SEN

C L AU DIA M OL L

28 The Idea of Combinare

88 Between Countries

Integrated design: Infrastructure in Switzerland

Public crossing: Footpath and cycleway in Switzerland

C ON OR O’SH EA

K EES C H R IST IAA NS E

36 Owned by the Public

96 Multiple Modality

Connecting element: The 606 in Chicago

On the road: Travelling through Europe

K EES L OK M AN

44 Exploring a New Paradigm Currents

New solutions: Water management in Mexico City

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News, Projects, Competitions

DAVID M ADDEN

52 Designing Against the Public

Products

Difficult investment: The Garden Bridge in London

102

AL EXAN DER G U T Z M ER

110 Authors

Playgrounds

60 Living (and Dying) in a Box 111 Credits/Imprint

Inside the container: Logistics and urbanism

VIR IATO SOROM EN H O-M AR QU ES

66 Erotic Slowness In harmony with nature: A walkway in Portugal

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CURRENTS

EVENTS

EVENTS

Blurred Lines – Topos Cities Initiative in Berlin BA U M E I S T E R TOPOS

INITIATIVE Alexander Gutzmer

Partner

What makes urban space acessible? What are the keys to guaranteeing that residents and outside visitors alike will take ownership of it and use it? How can green infrastructure foster maximum openness of the public realm? And finally: what can technical innovations contribute to transform cities into truly integrative places? The forum “Connective Spaces”, hosted by Topos, the German architecture magazine Baumeister and lighting specialist Schréder, investigated these crucial questions, sparking lively debates between four participants from very different backgrounds: landscape architect Leonard Grosch (Atelier Loidl, Berlin), architect Jan Liesegang (Raumlabor, Berlin), academic expert Undine Giseke (Technical University Berlin) and Schréder top manager Ernst Smolka. One conclusion, however, they all agreed on: the success of future cities depends on the extent to which existing professions, more precisely the professionals who work in them, are able to transcend the boundaries of their disciplines and mind-sets.

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The forum, which took place during this year’s Metropolitan Solutions conference, held in Berlin, is part of the “Baumeister Topos Cities Initiative”: it was launched in 2015 and examines a wide range of aspects of urban design, and urban planning and development, through events and publications. In 2016, connectivity is in the centre of the initiative’s attention. When it comes to connective spaces and interconnecting people, one may first of all think of technical infrastructure. Dr. Ernst Smolka, general manager of Schréder GmbH, pointed out how new modular technologies such as Schréder’s “Shuffle” can spark a shift in the way lighting solutions are perceived in urban contexts: the lumière no longer functions just as a tool for illuminating a space. Instead, it becomes a complex interactive instrument that integrates a variety of highly different functions, which fulfil the kinds of demands that today’s citizens will increasingly make on public spaces and their infrastructure. Accessibility to public wifi, provision of electricity

and availability as a security device are just three examples. It comes as no surprise then that great attention is being paid to the lumières of the future and whether they are able to provide the resources and services that are required of them by urban dwellers. In fact, infrastructure is just one angle from which to view the concept of connectivity. Leonard Grosch, partner at Atelier Loidl Landscape Architecture, Berlin, explained how modern metropolitan parks such as Atelier Loidl’s Park am Gleisdreieck in Berlin seek to bring together people from many different cultures and backgrounds in a subtly modern and contemporary way – and how that central goal influences a designer during their planning. He stressed the fact that the elaborate participatory process that preceded and accompanied the planning phase for Gleisdreieck enabled the landscape architects to better understand what this space that was to become a park actually meant to people. Even if discussions easily frayed into detail issues and even if many of the participants clang to the romantic railway scenarios that once characterized the Gleisdreieck area, Grosch insisted that the participation of citizens and other stakeholders will significantly inform a place’s design for the better. For in the course of this process, designers and landscape architects are required to balance the demands of the public, the aesthetic qualities of the space,

and its potential in terms of urban connections and surroundings. Jan Liesegang, architect at Raumlabor Berlin, would surely agree here. Together with Undine Giseke, Professor for Landscape Architecture and Open Space Planning at TU Berlin, he debated the question of when exactly participation should come into the planning process. They both emphasized that an early starting point facilitates mutual understanding and trust between designers and future users. Asked whether citizens nowadays are ready to actively support and influence spatial change processes, Giseke and Liesegang came to the same conclusion: citizens are more willing to participate than ever before. In fact, Liesegang and Giseke believe that architects and landscape architects should work together as closely as possible and alongside manufacturers and construction companies that develop connective solutions. Not only in order to find adequate products for such solutions but also to gauge their effects on urban culture in both the short and the long term. Liesegang, Giseke, Grosch and Smolka share the conviction that the more professionals suspend the divides that separate their professional fields and instead clear the way for new combinations of expertise and creativity, the more integrative the future city will become. And the more people will benefit from this evolution. Tanja Braemer

COMPETITIONS

COMPETITIONS

PROJECTS

CURRENTS

PROJECTS

The Hills on Governors Island, New York City, United States

MLA, OMA

In July, the park extension “The Hills” on Governors Island, New York, opened to the public – one year earlier than expected. “Thanks to an unseasonably warm fall and rigorous construction management, we can complete and open the Hills to the public in 2016 instead of next year,” said Leslie Koch, president of The Trust for Governors Island. The Hills are the culmination of the awardwinning Governors Island Park and Public Space Master Plan, designed by landscape architects, West 8. Released in 2010, the park master plan sets the stage for the island’s future redevelopment while ensuring quality public open space. The first 30 acres of new park and public space opened to the public in 2014. Made of recycled construction debris and clean fill material, the park’s four hills rise 25 to 70 feet above the island. The summit of Outlook Hill provides visitors with a 360-degree panorama of the Statue of Liberty, New York Harbor and the Lower Manhattan skyline. Four hills structure the park: Outlook Hill, Slide Hill (featuring the longest slide in New York City), Discovery Hill (featuring a site-specific sculpture by Rachel Whiteread) and Grassy Hill, which overlooks the island’s new and historic landscapes and the Manhattan skyline. The 2.2-mile-long promenade around the edge of the island also reopened after the four-year-building process was completed. The Hills has ten acres of green space, new pedestrian paths and more than 860 new trees. The Trust and the planners hope that this project will be a new must-see for tourists and residents alike and is working to turn the island into a year-round destination.

OMA, Mia Lehrer + Associates and IDEO won the competition for the new FAB Civic Center Park in downtown Los Angeles. The design aims to be low maintenance, with on-site storm water capture to reduce the need for water.

FAB Civic Center Park, Los Angeles, United States

Laura Klöser

Timothy Schenk

Los Angeles’ downtown will soon have a new public park. The Architecture practice OMA, landscape architects Mia Leher + Associates and the design firm IDEO won the competition for the FAB Civic Center Park, named after the location – a vacant lot situated at First and Broadway street. Prominent buildings adjacent to the park include the Los Angeles Supreme Court, the City Hall, the Federal Courthouse and the LAPD Headquarters. The planners’ objective is to have workers, residents and tourists all use the park. The extensive system of low seat walls will create an undulating ribbon of informal seating and shaded areas that define a series of “park rooms” for intimate gatherings and spaces for art and cultural programming. Larger capacity amphitheatre seating integrated into the restaurant is available for watching performances on the main plaza. The building in the park will feature a split-level restaurant and an array of sculpted shade canopies that also produce solar energy. OMA’s design of the park’s restaurant is made to create a diverse set of protected outdoor spaces, a main dining area with a vista over the park and an edible roof garden that reflects the park’s playful landscape. The design aims to be low maintenance, with on-site storm water capture to reduce the need for water. The architects will also use local plants. The park is anticipated to open to the public in 2019.

The Hills on Governors Island opened to the public a year earlier than expec-

Laura Klöser

ted. The park offers a new view of Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty.

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CURRENTS

PROJECTS

This year’s Serpentine Pavilion was created by the Bjarke Ingels Group and is, for the first time, accompa-

Iwan Baan

nied by four Summer Houses.

Serpentine Gallery and Summer Houses, London, United Kingdom Each year internationally renowned architects are invited to design the Serpentine Gallery Pavilion in London’s Kensington Gardens. The Bjarke Ingels Group created the 2016 Pavilion. The planners aimed to create a structure that embodies multiple aspects often perceived as opposites: modular yet sculptural, and transparent yet opaque. The Pavilion consists of fibreglass forms that are like bricks. They form a wall that splits up into a cave and hosts the events of the Gallery’s Park Nights programme. Four Summer Houses designed by different architects accompany the Serpentine Pavilion this year. They are all inspired by Queen Caroline’s Temple, a classical-style summer house built in 1734, close to the Serpentine Gallery. Nigerian architect Kunlé Adeyemi designed an inverse replica of the Temple – a tribute to its robust form, space and material. German architects Barkow Leibinger were inspired by another 18th

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century pavilion by William Kent that rotates and offers 360° views. Their Summer House is conceived as a series of undulating structural bands. 93-year-old architect Yona Friedman created a modular structure that can be assembled and disassembled in different formations. It refers to his project “Ville Spatiale” begun in the late 1950s. Asif Khan was inspired by the fact that Queen Caroline’s Temple was positioned in a way to catch the sunlight from the Serpentine lake. The Serpentine Architecture Programme invites architects to create their first built structure in England. The process is immediate, with a maximum of six months from invitation to completion. The very first pavilion was designed by Zaha Hadid; other famous architects involved were Daniel Libeskind and Frank Gehry. Laura Klöser

Children need to play to find the right approach to life. For children, playing does not always mean doing something active. Playing might just as well mean being there.

Richter

Spielgeräte GmbH · www.richter-spielgeraete.de

...our product designation for the European Market

CURRENTS

AWARDS

AWARDS

9th European Prize for Urban Public Space awarded

Space: The irrigation system for the thermal allotments in Caldes de Montbui, Spain, by Marta Serra, Elena Albareda and Jordi Calbetó (above), and the Przelomy Centre for Dialogue at Solidarnosc Square in Szczecin, Poland by Robert Konieczny.

Two very different projects have shared this year’s European Prize for Urban Public Space: the Przełomy Centre for Dialogue at Solidarnosc Square in, Poland by Robert Konieczny and the Recovery of the Irrigation System at the Thermal Orchards located on the edge of the town of Caldes de Montbui in Spain, by Marta Serra, Elena Albareda and Jordi Calbetó. Both projects fulfil the prize’s goal in particularly

successful ways: They open up and revitalise previously unused public space. Every two years a jury of architects and critics comes together to typically select two prize winners and several “Special Mentions” from the 25 finalists. The Przełomy Centre for Dialogue’s underground structure, which among other things will be used for exhibitions about the history of Szczecin, has an inclined urban plaza on its

roof. The successful interplay of architecture and open space thus fills an urban planning and historical gap in the city’s centre while creating a new and vibrant public plaza that allows for a variety of uses. In the Spanish town of Caldes de Montbui a dilapidated cultural landscape was developed into a publicly accessible space where the town’s residents are able to experience nature firsthand. The orchards in Caldes

European Prize 1, Adria Goula

European Prize for Urban Public

European Prize 2, Jaroslaw Syrek

This year’s award winners of the

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have always been irrigated with water from the Roman thermal springs located there. Due to a construction boom and consequent discharge of waste water at the end of the 20th century, however, the irrigation system fell into decline and cultivation of the orchards was discontinued. A restoration of the irrigation system linked to a redevelopment of the infrastructure system via a variety of bridges and walkways lead to the complete renovation of the canal system within a period of two and a half years. With the help of fruit growers and architects, a basin for the purification of polluted water was built and previously private parcels of land were made publicly accessible through the construction of a bridge over the main canal. In addition to the two prizes the jury also awarded four special mentions. These were awarded to the following projects: the Barkingside Town Centre Improvements in London, United Kingdom; the Multipurpose Hall in Molenbeek-Saint-Jean, Belgium; The Ring of Memory: International Memorial of Notre-Dame-deLorette in Ablain-Saint-Nazaire, France; and The Garden of the Heavenly Hundred in Kiev, Russia. A special recognition was awarded to the city of Copenhagen in acknowledgment of its public policies for improving the quality of life in public open space. Tanja Gallenmüller

REVIEWS

CURRENTS

Custom is Standard at Berliner.

REVIEWS

www.berliner-seilfabrik.com Infratecture

New ue og l a t a C ow out n er-

berlin info@ m rik.co seilfab

Bridges and promenades, crossings and streets – infrastructure is all around us. It is the fabric that holds our globalised world together. Mostly regarded as a pure necessity and solely designed as a functional element, infrastructure can be much more than simply making places accessible. It can be an integral part of our landscapes and cities that combines engineering with urban planning and architecture with landscape architecture. Or at least this is the opinion of author Marc Verheijen (see article, page 22). Verheijen was trained in two disciplines: He studied both engineering and architecture. Having this specific background, he worked for the internationally renowned architecture firm OMA in Rotterdam before joining the Department of the municipality of Rotterdam. In his book Infratecture he gives us an insight into his idea of infrastructure that adds social, cultural, ecological and economic aspects to its design, instead of being entirely focused on functionality. Verheijen defines this

new approach as “infratecture”, a combination of infrastructure and architecture. After an introduction and three chapters about the design of infrastructure, its history and an explanation of the specific philosophy of infratecture, the book continues with socalled “cases”. These cases are divided into different typologies upon which infrastructure is based: bridges, streets, decision points, infrabuildings, fencing and even roadside biotopes. Using a range of 15 infrastructural elements, the author presents 30 examples where the idea of infratecture was actually used – be it the Øresund Bridge that connects Denmark with Sweden or a new type of noise barrier in the Netherlands. The structure of the book forms a practicebased guide that helps planners develop new concepts. It has a universal approach and can be a useful source of inspiration for engineers, urban planners, architects and landscape architects – or “infratects” as Marc Verheijen would say. Alexander Russ

CURRENTS

REVIEWS

Approaches to the Landscape Every landscape architect knows his or her field of work – the landscape. They generally approach various projects from different perspectives, and in doing so focus their views on the context. In addition to a practical examination, a theoretical approach to the concept of landscape and the tasks of landscape architecture can also be worthwhile. This is also indispensable for a profession which constantly complains about a lack of theory. Three current publications now offer rewarding insights into this issue.

Is Landscape…? The collection of essays entitled Is Landscape...? Essays on the Identity of Landscape edited by Gareth Doherty and Charles Waldheim explores the multiple definitions of landscape. The book’s starting point is Garret Eckbo’s rhetorical question “Is landscape architecture?”, which he asked in an essay published in 1983 aimed at clarifying the relationship between landscape architecture and architecture and discussing its potential. A series of rhetorical questions asked by well-known authors describe the relationship between landscape architecture and its closely related disciplines and other cultural fields. In doing so, they sharpen the focus on landscape and landscape architecture. In Is Landscape Literature? Gareth Doherty traces the influence landscape has had on the written word. At the same time he addresses the question of how literature influences the built environment. In Is Landscape Gar-

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dening? Udo Weilacher argues for more garden thinking in landscape architectural practice. Nina-Marie Lister explores the interrelations between ecology and landscape and the affect they have on design, research and practice. Frederick Steiner discusses the interrelationships between landscape and planning. Pierre Bélanger looks at landscape and infrastructure. And of course history, discussed by John Dixon Hunt, and theory, explained by Rachael Delue, cannot be omitted and are both addressed here. Charles Waldheim examines the topic of Is Landscape Urbanism? and also looks at the contribution landscape architectural practice makes with regard to urban design and planning. What is Landscape? John R. Stilgoe addresses this question in his book of the same title. The Orchard Professor in the History of Landscape at Harvard University not only investigates the meaning and change in meaning of the word landscape, which has its origins in Old Frisian. In the chapters Making and Constructs through Stead and Farm up to Field and Away, numerous terms are worked out in detail and their cultural context explored. For non-native speakers the explanations about the subtle differences in vocabulary are at times a challenge. In addition to the author’s interesting

remarks about landscape history, the etymological development of certain terms and his skilful transition between different cultures, the book is first and foremost an invitation to go through the world with open eyes, to observe one’s surroundings, to read the landscape and to continuously question the context of things. Noting that the book is not a field guide, Stilgoe ultimately sends his readers out to explore the landscape: “Close it now, put it down, and go.” Landscape as Urbanism. A General Theory Waldheim didn’t just contribute an essay to the publication Is Landscape …?, however. In the book Landscape as Urbanism. A General Theory he also takes an in-depth look at landscape as being a model and medium for the contemporary city. In a series of engaging essays he explains the contribution landscape and landscape architecture has made to current issues

surrounding urban planning and acute urban questions. A profound overview is thus provided, which gives ample background information about a discourse of landscape urbanism that has enriched the theoretical investigation about the profession’s self image since the 1990s. In the introduction to Is Landscape…? the great landscape theoretician J.B. Jackson is quoted: “Why is it, I wonder, that we have trouble agreeing on the meaning of landscape? The word is simple enough, and it refers to something which we think we understand; and yet to each of us it seems to mean something different.” These three publications help to promote a common understanding of the issue. Although we are given no definitive answers here, the books provide sufficient motivation to question one’s own views and to think a step further about landscape Peter Zöch

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A flow through Copenhagen The most chaotic intersection and station in Copenhagen’s city center has transformed into a lively urban space. With modern sculptural building structures to guide the massive flow of pedestrians and bicycles through the station, a new atmosphere and mobility have emerged in a formerly dull and disorienting area.

Nørreport Station is the busiest traffic terminal in Copenhagen with access to S-Trains, local trains and the metro.

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NØRREPORT STATION, COPENHAGEN, DENMARK Client: The City of Copenhagen, the State Railway Architects: Cobe, Gottlieb Paludan Architects Year of construction: 2015

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Nørreport Station is the busiest traffic terminal in Copenhagen, with more than 250,000 people passing through it every day. The station is geographically located between the old medieval city and the boroughs of Vesterbro, Nørrebro and Østerbro, with borders reflected in the infrastructure of the Danish capital. Where the S-train line runs through the city, it marks the location of the old ramparts of Copenhagen; along these ramparts were several gates that served as entrances to the city, one of them being the northern gate, from which the name Nørreport evolved. The station has, over time, transformed from one for local trains alone to the only central station with access to underground S-trains, regional trains, and the Metro, as well as an above-ground bus terminal. It had become a chaotic and isolated island between veins of heavy traffic, making it an uneasy place for pedestrians and bicycles.

Shaped by pedestrians With a political wish for more open and accessible infrastructure, a large competition was initiated by the City of Copenhagen in 2009, with Cobe and Gottlieb Paludan Architects forming the winning team. The competition brief required a remodelling of the area above ground, and focused on rethinking the city gate as the link between the old medieval city and the boroughs to create a modern traffic terminal with a new urban space connected to it. With the City of Copenhagen’s vision for a better urban life and its investment in democratic and sustainable mobility, it was therefore essential that Nørreport become a place dedicated to pedestrians and bicycles. Cobe and Gottlieb Paludan Architects mapped out pedestrian flows, and actively incorporated these into the final design of the new Nørreport. By registering how people moved across the old Nørreport – to and from staircases, from adjacent streets and at pedestrian crossings – a soft-shaped plan emerged. The design’s main functions were placed

in areas where people were less likely to walk. Combined with the surrounding infrastructure, the final plan resulted in an archipelago of soft organic shapes, with passing pedestrians and bicycles almost acting as water streaming in between. In this way, Cobe and Gottlieb Paludan Architects have created an urban space with a natural infrastructure for pedestrians and bicycles, and solved the pre-existing problem of a chaotic and interrupted way of moving.

More than 250,000 people pass through the station every day. Its design was inspired by pedestrian flows. Page 18: Nørreport Station was designed as a place that functions for pedestrians and bycicles alike.

Navigating through Nørreport The station is not marked by a single significant monument or building, but by several almost floating roofs that slowly appear in the urban landscape as large canopies along the old city border. The roofs rest on round, transparent glass pavilions that house the main station facilities such as kiosks and ticket-vending machines. Gathered under white concrete roofs are entrances to the underground platforms, public toilets, elevators shafts, and bicycle parking. The six pavilions create a curved way of moving throughout the station, with islands of bicycle parking and chimneys from the underground stations located directly on a large, unifying surface. With the canopy roofs, these elements act as volumes to easily guide a visitor in and out. The area is closed to traffic on the east side, linking the station directly with the pedestrianized shopping street Frederiksborggade. Cobe and Gottlieb Paludan Architects have created a unifying surface that provides a foothold for the buildings along Nørre Voldgade on the east side, buildings that before were hidden away in the visual noise of station traffic. The surface provides new outdoor serving opportunities for restaurants and cafés, and is a compelling way to merge the infrastructure with surrounding activities at the same time that it secures a mixed use of the station area. The roofs, bicycle parking, and chimneys are repeated along the entire square, creating a f

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rhythmic regularity and shaping a variety of urban spaces. The unifying surface, a 3-by-3metre grid system, organizes the interior of the station, benches, bins, and the pillars of the roofs. The grid also works as a navigation system for visually handicapped people, and as water drainage. Almost every element at the station is organically shaped, eliminating backsides and corners.

The infrastructure of bicycles One of the biggest challenges of Nørreport is the 20,000 bicycles passing through every day, 2,100 of which park at the station. The bicycle culture in Copenhagen often results in bicycle parking dominating the urban space, sometimes making it impossible to have active fronts at shops and restaurants. The lack of proper parking space often blocks an optimal system of movement. Cobe and Gottlieb Paludan Architects have solved this problem in a simple and elegant way by creating so-called bicycle beds. As if the concrete roofs were directly lifted up from the ground, sunken footprints make room for all bicycles at the station. The beds are sunken 40 centimetres, making it easier to look over and find your bicycle; it also creates a clear hierarchy between pedestrians and bicycles, with bicycles no longer in eyesight, leaving an unobstructed view across the station. At Nørreport, the parked bicycles almost become monuments – a symbol of the Copenhagen bicycle culture. Around 150,000 passengers use the large underground network of trains and Metro at Nørreport Station every day. The underground station consists of two separate platforms, one for the S-train lines and one for the regional lines, a shared staircase from street level the only connection between them. Cobe and Gottlieb Paludan Architects have dissolved the overcrowded staircases to and from the underground network. By keeping a good distance between entrances and surrounding elements, commuters can now easily

move into the large open space instead of blocking the entrances and the flow. The Metro runs one level further down, and can be accessed from street level as well as from the train platforms. The underground station seems small compared to other large traffic terminals. As with above ground, it lacks a central meeting place, main hall, or waiting area. As soon as a visitor enters, he is on her way in any given direction. The underground network of train lines copies the aboveground street system, with S-train and regional train lines running along Nørre Voldgade/Vester Voldgade, and the Metro line running perpendicular two levels down along Frederiksborggade. All station facilities are located above ground, leaving the underground clear for as seamless a transit as possible to and from the busy Nørreport.

Page 19: The station is located between the old medieval city and the boroughs of Vesterbro, Nørrebro and Østerbro. 20,000 bicycles pass through the station every day. The new design offers parking space for 2,100 bycicles.

More than a station The need for a new and improved station was also a need for a merged urban space in an area with poor connectivity. Nørreport and the adjacent areas were worn, heavily trafficked, and in some places almost deserted. Now Nørreport Station not only connects Copenhagen to the rest of Denmark by public transport, but its new aboveground square and buildings link urban areas of commerce and cultural sights. The station runs along Nørre Voldgade and Vester Voldgade, north to south, connecting the entrances to three large parks, Ørstedparken, King’s Garden, and the Botanical Garden. The lateral axis, east-west, connects the newly transformed Israels Plads, the much-frequented market halls Torvehallerne, and the renovated pedestrian commerce street Frederiksborggade/Købmagergade on both sides of the station. Urban life, passenger flow, transparency, and accessibility were the keywords in reinterpreting the design. The result is an inviting urban square coexisting with the busiest transit hub in Copenhagen, a place that emphasises the Copenhagen atmosphere and pulse.

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Marc Verheijen

Infratecture Are you mobile? Probably, you are. Cycling to work, meeting friends, getting your groceries. Moving by planes, trains, and automobiles. Infrastructure is such an integral part of our daily life, our culture, and our being, it should be conceived of far beyond the functional. The idea of “infratecture” is a plea for embracing complexity and a quest for social values besides simple usage. A plea for the integral design of infrastructure.

In his book “Infratecture” (see page 11) Marc Verheijen introduces intergral designs like the Øresund Bridge that enables a direct connection between Denmark and Sweden.

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170 houses form a soundproof element at a motorway in the Netherlands. It is 700 metres long and 14 metres high. The Elfenbaan, another motorway in the Netherlands, was designed as an integral zone with an ecological corridor.

Moving is essential to us for our reproduction, trade, and social exchange. The places where we live have usually originated at crossings of trade routes over water and over land, at mountain passes, around train stations, at fords or in deltas. All of these are natural or created meeting places, where it has been relatively easy to travel or where different routes converged. Our mobility these days is tremendous, and in order to be this mobile, we use many different infrastructures on a daily basis. We have a historically grown system of networks at our disposal. Our society is based on these global systems and networks of infrastructure – universal and generic in one respect, local and specific in another. By car, you can get to almost every address in the world. By train, you can travel from station to station quickly and comfortably. The strategic positioning of airports allows us to travel to a different continent in a matter of hours.

euros to build. Worldwide yearly investments in infrastructure concern sums of money most of us cannot even fathom. Besides money, we as a society spend much energy and manpower on infrastructure. Millions of people across the globe work in the world of infrastructure. Most of their work is about making sure existing infrastructure functions well every day. Think of road works, but also of traffic control and snowploughs. Only a small percentage of these people work on the realization of new infrastructure, such as contractors, civil engineers, and railway companies. An even smaller percentage of all people working in the world of infrastructure design infrastructure. So, a small and select group of civil engineers, architects, landscape architects, urban designers, and traffic engineers determine what our infrastructure looks like.

A foundation of society

The importance of infrastructure is reason enough to take infrastructure design serious. In its most basic form, “design” is the art of creating a solution for a specific problem. Designing can be as simple as that. There is a question, and a designer comes up with an answer in the form of a sketched image of the future. But is that it? Limiting the answer to a satisfactory result for the designer and the client might suffice for the short term, but from a sustainability perspective, we would not be making the most of our chances. For behind a concrete question, there is often a larger, societal problem. A typical infrastructural project seems to be about a road from A to B, but the reason for the project can generally be traced back to social needs and developments in planning. The reality is so much more complex, requiring more attention, expertise, and energy. Global developments with an influence on the local level, such as urban growth and rural depopulation, change mobility patterns. Cities become more crowded, streets become busier. It

Infrastructure is a given part of our everyday environment. It is the physical basis of modern societies, the foundation on which we travel, meet each other, make exchanges, and have new experiences. All of us use multiple parts of our extensive infrastructure network every day, but hardly any of us know who actually owns this infrastructure, who maintains it, who finances it, who designs it, or who makes decisions about it. Still, infrastructure has been devised by the human brain, and has been realized by people spending a lot of money and energy in doing so. Every part, every extension, and every adjustment has been devised, designed, planned, and made. The true nature of it, however, is rarely scrutinized. Countries such as Germany and France spend over 16 billion euros a year on the construction and maintenance of their national infrastructure. The Øresundsbron, connecting Denmark and Sweden, cost over four billion

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Societal problems

becomes increasingly difficult to find a parking space. Cyclists have to pay more attention and drivers have no choice but to be patient. These are gradual transitions. They seem to evolve without a system or deeper logic behind them. So preceding an actual design, there is often a process of years, if not decades, in which diverging demands, expectations, and even desires come together. Designing therefore starts at a much earlier point than the project assignment itself. To be able to design alternatives for a future as yet unknown, it is essential to understand these developments. This is no different for infrastructure than it is for urban design, architecture, or landscape architecture. All of these involve spatial designs: a three-dimensional proposition within an existing context. Even a road, no matter how flat and straight, has to be thought up in three dimensions. And since a road has to function for a long time, the factor of time itself, the fourth dimension, also plays an important role.

The idea of Infratecture “Infratecture” is an invitation to think in possibilities rather than in solutions. Designing can then be much more about exploring possible alternatives for the future. Early choices for a certain direction based on first insights and ideas will speed up the design process, but carry the risk of depriving many qualities from being discovered. Thinking a direction through leads to new insights and knowledge, which may well lead to different choices, or even different directions. The design process should therefore not be considered a linear but a cyclic process. A cyclic process provides room for the re-evaluation of design directions after deep assessments have been made, and for new choices based on this knowledge. And that is the essence of design: choices. More than anything, to design is to make choices. This might seem to contradict the ambition to keep our options open, but merely

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A large and empty roundabout in the Netherlands is getting a distinct identity through artwork – a revolving house. In the Dutch village of Averna, the road was sunk by half a metre. The low mounds were used to reduce sound pollution.

keeping options open will not change the infrastructure. For in the design process, design decisions will have to be made (choices) to eventually arrive at designs that can be realized and thus make the difference. This cyclic thinking is characteristic for designers, and it sets them apart from many technicians and specialists. At some points, designers keep working on a specific part of a larger assignment, while at other points they will focus on the overall picture. One of the most important qualities of a so-called “infratect” is the ability to think on different scales.

A convincing example A perfect example of this approach lies with the Graafseweg in the Dutch village of Alverna. The increase in traffic through the years has created a conflict between the flow of traffic and the quality of life. The government decided to do something about noise pollution. The first option was to place a three-metre-high noise barrier on each side of the road, a simple and effective element that could be realized quickly and at relatively low cost. Despite the fact that such noise barriers would be the ideal solution from a functional point of view, the residents were very much opposed to this solution. They feared the barriers would become filthy, that they would block their views, decrease the value of their houses, and have an adverse effect on Alverna’s rural character, as the barriers would split the village into two halves both spatially and visually. At the initiative of the residents, professional designers of Topia explored alternative options by design. The goal was clear: reduce the noise pollution. How this would have to be achieved, however, was open and this was what the participation process was for. In this design process, much attention was given to aspects such as spatial quality, views, identity, and quality of life. The designers did not think in standard solutions, but looked for a combination of quality-enhancing measures.

Eventually, a combination of smart solutions resulted in a spatial design that reduced the noise and created a spatial image everyone was happy with. What makes the Alverna solution unique is the combination of measures that have ingeniously been amalgamated into one whole. One measure was to sink the road by half a metre. The dug-up soil was used to realize low mounds on both sides of the road. On the side of the road, the barriers were fitted with sound-absorbing materials, while on the side of the houses, they were planted with a rich mix of flowers and grasses. Because of the combination of the sunken road and the earthen barriers, residents can only see the roofs of tall vehicles from their houses, so their view has actually improved. Now, the residents hardly see the cars anymore, and they have beautiful flowers in front of their houses while they can still see the houses across the street. Furthermore, special “quiet” asphalt was used for the road, and in addition to these physical measures the speed limit was reduced.

Finesse This way of designing requires courage. Staying on course with so many variables, expectations, interests and requirements is not easy. Knowing when enough is enough. At what point do you have to make choices and present these to the stakeholders? This requires finesse, intuition, and experience. This complexity also requires interdisciplinarity. The problems we face require the expertise of people from various disciplines, not only spatial design disciplines such as traffic engineering, civil engineering, geotechnology, and construction. We must add planning, economy, sociology, and other disciplines, and it is clear that positioning infrastructural questions and approaching these as social matters is no sinecure. To make matters even more complex (and interesting), the designer must also enter into dialogue with interest

groups, residents, users, investors, administrators, and other stakeholders. Social positioning of infrastructural questions means designers must also define their position in the social debate; it means they have to admit irrationality and emotion. The Channel Tunnel between the United Kingdom and France is obviously an object made of concrete and steel. But the historical and cultural impact of this tunnel on the regions it connected was enormous. Besides the functional requirements, these factors also played an important role in the design process. And rightly so, because this new connection also meant new positions within Europe for the regions on either end of the tunnel.

Creating Conditions Infratecture is the insight that with the realization of an infrastructure project, one can achieve more than just a solution to a specific functional problem. With infrastructure, we create the conditions for our way of life, including all potentially positive and negative aspects. Approached in this way, infrastructure is the development of a realizable proposal that naturally also meets the design brief. The extra quality that infratecture adds is social value, value beyond the functional, value beyond design briefs, even value beyond the level of expectations of the stakeholders. Good infrastructure has current value as well as future value. Infratecture answers current questions, creates conditions for future and as of yet unforeseeable developments. A plea for embracing complexity. A plea for the integral design of infrastructure. Integral means looking at a problem from different perspectives, getting to the bottom of it, and striving for a comprehensive approach, analysis, and design. It stands for the development of solutions from which nothing is missing; for constant changes of perspective enabling a complete study of the problem and the inclusion of all interests and aspects.

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Palle Petersen

The Idea of

COMBINARE The new Swiss Gotthard Axis forms a relationship between infrastructure, architecture and landscape architecture. For over 20 years an interdisciplinary group has helped design of all of this transalpine flat route’s visible parts. The group has developed integrated solutions, thus creating a coherent appearance.

In 1882 the legendary Gotthard Railway Tunnel opened. Even today travel through the spiral tunnel on a train impressively shows how the Swiss opened up the Alpine region with this transport connection. The conquest of the Alps, which had taken Hannibal months to do in 218 BC and still took traders weeks before the tunnel, was now reduced to half a day thanks to the railway. A double track system, electrification and faster rolling stock resulted in a journey of four and a half hours by 1970. But not much else happened after this. In June of 2016, however, a leap in speed occurred: The Gotthard Base Tunnel was opened. And when the new Ceneri Base Tunnel is opened in 2020, an additional centennial project will have been

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completed. The Gotthard Axis of the New Railway Link through the Alps (NEAT) is part of the European high-speed network and is intended to shift heavy traffic on the northsouth axis from road to rail. Even though there are several missing links between Rotterdam and Genoa, the heart of NEAT is beating steadily. This greatly improves passenger transport as well. During the 95-minute trip from Zurich to Lugano, however, passengers have little time to see the fascination of this pioneering achievement. Along the 57- and 15-kilometre-long basis tunnels and the two additional ones in opencast mines there are few places with a view. The trip takes place in the dark. This makes the “outstanding archi-

tectural quality” and “coherent appearance” of the visible above-ground effects of the Gotthard axis all the more important. These were the declared objectives of the interdisciplinary Advisory Group for Design (BGG), founded in 1993. The fact that this group has been working on the project for over twenty years happened purely by chance. In 1992 engineer Peter Zuber went to an exhibition about the Ticino architect Rino Tami. Zuber, the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) delegate for the Gotthard axis, was impressed by work Tami had carried out on the A2 motorway (Gotthard route) in the 1960s. He decided to form the BGG under the chairmanship of Uli Huber. On board were also the Zurich architects

Most of the Gotthard Base Tunnel is underground, but several large-scale infrastructure elements along the route reveal its existence. These are examples of the successful integration of architecture, infrastructure and landscape.

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Pierre Feddersen, Rainer Klostermann, Pascal Sigrist and Flora Ruchat, who at that time was head of the architecture department at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH) and a designer of the A16 motorway (Transjurane). The well-known bridge builder Christian Menn worked as a consulting engineer until 2006 and various engineers including Peter Zbinden, Walter Schneebeli and Alex Regli also represented the SBB over the years.

AlpTransit Gotthard Ltd The BGG coordinates all the visible temporary and permanent impacts of the Gotthard axis between Litti near Baar and Lugano. They

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develop design specifications and details for various types of buildings, use sketches and models to construct both entire parts of the landscape and individual buildings, and work together with various engineering consortia to oversee these projects from initial planning to final construction. They have also done designs and studies for the later development stages of the Gotthard axis. Within the scope of their present construction activities they are working on eight portal areas, eleven main buildings (preliminary railway engineering and operations buildings), more than forty bridges and underpasses, as well as eight deposits of excavated materials and over 100 new structures

(for example, technical buildings, tunnel entrances, animal passages, bridges, retaining walls, substations and workers’ housing). The portal landscapes at the Urner Reusstal and Ticino’s Valle Leventina are the beginning and end of the Gotthard Base Tunnel. This is where countless requirements and standards converge. Railway infrastructure buildings and access roads, basins for cooling warm mountain water, railroad switches and underpasses surround the flyover structure that leads the old Gotthard line over the portal for the new basis tunnel. This large-scale curve appears as an 800-metre-long and 12-metre-high crescentshaped curve. Its sharp-edged concrete shape

spans large granite blocks. Cooling of the tunnels by the trains running through them had a major influence on the design of the portal areas. In order to prevent short circuits caused by escaping warm air and indrawn fresh air, the tunnels were staggered. Like sharp-ended needles, they symbolise the piercing of the mountains as a design theme and disappear into the mountainsides. Their hexagonal profile eliminates the need for any additional tunnel routes and combines the train’s clearance gauge with aerodynamic specifications to create an ideal air flow. When passenger and freight trains shoot out of the tubes at up to 250 kilometres per hour, trailing warm mountain air behind

them, the sun-warmed granite blocks promote its updraft and also provide a habitat for pioneer plants and reptiles. The crescentshaped flyover might well have been designed as a green embankment, but the architecture is conceived of in a topographical way, the landscape architecturally. The crescent-shaped arc is now symbolic of the epochal performance at Gotthard and stands for one thing in particular: 100,000 tons of creative willpower. Natural stone as an homage to the design of the landscape and the structures of the old Gotthard line, and dynamically cut concrete, that orchestrates the rapid travel of the trains as a reminiscence of Rino Tami.

Left: Cooling for the tunnels played a crucial role in the planning of the portal areas at Bodio and Ernstfeld. Right: The flyover structures also had an effect on the concept and were integrated into the overall design.

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Val Nalps ventilation structure, Sedrun Rino Tami’s influence is, as mentioned above, certainly no coincidence, as the BGG carefully analysed his design of the Ticino motorway A2 (Gotthard route) and also faced similar problems with the railway tunnel. When Pascal Sigrist read the word “combinare” on one of Tami’s sketches, he felt confirmed in his assumptions: “This is exactly the way we work. Large infrastructure projects tend to be a built collection of technical planning requirements. We combine functions and give integral solutions a clear form.” The Val Nalps ventilation structure serves as a before/after metaphor. This “exhaust pipe of a Ferrari” was the first structure

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the BGG worked on. But a short lesson about tunnelling is necessary before we continue: With long tunnels miners don’t just work toward each other from two sides. They make so-called “intermediate headings” in the mountain and assemble tunnel boring machines at these points. From here these “monsters”, which can be up to 450 metres long, eat their way towards one end. Waste heat and dust created by the machine make the air in the tunnel, which is already damp and up to 50° C in temperature, even worse. This makes the provision of powerful ventilation systems essential, especially during construction. One of the three intermediate headings at the Gotthard Base Tunnel is located far below

the village of Sedrun. This is the secret heart of the project and only accessible via an 800metre-deep shaft. Because of the possible formation of fog, the ventilation shaft is not near the village, but in the Val Nalps side valley. The project, which was originally of a purely engineering nature, consisted of a spacious turnaround blasted out of the cliffs, with a shaft made of precast concrete that towered above the steep slope. Its wedge shape was intended to protect it from avalanches and rock falls, and safety nets were to be provided. The built solution, an impressive concrete sculpture, now provides a clever solution to all the above requirements: It follows the course of the slope and vents toward the front instead of upwards,

and its broad lower wedge shape splits any avalanches and deftly integrates the turnaround. At this location, “combinare” means having a compact form that hugs the slope, requiring both less concrete and blasting.

The overburden at Buzza di Biasca The biggest interventions along the Gotthard axis are neither concrete animals nor stone arcs, however. At about 6.6 million tons, the artificial mountain near the south portal at Biasca takes this honour. The 50-metre-high mound is one of eight, and together with six bathing and nature preservation islands in the Urnersee lake serves as a deposit for material excavated from the rock

formations that was not used as concrete aggregate or for recultivation of the terrain. The management of the excavated material, which amounts to more than five of the pyramids at Cheops, is certainly a huge logistics challenge: 70 kilometres of conveyor belts transport the rock to concrete plants, interim storage and the artificial mountains and islands. “The deposit near Buzza di Biasca proudly exhibits its artificiality instead of trying to imitate nature,” explains Pascal Sigrist when talking about this geometric engineering project. Horizontal paths and vertical drainage ways criss-cross the artificial mountain at regular intervals. Weathering and vegetation will, however, eventually blur the sharp distinction to nature.

Left: The Val Nalps ventilation structure hugs the slope, as the tunnel is laterally vented. Right: In Buzza di Biasca material excavated from the rock formations is deposited in shaped mountains.

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Multipurpose building, Faido The intermediate heading at Faido provides access to a sloping tunnel instead of a vertical one. Here, the BGG combined several engineering structures in one compact building. The retaining wall at the base of the cliff looks like a 120-metre-long concrete animal. The entrance to the exploratory tunnel, building services and operation rooms of the neighbouring substation is in the animal’s tail. The torso is formed by railway infrastructure, i.e. computers, control equipment and giant diesel engines for emergency power. The 27-metre-high head, which slopes downhill and serves as the ventilation station, tapers in order to blow the air high up

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the hillside. The slope, which is logical at this point, runs across the entire front and bends in the opposite direction at the head. The compact volume appears somewhat ponderous, which is quite unlike the delicate dynamics of the portals and the ventilation structure at Val Nalps. The convincing design vocabulary there has been turned into a more crystalline-mannered independence here.

Kantonsstraße underpass, Camorino “One must imagine Sisyphus as happy,” grinned Sigrist as he quoted Camus, as the BGG’s work certainly requires perseverance. Since the beginning of construction in 2000 the group has

also provided support for the construction of more than 100 subsidiary buildings and 40 bridges and underpasses. They had to repeatedly explain the purpose and details of their work and convince numerous engineers to go along with their design ideas, which are based on locally applicable design guidelines for tunnel portals and entrances, underpasses and bridges, slopes and retaining walls, railings and fences, concrete surfaces, colours and signals. Much of the underpass at the Kantonsstrasse in Camorino is similar to the other underpasses the group has worked on. The trough’s cross-section is rectangular and the wing walls are directly integrated into the retaining walls. A typical bridge abutment links the drip edge, cable ducts, mast

foundation for overhead lines, service road and noise protection element in its combined geometry. What is different here, however, is that the intermediate wall at Camorino dissolves into polygonal cross supports. It takes its inspiration from the v-shaped columns of the neighbouring railway viaduct, under which Ticino envisions a future city growing.

Cross-border links This southern canton wants to use the Gotthard axis as an urban development catalyst and senses an opportunity to become an important node between the southern-German-Swiss section of the country and Milan’s metropolitan area. And

it should really take advantage of this, as everyone is aware of the disadvantage of 500-metrelong freight trains passing by every two minutes. The future of the ATG (AlpTransit Gotthard Ltd), and especially the BGG, is much less certain: Will the organisational and specialist knowledge the firm (which was created especially for work on the base tunnel) has be lost? And who will be responsible for design as the Gotthard axis is maintained and further developed in the future? It remains to be seen what will happen.

Left: The multipurpose building at Faido is integrated in the landscape as a retaining wall. Right: The intermediate wall in the underpass at Camorino consists of several v-shaped columns.

This article is based on one that appeared in the September 2014 edition of the Swiss architecture magazine Hochparterre.

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Conor O’Shea

Owned by the

PUBLIC In Chicago, the 606 represents a new era of park-building in which municipal interagency collaborations manage complex teams of consultants to tackle the physical, social, environmental, and financial demands presented by outmoded infrastructure. Under this new model, landscape architecture is used as a common framework for building new public spaces.

For the 606, multiple municipal agencies managed large teams of landscape architects and engineers, capable of tackling the complex conditions presented by outmoded infrastructure.

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In 2002, the BNSF Logistics Park in Elwood, Illinois opened on the site of a decommissioned U.S. Army munitions plant. The freight yard and its adjacent Union Pacific port in Joliet now constitute the largest inland port in the United States. Just a year earlier and some 40 miles northeast, in Chicago, after decades of declining manufacturing in the area, Canadian Pacific ended all freight traffic on a nearly three-mile industrial corridor embedded in 19thcentury urban fabric. On June 6, 2015, this 17-foot-high raised embankment opened to the public as the 606, a park network comprising the 2.7-mile-long bike and running path known as the Bloomingdale Trail, four adjacent at-grade parks (with two more planned), and 12 access points. The project resulted from a planning and design process that involved multiple city agencies, nonprofit, community groups, and over 20 consultants. The collaboration among Collins Engineers (project management; lead civil and structural engineers), Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates (landscape architecture design), and Frances Whitehead (lead artist), drew upon feedback from multiple public charrettes and input from numerous community groups.

A new type of park. The 606 represents the mature phase of a new mode of civic park production in Chicago. Under this model, multiple municipal agencies manage large teams of landscape architects, engineers, and other consultants capable of tackling the complex physical, social, and environmental conditions presented by outmoded infrastructure. These agencies also blend unique combinations of public and private project-funding. In this new model, landscape – not engineering or architecture – is used as a common framework for thinking about and building new public spaces. Within this condition, the 606 distinguishes itself from a concentration of other high-profile parks built under this regime in Chicago by the serious debates it catalyzed: how the city should invest in its neighborhoods, how community needs should be met, and how landscape architecture can contribute to the production of democratic urban spaces. Its straightforward celebration of existing industrial infrastructure, climate-aware planting, and pragmatic primary function as a transportation corridor set it apart from other parks built since the turn of the century in Chicago. As Matt Urbanski of Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates (MVVA) declares, “It’s not imported glamour and glitz.” Reconceiving abandoned railroad tracks as public space is of course not new. The 606 comes on the heels of other projects, including Paris’s Promenade plantée, Berlin’s Natur-Park Südgelände, New York’s High Line, and Atlanta’s Belt Line. These projects demonstrate the efficacy of landscape architecture’s skill in transforming 19th- and early 20th-century logistical infrastructure into powerful economic generators of 21st-century urban economies. Though prioritized by Mayor Rahm Emmanuel during his first re-election campaign along with other new downtown parks like Maggie Daley Park and the Chicago Riverwalk, the 606 is several miles northwest of the central

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The 606 is a new type of park network, comprising the 2.7-mile-long bike and running path known as the Bloomingdale Trail, four adjacent at-grade parks, and 12 access points.

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The 606 is in many ways a bridge project – 37 bridges were replaced along its length. The engineers worked hand in hand with the landscape architects in conceiving the overall design.

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business district. Its eastern terminus at the Walsh Park access point lies at the heart of primarily white neighborhoods within short commuting distance to downtown by public transportation. Its western terminus at the Ridgway Trailhead is heavily Latino, with lower property values and less access to rapid transit. While its length led to contentious debate over its outcome, the design team and managing agencies nobly aimed to democratically connect the desires of the Wicker Park, Bucktown, Logan Square, and Humboldt Park neighborhoods through an even and practical design approach. Dialogues within the community on the future use of the corridor were formalized in 2003 when Ben Helphand co-founded the Friends of the Bloomingdale Trail. The former railroad, which first appeared as a potential bike trail in the city’s 1997 Bicycle Facilities Development Plan, was also included in the influential 2004 Logan Square Open Space Plan. From then until 2011, the triad of the City of Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT), the Chicago Park District (CPD), and the Trust for Public Land (TPL) were involved in fundraising, land acquisition, and community outreach. A three-day public charrette in 2011 informed the Bloomingdale Trail Framework Plan, which was published in 2012 and foundational in the formal design process that followed. According to James Hamelka of Collins Engineers, the design process was thoroughly collaborative. Though the project is in many ways a bridge project – 37 bridges were replaced along its length – the engineers worked hand in hand with MVVA and Whitehead in conceiving the overall design. The design delivers on the community’s desire for trail access, recreational space, and a running and bike path, but is also decidedly unfinished. As Matt Urbanski and Frances Whitehead stress, the park is built to last, but its design is not overdetermined. Part of the reason behind this, says Whitehead, is a vision inherited from the community: that the future park should be “a living work of art that can be owned by the public.” Ongoing programming and stewardship of the 606 by local residents will drive its evolution. For example, in 2013, TPL announced the appointment of a two-year Exelon Fellow, an education leader to connect children and families of the nearby 25 neighborhoods to the 606. The 606 will evolve through both community involvement and its phenologic planting strategy. A designed landscape, according to Urbanski, comprises both variation and continuity. In the case of the 606, over 450 serviceberries are distributed along the length of the trail; they are punctuated by striking groups of monoculture like the poplar thicket between Drake and St. Louis avenues, the smoke bush tunnel at Humboldt Boulevard, and the sumac tunnel between Rockwell Street and Maplewood Avenue. The serviceberries are intended to leverage the pathway’s linear form to “engage people in a climate conversation by using a showy flowery species.” The serviceberries, which Whitehead compares to the annual cherry blossoms in Washington D.C.’s tidal basin, reveal a regional phenomenon: the warming effect of Lake

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THE 606, CHICAGO, USA Client: Chicago Department of Transportation and Chicago Park District Landscape architects: Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates Structures: Collins Engineers, Inc. Lead Artist: Frances Whitehead / ARTetal Year of construction: 2015

Michigan across the city. Serviceberries will flower in succession from east to west over a five-day period, casting global and local climate changes into relief. Chinese lilacs planted every tenth of a mile will become sources of data for citizen-scientists reporting bloom time for the USA National Phenology Network. The Chicago Park District today is increasingly recognized for excellence in project management, community engagement, and project implementation. The 606’s completion represents the mature phase of a new mode of civic park production that emerged with the opening of Millennium Park in 2004. The types of sites available for parks in the 21st century are usually polluted, physically complex, and embedded in a variety of longstanding social dynamics. Reconciling these factors takes large multidisciplinary teams, ones that, according to Michael Lange, senior project manager at the CPD, would be too expensive to employ full-time, in-house. Under this regime, projects are produced through what Lange describes as enormous interagency efforts. For example, in the case of the 606, in addition to the 20-plus consultants on the team, CDOT applied for much of the funding through a Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement grant from the United States Department of Transportation. While the project was then turned over to the CPD for managing the design and community input process along with TPL, CDOT was responsible for bidding and construction. Like Millennium Park, Maggie Daley Park, and the Chicago Riverwalk, new parks are now rarely funded by a single source. Managing diverse financial sources – in the case of the 606, a combination of $56 million in public money and $20 million in private funding – is a major responsibility of the CPD. Unlike Millennium Park and other new downtown parks in Chicago, the 606 is a neighborhood park conceived through thoughtful community engagement. Its materiality, too, is vastly different. Galvanized steel fencing, exposed concrete viaducts, and its ten-footwide concrete mixed-use pathway bordered on either side by two-foot-wide rubber running paths are reminiscent of CDOT standards and help reframe Chicago’s industrial heritage for recreational users. Like Chicago’s historic parks, which helped shape the city’s expansion during a period of rapid growth during the 19th and early 20th centuries, the 606 provides mixing space for a range of Chicago residents. On a recent weekend visit, joggers and cyclists diverse in age and ethnicity could be seen using the trail. Within the vast socioeconomic, financial, and physical complexity of projects like the 606, the landscape architect’s role as mediator of commercial, community, and civic responsibilities grows ever more important. Compared with similar adaptive reuse projects nationally, the 606 is distinguished by modest design, physical accessibility, and intelligent planting, all inflected by a commitment to ongoing community-engagement programming. It is a park in which the landscape architect, lead artist, and engineer worked collaboratively to navigate a complex urban force field to produce a space that, as Urbanski says, is “in the neighbhorhood, [and] of the neighborhood”.

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The design of the whole structure is decidedly unfinished, so that the park can be owned by the puclic. “It’s not imported glamour and glitz” says the landscape architects of the project.

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Kees Lokman

Exploring a New Paradigm With climate change, urban regions must develop new approaches and policies to sustainably manage regional water resources. A group of students from the University of British Columbia spent several weeks in Mexico City to research new synergies between water management, mobility, and open space.

Located in the Valley of Mexico at 2,200 metres above sea level, the basin of Mexico City has no natural drainage outlet for water. As such, floods, droughts, and other water-related dynamics have always been part of the region. When the Aztecs founded their capital city Tenochtitlán here in 1325, they engineered an impressive system of water infrastructures, including dikes, locks, aqueducts, and chinampas: small, rectangular islands filled with fertile dredged soil to grow crops. This half-natural, half-artificial landscape was at once productive, environmentally sensitive, and spatially distinctive. It both provided protection against floods and allowed for the irrigation and lacustrine transport of agricultural crops. Even up until the 20th century, the region

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hosted several shallow lakes that fluctuated between one to three metres during the wet and dry seasons, providing a dynamic equilibrium by regulating floods, infiltration, and precipitation. This drastically changed at the turn of the 20th century. The implementation of artisanal wells for the extraction of water from the shallow aquifer, combined with the construction of large-scale hydraulic infrastructures to drain the lakes and to redirect waste and stormwater, completely changed the basin’s hydrological cycle. This system, much of which still remains operational today, diverts water out of the valley into the Tula River. Additionally, between 1930 and 1940, the construction of multiple dams as well as the implementation of water transfer systems from

the Lerma Basin (1951) and the Cutzamala Basin (1982) further complicated issues of water management. Today, nearly one-third of Mexico City’s total drinking water is transported from as far as 130 kilometres away, and uphill over an elevation of 1,100 metres – a system that uses an equivalent of energy that could meet the needs of 1.5 million people. At the same time, overexploitation of groundwater is causing land subsidence at alarming rates (approximately one metre per 10 years), resulting in building damage, broken and leaky pipes, and groundwater contamination. To make matters worse, the city pumps massive amounts of untreated storm and contaminated wastewater to the neighbouring state of Hidalgo, where it is used to irrigate nearly

90 thousand hectares of agricultural land. Crops grown in this area are transported to Mexico City to feed its people, not surprisingly creating a serious environmental and public health issue. Another challenge is the fact that Mexico City is composed of two jurisdictions: the federal district (DF) and the State of Mexico. Despite recent efforts to improve coordination between the two jurisdictions, ongoing shifts in population and economic activity from DF to the State of Mexico are posing significant challenges with respect to urban development, water management, and infrastructure planning. This contributes to growing levels of inequality, which are directly inscribed in the geography. Whereas (upper-) middle-class neighbourhoods have

access to green space, multi-modal transit, and amenities, the poor lack basic sanitation and live in areas prone to “natural” disasters (flooding, landslides, etc.). Currently, nearly 30% of the 21 million people in the metropolitan area have inadequate access to clean drinking water and solely rely on buying water from pipas (water trucks). While presumably safe, this alternative is often more expensive than piped water, and service is sporadic, leaving communities sometimes without water for days.

Above: A so-called “pipa” delivers large plastic bottles to Mexico City to supply the inhabitants with drinking water. Due to a deficient drinking-water distribution system and low quality of public water supplies, Mexicans are the largest con-

Making Water Visible Again. Clearly, Mexico City needs alternative ways to deal with its water management. As with many complex planning and design problems, successful solutions f

sumers of bottled water per capita in the world, according to the International Bottled Water Association.

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During the course, UBC students studied water-related issues in Mexico City through four different lenses: (1) ecology, (2) mobility, (3) housing, and (4) waste. They explored these topics by researching a particular cross-section of the city, which spans from the prosperous areas in the west to the poorer and less-serviced communities in the east.

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STUDY ABROAD COURSE “VISUALIZING MEXICO CITY’S WATER CRISIS” University of British Columbia, April-May 2016 Instructors: Kees Lokman and Daniel Roehr Teaching Assistant: Gustavo Manzano Pérez Peláez Student Researchers: Kirsten Harrison, Fahimeh Vahabi, Huan Pan, Genevieve Depelteau, Lacee Barr, Patrick Beech, Ayishah Chui, Taylor Kirsh, Yusraa Tadj, Julia Eyerund, Grace Jiang, Afrooz Fallahmanshadi, Shakun Singla, Baiyi Chen, Yingluo Wang, Nan Zhou, Emily Rennalls, Xuxin Feng, Julia Casol, Mahsa Momenzadeh, Alyssa Quiring, Luyang Zhou and Reese Lewis Support Mexico City: Centro Cultural Border, Elena Tudela Rivadeneyra and Adriana Chavez

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involve approaches at regional, neighbourhood and local scales, as well as implementation strategies that are informed by top-down and bottom-up initiatives, both short and long-term. In recent years, designers have developed imaginative and opportunistic proposals to transform the hydrological cycle in the Mexico City Basin. The project Río La Piedad by Taller 13, for example, proposes to daylight nearly 15 kilometres of river currently hidden under a major highway. This provides a holistic solution that combines an integrated system for managing and treating water with multi-modal transportation, public green space, and ecological restoration – connecting people both visually and physically with the

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dynamics of the hydrological cycle. Similar to recent river-regeneration efforts in cities like Seoul, Singapore, and Madrid, Río La Piedad has real potential to bring about change and reconfigure Mexico City’s relationship with water. Unfortunately, due to a strong pro-car lobby and lack of political will, the project has not moved beyond a conceptual design phase. Other similarly ambitious projects like Alberto Kalach’s proposal to regenerate 7,000 hectares of ancient lakes have also been stalled. Indeed, as argued by David Barkin, economics professor at Mexico City’s Metropolitan Autonomous University: “This is not a crisis of water, it’s a crisis of governance and paradigms.” Due to this failure of decision-makers to imple-

ment these large-scale projects, the more immediate potential for change exists at neighbourhood and local scales. Here, two examples, Bicentennial Park by Mario Schjetnan (Grupo de Diseño Urbano) and Quebradora Hydraulic Park by Loreta Castro (Taller Hídrico Urbano/ UNAM), promote ways to reconnect urban populations with urban water management while creating new open spaces and cultural platforms.

Ecological Engineering. Constructed on the site of a former PEMEX refinery in northern Mexico City, Bicentennial Park provides a multilayered landscape that fuses ecology, hydrology, geology, and technology while hosting numerous public programs and recreational activities. Aes-

thetically and hydrologically, the most interesting section of the park is the Botanical Garden, which contains seven different micro-landscapes featuring plants of Mexico’s major bioclimatic zones. Water is not only the main visual element of this section of the park; it is also functional as it collects, treats, and cycles all the water that falls on the site. Surrounding the thematic gardens – which include a subterranean orchid garden as well as a reconstructed chinampa – is a system of constructed wetlands, triangular rainwater collection structures, and underground cisterns that collects and stores all the rainwater. After water is filtered and purified, it is injected into deep wells (at approximately 80 metres) to recharge the city aquifer. Here, ecological engineering has

informed the design of a cultural landscape that integrates human activities with ecological systems to create mutual benefits.

Left: In recent years, Taller 13 has worked in Regenesis and 28 other individual areas on a proposal to day-

Landscape Infrastructure. The Quebradora

light La Piedad River to

Hydraulic Park offers another innovative strategy for the integration of social, ecological and spatial strategies related to stormwater management. The park is located in a flood-prone area at the foothills of the Sierra Santa Catarina in Iztapalapa: a poor, high-crime neighbourhood that lacks access to both green space and potable water. In order to address these issues, the design incorporates a series of catchment basins to store and infiltrate rainwater, a program area that can be temporarily flooded in times of heavy rain, and a

enhance mobility and ecological connectivity. Right: Bicentennial Park celebrates the horticultural, hydrological and cultural heritage of Mexico by repurposing a formerly industrial site and integrating innovative water-management strategies.

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system of multi-level pathways to provide safe access and views from which the dynamics of water and activities are perceptible. The entire park embraces processes of water to create meaningful interactions, cultivate public awareness, and support local ecologic and economic viability. Water in all its forms is celebrated and allowed to continuously change the landscape, leaving behind watercourses and pools, and reflecting the seasonal fluctuations and identity of Mexico City.

Let it Rain. At an even more intimate scale, Isla Urbana is providing opportunities for citizens to take more control over their water futures. The organization is implementing relatively inexpensive rainwater harvesting (RWH)

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systems, especially in marginalized communities that lack consistent access to water. By capturing water that falls during the rainy season, the system can supply typical households with water for up to 6 to 8 months. By taking advantage of elements that are already part of a typical house in Mexico City – such as a pitched or flat concrete roof, an underground cistern, waterstorage tanks, and a small water pump – the system does not require expensive retrofits. Isla Urbana estimates that RWH, if widely implemented, could provide nearly a third of Mexico City’s entire water supply. This would not only limit the city’s reliance on energy-intensive infrastructures that bring in water over great distances, it also provides a flexible and scalable

solution that can be easily implemented in peripheral neighbourhoods. Where implemented, RWH systems act as agents of change. Residents now spend less time securing water, allowing them to invest time and resources in other aspects of life. In Paraje Quiltepec, a community we visited, access to water enabled residents to plant an orchard and cultivate crops in order to secure their own food sources. They also implemented a bio-digester to produce biogas (energy for heating) and fertilizer to enrich the soil. Here, “simple” access to water fully transformed the urban landscape, enabling the cultivation of new resources and revitalizing the human spirit. In all of this, education plays a key role. First, there is a need to educate residents on the benefits of

RWH and the opportunities it provides to positively impact their everyday lives. Second, decision-makers need to be convinced that RWH, as a low-tech and replicable application to individual buildings, is indeed a viable solution to regional water-management issues.

A New Water-Management Paradigm. Water management is becoming increasingly important in urbanized areas around the world. Mexico City, as a megacity with a simultaneous excess and lack of water, provides a very relevant place to study these issues. It provides a legible example of how changing policies and engineering practices have radically altered the natural water cycle. At the same time, these water pressures are

inspiring designers to test and develop more sustainable and resilient models of urban water management, particularly by reintroducing water and its dynamics into urban spaces and everyday life. This requires shifting between local and regional scales, providing short- and long-term solutions; manipulating flows and associated physical landscapes; and addressing socio-economic and ecological needs. Like Mexico City, there are dozens of cities around the world in need of a new watermanagement paradigm. Here, planners and designers – especially landscape architects – have a key role to play in providing solutions that combine ecology and economy, functionality and aesthetics, and advocacy and activism in order to reshape our relationship with water.

Left: Quebradora Hydraulic Park in Mexico City presents a new type of water park, reconnecting residents with the dynamics of the hydrological cycle in the Mexico City Basin. Right: UBC Students receiving a tour of Paraje Quiltepec, a semi-rural community that adopted Isla Urbana’s rainwater- harvesting systems and also integrated a low-tech biogas digester.

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The Garden Bridge is a new spectacular design for Central London. It is planned to span the River Thames from Temple to the South Bank. The 366-meter-long concrete and steel construction is designed to appear as a quasi-organic form.

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David Madden

Designing Against the Public Spectacular new public spaces are being built in many cities today. But for the most part, they are privately financed and controlled. Far from embodying the democratic spirit of the city, they illustrate the domination of urban development by elites. The Garden Bridge, a new eye-catching project in the heart of London, exemplifies this trend – and exposes the limits and contradictions of contemporary urban public space.

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Urban public space is big business today. Cities across the world are constructing expensive new parks, promenades and other new high-profile public projects. This may seem on the surface to be a boost for the collective, civic dimension of the urban experience, a vote of confidence in the urban commons. But many of the spectacular new public spaces being constructed in cities today are privately financed and controlled. They speak more to the domination of urban development by elites than they do to the democratic spirit of the city. The Garden Bridge, a planned pedestrian crossing in Central London, exemplifies these trends. The Garden Bridge is planned to span the River Thames from Temple to the South Bank. The 366-meter-long concrete and steel construction is designed to appear as a quasi-organic form emerging from two giant stem-like piers in the riverbed. The deck will be covered with trees, plantings, and a walkway. A team led by Thomas Heatherwick designed the bridge, working with the engineering firm Arup and the landscape designer Dan Pearson. The project was originally estimated to cost £60 million, though that figure has now grown to £175 million. Fees and corporate sponsorship are key to its business model. As planned, the bridge will meet some of its operating costs by serving as a hired venue for private events. Money will also be raised by selling naming rights to various parts of the bridge, and through other revenue-generating activities. At first, the bridge was going to be financed entirely by private funding. But significant amounts of public money have also been pledged towards it, including £30 million each from Transport for London and the Treasury.

Elitist Urbanism. The project is, in essence, an emanation of London’s political, financial and cultural establishments. It was first promoted by the actress Joanna Lumley, who is a childhood friend of the former Mayor of London Boris Johnson, one of the bridge’s most enthusiastic backers. Heatherwick himself is closely associated with two other initiatives promoted by Johnson when he was mayor: the New Routemaster buses and the cauldron for the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. The current Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has expressed scepticism regarding the bridge, but counts himself as a proponent. Other well-known supporters include the Cameron government’s Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne; Sarah Sands, the editor of the Evening Standard; Mervyn Davies, a banker and former Labour government minister; and Richard Rogers, the architect who has done much to promote particular kinds of “urban regeneration” projects in the UK. The Garden Bridge Trust, the organisation that is promoting the project, is packed with representatives of finance, insurance, real estate and the media. If the Garden Bridge is public space in any sense, it is a very narrow, well-connected and powerful sliver of the public that is promoting it.

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Opponents of the bridge criticise that the structure is blocking historic views of world heritage sites. Others object to the misappropriation of public funds for infrastructure, its failure as transportation infrastructure or as a public space.

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Against the Garden Bridge. There are many different grounds upon which to object to the Garden Bridge. For some, the issue is the integrity of the process by which Heatherwick was selected. Jane Duncan, president of the Royal Institute of British Architects, is one of many prominent voices to raise questions about how Heatherwick was chosen for the job. Two other firms, Marks Barfield and Wilkinson Eyre, had been invited to submit designs. But Boris Johnson is alleged to have decided to award the project to Heatherwick from the beginning, and Transport for London admitted that the procurement process was “neither open nor objective”. Others object to the project’s spoiling of historic and protected views of the Thames. The artist Will Jennings, one of the Garden Bridge’s most prominent critics, has objected to the bridge’s “blocking of historic views of world heritage sites”. Jennings and others have noted that the renderings used to promote the bridge present a drone’s-eye view of the site, rather than an actual pedestrian’s point of view. Westminster Council remarked that “if this proposal was for a private commercial development of this height and size, the harm to these views would be considered unacceptable and the application refused”. Yet others object to the misappropriation of public funds for infrastructure. There are many locations on the Thames where new crossings are needed, but the Garden Bridge’s planned site is not one of them. It will stand only three hundred metres away from Waterloo Bridge. In basic ways, it is bound to fail as transportation infrastructure. The designers expect long queues, which will complicate the use of the bridge for commuting. Cyclists will be required to dismount and walk their bikes. The project is manifestly not designed as a solution to transportation problems.

A Failed Public Space. These are all serious points that raise major questions. But the deeper reason to object to the Garden Bridge is that it fails as an urban space. And it does so in ways that are symptomatic of many of the most troubling developments in contemporary public space in cities worldwide. The urban public realm has long been shaped by opposing forces: between city dwellers advocating control versus those pushing for autonomy; and between urbanites seeking to use outdoor space for commerce versus those seeking to use it for free leisure or collective politics. The ideal of public space as a contemporary version of the ancient Greek agora was always misleading. But there were times when public space provided a respite from market-led urbanisation and facilitated critical opposition to the urban power structure. The historian Lisa Keller describes how public spaces in nineteenth-century London and New York became sites for “free speech and assembly”. The philosopher Iris Marion Young defined public space in the twentieth century as the collection of places “where anyone can speak and anyone can listen”. While in different historical eras, actual public

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The project was originally estimated to cost £60 million, though that figure has now grown to £175 million. As planned, it will meet some of its operating costs by serving as a hired venue or by selling naming rights to various parts of the bridge.

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spaces have often departed from these visions, the existence of the urban public realm is still justified by the possibility of serving as a political and social resource available to all. The Garden Bridge serves no such public purposes. It is planned not as a common social and political resource but as a strictly controlled, privatised tourist trap. The Garden Bridge Trust says in a planning document that it intends to “maximise the opportunity provided by the status of the bridge as private land with permitted access, by introducing a set of conditions prior to opening to help manage the bridge environment”. While the group has backed away from its initial plan to require tickets for groups of eight people or more, the fact remains that, like Paternoster Square and the viewing platforms at the top of City of London skyscrapers, the Garden Bridge will not be a place for public assembly. It will be a place where public assembly will be off limits. The organisation lists “Public Protest/Encampment” as one “Crime Related Threat” that must be anticipated and actively avoided. In order to deter potential troublemakers, the bridge will be fully monitored by closed-circuit television. There are plans to track visitors’ mobile phones. The self-conscious whimsy of the design disguises the fact that the bridge is planned as a high-tech surveillance-scape. In this sense, the project resembles recent design interventions in other cities. Joanna Lumley’s original idea notwithstanding, the direct inspiration for the Garden Bridge is supposed to be the High Line in New York City. Critics and supporters alike have argued over whether or not the Garden Bridge will live up to the High Line’s standard in terms of design. But the goal of emulating the High Line is itself part of the problem. The High Line is also a privately operated public space, closely tied to local real estate, finance, and culture industry elites. Research has shown that the users of the High Line are significantly less diverse than the neighbourhoods that surround it. Like the Garden Bridge, it has been justified by its appeal to tourists in a city not lacking for places to visit. As a design intervention and icon of adaptive reuse, the High Line has clearly excited many. But it was above all a mechanism for pushing the gentrification of Chelsea into overdrive. It should therefore not be treated as a model for public space today by London or other cities.

What Cities Need. Unequal cities like contemporary London do not need more projects that reflect and augment the power of elites. Instead, they should seek to produce spaces with actual democratic and egalitarian sensibilities. Central London is enough of a luxury product as it is without the Garden Bridge. What London truly needs today is a public realm through which city dwellers can experience the conviviality of everyday urban multiculture rather than be subjected to a controlled, gentrified version of it – and a space where Londoners can contest urban inequality rather than being absorbed by it.

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The deck of the Garden Bridge will be covered with trees, plantings, and a walkway. It is planned as a pedestrian crossing, but the designers expect long queues of people, which will complicate the use of the bridge for daily commuting.

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Alexander Gutzmer

LIVING

(AND

MVRDV have designed a “City Container” that consists of 3500 containers. They are substracted from the worldwide flow of trade to form a megacontainer on the scale of the city.

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DYING)

IN

A

BOX

It is one of the prime symbols of contemporary capitalism: the shipping container. The plain box stands for the impressive efficiencies of today’s global logistics system. Inherently ambivalent as so much of modern technology, it can be used for the most noble purposes as well as for the most cruel and atrocious ones.

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MVRDVs design is like a beehive with 3500 niches for sleeping, eating, exhibiting and performing. It creates space for hotels, bars, galleries, business units, schools or ateliers.

One of the most shocking scenes of recent television history occurs in Season Two of HBO’s “The Wire”: thirteen unidentified young women are discovered dead in a container at the docks of Baltimore port. A crucial element in this scene that reveals the horrors of modern human trafficking is the shipping container – a standardized box made of steel, with suitable strength to sustain the shipment, storage, and handling that it undergoes as it travels across oceans and continents. In the universe of today’s globalized capitalist economy it is as ubiquitous as it is indispensable. Logistically, the invention of the modern shipping container was a stroke of genius. Ethically, the situation is more complicated. Technology is ambivalent per se. It can be put to use by good motives as well as sinister and evil ones. The scriptwriters of “The Wire” must have been aware of that; their TV series is arguably one of the most lucid pop-cultural critiques of the drama of the capitalist city. The container is indifferent to what it is being transported in it. It does not care. Its economic efficacy is available regardless of whether it transports tea or machine

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guns, bananas or bombs, motor bikes or human beings, even dead ones. It is simply a sturdy and robust box used to carry objects efficiently over large distances.

A GLOBAL SYSTEM OF PORTS. In organizing the constant flow of commodities across the planet the shipping container has become a crucial factor. Its efficiency has made it the congenial “partner” for the erection of the global trading system we are witnessing today. The container is the “glue” that makes global trade logistically feasible at all. It is the missing link connecting the worldwide system of producing, transporting (mainly shipping), and consuming. What is more, it is what connects water and land. The container eases the transition of product delivery from sea to land. It works like an amphibian. In this way, it is also essential for the functioning of the global system of ports. Without containers, there would be no ports as we know them today. And without ports, the world of trade, and the global economic network, would be a very different one.

The “Village Underground” in Lisbon is a co-working space for artists, musicians and designers. It consists of stacked containers and is situated under the 25 de Abril Bridge.

While the system of ports spans the entire world, it is by no means globally equal. In fact, the weights of this port system are currently changing dramatically. Its center of gravity has been shifting – towards the East. Being born in Hamburg, I always fancied the idea that Hamburg’s port might be a key player in global goods transport, and the city of Hamburg a center of global trade. However, looking at the numbers, this is clearly not the case. According to current statistics published by the World Shipping Council, Hamburg ranks only as number 15 of the world’s busiest ports. Rotterdam comes in as number 11. With the exception of Dubai, number 9, the top ten are all in East Asia: Shanghai; Singapore; Shenzhen; Hong Kong; Ningbo-Zhoushan (China), Busan (South Korea); Qingdao (China); Guangzhou (China); Tianjin (China).

TOOLS OF POWER. Just as containers, ports too are much more than indifferent or neutral enablers. They are tools of power. If you own the ports, you control the flows of global capitalism. It might be relevant for a country to be the home base of the most successful digital enterprises. But Amazon

and company can only profit from those global trade processes that can be physically handled. You can only shop an iPad if it can be delivered to your house. And for this, it needs to be transported from its place of origin, e.g. from an industrial hub like the infamous Chinese Pearl River Delta. No country has understood the relevance of ports for strengthening its power in the global trade system (and increasing its geopolitical sway) as well as China. Not only does the country already own most of the world’s biggest ports, as the statistics above show, it also continues to further expand its global power network. One strategic region targeted by China’s geopolitical ambitions is Africa. As has recently been frequently reported, China has been investing heavily in Africa’s infrastructure, thereby securing its own central position in the running of this infrastructure. Ports are a crucial part of this investment-based power strategy, that’s why China is helping so many African countries to build new ports. One key example is the new port of Bagamoyo, currently being built in Tanzania, East Africa. Bagamoyo Port is probably the most ambitious current investment program by the Tanzanian government.

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This building in Flörsheim, Germany, consisting of 22 containers forming a courtyard and accessed via gallery walkways, offers accommodation to 40 asylum seekers.

Construction started in October 2015, and despite some setbacks, it is still expected to be finished in 2017. The main funder of the project is the construction firm China Merchants Group, a company owned by the Chinese government. Politically, the port project is a co-operation between Tanzania, China, and Oman. What we can see here is a new system of global political alliances unfolding. Ports function as central nodes in this system, and the central mechanism are containers.

CONTAINER CITY. However, the container is not only the key unit around which ports – and the global product flow in general – are planned. It is also the visual icon that distinguishes a high-efficiency port from an ordinary logistics space. Aesthetically, we perceive containers as a colorful dots characterizing the visual appearance as well as the spatial structure of a port. In his essay “Flatscape with Containers”, published in the journal New Society, architectural theorist Reyner Banham describes these new spatial structures. The old port city with its “craggy warehouses, masts, cranes and funnels silhouetted against the sky” is a thing of the past. There are no more “picturesque Trotskyites in silk mufflers toting that box, lifting

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that bale, getting a little drunk.” Instead, the new port is an abstract machine. Banham comments: “What you see, more than anything else, is acreage of flat tarmac or concrete.” And in addition to that, what you see is containers. The new port city is a container city.

A WORLD OBJECT. Only a minority of containers, however, are in ports at any given time. Most of them are at sea. Given the need for a reduction of stagnation times in the global economy, only a moving container is an efficient container. The number of containers that can be moved at any one moment is impressive. According to data from the information provider Alphaliner, today there are 6,130 ships active on liner trades. These have the capacity to transport 20,667,618 TEU, with TEU standing for “Twenty-foot Equivalent Unit”. “Twenty foot” refers to the length of the standardized container. So, at any given moment, ships can transport and hold more than 20 million standard containers. However, while the 20-foot container is the standard, the stock of containers is increasingly replaced by 40-foot containers, which means that the global capacity of an estimated 33 million TEU is made up of fewer than these 33 million containers.

A further container building in Tübingen, Germany. It is used to shelter families seeking political asylum who are given the right of residence for up to one year.

Whether 20 or 40 feet long, the container is an impressively flexible object. It can shelter and confine, move and capture things – and people. It can be used as tool for global trade, but also as an architectural icon, as we can see in the hipper areas of our metropolises, where artists and design offices love to reside in temporary structures built from containers. Innovative architectural practices such as the Dutch office MVRDV play with the idea of an outright “Container City”. (MVRDV proposed such a design, unsuccessfully, to the city of Rotterdam.) It is this flexibility that makes the container a supreme instrument for organizing the culture and economy of the world we live in. It is what the philosopher Michel Serres calls a “world object”. Quoting Serres, design theorist Craig Martin, in his book Shipping Container, explains why the container is such a world object. The container, he says, is “an object that we live through. By this I mean that they are one of the paradigmatic objects of the global age.” This puts the container alongside other iconic objects such as the car, the mobile phone, or the laptop computer. Like them, the container enables and organizes the way we live.

THE CONTAINER AS A SYMBOL. The container also gives symbolic expression to our way of life. It is a metaphor. As such, it expresses a high degree of replicability and differing surfaces – amid an essential quality of sameness. The key quality of the container is its sameness. Each container functions like the other. And each container has the capacity to link with its peers in a potentially endless process of piling-up and stapling. The container is the object that never tires of being stapled. This characteristic is what makes it so productive, but also so scary. For the container, shape does not matter. It is the link that counts. Each container has fulfilled its purpose as soon as it has been filled, linked to another container, and moved. If we take this as a metaphor of our times, then the world we live in is one of brutal functionalism, in which the ultimate end are objects. Human beings are reduced to joining in in a system that provides links and is incessantly on the move. In this sense, the container is a somewhat uncanny world object, even beyond the fact that it can become the instrument of an inhuman crime as the one displayed in the televison-series “The Wire”.

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Viriato Soromenho-Marques

EROTIC SLOWNESS In Northern Portugal, in one of the most pristine landscapes of the country, landscape architects and engineers have proposed a solution to solve one of the major problems of sustainable tourism: how can we enjoy environmental beauty without spoiling it through unwanted negative impacts?

Henry David Thoreau is the well-known North-American ethical pioneer of many of our worries regarding the major problem of our planet today, the global environmental crisis. It is almost impossible not to be deeply touched by his decision on the 4th July 1845, to move from his hometown Concord to the wooden shores of pound Walden, only some miles away in the Massachusetts countryside. He wanted, according to his own words, “to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life”. The literary depiction of his two-year-long solitary experience in the heart of nature can be found in his masterpiece, Walden; or, Life in the Woods (1854). However, the reader will not find in the hundreds of pages of this philosophical pilgrimage a mention of the author’s serious blunder that raised the wrath of timbermen and farmers who also wandered near the lake. Apparently, Thoreau caused the burning of around 300 acres of valuable forest land by letting a camp fire that he had lit run out of control. This incident may be taken as emblematic of the very same problem facing humanity today, only at a global scale: our problem, both as society and individuals, is the gap between our intentions and our deeds. We will not find solutions, neither to climate change nor to the massive extinction of biodiversity, merely by professing lofty moral commitments or giving ponderous speeches, like those delivered by heads of state at the end of international summits. We need to learn, as fast and as smartly as possible, how to dwell on earth in ways that do

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Page 66: The project provides an intense visual experience of the landscape, which gradually unfolds as the hikers slowly progress, step by step, on a boardwalk comprising sharp zigzags. The walkway blends into the sourrounding landscape and meanders over the Paiva River’s left bank, covering a distance of almost 9 kilometers.The visitor can pick one of its two entries.

not destroy it. That is the essence of grand concepts like sustainable development or green economics. Will we be capable of developing an alternative to our current predatory paradigm of civilisation, which continues to dominate despite attempts at reform? Can human society and the natural environment establish a way of living together that is symbiotic and peaceful?

The Wildest River Great challenges are often gained or lost through small-scale events. The big transition towards a sustainable human existence is being fought in thousands of small and large battles around the world. These represent a collective learning process, often progressing by trial and error, in which the contributions of individual minds, their values and actions, will be the key factors. A good example of this can be found in Northern Portugal, in the area of the Arouca municipality. The Paiva River is approximately 110km long, traversing a pristine landscape characterized by a stupendous natural wealth of fauna and flora. The area is part of the EU’s Natura 2000 network and has been classified as a Site of Community Importance (SCI). The river rises at an altitude of 1000 meters on the Nave Plateau in the Leomil Mountains, near the village of Carapito, located in the Moimenta da Beira municipality. It flows through a steep valley, crossing ten different municipalities, before meeting the much larger Douro River at Castelo de Paiva, a village spread on the Douro River’s left bank. The Paiva River basin is as rich in biological diversity as its landscape is beautiful; and it is probably one of the best-preserved wilderness areas of the country. According to Orlando Ribeiro, the father of modern geographical studies in Portugal, the area where the Paiva runs is still part of Atlantic Portugal, i.e. those regions of the country that benefit from the moisture and rain coming in from the ocean and in some parts penetrating even to higher altitudes. The river slopes sport a wide variety of riparian flora, with groves of alder and ash, flanked by oaks and an impressive range of flower species, including protected endemic plants like the Anarrhinum longipedicellatum. In terms of fauna, the basin likewise harbours a large diversity of protected species, like the water mole or Pyrenean desman (Galemys pyrenaicus), the common otter (Lutra Lutra), the gold-striped salamander (Chioglossa Lusitanica), the Iberian frog (Rana iberica) and the marbled newt (Triturus marmoratus). In the river one finds one of the rare European populations of thick-shelled river mussels (Margaritifera margaritifera).

Multiple Benefits Contemporary history is paved with negative examples of humans exploiting, and in the course destroying, the treasures of nature. The rich and unique habitats of the Paiva River basin are viewed by many political decision makers as a

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The Paiva River is approximately 110km long, traversing a pristine landscape characterized by a stupendous natural wealth. The area is part of the EU’s Natura 2000 network. Page 72: The walkway was opened in June 2015, becoming an instant and tremendous success. In less than three months it brought over 200,000 visitors to the region.

resource that needs to be used; environmental protection, in their eyes, is just a stumbling block to economic development. We must be wary even of those who do profess to be “environmentally correct”. Too many times we have seen that the praise of sustainable development is nothing but lip service to green ideals, which actually disguises the business-as-usual policies that are being pursued by these seemingly “environmentally minded” decision makers. And business as usual means that both biological diversity and the beauty of the natural landscape are sacrificed on the altar of economic growth. To add more, exploitation of natural resources often does not even mean that the material gains reach those whose live in the area. Instead, material profit is frequently drained away from the region, which is ultimately left depleted and impoverished, the very opposite of what the growth model promised. Fortunately, the way things went in the Paiva River basin has been quite different. The Arouca municipality, one of the local governments responsible for managing the area’s natural resources, decided to apply a different model of development to the river and its basin, viewing these assets of the region as natural capital that needs to be preserved even as it is used. In 2010, the Paiva Walkways project was launched, starting with a competition organized by the Arouca local government. The task was to design 8.7 kilometers of boardwalk along the left bank of the Paiva River. When the completed walkway was opened in June 2015, it proved an instant and tremendous success. In less than three months the new attraction brought over 200,000 visitors to the region. A forest fire caused by arson led to partial destruction of the wooden structure, forcing it to be closed in September 2015. However, the unexpected closure was used to not only rebuild the 600-meter stretch lost to the fire, but also to review and upgrade the management tools for the entire project, with the intention of enhancing the safety of both the public and the environment. The permissible number of visitors was capped at 3,500 per day. Monitoring procedures were significantly improved, allowing the project to become a public investment that was environment-friendly and self-sustaining.

Erotic Slowness The walkways impress visually by how well they blend in with the surrounding landscape. The light and elegant wooden, serpent-like structure meanders over the Paiva River’s left bank, covering a distance of almost 9 km. The visitor can pick one of its two entries. The elevated path connects Areinho River beach to the beach of Espiunca River and in between these end points also passes by Vau River beach. The project was designed to provide visitors with an intense visual experience of the landscape, which gradually unfolds as the hikers slowly progress, step by step, on a boardwalk comprising sharp zigzags, balconies, a suspension bridge, and viewing points. Coming from Espiunca, the climbing is mild; at various

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PAIVA WALKWAYS, PAIVA RIVER, PORTUGAL Client: Municipality of Arouca, Portugal Landscape architects: Nuno Melo, João Oliveira, Pedro Domingues Structures: Fernando Domingues, José Oliveira, Inês Rodrigues, Rui Oliveira Year of construction: 2015

places hikers are offered the opportunity of a swim in clearly identifiable and monitored sites along the river. A narrow suspended footbridge provides dizzying views as it crosses a gorge. Hikers may also simply pause and marvel at the bounty of colours, sounds and scents as they look from one of the numerous balconies, wisely planted amongst the green of the bushes and the grey of the old and silent cliffs. As they follow this enchanted route, hikers are continuously surrounded by oaks, ashes, alders, rocks and the restless waters of the Paiva River. Eventually, the visitor will reach a flight of steep stairs that climb up to Areinho, the walkway’s upper gate.

Ecomomic Impacts The Paiva River Walkways represent a design achievement that impresses through its coherence and its sensitivity towards the natural environment in which it is embedded and which it aims to protect and celebrate. As fragile as the wood construction may appear, it convinces through engineering features that fulfill all safety requirements and at the same time insert the structure into the landscapeso carefully as to keep disruption at a minimum. The investments undergone to realize the Paiva Walkways project have paid off well so far as they have created a significant boost to the local economy, ranging from restaurants to small hotels to the creation of new small businesses. The visitors who come to experience the wonders of the Paiva River, bring with them an influx of capital into the area that contributes directly to the betterment of the quality of life of Arouca’s citizens and families. This is a case of clear evidence of the virtues of local public investment, in comparison to alien investment, which tends to abuse local resources, while the profits made are siphoned off, depriving the local economy and community of potential benefits. Finally, it is important to underline that the Paiva Walkways are the result of not only a coherent architectural concept, but also a holistic and strategic long-term political vision for the community of Arouca. The local government had been engaged in promoting and enhancing the natural and geological richness of its territory for a long time. Many years before the idea of building the walkways materialized, Arouca had already been working very hard to become a member of the select and prestigious club of the Unesco Global Geoparks Network, a goal that was eventually achieved in 2009. In other words, the Paiva Walkways are not a sudden miracle but a result of long-term planning and serious political resolve that vindicates public interest in a sustainable use of the environment. Here local institutions and citizens at large have had a word to say about their shared future from the beginning. Paiva Walkways is an exemplary project that for this region of northern Portugal will bring about opportunities for many other inspiring learning experiences and whose appeal extends far beyond its immediate locality.

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Laura Cipriani

FLOAT I N G AIRPORTS Recent episodes have demonstrated the fragility of airport nodes in the face of extreme weather events. But what does that mean for the future? Can we envision a new alliance between architecture, landscape architecture and water? The disciplines of urbanism, architecture and landscape planning will become of central importance in the choices to be made.

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What will the airport of the future look like? “Floating airports” are based on a view of water that does not see it as a threat but as an element to adapt to by “floating”.

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FLOODED AIRPORTS

RAINSTORM OVERFLOW

HURRICANE

TSUNAMI

76 Jakarta airport, INDONESIA

JANUARY 13 2013

Sonoma Valley Airport, USA

NOVEMBER 30, 2012

Malaga Airport, SPAIN

NOVEMBER 17 2012

John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)

La Guardia Airport, New York USA

OCTOBER 29 2012

Valencia Airport, SPAIN

SEPTEMBER 29, 2012

Ronald Reagan Washinton National Airport, USA

SEPTEMBER 26 2012

New Orleans Lakefront Airport, USA

AUGUST 30 2012

Canefield Airport, DOMINICA

AUGUST 13 2012

Catania Fontanarossa Airport, ITALY

MARCH 8 2012

Chennai Airport, INDIA

NOVEMBER 28 2011

Elba Island Airport, ITALY

NOVEMBER 7 2011

Bari Palese Airport, ITALY

NOVEMBER 6 2011

Genoa Cristoforo Colombo Airport, ITALY

NOVEMBER 4 2011

Dublin Airport, IRELAND

OCTOBER 25 2011

Don Muang Airport, THAILAND

OCTOBER 25 2011

Delhi International Airport Limited, INDIA

SEPTEMBER 15 2011

Teterboro Airport, USA

AUGUST 29 2011

Eppley Airfield, USA

JUNE 12 2011

Firenze Amerigo Vespucci Airport, ITALY

JUNE 6 2011

General DeWitt Spain Airport, USA

MAY 10 2011

Harrisburg International Airport, USA

APRIL 16 2011

Koh Samui Airport, THAILAND

MARCH 31 2011

Whitsunday Coast Airport, AUSTRALIA

MARCH 31 2011

Sendai Airport, JAPAN

MARCH 11 2011

Ancona Raffaello Sanzio Airport, ITALY

MARCH 2 2011

Rockhampton Airport, AUSTRALIA

JANUARY 22 2011

Brisbane Airport, AUSTRALIA

JANUARY 12 2011

Corona Municipal Airport, USA

DECEMBER 21 2010

General Mitchell International Airport, USA

JULY 23 2010

Norwood Memorial Airport, USA

APRIL 4 2010

Norwood Memorial Airport, USA

MARCH 16 2010

Pago Pago International Airport, American Samoa

SEPTEMBER 29 2009

Palermo Falcone Borsellino Airport, ITALY

SEPTEMBER 16 2009

Delhi International Airport Limited, INDIA

AUGUST 22 2009

Louisville International Airport, USA

AUGUST 4 2009

Chicago O’Hare International Airport, USA

OCTOBER 3 2008

Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, USA

AUGUST 29 2005

Corona Municipal Airport, USA

JANUARY 9 2005

Malè International Airport, MALDIVES

DECEMBER 26 2004

Bloomsburg Municipal Airport, USA

SEPTEMBER 19 2004

The diagram lists airports that, according to international press sources, were temporarily

declared inoperative due to water damage – among them mayor airports across the world.

The diagram also gives an overview of the threat of sea level rise to airports. It distinguishes

between the risk of flooding by tsunami, hurricane, rainstorm or river overflow.

FLOODED AIRPORTS

Source data: Newspapers and magazines, 2004-2013. Diagram by L. Cipriani.

Recent empirical evidence and scientific data suggest that climate change is happening with now irreversible dynamics. Numerous effects will have consequences for the territory, for cities and for infrastructure itself, not the least important being airports, considering the fundamental role air transport plays in today’s world. The airport of the future will necessarily be re-shaped and transformed in a changing climate. Airports are, in fact, highly vulnerable infrastructures requiring precise adaptation and mitigation strategies at various levels. Recurrent floods, rising seas, desertification, land impoverishment and more generally extreme meteorological events can temporarily or permanently compromise mobility networks and spaces.

Three Principal Issues Within this complex situation, three principal issues must be clarified. The first concerns the uncertainty and variability of scientific predictions on future climate change. We know that during the next few years and decades the sea level will rise, extreme events will become even more frequent and intense, and temperature changes, increased precipitation and drought cycles will affect various parts of the planet. Despite a widely shared awareness of the climate change underway, we do not know, however, when and with what intensity it will occur in the coming years. Moreover, the data currently available indicate that the dynamics of climate transformation are much more rapid than initially predicted. The second concern focuses on the fact that the effects of climate change are particularly insidious for transport infrastructure, which typically have a long life cycle. The life span of ports, bridges, roads, railways and airports usually vary from a minimum of 30 to a maximum of 200 years. Much of the infrastructure existing today or currently being designed will still be in use by 2030 or 2050 when climate change could have a much greater effect than at present. The third issue therefore concerns the degree of uncertainty that infrastructure in general must confront before, during and after its life cycle; the focus here is on how to limit the economic, social and environmental damage. It has been calculated that the annual financial losses deriving from extreme meteorological phenomena have increased appreciably from a few billion dollars in 1980 to about 200 billion in 2010.

Flooded Airport Urbanism Design or re-design of the territory and infrastructure elements must therefore be redefined. In the foreseeable future, the disciplines of urban and landscape planning will become of central importance in the choices to be made regarding both new infrastructure sites and the adaptation of existing infrastructure to the changed environmental conditions, with

“soft green measures” to be implemented alongside traditional engineering choices (“hard measures”). But if the climate will inevitably change the design process, what will the airport of the future be like? Can we imagine an airport infrastructure adaptable to the changing climate and landscape? Today many airports in the world are located along the coast or on plains at high risk from flooding. Exceptional precipitation and floods, not to mention tornadoes, hurricanes and tsunamis, can all cause infrastructure to become partially or totally unusable. La Guardia at New York, Don Muang at Bangkok, Sendai in Japan and Brisbane in Australia are just some of the airports that had to be temporarily closed in recent years due to a range of extreme weather events. Historic records of meteorological events affecting New York show a string of hurricanes over the years hitting the city and the state, and already in the past making the airports of La Guardia and J. F. Kennedy inoperative. The administrative authorities of the regions regularly affected are almost always aware of the type and scale of potential risks for urbanised areas. But often when extreme meteorological phenomena occur, there is a clear lack of coordination among the institutions and authorities involved. In many cases, the damage extends to the entire mobility network. Not just airports, but also underground and above-ground railways and roads are flooded by water, with such circumstances causing various degrees of disruption and devastation.

Exposure and Vulnerability Those most exposed to these phenomena are the infrastructure and populations of Southeast Asia, the archipelagos consisting of atolls, and the regions lining the Gulf of Mexico. But also countries such as the Netherlands, Italy, Greece, Portugal, Egypt, other regions of the United States, Papua New Guinea and Australia are affected by these events. As stated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the scientific forum formed in 1988 to study climate change, the seriousness of the impacts of extreme weather events depends greatly on exposure and vulnerability. Both man-made and natural risks are, in fact, interpreted as consequent to the stresses and pressures affecting a given area (dangerousness), the quantity and type of elements (presence of people, services, environmental resources, infrastructure, economic, social or cultural elements) potentially affected (exposure) and the propensity for damage of those elements (vulnerability). Given a similar event, different landscape systems may suffer widely diverging degrees of damage, according to the quantity and characteristics of the local elements exposed. Everything that is apparently unexpected can often, in fact, be partially planned. The planners must therefore adopt a case-by-case strategy for the landscape, which will involve short, medium and long-term scenarios.

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Floating Airport Urbanism

Fertile Ground

While, on one hand, water threatens the operation of airports in particular climate conditions, there is a small number of airports around the world that have been defined correctly or incorrectly as “floating airports”. Although they actually stand on artificial islands, Kansai International Airport (at Osaka in Japan) and Hong Kong International Airport have become symbols of technological adaptation to nature. Some of these structures were initially designed as refuelling bases for transoceanic crossings, then converted into airports with the goal of distancing air traffic movements from the mainland in order to reduce acoustic and environmental impacts. No genuine floating airports have yet been built, they have merely been studied by engineering science. Even so, the existing artificial island structures have become emblematic of a new union between architecture, landscape and water. “Real” floating airports must not be imagined literally as a banal technical and technological solution, but rather viewed figuratively as a new way of interacting with the given circumstances of coastal regions. Defensive measures cannot be the only solution to oppose water, as sooner or later nature will get the better. We are currently witnessing a radical paradigm change in the way the subject is approached. Water is no longer seen as a threat to be protected against, instead it is viewed as an element that stimulates adaptation to living with it and on it, by “floating”.

Although the overall picture of climatic/weather phenomena in an urban context is complex, and the various elements require study at regional scales, airport systems and structures can be brought into a framework of global strategies and precise adaptation measures on various scales. According to the definition of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), in natural and “human” systems, adaptation is “the process of adjustment to actual or expected climate and its effects, in order to moderate harm or exploit beneficial opportunities”. Adaptation (in terms of scale, usually involving regional and local circumstances) must not exclude mitigation, the latter being understood as an “anthropogenic intervention to reduce the sources or enhance the sinks of greenhouse gases.” Together they can significantly reduce the risks deriving from climate change. To prepare the territory and construct resilient infrastructure and cities largely means identifying suitable prevention measures on the various scales of action to help mitigate the effects deriving from the rigidity of urban and infrastructural systems. Short, medium and long-term scenarios and large-scale strategic planning are the first necessary steps to the construction of resilient airports – a strategy that has to be combined with effective design tactics. In airports, for example, runways, terminal roofs, roads and large areas of hard standing prevent rainwater from percolating into the subsoil, also contributing to water pollution given the high concentrations of heavy metals, oil, grease and antifreeze liquid. In addition, rainwater runs off these impervious surfaces rapidly, flooding pipes and canals, contributing to erosion and accumulating pollution as it flows. In response to this “runoff ” problem, numerous architectural and landscape solutions have been developed to slow down the rate of flow and absorb this excess water. Water management techniques compensate for peaks caused by the excessively impervious surfaces (runways, structures, car parks, etc.); they also increase efficiency and save water. Green roofs can improve permeability (which also reduces noise); bioswales or rain gardens can be used to collect rainwater in vegetated ditches in place of surface waterways or underground storm sewers. Settlement tanks or wetlands can be constructed upstream of the airport area if not inside the airport itself, where water bodies must be meticulously covered to avoid birdstrike with aircraft. Porous asphalt allows rainwater to percolate at least into the subsoil under the runways. In an era dominated by uncertainty about tomorrow and by a race towards real or presumed sustainability, infrastructure must be re-planned, not just to accommodate today’s technological functions or contingent needs, but also with a view to possible future recycling, generating a method for re-inventing the landscape, which may thereby become fertile ground for the unexpected.

A Concept of Resilience Certain cities have always had to adapt to and live with water, giving rise to a genuine “floating urbanism”. Take for example an amphibious city such as Venice, certain cities in the Netherlands, the floating gardens of Myanmar, or numerous examples of pile dwellings from the Alps to the Padana Plain in Italy. There are also examples of floating airports built from the late 1970s, largely in East Asia and Southeast Asia – in Japan, apart from Kansai International, Chubu Centrair International, Kobe Kitakyushu and Tokyo Haneda International; in China, in addition to Hong Kong International, Macau International. These structures seem to be an expression of the concept of resilience, at least in theory. Applied here to the urban context, resilience is a notion that has been borrowed from studies on how ecological systems react to stress and disturbance caused by external factors. Far from being truly resilient, the concept of floating airport can instead be used as a symbol to give space to water in urban structures. From an ecological point of view, C. S. Holling, one of the founders of ecological economics, was the first to talk about the topic in 1973, suggesting that resilience is “the persistence of relationships within a system” and “the ability of these systems to absorb changes of state variables, driving variables, and parameters, and still persist”. In other words, resilience is the ability of a system to suffer disturbance and maintain its functions and control.

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A small number of airports have been defined as “floating airports”. They stand on artificial islands and have become symbols of a new union between architecture, landscape and water. Japan's Kansai International is a “floating airport”. It was designed as refuelling base for transoceanic crossings, then turned into an airport further removed from the city of Osaka.

AIRPORTS ON ARTIFICIAL ISLANDS

NAGASAKI AIRPORT RJFU

IBRAHIM NASIR INTERNATIONAL VRMM

KANSAI INTERNATIONAL RJBB

MACAU INTERNATIONAL VMMC

HONG KONG INTERNATIONAL VHHH

CHUBU CENTRAIR INTERNATIONAL RJGG

KOBE AIRPORT RJBE

KITAKYUSHU AIRPORT RJFR

TOKYO INTERNATIONAL HANEDA RJTT

0

0

5

5

15 Km

15 Km

2004

1981

1987

1995

1998

2005

2006

2006

1.54 km 2

1.80 km 2

10.62 km 2

1.14 km 2

12.29 km 2

5.80 km 2

2.80 km 2

3.73 km 2

1.50 km 2

2 637 000 passengers year 2004

2 600 000 passengers year 2011

13 857 000 passengers year 2010

5 000 000 passengers year 2006

53 314 213 passengers year 2011

9 060 000 passengers year 2011

2 215 000 passengers year 2011

3 000 000 passengers year 2007

64 211 074 passengers year 2010

N.A.

N.A.

712 000 tons year 2010

220 000 tons year 2006

3 939 000 tons year 2011

151 000 tons year 2011

N.A.

N.A.

818 806 tons year 2010

2010 offshore runway year 2011

year 2011

KANSAI

KANSAI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

CONSTRUCTION NUMBERS

21 000 000

48 000

80

CUBIC METERS OF LANDFILL

TETRAHEDRAL CONCRETE BLOCKS

SHIPS

10 000 10 000 000 WORKERS WORKED

HOURS IN 3 YEARS

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Stefan Tischer, Francesca Arici

SICILIAN Minimalism The seafront of Balestrate in northwestern Sicily is a thin white strip of land between the town’s geometric pattern and the sea. Along that strip a new promenade has been opened, consisting of few elements and built entirely with local materials. The subtle design of the space enhances the landscape and the natural features of the site.

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The last decade has witnessed a phenomenon of re-appropriation of a few significant public spaces along the coast of northwestern Sicily. The promenade of Balestrate is a case in point.

81

Balestrate is a town of about 6000 inhabitants. The new promenade at first elicited strong opposition by the local population but now enjoys widespread appreciation.

82

With an area of 25,000 square kilometres and a population of five million, the island of Sicily is one of the most densely populated regions in Europe, if one allows for the fact that the majority of its inhabitants reside along the coast and large swaths of the interior are virtually uninhabited. Palermo is the capital of the region, with a metropolitan area spanning along the northern coast of the island for some 110 square kilometres. Since the late 20th century there has been a peculiar attitude of neglect of the formerly remarkable public spaces inherited from the past. For most people “public” means “nobody’s” instead of “everyone’s”.

Segregation from the sea. In Palermo the public space is the waterfront. The social degradation of the meaning of public values manifests itself in the city’s conflicting relationship with this space. After the Second World War, the waterfront was used as a dump both for solid waste and for the debris left by the war; the sea was segregated from the land by a successive expansion of the disconnected commercial port and, above all, by an extensive private appropriation of coastal areas for the development of second houses or exclusive clubs. The railway and the highway run parallel to the coastline for the entire length of the northern coast, creating a continuous linear urbanized pattern, occasionally interrupted by the topography or by protected natural areas. Connecting to the sea. The last decade has witnessed the start of a phenomenon of re-appropriation of a few significant public spaces on the waterfront. One example is the commendable redevelopment of La Cala, the old port of Palermo, designed by architects Sebastiano Provenzano and Giulia Argiroffi. Most of these interventions have remained isolated facelifts basically unable to trigger momentous or strategic change. The bombastic restyling of the urban seafront, the Foro Italico by architect Italo Rota,

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completely missed the opportunity to address the urgent issues of the city’s infrastructure, choosing instead scatter expensive ceramic bollards across the large site. Interestingly, however, this recent trend has shown the eagerness of the local population to re-conquer space in contact with the sea. More than by the public administrations, this need is now understood by the private sector. A diffuse investment in bars and catering services along the coast has been opening up the “denied sea” to public access.

A unique case. In this context, the project for Balestrate – a small coastal town of about 6,000 inhabitants to the west of Palermo’s airport– appears as a unique case. The skill of AM3 Architects and Studio Cangemi, originally appointed by the Municipality for detail design services only, achieved maximum result through minimum use of public resources. This is even truer when acknowledging the political context of the project: a conflictive democratic terrain where an enlightened minority overcame the opposition of the local majority’s resistance to change. The plan, with small but significant changes to the state of the place, intended to preserve and enhance the landscape and the natural features of the site, mitigating the environmental impact of the coastline road. The design focused on the creation of a promenade in straight contact with the beach, limiting the presence of artificial structures. The project reduced the environmental impact of the seafront road and instead favored non-vehicular uses of the site. All newly designed elements on the seafront were constructed according to the principle of easy reversibility.

Constitutive elements. What originally appeared as a simple intervention of emergency maintenance became an operation of environmental and urban redevelopment of this coastal space. This result was accomplished through the integration of all the infrastructural elements – the road, the drainage

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The redesign restricted itself to subtle interventions. Among these are the so-called “seaplazas”, enlargements of the promenade that create “belvederes” over the beach.

85

Bridges, benches and street lights are constitutive elements of the site. The promenade paving was replaced by a covering of in-situ cast concrete with quarry aggregates and sand.

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system, the street lighting – into the design as constitutive elements of the site. While the overall width of the roadway was not changed, a considerable enlargement of the sidewalks was achieved by eliminating the existing unorganized and “spontaneous” line of parking stalls along the seaside, with a consequent reduction of the road section and of the asphalted surface.

A new public space. The resulting pedestrian and bicycle promenade has an average width of 2.30 metres, reaching 8 metres at some specific points, the “sea-plazas”. These areas enlarge the promenade and create “belvederes” over the beach and offer places for rest without using a new language of design. The promenade paving was replaced by a covering of in-situ cast concrete with quarry aggregates and sand, which was then washed to bring the aggregates to sight. The access points to the sea were made conveniently usable by the installation of walkways made of lamellar wood and stainless steel. In order to limit the impact of the new constructions on the site, a new surface of local stone was laid, with the purpose of protecting the retaining wall of the road from potential sagging, and defining the boundary of the beach in a more natural way. The local population at first manifested strong opposition against the project, mostly because a sizable number of parking spaces were eliminated. But meanwhile the project has become widely appreciated, for the redevelopment has significantly upgraded the seafront, both esthetically and with regard to its value as a public space. In this way, the architects were able to achieve a maximum result with minimal intervention. Even under the difficult circumstances of an unfair and petty administrative practice on the part of the municipal client, who neither mandated nor paid the planners for preliminary or definitive design work, a truly high-quality public space was created.

BALESTRATE SEAFRONT, SICILY, ITALY Client: Municipality of Balestrate Design team: AM3 Architetti Associati, Studio Cangemi Year of construction: 2014

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A spectacular new public promenade by the River Rhine near the Novartis Campus in Basel connects Switzerland with France. Curved walls weave the various different levels together.

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Claudia Moll

B E T W E E N

COUNTRIES A public footpath and cycleway has recently opened in a border region on the River Rhine. While the Swiss part of the project incorporates an elaborate promenade, the French side represents a much-reduced extension of this transnational initiative. Despite these notable differences, the venture should certainly still be regarded as an urban achievement, creating connections across borders and opening up a section of the riverbank that had remained inaccessible for decades.

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RHINE BANK PROMENADE, BASEL, SWITZERLAND Client: Kanton Basel-Stadt, Novartis Pharma AG Landscape architect: Hager Partner AG, Zürich Year of construction: 2016

Imposing walls level out height differences of up to 12 metres between the city and the water in the area stretching from the Dreirosenbrücke (three roses) bridge in Basel to the French border. These partitions divide the riverside, which is 30 metres wide in places, into a flood-safe promenade and the deeper-lying Bermenweg path. This is where a series of gates and showers embedded in the walls await swimmers who enjoy the waters of the Rhine. The paved promenade opens out into small gravel areas on the upper level. Curved wooden benches nestled under sparse willows and alders offer passers-by the chance to stop and enjoy a clear view of the fast-flowing river. Stairs and ramps lead from the Dreirosenbrücke bridge down to the water and weave the various different levels together. The promenade is part of the public footpath and cycleway that continues on the French side. It forms part of the European EuroVelo 15 cycle route, which extends along the Rhine from the Swiss village of Andermatt all the way up to the North Sea. The most striking feature of the promenade on the Swiss side is without doubt the glowing yellow limestone. Curved walls are covered in narrow, vertically arranged stone bands that give them an almost textile appearance. The restaurant in the middle with a huge terrace has echoes of the Mediterranean. It is housed in the base of the Asklepios 8 office block from Herzog & de Meuron, which was opened a year ago. Together with a series of architectural gems, squares and green areas, it is now part of the “Campus of Knowledge” that has evolved above the promenade since 2011 on the site of the Novartis pharmaceutical company’s former St Johann factory complex. “Archäologische Guckrohre” (archaeological telescopes), a project from the Basel scenographers Stauffenegger + Stutz, harks back to the Celtic settlement that was established in 100 BC in the area around the modern-day Dreirosenbrücke bridge. It can certainly take some getting used to the thirty infrared cameras mounted on masts lining the promenade path. They gesture towards the Novartis Campus like powerful neighbours whose main priority is to protect the important research location. They also leave those people visiting the elegant walkway with a slightly ambiguous feeling. Just how public are public spaces these days? What is allowed, what is forbidden and how far should each step be registered and recorded? Just a few metres after the border, the contrast could hardly be greater. A simple asphalt road represents the continuation of the promenade on the French side. A meadow

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slopes steeply down to the river, free from steps or ramps. Move a little further along and the trail passes industrial sites that are still in operation, where two concrete walls have been erected to protect pedestrians and cyclists. Six feet tall and ten and seventeen feet long, these massive structures separate the public space from the land belonging to BASF, which is classified as a risk zone. Shortly before the Dreiländerbrücke bridge, the road turns into a path that has been integrated into the embankment due to a lack of space. The austere engineering structure will soon become more interesting. The IBA Basel launched a competition in 2015 for “landmark” design ideas and the winning project will be realised in the coming year. The new link eventually connects to the existing cycleway, which leads into the heart of the French Huningue suburb of Basel.

From gasworks to research campus The new footpath and cycleway is very much an urban achievement. It opens up part of the riverbank that had remained closed to the public for the last 150 years. The urban turning point on the Swiss side goes back to 1860, when Basel’s first gasworks, which since 1852 had been located close to the centre, was moved to the edge of the city near the French border. The meadows, pastures and vineyards that marked the border area had to give way to industry, but the location offered several logistical advantages. The close proximity to the St Johann cargo station guaranteed optimum rail connections and coal required for production could be delivered directly by ship. In addition, both solid and liquid waste materials were eventually discharged directly into the water. Ownership of the private gas plant passed to the municipal authorities in 1886, before the city of Basel constructed St Johann Harbour as the first of a series of three Rhine ports at the beginning of the 20th century. After the closure of the gasworks in the early 1900s, dye and colorant industries began to spring up in the area. In the following years these small businesses expanded in line with the increasing amount of shipping entering the river port. The riverbank remained largely closed to pedestrians. The public path on the Swiss side ended in the shadow of the huge St Johannes-Parkweg residential development, which was built shortly before the Dreirosenbrücke bridge in the 1980s. The nature of the urban f

A series of stairs connect the different levels of the promenade. Curved wooden benches offer passers-by the chance to stop, relax and enjoy a clear view of the fast-flowing river.

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The promenade is part of the public footpath and cycleway that continues on the French side. It forms part of the European EuroVelo 15 cycle route that extends along the Rhine.

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VOIE VERTE HUNINGUE, HUNINGUE, FRANCE Client: Conseil Departemental Haut-Rhin Engineering: Égis, Strasbourg Year of construction: 2016

development on the French side was similar, with chemical industries settling on the banks of the Rhine. The residential areas of the French-Swiss agglomeration area started to appear between the industrial plants, of which just two are still in operation. Over the years these areas slowly crept down to the Rhine and merged into a dense residential belt. In 2005 things gradually started to change. The Novartis organisation, which now occupied the former gasworks industrial site, entered into negotiations with the Basel-Stadt Canton (Basel metropolitan county). The pharmaceutical company wanted to acquire the port area and transform the manufacturing base, which had grown haphazardly on both sides of the border, into a large research campus. The canton accepted the proposal and sold most of the site, although a thin sliver of the riverbank remained in their possession. In return Novartis agreed to help support the construction of a long-coveted public promenade. The different interests came together in a joint project called “Campus Plus”, which the two parties used to pursue their goals – on the one hand, the expansion of the pharmaceutical company campus down to the Rhine, and on the other, direct access to the river combined with a continuous public path. The design for the Swiss promenade section was finalised as early as 2007. The Staubli + Kurath civil and hydraulic engineering office and the Zurich landscape architects Hager Partner engaged in a multi-stage competition process. The designers used their work to try and symbolise the current of the river, with gently curving walls, paths and ramps forming a core central aspect. Where obstacles such as the Dreirosenbrücke bridge or campus buildings had to be taken into account, the contours simply became even more pronounced. A quick comparison between the visualisations created for the selection process and the actual project is certainly quite impressive. Despite a planning phase that lasted almost ten years, the landscape architects succeeded in translating their finely detailed image directly into reality. Although this definitely represents an outstanding piece of design, the final result sometimes seems to prioritise order and formality. The promenade has become a spectacle in places – less would indeed have been more. The process was very different on the French side, where planning for the footpath and cycleway only really started once the finishing touches were being added to the Swiss promenade. No competition was held to design the infrastructure, so engineering companies were offered the chance to apply for the publicly tendered project.

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The contract was awarded to the Égis France global consortium, which set about devising a concept for the footpath and cycleway that took a functional approach to dealing with local conditions. The project managers presented their ideas to local people in September 2014 and the project was finally initiated around a year and a half later.

Solidarity despite the differences The respective planning costs on each side of the border once again reflect two widely divergent approaches. Canton Basel invested jointly with Novartis around 25 million euros in its 600-metre-long Rhine promenade, while 4 million euros were sufficient for almost 2 kilometres on the French side of the border. Along with the Huningue municipal authorities and the Département du Haut-Rhin, the costs were shared between the Basel-Stadt Canton, the European Union, the “Communauté de Communes de Trois Frontières” (the commune community of the three borders) and the Novartis company. So why are the two sections so strikingly different? Can the variation on each side of the national boundary be explained by divergent planning cultures? No, according to Guirec Gicquel, who is responsible for the landscape projects at IBA Basel, which supported the initiative. It was more the different overall conditions that led to the aforementioned financial imbalance, as well as varying usage of the waterfront sections. While the industry on the Swiss side made room for a new urban function, the active factories on French soil were until now more of an obstacle. The land here is also held by a number of different owners, which would have complicated a project with high artistic standards in the time period available. Despite the many differences, Gicquel is at pains to highlight just what has been achieved by working together. For a start, there is the urban success of reopening the riverside to the public between Basel and Huningue. In addition, the cross-border cooperation between authorities and planners, as well as the commitment and motivation to connect interests, people and facilities at a regional level, should certainly not be overlooked. For the organisers of the IBA, this alliance therefore represents a showpiece initiative – a belief that convinced Managing Director Monica Linder-Guarnaccia to mark the official opening by awarding the Rheinuferweg project the IBA Base Label.

The promenade continues on the French side with a simple asphalt path to Huningue. There was no competition held to design the infrastructure and its surroundings.

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Multiple Modality: a Travel Report An urban planner travels a lot: Kees Christiaanse’s projects have repeatedly lead him through Central Europe where he observes the changing mobility-systems. In this article he talks about how itineraries change and what impact this often has on urbanisation, infrastructure, architecture and the landscape.

Kees Christiaanse

Amsterdam’s central station is connected to the European high-speed network, which can be understood as a part of an urban model. In this model, local centres that have high densities of supply form a complementary polycentric system, both in terms of Western Europe as well as within their own agglomerations. The failure to construct a high-speed rail link from Amsterdam to the German border is therefore one of the many shortsighted decisions made in the history of mobility in Holland. As a result, an ICE travelling to Frankfurt must first travel through Arnhem to the Dutch border at a snail’s pace of 130 km/h. Upon reaching the border, it can accelerate to about 250 km/h – the average speed of the German high-speed network.

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ICE VS. TGV. The train ride from Amsterdam to Zurich takes about eight hours whether one uses the German or the French rail network. Travelling with the TGV from Paris is about 250 km longer, however, and there is still time for a café au lait avec croissant between the Gare du Nord and the Gare de Lyon train stations. In addition to the TGV’s higher-speed, this fact can also be attributed to fundamental differences between the Dutch-German-Swiss high-speed network and the French high-speed network. All three of the aforementioned countries have more cities than France and the ICE always travels through each city’s main train station. In France the SNCF decided that the TGV would travel past fewer cities, and thus the train stations need to serve

KCAP Architects & Planners developed a new master plan for Montpellier that calls for a framework of public space. The TGV station is one of the project’s main components.

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several cities simultaneously. The differences in these systems have also resulted in different forms of urbanisation. Stopping in urban centres makes these cities more accessible, promoting urbanisation in the areas around the railway stations as a result of their proximity to downtown areas and the location of urban functions in them. Conversely, stopping at stations that are close to – but not in – cities does indeed increase the speed between stations but not necessarily the speed between city centres. And while the areas around the train stations in the urban centres may have developed less intensively, the TGV stations – except for airport-railway combinations – have now become interurban industrial parks that required the construction of additional shuttles into the cities.

A remote-control underground system. The central train station in Zurich should be mentioned as a positive example of the Dutch-German-Swiss model. This is where ICE and TGV trains arrive “shoulder to shoulder”. The main hall of Zurich’s central station is open, as the rails have been pushed back about 100 metres. The resulting space has become a lively location for public events, where Christmas markets, concerts and trade fairs take place. The buildings flanking the central space contain the usual functions, i.e. two good restaurants, a medical centre and spa facilities. The labyrinthine ShopVille shopping centre is located below the main hall and is open day and night. The large railhead station sits atop a transit station serving numerous commuter trains arriving from the

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surrounding metropolitan area. The catchment area for this S-Bahn system is unique. It functions like a remote-control underground system: Trains head out at 30-minute intervals and after a 15-minute ride, passengers arrive in idyllic suburbs around which well-structured urban expansion is thriving. This type of development is in stark contrast to the desolate train stations in the Dutch Vinex neighbourhoods, which are large-scale and monofunctional.

Stopping in the middle of nowhere. From Zurich to Montpellier the TGV is the only option for travel. It runs through Basel-Mulhouse, Besançon Franche-Comté and Lyon Part-Dieu to Montpellier. In Besançon the train stops in the middle of a forest, 15 kilometres away from the city, and new passengers appear as if out of nowhere – an extreme example of SNCF policies. The station itself consists of little more than a parking area and a bus stop. Another example is the railway station at Valence – one of the most bizarre places along the TGV network. The station is located 12 kilometres from Valence, in the middle of nowhere. This “train accident” inspired by Zaha Hadid appears to arise out of nowhere as well. The tracks here run through a large trench. The middle track runs through a concrete enclosure and is used by the TGV, which can rush past at full speed. The actual train station appears to float on top of this concrete box, which is connected to the surrounding area by bridges. A track for local trains crosses the train station diagonally. All these various levels are connected

by Piranesi-like stairways. The railway station is practically surrounded by...nothing: a large asphalt surface, a bus stop, an empty office building and an Etap Hotel without any staff. In Montpellier the TGV reaches its final stop at the Gare Saint-Roche, near the Place de la Comedie. Beginning in 2017 the TGVs will no longer arrive here, however. The railway station will only serve regional trains, even though Montpellier is a prosperous city, with a university, high-tech companies and tourism. There is a lively architectural culture in the city, with residential areas developed by Christian de Potzamparc, Rob Krier and Ricardo Bofill, and buildings designed by Jean Nouvel and Zaha Hadid. To the south, the city is bordered by the A9 motorway and then there is a 2 kilometre-wide belt of great scenic interest. Montpellier’s airport is located here along with commercial areas and event halls, and a narrow strip of sand that separates the lagoon from the ocean. During the summer Montpellier also serves as a transfer hub between the Maghreb countries’ low-cost airlines and those airlines and railways serving Northwest Europe. This type of movement can be observed at other places in the network as well, for instance in Lyon-St Exupery. Eindhoven Airport is even considered to be an important stopover for human trafficking.

Central decisions. It was recently decided that a new TGV line will be built between Nimes and Barcelona, as should a new A9 through the beautiful landscape that separates Montpellier from its airport. This is where the new Montpellier TGV

The central train station in Zurich is as a positive example of the Dutch-German-Swiss model of railway transportation. The main hall has become a lively location for public events.

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railway station will be built. Decisions about rural infrastructure in France are generally made as a result of central planning. Local communities, however, are very interested in both the TGV network and motorways – especially because of the economic advantages that such connections provide. The fact that the TGV in Montpellier will not run through the city via St. Roche has mainly to do with the simultaneous construction of the new motorway, but is also a result of aforementioned SNCF policies and the high cost of converting the inner-city line.

The end of the railhead. From Montpellier I would like to go back to the Netherlands, and specifically to our office in Rotterdam. The flight with Air France to Amsterdam via Paris is not terribly attractive because of poor connections and the high price. But in the summer this trip is easy: With Transavia there is a direct flight to Rotterdam. In the autumn it gets more difficult, though. Then I have to fly to Brussels or Charleroi with Ryanair, take a shuttle to Brussels-South and finally take the Thalys high-speed train to Rotterdam. As an alternative, I can take the train to Marseille and then fly with Ryanair to Eindhoven, the Dutch low-budget air traffic hub designed by KCAP and De Bever Architects. The rest of the year I have to rely on the TGV that runs through Paris. I decide to take the train from Montpellier and travel north. The trip from Bordeaux to Rotterdam first goes, as usual (and with time for a café avec croissant), to Paris Montparnasse and then to Gare du Nord.

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These Grand Gares are still unique central structures in Paris’s urban landscape. Given the current developments within the network, however, railheads can only survive as final destinations if they are located in very dense areas of cities – or, as is the case with Zurich and Stuttgart 21, if great pressure is brought to bear and they are converted into transit stations. The rest of these stations are unfortunately “dead ends”, which in the Parisian context becomes painfully clear due to the great increase of through trains at stations like Marne la Vallée und Roissy-Charles de Gaulle. The Thalys doesn’t even stop at Euralille, one of the first modern railway stations.

The privatisation of mobility.

The journey ends at Rotterdam Centraal, a beautiful new central station that has emerged from the ruins of the former station designed by Van Ravesteyn, which was also quite beautiful. The large new shopping centre under the tracks is a precise urban intervention, with public areas and strong connections to the surrounding parts of the city – all activated by retail sales and restaurants. Rotterdam’s entire centre has become a huge railway station centrality due to the extension of the underground and light rail system to The Hague, and the highspeed line that connects the city with Schiphol Airport. There is one thing the city didn’t count on, though: Since the introduction of electronic tickets, the pedestrian passage between Rotterdam Centre and Rotterdam North is blocked by two smart card batteries. It is therefore only possible to go through the passage when checking in or

out. And thus the privatisation of public space has already begun here. An urban planner who works on projects scattered all over Europe is continually on the lookout for the best route to take. The fastest way often involves a combination of modes of travel, so-called “multiple modality”. The fastest and least expensive way of getting from Zurich to Brittany is to take the train to Basel, fly to Nantes with Easyjet, and then to drive a hired car to Vannes. This is twice as fast as using the TGV and costs half as much. There are many examples of such trajectories that confirm the fact that highspeed trains and air transport are not competitors, but can instead complement each other as part of a future concept of European mobility. The increasing combination of airports, railway stations and urban centrality is thus a sensible development. In spite of the TGV’s higher speed, the central European model of ICEs with their stations in urban centres is therefore the preferable way to go. It would activate urban centres in a sustainable manner and promotes the use of regional public transport as opposed to individual motorised transport. Fast links that provide uninterrupted connections to airports must therefore be provided. Large airports like Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris, Zurich and Frankfurt should have full-service Intercity railway stations. This kind of organisation forms the basis upon which the multiple modality of future forms of mobility can be built in a complementary way. This article is based on one that appeared in the June 2013 edition of the Dutch architecture magazine deArchitect.

Rotterdam Centraal has emerged from the ruins of the former station designed by Sybold Van Ravesteyn. The large shopping centre under the tracks is a precise urban intervention.

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David Hannah

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More risk-taking for children The popularity of theme playgrounds is increasing. Swings, seesaws, sand boxes – that’s the way things used to be. Theme playgrounds are now the order of the day when it comes to providing children with opportunities to play and exercise. And, it is even better when such facilities are integrated into the local environment, i.e make use of existing topography and natural materials such as stones, plants, soil and especially water.

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Cities and communities around the world have recognised this, as have operators of tourist resorts, amusement parks and camp grounds. Those interested in attracting families have to expand the range of activities they offer children. But what are the current trends concerning this type of playground? Although there doesn’t appear to be any one particular direction, it’s clear that the market for indoor playgrounds

continues to grow, especially in Europe. In Asia, Australia and the United States, on the other hand, large playgrounds with a wide range of activities for play and movement are increasingly common. Here, there is a tendency to build progressively bigger and higher play equipment that often involves the use of climbing nets. The willingness to design playgrounds that enable children to take risks is also growing.

This involves risks, however, that children can assess themselves, risks which present no hidden dangers. This can be seen as progress in a world in which “helicopter parents” constantly provide all-round care for their children. As one established playground designer once said, “Every child has the right to break his or her arm while playing”. Thomas Jakob

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Join our faculty. Change the world. Deeply committed to the quality of the built and natural environment, we are a close-knit school of architecture and landscape architecture at one of the world’s top 20 public universities. We are located in Vancouver, an ideal laboratory to prepare the next generations of architects, landscape architects, designers, and planners to respond to the urgent human and environmental issues of our times. We are looking for new colleagues to teach students to become intellectual and creative leaders, articulate spokespersons, and progressive agents of change for society.

Assistant Professor, Landscape Architecture You’ll study contemporary issues in landscape architecture and engage in a related area of research, scholarship or creative practice, and teaching. You must be committed to quality design teaching and have amazing abilities in digital representation. You must enjoy teaching courses and design studios, and supervising graduate students.

Instructor, Landscape Architecture You will develop innovative curricula in landscape technology and representation courses. You’ll take on a leadership role in the materials and structures area of the curriculum and have opportunities to participate in design-build projects. You must enjoy teaching undergraduate and graduate courses.

For the full details, please visit sala.ubc.ca/careers

Thomas Jakob

UBC hires on the basis of merit and is committed to employment equity. We encourage all qualified persons to apply. Canadians and permanent residents of Canada will be given priority.

Rope play equipment offers children and adolescents a variety of opportunities to safely go beyond their limits. It can also be used by several children simultaneously.

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Mobile Play System The Imagination Playground is a mobile playground equipment system for children between the ages of two and twelve. The geometric blocks and shapes are made of lightweight foam material, and were developed by the American architect David Rockwell. The Imagination Playground blocks can be used to create both mobile indoor and outdoor playgrounds. When used together with other materials such as sand, water and various loose items, the strengths of this play and learning system quickly become apparent. www.playparc.de

Global Motion Children who love to climb and rotate now have infinite play possibilities within their reach with Global Motion. Landscape Structures’ new freestanding, rotating climber welcomes groups of children aboard for a fully-inclusive, multisensory experience. Global Motion even remains easy to turn and control when fully loaded, thanks to the patent-pending progressive resistance mechanism which keeps things rotating at fun, yet controllable speeds. With 14 nets that can be climbed on the inside or outside and two levels of multi-person seating areas, Global Motion is a thrilling and safe way for many children to play together. www.playlsi.com

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Water Journey Inspired by nature’s flowing streams, Water Journey is a collection of four events – Labyrinth, Jet Dance, The Race and Tide Pool – that stimulate children of all ages physically, intellectually, emotionally and socially. Whether this involves the use of a single event or multiple ones connected together, Water Journey creates vibrant spaces that invite everyone to play, socialise or just relax. It is an interactive experience for children and a communal meeting place for parents as they gather to play, socialise or just contemplate and watch water on its journey downstream. www.vortex-intl.com

Across the Gorge The Swiss municipality Grindelwald southwest of Bern has yet another tourist attraction: a 170 m2 net construction now spans the glacier gorge through which the Lütschine River rapidly flows. Opened at the end of June 2016, a maximum of 229 climbers can now simultaneously climb above the gorge at a height of seven metres above the water, supported by a structure made of steel and rope. The net was custom-made by hand in Berlin by Corocord Spacenet Manufacture, which belongs to the Danish Kompan Group. The climbing spacenet is part of grindelwaldsports AG’s completely new adventure and theme park.

www.corocord.com

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Nature Play is a prominent new gateway at Royal Park in Melbourne, Australia. The playground includes an area of high rope traverses, a water

Peter Bennetts

play area and climbing structures.

Richter Spielgeräte

Nature Play, Melbourne, Australia

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Nature Play at Royal Park is part of a partnership project between the City of Melbourne and the Victorian Department of Health and Human Services to reestablish parkland at the former Royal Children’s Hospital site. The project is a prominent new gateway that responds directly to both feedback from the community and the valued character of Royal Park. The seven Wurundjeri seasons of Melbourne are central to this new landscape, informing the structure, planting and play experiences of the space. Built for $5.5 million and opened last March, Nature

Play has 1,200 trees, gullies, grasslands and a hill with dramatic views of the city. And, to the chagrin of many parents and delight of their children, the project also includes a water play area that encourages kids to work together to pump and dam water before it is finally released into a sandpit. The playground was developed and designed by the City of Melbourne and Richter Spielgeräte in Germany. It includes an area of high rope traverses, large climbing structures made of logs and ropes, a water play area and landscaped areas. The idea was to provide an opportunity for

children to take more risks. An extensive community engagement process encouraged input from locals, broader metropolitan Melbourne and the entire state, reflecting both the regional role of the park and the important relationship this site has with the new Royal Children’s Hospital. This engagement process lead to the creation of a brief to include nature-based play and to be inviting and accessible to the whole community. The project was recently crowned the nation’s best by the Australian Institute for Landscape Architects. www.richter-spielgeraete.de

Richter Spielgeräte

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Margaret Mahy Playground, Christchurch, New Zealand

Margaret Mahy Playground in Christchurch, New Zealand was built after the major earthquake that struck New Zealand in February 2011, and affected Christchurch in particular.

With the opening of the Margaret Mahy Playground in Christchurch, New Zealand, one of the southern hemisphere’s largest and most modern playgrounds has been created. It was built after the major earthquake that struck New Zealand in February 2011, and affected Christchurch in particular. The detailed planning phase from early 2013 to mid-2015 included a playground design competition held among schools in the Canterbury

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region. The entries for this competition helped inspire the final design as created by the Berliner Seilfabrik. The playground’s layout is based on Canterbury’s four main natural habitats: “The Forest”, “The Wetlands”, “The Plains” and “Coastal”. The playground consists of two different parts. The first section includes a large, custommade net stretched across two enormous masts. The net is fixed in place by a total of 15 anchor points, whose

foundations are at different heights. One of the greatest challenges facing the team at the Berliner Seilfabrik’s Creative Centre was to get reliable topographical data from the park designers on the ground, since the creation of artificial hills was envisaged as part of the park’s landscape. To allay this problem, playground concepts were first created, based on which preliminary drafts were then drawn up and offered. When site grading was completed,

the entire site was surveyed. The resulting three-dimensional data set was then used by the Berliner Seilfabrik to create a virtual site. Using this data, the play structure was conceived, manufactured and installed on site with the utmost precision. As a result, a new and wonderful playground is now located in the Heart of Christchurch, exciting both children and their parents and grandparents alike. www.berliner-seilfabrik.de

Berliner Seilfabrik

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AUTHORS

AUTHORS

Francesca Arici is a Sicilian landscape urbanist with extensive international experience. She is an Adjunct Professor in Urban Culture at IE University in Spain. Currently, she is leading a large interdisciplinary urban regeneration project for Mutrah, Oman.

Lærke Sophie Keil is a landscape architect with an M.A. from the University of Copenhagen. Specializing in the reconfiguration of 20th-century urban landscapes and citizen participation, she will continue her doctoral work at UCPH in the fall of 2016.

[email protected]

[email protected]

Kees Christiaanse studied architecture and urban planning at TU Delft, the Netherlands. In 1980 he joined OMA/Rem Koolhaas and was appointed partner in 1983. In 1989 he founded his own company, now KCAP Architects & Planners. Kees Christiaanse was awarded with a 2016 RIBA international Fellowship as an honour to his lifetime oeuvre. [email protected]

Laura Cipriani is an Adjunct Professor of Landscape Architecture and Urbanism at IUAV University of Venice and the Politecnico di Milano. After completion of a Master’s degree in Design Studies at Harvard’s GSD and a Ph.D. at IUAV, Cipriani co-founded the research firm Superlandscape. [email protected]

Alexander Gutzmer is Editorin-Chief of the German architecture magazine Baumeister and Editorial Director of the publishing house Callwey in Munich. He is also a Professor of Communication and Media Culture at Quadriga University of Applied Sciences, Berlin. [email protected]

Kees Lokman is Assistant Professor in the School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture at the University of British Columbia, Canada. His research focuses on relationships among landscape, infrastructure, ecology and urbanism. Lokman is also founder of Parallax Landscape, a collaborative platform that explores design challenges related to climate change, water and food shortages, depletion of energy resources, and urbanization. [email protected]

David Madden is Assistant Professor in the Sociology Department and the Cities Programme at the London School of Economics. His research focuses on housing, public space, and urban theory. He is co-author, with Peter Marcuse, of In Defense of Housing (Verso, 2016). [email protected]

Claudia Moll studied landscape architecture at HSR Hochschule für Technik Rapperswil, Switzerland, and holds a Ph.D. from ETH Zurich. She worked for several landscape architecture offices in Switzerland

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and was an editor for the magazines Garten+Landschaft and Topos. Currently, she is with the gta Archives at ETH Zurich and also works as a freelance journalist. She is Co-President of the Swiss Association of Landscape Architects (BSLA). [email protected]

Stefan Tischer is a landscape architect. He is also a Professor for Landscape Architecture at the University of Sassari, Italy. With his office in Berlin he has realized major projects like the memorial landscape at the former concentration camp of Ravensbrück in Germany. [email protected]

Conor O’Shea is an American landscape designer and urbanist. He is founder and principal of Hinterlands Urbanism and Landscape and Assistant Professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. [email protected]

Marc Verheijen is a traffic engineer and an architect. He is Professor of Urban Infrastructure and Mobility at Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences and also work as an architect for the Urban Planning and Public Works Department of the municipality of Rotterdam. [email protected]

Palle Petersen studied journalism in Winterthur and architecture at ETH Zurich. Since 2013 he has been an editor for Hochparterre, a Swiss specialized journal for architecture, design and planning. He accompanied the development of the Gotthard axis by publishing several articles as well as a 40-page special edition on the subject. [email protected]

Viriato Soromenho-Marques teaches political and environmental philosophy, and European intellectual history in the Departments of Philosophy and European Studies at the University of Lisbon, where he is a Full Professor. He has been actively engaged in the citizens’ environmental movement in Portugal and other European countries since 1978. [email protected]

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CREDITS

Rasmus Hjortshøj – Coast Studio: 15 Cobe Architects: 16 Rasmus Hjortshøj – Coast Studio: 18–19 Gottlieb Paludan Architects / Lars Rolfsted Mortensen: 20 Håkan Dahlström: 22–23 Buro Lubbers: 25 (Top) Idde Lammers: 25 (Bottom) Mi Chiel: 26 (Top) Buro Topia: 26 (Bottom) BGG: 28 Markus Frietsch: 30–31 Markus Frietsch: 32 Alp Transit Gotthard AG: 33 CIPM/Franco Banfi: 34–35 Alex MacLean: 36–37 Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Inc.: 38–39 Alex MacLean: 40–43 Grace Jiang: 45 Patrick Beech, Julia Casol: 46–47

Kees Lokman: 48–51 Arup: 52–59 MVRDV: 60–62 Village Underground: 63 Olaf Riegel: 64 Heiner Holme: 65 Nelson Garrido: 66–73 E. Isidoro, P. Marangoni, F. Marcato, A. Marinelli, N. Mascotto: 74–75 Laura Cipriani: 76 E. Isidoro, P. Marangoni, F. Marcato, A. Marinelli, N. Mascotto: 79 (Top) G. Facchinelli, L. Gibellato, D. Jovanovic’, L. Musio, C. Olivato: 79 (Bottom) AM3/Mauro Filippi: 80–87 Daniel Kessler: 88–89 Daniel Kessler: 91–93 IBA Basel: 95 (Top) Stadt Huningue: 95 (Bottom) KCAP: 97 Stefan Müller: 99 Ossip van Duivenbode: 101

BIBLIOGRAPHY

p. 44, Kees Lokman Tortajada, C (2006), “Who has access to water? Case study of Mexico City Metropolitan Area”, thematic paper for the 2006 Human Development Report, accessible at hdr.undp.org/en/reports/global/hdr2006/papers/ Tortajada, C. (2012), “Mexico City's Problem Is Political”, UBM Future Cities, 31 October. http://www.ubmfuturecities. com/author.asp?section_ id=362&doc_ id=523714&print=yes http://www.dw.com/en/globalideas-mexico-water-shortageclimate-change/a-18792527 Marilyn Jordan Taylor (2014),

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“Foreword”, in Mathur, Anuradha, and Dilip da Cunha, Design in the Terrain of Water (Novato, CA; and Philadelphia: Applied Research + Design Publishing with the University of Pennsylvania School of Design): viii-ix. p. 60, Alexander Gutzmer Banham, R. (1967), “Flatscape with Containers”, New Society 1, pp. 231–232 Martin, C. (2016), Shipping Container (New York: Bloomsbury). p. 74, Laura Cipriani ACRP (2012), Airport Climate Adaptation and Resilience. A Synthesis of Airport Practice (Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board). Cipriani, L. (2012a), Ecological Airport Urbanism. Airports and Landscapes in the Italian Northeast (Trento: Università degli Studi di Trento). Cipriani, L. (2012b), “Towards an ‘Ecological Airport Urbanism’. Indagini e scenari per l'aeroporto di Venezia”, Planum – The Journal of Urbanism, no. 25, vol. 2, pp. 1–7. Eurocontrol (2013), Challenges of Growth 2013. Task 8: Climate Change Risk and Resilience (Brussels: Eurocontrol). Eurocontrol, Omega, Manchester Metropolitan University, MetOffice (2010), Challenges of Growth, Environmental Update Study. January 2009 (Brussels: Eurocontrol). European Commission (2013), An EU Strategy on Adaptation to Climate Change (Brussels: European Commission). Giordano, T. (2012), “Adaptive

planning for climate resilient long-lived infrastructures”, Utilities Policy, no. 23, pp. 80–89. Gunderson, L., Holling C. S., eds. (2001), Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Human and Natural Systems (Washington, DC: Island Press). Hallegatte, S. (2007), “Do current assessments underestimate future damages from climate change?”, World Economics, no. 8 (3), pp. 131–146. Hallegatte, S. (2009), “Strategies to adapt to uncertain climate change”, Global Environmental Change, no. 19, pp. 240–247. Hallegatte, S., Corfee-Morlot, J. (2011), “Understanding climate change impacts, vulnerability and adaptation at city scale: an introduction”, Climatic Change, no. 104, pp. 1–12. Hallegatte, S., Przyluski, V., Vogt-Schlib, A. (2011), “Building world narratives for climate change impact, adaptation and vulnerability analyses”, Nature Climate Change, no. 1, pp. 151– 155. Hallegatte, S., Ranger, N., Mestre, O., Dumas, P., Corfee-Morlot, J., Herweijer, C. and Wood, R. M. (2011), “Assessing climate change impacts, sea level rise and storm surge risk in port cities: a case study on Copenhagen”, Climatic Change, no. 104, pp. 113–117. Holling, C. (1973), “Resilience and stability of ecological systems”, Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, no. 4, pp. 1–23. IPCC (2007), Climate Change 2007: Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press). IPCC (2012), Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation. Special Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). IPCC (2013), Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis (Geneva: IPCC). Neumann, J. (2009), Adaptation to Climate Change: Revisiting Infrastructure Norms (Washington, DC: Resources for the Future) Newman, P., Beatley, T., Boyer, H. (2009), Resilient Cities: Responding to Peak Oil and Climate Change (Washington, DC: Island Press).

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Topos 97/December 2016 Transformation Process

Infrastructure. Mobility is all around us. It is a central element in a globalised world that shapes our everyday life. To enable mobility, infrastructure is becoming more and more important. But infrastructure should be much more than just a necessity that connects people with their surroundings. It affects our environment and calls for integrated solutions that form a relationship between engineering, architecture and landscape architecture. This issue of Topos portraits projects, that have an interdisciplinary approach and provide innovative design solutions for stations, walkways and promenades. Furthermore, it looks at the social and political impacts of infrastructure – be it a bridge in London, a new water management concept in Mexico or a transboundary footpath between France and Switzerland.

ISBN 978-3-7667-2259-1