Category Archives: Urbanism

LowLine New York

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After successful transformation of overhead infrastructures into leisure spaces, such as the New York HighLine park, new possibilities are being explored underground. The LowLine project uses crowd funding to turn the old Williamsburg Trolley Terminal, an underground complex, into a community park. The complex was built in 1903 and has remained unused since 1948.

The location in the Lower East Side, which lacks public green space and business opportunities, challenged a neighboring architecture firm to come up with this plan. The designers developed a system that captures sunlight and transmits it to the subterranean park, in sufficient quantities for photosynthesis, in other words to grow trees and other plants.

 

Grand projets – Bibliotèque François Mitterand

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Current times of bottom-up planning, urban acupuncture, pocket parks and temporary uses make the Grand Projets of president Mitterand – merely a few decades ago – look like remnants of a distant past. One way or another, these projects create the context of our current interventions and will determine the face of the city for centuries. Parque de la Villette, Grand Arche (La Défense) and the Bibliotèque de France became landmarks and icons for Paris, despite heavy criticism about the high costs for the tax payers and elitist locations of the project, predominantly in the west near the river Seine.

The expansion of the national library – with its historic location at the Rue Richelieu – was to create a new hot spot at the margins of the river, stimulating the revitalization of the Rive Gauche area. It was the most costly of the Grand Projets, and suffered various operational problems, such as creating a good climate for conservation of the books inside the glass towers. The project by Dominique Perrault was the winning design of the 1989 competition. The honorary mention of the OMA project also became famous. The project was inaugurated in 1996, a year after Mitterands death.

The library occupies 60 thousand square meters, with a stunningly quitet forest patio in the middle.

The project is connected to the other side of the river by a new pedestrian bridge. The full perimeter of the library is accessible as a wooden staircase.

The rise of bike culture in São Paulo

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São Paulo is becoming more bike-minded. This does not seem surprising, regarding the global trend of urban bike culture as an alternative to car use and public transport, or as a hip subculture. But those who know the city of São Paulo and its inhabitants, will affirm that a revolution is taking place.

Bike lane, painted over the traditional pavement of central São Paulo

Car dominated avenue near Ibirapuera, São Paulo

This city of car lovers and manufacturers, hills and valleys, broad avenues and potholes, is probably one of the most bike-unfriendly environments on the planet. The average driver here has been tormented for years by traffic jams and strings of ´motoboys´ that zigzag their way through traffic as mavericks. For him, two-wheelers are the enemy. Biking may have a promising future in the city, in the light of increasing congestion and air pollution, if only it were a bit safer. I tried to bike to work for a couple of weeks in central São Paulo, but downhill I almost got killed several times, and biking uphill behind a fuming bus or truck equals smoking a pack of cigarettes.

Bike network map of central São Paulo

Over the last decade, a small number of bike lanes was implemented, mainly in parks and in the center of arterial roads. The Minhocão viaduct is a well-known meeting place for bikers. More and more bike events and trips have been organized, especially at night and in the weekends. Recently, the municipality organizes temporary bike routes – called Ciclofaixa, that are slowly becoming a network for recreational biking. Hip bike stores are popping up throughout the central area, as well as bike rental points comparable to those in London or Paris. Dozens of municipal employees with red flags, guarding each crossing of the temporary bike lane, remind us that biking is still not completely safe in the city, but at least it´s possible. Big trucks are increasingly banned to the ring roads, and cars are becoming cleaner. As soon as the smaller, greener roads are incorporated into a permanent bike network, São Paulo could be a great place to ride a bicycle.

Ciclofaixa flagholders on Sunday at Avenida Paulista

Bike rental in central São Paulo, sponsored by Itaú

 

Recreational biking in Parque Ibirapuera

Cable car improves public transport in Rio

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The hill tops of the slums in Rio de Janeiro used to be the least accessible areas in the city, plagued by violent drug traffic and lack of infrastructure. A recent project of cable cars, linking 5 hill tops around the favela Complexo do Alemão to a suburban railway station, is turning this reality upside down.

As ground access in the hilly area continues to be difficult, the hill tops are  becoming hot spots for new economic activity and gathering. At several stations, small shops appear and restaurants are being set up for the small but steady number of tourists riding on the cable car. Close to each station, a so-called ´pacification police unit´ is installed. The cable car system is run by local workers of the neighborhood itself.

The line (see bottom of transit map) was built in 2011 and is to transport 30 thousand people per day, increasing the proximity of jobs and services. This effectively turns the former favela from a no-go area into a part of the ´formal´ city. The reduction of poverty and increase of government control of these areas are key elements of Rio´s strategy to make the city a safe place to organize the World Cup in 2014 and the Olympics in 2016. And without accessibility, non of this will be possible.

To reduce costs, cable car stations are being sponsored by Kibon and other private companies.

Watch the cable car on BBC

Multi-use buildings – a city within the city #1

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Many times, modern architecture is blamed for the separation of urban functions, as well as the lack of street life and human scale in the contemporary metropolis. Fair enough, but modern building types may also provide the solution if you do it right. Learning from the good examples and improving them provides a much richer perspective than moving backwards with retro town planning. This is the first of a series of posts celebrating the big-scale multi-use building.

Instead of separating public from private space, multi-use buildings can be extremely permeable and add thousands of square meters to the public domain, in the shape of internal streets, escalators and mezzanines. They give access to a variety of urban functions, such as retail, public services, offices, cinemas, theaters, restaurants and bars, auditoriums and apartments. This means they are also an important meeting place, and certainly more than just a building: they are a city within the city. In this post we take a closer look at the Galerias in São Paulo.

Conjunto Nacional during festivity at Avenida Paulista (Gay Parade)

Conjunto Nacional, designed by David Libeskind in the 1950s, is one of the main attractions and meeting points at the busy Avenida Paulista. The classic sidewalk pavement (designed by Burle Marx) continued seamlessly into the ground floor of the building. The complex combines shops, lecture halls, restaurants, exhibition space, offices, a gymnasium, a cinema and many apartments.

Conjunto Nacional – running track on the second floor

Edifício Copan in urban context (to the left Edifício Itália)


One of the most iconic buildings in the city is no doubt Edifício Copan, built in the 1960s by Oscar Niemeyer. With its 5 thousand inhabitants, the 35 storey building is a city in itself. For many years the building was in poor conditions, but new inhabitants and higher rents have made it possible to restore the edifice to its former glory. The ground floor, open to the street, is a pleasant semi-public space during the whole day, mixing small shops, coffee bars, a church and the elevator halls of the 4 blocos.

Galeria do Rock – facade

A typical remnant of São Paulo’s modern past are the galerias. The whole week round, but especially in the weekends, Galeria do Rock (1963) is a favorite hangout for alternative youngsters, mostly part of skate, gothic and rock subcultures. The multi-storey building is populated by some 450 small shops, varying from clothing to music, fruit juice and tattoos. The entire ground floor connects to the street and literally connects 2 parallel streets with a ramp, across the building block.

The idea of permeable multi-use  buildings and galerias is also common in the more anonymous buildings of the newer central parts of the city. It is here – and not in the drive-in type shopping malls – that new trends emerge, and fashion labels, biker shops and new designers have their start-up businesses. Several such galerias can be found at Rua Augusta and near Praça da República.

Shops in multi-use residential building at Rua Pamplona (Jardins). The inclined street is used to create easy pedestrian access to two levels of shops from the sidewalk. The typical cantilever above the second floor provides shelter in rainy weather.

Covered two-level galeria at Rua Augusta

Open galeria as a semi-public perpendicular street of Rua Augusta