PAPERS 47 The Challenge of landscape in metropolitan areas

FOREWORD the traditional bonds between individuals Metropolitan landscapes: and places, to be substituted by a polycentrism, expansion, paradoxical delocated sense of place. multi-peripheries and micro- Amongst the processes linked to peripheries. From the cliché the territorial expansion of the city The third article, by Enric Batlle, deals landscape to the kaleidoscope —particularly to the development of with the leap of scale regarding the landscape great urban systems— we find the design of parks in metropolitan areas, production of metropolitan landscapes, as landscape plans that intend to Carles Llop the characteristics of which cannot respond to territorial functions which be understood in the light of the usual go beyond municipal boundaries. The landscape categories nor the methods author’s discourse runs over a number 1. Quo vadis city? Quo vadis territory? associated to their analysis. That is why of design strategies found to be adapted Quo vadis landscape? remarkable efforts have been made over to the scale and characteristics of the last twenty years in order to develop places —from municipal urban parks to The use of the territory has always a theoretical body for their understanding, metropolitan park systems— through followed an expansionist trend. parallel to the efforts carried on by the what he calls value-added environments. Notwithstanding, up until the last century public administration in order to improve the city has demonstrated a controlled them. After describing the main features of configuration. Now, the city and the the process of urbanization of Northern territory are changing inexorably and, Both their territorial reach and their Italy during the second half of the 20th consequently, how they are interpreted. being the background of most of century, Fabio Renzi writes about one But, what we perceive as an “urban the population’s daily life entail an of the most innovative experiences of landscape” or a “territorial landscape” increasing prominence of metropolitan the Lombardia park system: the Parco should not be seen from an apocalyptic or landscapes as objects of planning, Agricolo Sud di Milano, appeared in the nostalgic point of view. We revise the state design and management. Furthermore, 1990s as a supra-municipal answer to of the city and the territory to improve this prominence is enhanced by the the urban pressure affecting one of the them in an attempt to construct quality goals of the European Landscape most developed areas of the country. landscapes, proving the Catalan aphorism Convention, which introduces the Being based on heritage, ecological “el paisatge és l’ànima del territori” (the need to dedicate attention to common and social landscape values, the Parco landscape is the soul of the territory). After landscapes, and —in the case of has become a European reference in all, it is never too late to start and nothing Catalonia— the implementation of the field of metropolitan territories and is completely lost when it comes to city, the policies stipulated by the Llei landscapes management. territory and landscape quality. del paisatge (2005). The articles in this issue of Papers suggest a In the fifth article, Ramon Torra, Antoni There have been a number of reinterpretation of metropolitan Farrero and Víctor Ténez describe the seminars and papers read, not forgetting landscapes that can be understood ways in which the successive plans resulting published articles, that have as a challenge to achieve a better of the metropolitan area of Barcelona concerned themselves with investigating articulation of the territory and an have interpreted the Llobregat River, new landscapes, particularly metropolitan improvement of the quality of both and analyse several initiatives promoted landscapes.1 In particular, I would like to places and the lives of their dwellers. by the Mancomunitat de Municipis that underline those studies which have talked aim to create a new type of relation in detail about densely populated territorial In the first article, Carles Llop refers the between the river and its territorial areas where phenomena such as urban most substantive elements and dynamics environment, according to what they call sprawl determine the characteristics of metropolitan landscapes and claims the river city. They deal, amongst others, of public concern that attempts to deal the worth of the concepts and with the means and projects focused with environmental management from a instruments unfolded by the territorial on environment, landscape and social renewed standpoint. planning, and the principles of restoration of the last stretch of the environmental sustainability, as means riverside. American cities have already experienced to deal with the current stage of the city. the expansion of the city across the In accordance to this goal the author The last article of the issue is Jaume territory many years before us here introduces the challenge of renewing Busquets’, which reflects on the in Catalonia, and many articles have territorial planning basing on a reinvention importance of the appreciation of urban been published on the phenomena of of the landscape. peripheries and the evolution of groves metropolisation, generating a substantial as a shaping factor of the entrances bibliography of explanations and In the second article, Francesc Muñoz to the cities, introducing the project of definitions.2 “Cities without Cities” is expounds the way in which mobility, landscape improvement of the access the title of the introductory conference besides transforming the territory to the town of Granollers through the to the seminar The Future Metropolitan and the landscape, is determining the BP-5002 road. Based on urban-planning Landscape: Conference Reflections, which appearance of typologies of places requirements and the understanding of focused on understanding contemporary and landscapes related to each type the landscape values of the site, this regional metropolitan landscapes. This of mobility. In particular, the author plan is an example of intervention in title has a bearing on our awareness of analyses the rise of a new type of low peripheral areas, in which landscape how the traditional city (more or less cost geography and landscapes which improvement cannot be undertaken compact, but which can be measured are linked to the needs of this form of without regarding the citizens’ and delimited) is losing its configuration aerial mobility, and the breaking away of wellbeing. in the face of the ever-increasing

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 91 constitution of an infinite city (spread and socially. We have over-consecrated metropolis to be able to understand out and dilating across the territory, not the contents of the “landscape” and the challenges posed by its possible so easy to delimit, heterogeneous and we have lost the force and convincing transformation: multiform); a kind of city which some nature of what “territory” is and what it scholars have already qualified as a great means. Territory signified on the basis of — Extension of the forms of the city over mixed colloidal cities, curdled cities, or environmental features, transformed by the territory with the resulting dispersal a variety of forms built over a territory the ways in which it has been inhabited. of functions. ploughed up by infrastructures, spattered Landscape needs to rediscover its with construction and with fragmented condition of “land”! There is no sense — Spread of residential areas which are geographic continuities. behind nostalgia for the old landscapes increasingly located further from the which cannot be recovered, the pseudo- metropolitan centres. Metropolitan territories not only have to modern defence of —and fascination put up with physical banalisation. More for— “none-places” or the landscapes of — Polarisation of central functions over than anything else, this is a question of homogenising globalisation. If the territory the metropolitan access junctions. quality loss that has a clear impact on has no soul then the epidermis dries up weakening social integrity and economic and withers. — Major internal transformations of the power. Degraded landscapes looked consolidated city. upon with displeasure, is how we citizens who live in them verbalise and feel them 3. Territories in a world of explosions - — Lloss of centrality. when we see extensions to “urbanalised” explosive landscapes in the territory residential areas: the now abandoned — Increase of the peri-urban perimeters. agricultural areas, brownfields on the We could perhaps agree that the edges of infrastructures, the industrial contemporary world bears the marks — Infrastructure congestion. areas in precarious conditions or the major of explosions: demographic, urban, spaghetti junctions at the intersections migration, mobility, economic and, finally, a — Problematic use of certain types of land. of principal metropolitan road networks. social explosion which shatters traditional It is abandonment which degrades the paradigms. It is interesting to observe territory and illustrates a belligerent and how we set territories against the limits of 4. Multi-peripheries and micro- disappointing landscape where we feel certain thresholds to achieve the highest peripheries: the effects of dispersed the need to call for a renewed perception level of urban occupation (the metropolis) limits in the use of the territory of space. To re-think and re-make the and the total absence of anthropisation landscape of the metropolis is surely the (the desert). This extreme dualisation, The city has turned its back on its atavistic only path to follow to rediscover this lost becomes mistaken, attending to the relationship with the territory, generating a perception. progressive loss of definitive isolation in multiplicity of heterogeneous forms, often desert territories, parallel to the growing fragmented and jumbled up. The real city isolation experienced by humans in the is a huge “nebulous urban construct”,4 2. The landscape as a perception of atopy of some metropolitan places. Nature that we need to know how to decipher, the territory: multi-landscapes is becoming more and more urbanised comprehend and act on accordingly. and the city is rediscovering new forms of The new lexicon we are searching for to We can attribute multiple meanings to the forest abandonment. understand the phenomenon of urban word “landscape” to the degree that it reality, are devices for planning and begins to generate certain confusion. But, Urban explosions are causing an managing urban processes. what are the consequences of using the uncontrolled break up of physical space word “landscape” indiscriminately? which becomes a broken mirror, a split Mobility conditions and determines the space, a broken-mosaic, where the shape of the territory, and the metropolis A sound reaction would be to try and fragments still maintain the sense of a is its ultimate stage. The spread of establish a consensus concerning the decomposed “whole”. It offers a shattered people over the territory determines the meaning we associate with landscape landscape and a desolation in which it scale of the metropolis. It does not exist and precise usage so that we can attempts to comprehend the integrity without the movement and flows of identify or give meaning to shared of the territory, because the sequences materials, goods, information and people. questions concerning our perception of and links between the individual pieces The “product” and the “construct” of territories. I have begun by deliberately no longer exist. This is the landscape of this mobility are the urbanisation of the employing the use of the two key words, the ordinary periphery, now transformed territory and the most visible expression but now propose changing their order: into a multitude of incongruous and banal of the depths and surfaces of what the “territory” and “perception”. “Territory” peripheries, polluted and noisy, sliced up metropolis is; its real landscape, in the is the fundamental key to setting the by road networks and poorly connected, kinetic perception and in the changes and boundaries of what I am talking about, and with little infrastructure and poorly transformation that it accumulates. “perception” is the term which enriches infrastructured. The city sprouts with a the interpretation of what happens in the wide range of plural processes of different The prolonged use of the territory that territory. Territory entails a tangible reality, shapes and forms. But we have to accept has progressively shaped urban life, has and perception influences our judgement the “new forms of urbanity” even though spread the city over a vast geographical of it, hermeneutically and critically, when the new forms of cities may appear area, giving rise to a highly anthropised it is observed, analysed, and a given inadmissible. We need to distinguish territorial geography, and a system evaluation is made. Perception, cognition between ‘city’ and ‘urbs’ as suggested of cities that are increasingly more and emotion are the categories that are by Henri Lefebvre;3 otherwise we cannot urbanised and closer. applied with one’s view of the landscape. understand, and even less identify, the true reality of the contemporary city. The spread of the city, the over- Landscape is the fusion of what is seen occupation and the fragmentation ways and not seen of the territory; the texture So, it makes no sense to panegyrise the of occupying the territory have as an expression of a profound structure city left to the devices of the chaotic increased the contact perimeters between and the history that has preceded it and flexibility, non-regulations or uncontrolled, the countryside and the city, between determined a “semantic latency” (as nor does it make sense to praise the countryside and countryside, and suggested by Eugenio Turri) made up of periphery as a new type of modern space. between city and city, in the multiple the communities that have lived in the What is needed here is to be aware of situations that cause contemporary urban territory and have shaped it geographically the phenomena which characterise the realities: commercial strips, infrastructure

92 / Papers 47 / landscapes, brownfields, wastedlands, — Reticulating polarisation of the — The regeneration and articulation of major areas occupied by industry, capital centres linked by networks empty spaces of the metropolis. An transport and mobility hubs, marginal to metropolitan medium-sized cities, active empty space is the “non-city”, landscapes, marginalised landscapes, and making good of the network theory comprising the group of spaces of the so on. principle: autonomy of the parts and territory’s biophysical matrix, full of being mutually complementary. rivers and all their components, of water drainage and the most capillary 5. Recomposing the territory, Reinventing landscapes means generating water supply network, crop growing reinventing it: generating new renewed ways of relating to the territory, fields, orchards and forest spaces. landscapes using it and managing it. On the subject of metropolitan landscapes, Bernardo Secchi The territory is a permanent archive. It says, “Watercourses once engineered for 7. The kaleidoscope landscape provides clear proof of the biophysical transport can be set free or reconnected substratum, it expresses environmental to wetlands. Industrial areas can be The relationship between the city and its dynamics, and it bears witness to social transformed into porous sites, and the surroundings has generated a wide array actions. It is the history and geography infrastructure of rail lines can become an of confused feelings and a collection of of the space production. From a opportunity to enhance mobility and make imaginaries or multiple landscapes which holistic perspective of “territory” as a the city truly accessible to all without praise or criticise the different territorial contemporary expression which includes relying on private transportation.” These situations. Often we have found model memories of the past and the vindication are images that do not belong to the pre- orphans to manage territorial planning. of an improved future, we understand existing territory, but rather to the virtual I believe that we now have to talk that it is possible to intervene modifying imagination of new scenery. Reinvention is from the perspective of the wealth of territory pathologies. The most appropriate based on new imaginary conceived in the disciplinary diversity, a forum of visions strategies involve re-composing it, but also virtual world, reflecting on the possibilities and polyhedral opinions (even dialectically reinventing it. of changes, on the basis of a spatiality that opposed) because we are living in times does not correspond to the real view, but of uncertainty. We are living through the Recomposing is the order of the day. rather the evocation of reflexive thought, tension between the most pernicious Re-mix, re-make, re-configure, re- and the cybernetic world, in a still non- liberalism and the demand for a new consider”5 are formulations applicable to formal a priori that will become possible territorial culture, or “for the territory” social behaviour and, consequently, to though the landscape project. which, when all said and done, this is what the recomposing of our territories from constitutes the true ecosystem in which a standpoint of commitment to ecology, we live incorporating the people that live to arrive at an environmental agreement 6. A new structure to rethink the in it. between the contemporary city and the efficiency of the metropolis: the permanent territory. territorial-mosaic-city We need to talk from the perspective of the planner, the project manager, of The city is expanding and the territory The renewed territorial project, thus those who, if I may be allowed to say, welcomes it. This has been and still passes through remixing and reinventing, is building the city, intervening in the is the binomial on which territorial which take shape by expressing the subtle equilibrium of the blurred frontier transformations are based. fragments and adapting the different forms between the natural and the built, who are of the city in a new system of physical and aware of what Joseph Rykwert reminds The new paradigm for the contemporary functional organisation. The “territorial- us: Planners today... still have to learn an city project would have to establish itself mosaic-city” is both a morphological and important lesson from their predecessors over technical, political and social accords environmental structure at the same time, [...] that “model” the city may offer has which we have been constructing seen in terms of the ecological mutual to be strong enough to survive whatever in territorial governance in recent adaptation and the co-evolution of urban inevitable disorder [...] and has to give years, in plans for urban and territorial and natural ecosystems in interaction, structure to the urban experience.6 development, and in citizen proposals. based on a mosaic articulated in urban Through all these platforms and agents, pieces and the biophysical matrix of We will have to explore to the full the we have been putting together a the territory, environmentally balanced, possibilities of the landscape without a collection of efficient and conceptually comprising: nostalgic yearning for the past and with a solid principles when it comes to deeply rooted enthusiasm for managing planning, projecting and managing this — Consolidated urban structures. the city project which is our fate to live in, phase of the city which has befallen giving thought to the construction of the us. Here, I am mainly talking about the — High quality rurban tessera on “new” space in this road to the infinite case for Catalonia —alas we are not metropolitan perimeters and city. accompanied along this path by other interstices, as new city spaces. autonomous communities in the Spanish So, we have to reinterpret the possibilities peninsula. These are to confront: — New Attractors fitted out in the contact of the landscape as a tool. In the between the major territorial empty metropolis, landscaping has to create a — Spread, concentration. spaces and the urban tesserae. social contract to: improve the quality of life (environmental, cultural and — Low population density, work on new The conceptualisation of this model brings aesthetic) in places that are useful for the population densities that are rationally with it a series of operative objectives: community; provide efficient mobility; higher. create habitability, for the sake of health in — The favouring of osmosis and an appropriate environment. A new — Territorial fragmentation, more dissolving of frontiers through planning beauty, a new aesthetics, a new feeling rationally compact models. permeable and exchange spaces. for the possibilities of the metropolitan inhabitant to generate comfort and equity. — Hyper-specialisation, mixture and — The task of re-classifying boundaries. mixed uses. Our use of the landscape has to — The articulation of the pieces that make be a “tool for social mediation” for — social segregation, the project of up the mosaic by means of efficient “managing transformations”. When social space as an motivating agent for mobility management and an ever more planning territorial transformations one cohesion and solidarity. precise plan for road network grids. realises how “new landscapes” open up.

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 93 Landscape planning is thus a tool, cultural Second, the type of settlement and the landscapes traditionally understood mediation to generate a critical view of housing construction from which we as being responsible for this function of the abuse of the territory and to pose new derive both the population structure and endowing its inhabitants with a sense of paradigms of use. Recycling the territorial the functional and aesthetic characteristics their own place and shared history. abuse of the metropolitan peripheries of the constructed buildings. Accordingly, means generating a ‘landscape factory” agrarian and industrial societies have given which, in addition to new forms and rise to characteristic landscapes seen as 1. City and urban development: a space, arouses new ethical attitudes in the a synthesis of not only the economic or history of the 20th century citizens who inhabit them. As proposed social nature of the inhabitants, but also by Gaston Bachelard: “…it is dreamed their underlying historical and cultural During the course of the last two before contemplated, before becoming a foundations. Thus, a strong link has been centuries, city and urban development conscious spectacle; all landscapes are an established between our perception of has been a continuous process with one oneiric experience. One only contemplates landscape and a whole series of concepts particularly important consequence: the with aesthetic passion those landscapes associated with the idea of place, such as city is no longer the exception in a territory that were previously seen in dreams. We identity, vernacular or local character. where there is no urban development, have to recognise the prelude of natural and has become the most important beauty in human dreams7… If we look at However, the sharp increase in urban characteristic feature of inhabited space. the metropolis in this way, we shall leave development, particularly since the Although it is true that a territory may behind the cliché that limits and we will be second half of the 20th century, and the be subject to different degrees of urban able to glimpse at the possibilities of the present-day characteristic levels at a global development, it is no less the case that kaleidoscope landscape. scale, raise important questions about non-urbanised, agricultural or natural the key issues which not only explain spaces (which were predominant in the the production of landscapes but also past) have become environments that very 1 The Future Metropolitan Landscape: Conference what they really mean in terms of what often are confined or surrounded by urban Reflections, a collection of reflections resulting characterises, identifies and differentiates from the exhibition at the York Museum of stretches, infrastructures and buildings. Modern Art “Groundswells” (Febrer 2005). a given society. Many of the questions 2 Llop Torné, Carles, Adrià Calvo and Mara raised by the urban development of a The spread of land development for urban Marincioni: “Formes de ciutat al segle XX” in territory cover dynamics such as the purposes was a process which first began, L’explosió de la ciutat / The explosion of the ever increasing importance of the spatial and at a faster rate, in the cities in North city, Barcelona: COAC i Fòrum Universal de les mobility of people, a process which Cultures Barcelona 2004, pp. 346-352. ISBN: Europe which became industrialised 84-96185-18-4, 2004; and “Mocions i lògiques is associated with the production of cities and had already entered into the d’intervenció en el projecte territorial renovat en landscapes that are not only specifically dynamics of metropolitan development, les regions urbanes” in the same publication, pp. related to managing mobility flows, but particularly in the second half of the 346-379. also to territorial support for this mobility. 20th century. These images of urban 3 Lefebvre, H., Espacio y política, Editorial Península, Barcelona, 1972. development became the archetypal 4 In the last one hundred years, the urban revolution, In other words, it is not only the mobility process of the urban sprawl process with based on the concentration of major cities, has of people which is a key consideration the now familiar features of low residential given rise to multiple denominations from a to be taken into account in order to population density and specialised land diverse to the traditional city, nuclear. See my understand how a territory functions, but use. For their own part, cities in the South article: l Timeline “Nuevas formas de ciudad en also that we are witnessing the production of Europe, particularly Mediterranean los siglos XX-XXI”. of specific landscape typologies related 5 REBAR, group of creators, designers and activists cities, have preserved an image, that (San Francisco, EE.UU.) http://www.rebargroup. to the manifestation of this mobility. As is no less archetypal: urban density, org/ we are increasingly developing different continued building construction density 6 Joseph Rykwert. La idea de ciudad: antropología dimensions to our lives in different places and mixed economic activities and land de la forma urbana en Roma, Italia, y el mundo simultaneously, our experience of the use. In contrast, the recent development antiguo. Ediciones Sígueme, 2002 (republished landscape is not just related to where we from the first edition, 1976). of these compact cities illustrates an urban 7 Bachelard, Gaston, El agua y los sueños: ensayo live, but rather a whole series of territories scenery which is clearly more complex, sobre la imaginación de la materia, Fondo de with which we coexist when establishing and which displays alternative urban forms Cultura Económica, México, 1978. our mobility itineraries. A wide range of to the compact city and dense population places with specific mobility connotations growth. The last thirty years have in fact emerge that are particularly important witnessed a progressive dispersion of the when it comes to defining concepts such population, activities and types of urban Mobility landscapes: from as “living space” or a “feeling of belonging development in global terms throughout multiplex centres to low-cost to a place”. These landscapes not only the urbanised world. Accordingly, airports stem from the infrastructure that actually a common metropolitan space has copes with mobility —the motorways appeared in the majority of these cities Francesc Muñoz and airports—; they are also a result of a characterised by its dispersed structure. territorial model which is better explained This is a territory which combines different from the perspective of mobility flows than spaces, places and landscapes: some have Introduction the levels of population or building density. undergone greater urban development, others are less built up, but all of them The morphology and evolution of the Roundabouts, petrol station-shops, put to great use by the inhabitants and landscape, which always describe the multi-screen cinemas or low-cost visitors whose numbers vary depending relationships people establish with airports are clear examples of emerging on the time of the year. Urban life, which places, are matters that have habitually landscapes that raise a key question. in the 19th century was understood as any been explained as a result or function If mobility has now become the first characteristic of the city and substantially of how people inhabit the territory. So, order for inhabiting the territory, then it different from life in the countryside, has the link between a given community and follows that landscapes associated with thus ended up reaching out across the landscape has always been seen in the this mobility can also offer explanations entire territory. light of the activities and, consequently, (something which still has not been not territorial behaviour of a community, sufficiently recognised) concerning the Dejan Sudjic described metropolitan especially with reference to two major association between individual and place, space in similar terms in The 100 mile city issues. First, the type of economy and between community and urbanised space (1991), in which the peripheries, centres, the way in which it exploits the natural mentioned in the opening paragraph. densely populated areas and the mobility resources, or the assets of the territory. Perhaps they can explain even more than spaces prove to be equally important

94 / Papers 47 / when classifying a hybrid territory, and New types of inhabitants, such as the such an important requirement from the one which has underdone dramatic and resident or the commuter, reveal an point of view of “post-modern capitalist” discontinuous urbanisation: undeniable fact: the living space of urban ventures. inhabitants has progressively spread “But in its present form, the old urban centre beyond the city limits drawing a picture of So, on the one hand it was no longer is nothing more than another piece on the variable metropolitan extensions, inhabited necessary to concentrate either board, with the same importance as an in different ways according to the time of infrastructures, work force or capital and, airport, medical centre or museum complex. day, whether a work day or weekend, and on the other, advant age was taken of the They are all swimming in a sea of shopping even depending on the week of the month extension of land for urban uses. This was centres, hypermarkets and warehouses, road- or the month of the year. a territory where medium-sized cities, stop restaurants, anonymous factories, ring rather than the major capitals, began to roads and motorway areas.” Turning to the dynamics of landscape emerge as important urban centres within production, this dramatic increase in the the framework of the global economy. dynamics of urban sprawl has in effect 2. From sub-urban territory to the meant the construction of a territory in The distribution of multiplex centres and “subrurban” landscape which low density residential areas have the incipient geography illustrated by gone hand in hand with the appearance low-cost flight airports, two of the latest Towards the end of the 20th century of suburban landscapes, characterised by additions to this new suburban landscape, it was becoming clear that the model the cloning of urban uses of the compact correspond much more to the territorial for territorial concentration which had city that have emerged adapted, but at a logic of these medium-sized cities rather typified the shaping of metropolitan metropolitan scale. The main outcome of than that of major capital cities. landscapes had undergone a radical this process for landscape morphology has change. Improvements and new services been the appearance of new typologies of Mulitplex spaces are located at in transport and communications meant urban space defined by their vocation and equidistance from medium-sized urban that it was no longer so necessary capacity to attract, generate and manage centres or between dispersed suburban to concentrate manufacturing in the mobility flows. fabrics. For their part, low-cost airline city spaces. So, the former economic companies do not operate from major geography of large industrial and duty- So, economic activities, previously located airports, those which for half a century in free zones was replaced by a network in the central city and its immediate Europe had associated national airlines of industrial estates spread across the peripheral areas, are taking up residence with a given state and were located next to territory. in new industrial parks or districts. Service state or financial capitals. Low-cost flight industries or merchandise transport companies operate quite differently. They From Detroit to Bilbao or Turin to logistics are moving to strategic locations have searched out regional secondary Rürghebeit, the economic model that further and further away, as part of a new level airport infrastructures, but which had engendered landscapes defined global perception of a vast metropolitan offer optimum conditions in terms of being by densely populated urban areas area. Commerce and leisure are combined a potential centre and easily accessible and typified by a strong presence of in premises such as shopping malls, from the road and rail transport networks. industry, was no longer applicable due situated between the predominant urban Airports such as Reus or Vilobí d’Onyar to the dramatic changes that not only centres and spaces, and easily accessible (Girona) in Catalonia, Treviso in Venice, affected manufacturing processes but by road. They not only offer basic Gatwick in London or Kosice-Bratislava in also consumer patterns. Almost in products but also specialise in particular Slovakia, are names which now make up complete contrast to those major urban areas of the consumer market, such as the toponymy of this new low-cost flight agglomerations where the centre vs. furniture and interior design (IKEA), DIY mobility map. periphery dynamics explained both the (BAUHAUS) or gardening (AKI), and economic function and the morphology are complemented with all manner of This surge of activity in regional secondary of the landscape, a new kind of dispersed entertainments and services from travel airports, located outside and at a metropolitan space appeared to such a agencies to gymnasiums. The former distance form central urban areas, has clear degree that it was already visible urban amusement parks are giving way to become more and more linked to rapid in tangible and physical aspects such as large theme parks at a regional level; the changes in land development leading urban sprawl itself. decline of the cinema within the city space to an accelerated transformation of the parallels the success of the new multi- landscape. Agricultural and peri-urban This continuing expansion process of screen cinemas, the “multi-plex spaces”, spaces reveal the emergence of a “low- the urban world had in fact been taking while the new ventures of secondary cost” landscape which can be seen around place since the 19th century, and always regional airports, where low-cost airlines the airports where companies such as dependent on technology. Transport and operate from, offer alternatives to using Easyjet or Ryanair operate in Europe. communications, in different shapes and major airports, located close to the big forms with the passing of time, created cities. This “low-cost” landscape is where B favourable conditions for the progressive roads, shopping malls, car parks and dispersal of the work place, consumer At the end of the 1990s, scholars such incipient residential areas or minor services spending and leisure spots frequented by as Giuseppe Demateis or the urban leave their stamp. Here, we could assign city inhabitants. The advent of the train, geographer Robert Fishmann, explained the label “subrurban”: a landscape where followed by the car, were key moments how this physical dilation of built up areas traditional images of suburbia mix with in this development. Railways allowed and, in general, the dynamics of urban the vestiges of the still remaining rural cities to grow in a linear fashion and sprawl, meant that it would become landscape, cultural and iconography. extend residential and industrial areas easier and easier to find metropolitan beyond the first belt of what was a densely characteristics in places which historically What we have here is a genuine populated city. The car meant that urban were outside the scope of urban reinvention of urban landscape in the rural life spread to the degree of furnishing development processes. Fishmann (1998) context, linked to the role of the airport, areas much further away and allowed for even argued for the “end of the city”, not in relation to the central metropolis but radial suburban growth, chaotic, to one particularly the “major city”. The great rather intermediary cities and territories degree or another, depending on the layout metropolis or the major city, the metaphor which have undergone far less urban of metropolitan motorways. So, the car for the type of metropolitan territory that development. So, a new type of suburban consolidated the city with suburbs and had been necessary for the development landscape is beginning to characterise paved the way for new forms of inhabiting of the Ford economic cycle during the these traditionally agricultural spaces the territory closely linked to daily mobility. course of the 20th century, was no longer whose transformation can no longer

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 95 be explained in terms of depending on a kind of special interaction between the An abridged explanation of the genesis the city and its growth and the need for individual and the landscape characterised of these territorial dynamics, reveals how physical expansion, but instead in terms of by certain constant factors; a relationship the first consumer habit affected by this the new nature illustrated by countryside that would be: process of clearing commercial outlets that has already been urbanised. from urban centres and relocating them — Independent of legal and administration across the territory, was the purchase boundaries. of essential products. Supermarkets 3. “Part time” territory, culture and and hypermarkets appeared which then landscape — Disconnected from the local vernacular evolved to the extent of becoming major characteristics which are related to specialised commercial complexes. So, In this new metropolitan context, how the both the physical and social space, from the original idea of “food shopping” space is inhabited as well as the kinds and normally taken into consideration once a week at the hypermarket, of corresponding urban experiences, are in traditional definitions of place and consumer habits evolved to the degree of two clearly interrelated elements. On the which would be transmitted or passed “going shopping”, which clearly showed one hand, as mentioned earlier, mobility on to the landscape. a close association between consumption appears as an increasingly important factor and leisure, or between time spent when defining how to inhabit the territory. — Divorced from the common cultural shopping and free time. Put another way, it is the temporary use of substrata which binds a given metropolitan spaces which determines the community and which would make So, as people spent more and more time appropriation of the territory and how we up the equally diverse character of a in these centres, all manner of options identify with the landscape. On the one specific landscape. began to be set up to occupy this time: hand, a mobile culture, moving from live entertainment or games, nurseries and one place to another, is beginning to be — Free from the implications that have restaurants. The cinema became part of confirmed; a culture which is associated traditionally characterised the city as these dynamics as just another available with new kinds of cultural behaviour and the space of the civitas. In other words, item, but has ended up taking on a very habits. This is a culture of simultaneity a space suitable to be inhabited in clear leading role to the degree of giving and fast consumption which takes shape social, cultural and political terms. way to a specific, and most certainly new, in the form of cultural processes such as space typology: the multiplex centre. the increasing and elevated use of the Present day metropolitan life already This is a leisure space associated with mobile phone, and territorial processes provides examples of these characteristics. filmgoers and defined by three specific such as the increased number of territories This can be seen by looking at how people features. Firstly, a wide range of films and providing support and related to daily use spaces such as multiplex complexes showing hours, so that decision-making mobility. It is within this cultural and or low-cost flight airports, which are options are multiplied and much more territorial stage where the definitions of already a part of the new social map that flexible. Secondly, a large number of city and urban society, inspired by — in comprises places and moments in time screen rooms which take up less space the words of Giorgio Piccinato (1993)— defined by multiplicity and flexibility. and smaller seating capacity compared “the concentrated universe” of the to the dimensions and seating capacity industrial city or density as the principle of the tradition urban cinema. Thirdly, the attribute of urban areas, are clearly 4. Redefining living spaces and possibility of combining going to the inadequate. Consequently, definitions of landscapes for consumption: the cinema with other leisure activities. concepts such as inhabitant, living space, multiplex as a metaphor Accordingly, multiplex centres offer greater district, community, local culture, and choice when it comes to the object of the vernacular etc., are becoming less As stated earlier, the new structure of consumption, the cinema, but, above relevant, and at the very least need to be metropolitan mobility is typified by a all, when it comes to the place and time. reformulated in a context where flexibility global increase in the number of journeys Furthermore, a multiplex space includes and mutability in behaviour describe a people make and which increasingly multiple options in addition to the cinema. metropolitan individual that inhabits cities cover greater distances. In addition the Previously, these leisure alternatives of variable geometric dimensions set growing and indiscriminate use of the tended to have their own location in against an equally variable geography. car has had a clear impact on consumer the city and spread out across different models and, as a consequence, on areas, but in the multiplex space they are But if this mobility between places is the lifestyles. It is becoming more and more concentrated and contiguous. factor which is increasingly characterising the case that consumer trends which metropolitan life, how can one develop were traditionally linked to the city, the Multiplex spaces operate like space-time a sense of belonging to one place in a most densely urbanised territory, are compressors, to the degree that leisure cultural and territorial context defined in beginning to materialise in sites located becomes a flexible, ambiguous and elastic this manner? between cities which are well linked space-time. Multiplex spaces perhaps by the motorway network. From this represent a space typology that best People inhabit and appropriate different gallery of spaces that make up these new illustrates the characteristics of how a territories, but precisely because of their metropolitan landscapes, a particularly territory is used at present because they new mobility models, they do so from noticeable feature is the leisure areas are indifferent to place and independent in the basis of belonging to a place that is which act as mobility magnets, capable terms of time. This is the perfect metaphor analogous and standardised. Although of amassing large concentrations of the for the landscape production process, the territories they frequent or inhabit are population during very specific time equally independent of places and their not the same, the sense of place which slots (such as weekends), as if they history, as opposed to metropolitan they experience is, in contrast, extremely were part-time cities. Spaces such as spaces. similar and comparable. This is a sense of theme parks, shopping malls or outlet place which is compatible with the logic of stores, thus temporarily alter population All that is found in multiplex centres is a part time. So, in the same way that living density in metropolitan regions. A hidden response to the logic of standardisation space takes physical form based on the cartography emerges on a regular basis at and analogy: the tickets for the cinema portion of territory where one lives, works given moments in time, and in this map which include a “happy meal”, drinks and or visits, the feeling of belonging to a a conspicuous feature is the new multi- snacks to take away, or being able to rely place is also constructed from the basis of screen cinemas because of their ability on a wide variety of films, etc. These are segments of living time which are equally to attract metropolitan leisure-seekers features that you can find in any multiplex fragmented and discontinuous. Both a characterised by their continuous flow and centre and which offer an absolute feeling of place and the time factor reveal high visit rates. guarantee of an analogous behaviour that

96 / Papers 47 / can be likewise replicated indefinitely at typically used for summer holiday or between a waiting room and a cocktail any other new point in the territory. This is national flights. These infrastructures bar lounge. Windows with curtains or the very same standardisation and analogy have not only increased their position in smiling uniformed waitresses bearing we can find at any motorway toll, petrol airport rankings but have also generated menus illustrated the narrow consumer station-shop or airport. We have mobility suburban growth, economic activities market sector covered by passenger landscapes constructed in a discontinuous and transformations regarding land use airline transport. However, throughout manner but which share a common nature: structures in their surrounding areas. This the course of the last thirty years, the the explicit autism as regards place and the is a development that further underlines growing number of travellers has meant implicit recreation of new codes of how the organising role of the territory which, a wider range of user types, particularly society uses space, and directly related to as stated earlier, is in the hands of due to fixed holidays and recent options the culture of mobility mentioned earlier. medium-sized cities or those outside the to fly to new destinations. The present- more central metropolitan belts -the very day success of low-cost flights has meant Low-cost airports are the last and territories which are the first choice for the end of this “social levelling” process most recent example of the dynamics low-cost airports in Europe. mentioned above and has taken the limits of landscape production, if only for of air transport to new levels. But, if we the spectacular expansion they have look beyond figures themselves, cheap undergone and the global levels they have 6. “Easy-going” culture: low- flights have also meant a more familiar reached, at least in the context of Europe. cost mobility and identity in the use, almost daily and domestic, of the It is these that I would now like to turn to. “subrurban” landscape air transport infrastructure which is very similar to the experience characterised The appearance of low-cost flights by suburban or commuter trains. This 5. A new “low-cost” geography in should not be considered only in becomes evident when we see how users urban Europe terms of economic perspectives or the take their own food, travel with gifts they transformation of the territory, but also have bought in another place or use the At present European cities show how that there is a very clear cultural content. journey as time to work or for personal urban centrality and accessibility between While access to low-cost flights may entertainment thanks to their laptop territories are a source of inspiration for be the explanation for the expansion computer. planning policies and strategies, just of the market of air transport users to as much, if not more, than planning include new and more numerous fringes Third, the habit of low-cost flying has not growth and expanding built up space. In of the population, the cultural elements been incorporated into the metropolitan this territorial context, where mobility introduced by low-cost geography to the experience of individuals as something management (passengers, goods and metropolitan experience deserve to be new or unknown, but rather quite the information) carries as much weight as taken into consideration. With this in mind, opposite: it rounds off a wide range of the distribution of population density, a I would like to consider three main issues. situations characterised by a high degree new geography is emerging from urban of standardisation. It is an experience development. This new geography is less First, both individual and collective where perceptions of the territory are dependent on physical distances and perceptions of physical distances are constructed on similar, and particularly, much more dependent on the accessibility shrinking as a result of the wide range of comparable urban situations. As I of transport networks and being able to mobility possibilities offered by low-cost mentioned before, all the motorway tolls make connections between multi-modal flights. So, studying questions such as are used in an analogous manner in the transport means. In short, the centrality weekend leisure activities, for example, same way that all the airports adhere to of cities and urban spaces are assessed in is beginning to provide specific data one spatial and iconographic design which relation to these thresholds of accessibility, about how low-cost flight availability welcomes a behaviour which is surely where motorways, high-speed trains, ports has increased the territorial span of non- generic. and airports make the territory more or essential mobility, particularly in the less attractive depending on this network. young adult population. The low-cost Low-cost flight airports are an obvious In this new map of the financial cost of flight experience in fact fits perfectly response to the logic of this “easy” travelling between cities, the impact of with a whole series of young adult standardisation, which Easyjet adopted by the so-called “low-cost” airlines has iconography which emphasises values including the word as part of the company been a key element to understanding two such as flexibility, constant change and name -a slogan later copied and adapted phenomena which, although nothing new maximum mobility. Images of this can be in all its franchise sales points. This is a per se, do represent an economic, social seen clearly in advertising campaigns for standardisation which, as I commented in and territorial dimension hitherto unknown. mobile phones, which are equally aimed the case of multiplex centres, illustrates at consumers in the same age range. the malleability of time and the ductility of First of all, a change in the number of They make reference to an entire cultural space in physical and real terms. people who travel by plane. While it is universe linked to experiences which range true to say that commercial flights have from contact with audiovisual support Finally, low-cost flight airports constitute a history of their own, the exponential (videogames being the prime example), a new moment in this process which growth in the number of passengers to the elevated use of telematics (such has placed mobility at the centre of the and the number of flights recorded in as the internet). So, through habits which urban experience. Rather than a residual European airports, they also reveal a clear are starting to become a daily feature, element of density, mobility has now “social levelling” of airline passengers. such as using email or a mobile phone, become a way of inhabiting the territory. This can be explained to a large degree direct contact with “real time” through Mobility is what shapes the space and by the significant number of low-cost telecommunications is becoming a part of style of life, assigns new values to how operators today and how extremely active metropolitan life, existing side by side with we perceive landscapes, and accordingly they are.1 Secondly, airports have gained the experience of “historical time” of the determines a feeling of belonging to a protagonism in the metropolitan space territory and places. place which is just as fragmented (if not and have become focal points that attract more) as the territories on which it is economic exploitation and have brought Second, the low-cost flight experience constructed. As regard the specific shape about strategic growth patterns between equally implies use of air transport on a the landscape is taking on, the new “low- different cities. more massive scale. It is quite surprising cost” culture reveals the emergence of to review the publicity campaigns and different situations that are transforming This effect of centrality is, relatively advertisements by airlines in the 1960s, metropolitan landscapes: busy airports speaking, more important in the case in which the decor is shown almost as if and a growing hierarchy located “in the of regional airports that until now were for an interior design spot: somewhere countryside”; accelerated changes to

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 97 the landscape which affect its ability This is the result of two parallel and explain the present-day hypervisibility of to represent territories and identify simultaneous trends that make up their mobility landscapes. If, on the one hand, local cultures; a strange hybridisation own system. it is mobility which progressively gives among the characteristic elements of meaning to the processes of relationship, suburban landscapes and the most basic First, there is a multiplicity of places and appropriation and identification between iconography of an agrarian world which is territories which end up forming living the individual and the landscape and, on still present in a countryside undergoing space, to the degree that there is a shift the other hand, the landscapes related to urban development at an accelerated rate; from that feeling of belonging to place habitation are abandoning their function of or a relationship between individual and whose reference is a single landscape, to explaining the social and cultural content landscape which can be better understood another multiplied and fractured sense of of this relationship, then one could suggest since it has become mobile and changing belonging. This is built on the basis of that mobility landscapes, those which are than all that understood as fixed and fragments of space and time of a specifically related to the management stable. These are tendencies which give metropolitan nature which are recognised of mobility flows or providing support for shape to a new “subrurban” landscape by perceptive memory precisely from this mobility, are where we now have to which reveals a new generation of the perspective of mobility and not being search out the way in which relationships peripheries in European metropolises. there. In other words, it is this very same are established between society and mobility which links these fragments and landscape. appropriates them to shape this new sense 7. Conclusions: society and landscape of belonging associated with an equally A far cry from marginal stretches, mobility in mobility territories new living space, difficult to delimit but, landscapes represent the privileged stage whatever the case, not determined only by where, at present, the identity of the On the basis of what has been suggested the place where one lives. people and the culture of the places are so far, two final arguments can now be put being negotiated. forward which refer to the way in which Second, the immense capacity nowadays we explain the links between society and to replicate and clone landscapes in 1 “Low-cost” flights are certainly not a new landscape. different places means that the association phenomenon as they have an obvious precedent between place and landscape is certainly in the charter flights which began in the 1960s. First, at the beginning of this article I less clear and has become a cloudy link, posed questions which have a strong or at least easily interchangeable on both bearing on the territorial behaviour sides of the association. Put another of all communities and, therefore, way, if it is both possible to recreate Renovating landscape any landscape in a given place and the key questions when it comes to planning in the new understanding the links that are opposite, then any place can host a given metropolitan parks established between a community and a landscape. This means that all landscapes landscape. On the one hand, the type of can be associated with all places: the economy and the ways of exploiting the replication of beaches from Bali in the Enric Batlle i Durany natural resources which have historically Berlin leisure centre Tropical Island; the ski transformed the territory and have given slopes inside the Xanadú shopping mall in Introduction shape to the landscape. On the other Madrid; the cloning of the streets of New hand, the characteristics of housing Orleans in the south wing of the Trafford Nature in the city, typically in the form construction and the corresponding Centre shopping mall in Manchester, the of parks, is a prime example of how structure of the settlement and the formal language of oriental architecture the popular spirit associates images of building typology. So, the model, forms rehashed in fast consumption versions longed-for landscapes with public space. and guidelines for mobility which typify inspired by One Thousand and One Nights Joseph Rykwert, in his article “The the life of a community would be equally imposed upon second home urbanisations garden of the future, between aesthetic important in this explanation about the on the Mediterranean coast; or the and technology”,1 invites us to resolve nature of the landscape seen in terms of a standardisation which is clearly visible one of the clearest challenges of our social and cultural construct. in the restoration of historical centres and Jewish ghettoes in Eastern Europe, times: “Bring nature to the city, and put nature at the service of the citizen.” Second, as a consequence of the present- which end up reproducing urban design The relationship between city and day importance of population mobility programmes that are surely similar and nature has lead to numerous examples within a territory, the emergence and predictable. These are but a few examples, of public space which are the result of dramatic development of landscapes, different moments in a global sequence the complexities of literally transporting directly related to or having strong links of landscapes characterised by the easy, natural models to the city for public with managing and providing support for indifferent and common transposition with use, or the clear contradiction between this mobility, poses a thought-provoking place. these urban uses and the nature areas or hypothesis which could be formulated as images of nature these models attempt follows: is it possible that the multiplication But if the landscape is no longer peculiar preserve. In this article I would also like to of mobility landscapes might represent, to a place, but rather in some way can highlight this key public space paradigm, in reality, a break with the traditional way flow and manifest itself in a multiplicity and help to find urban, ecological and in which individuals have related to the of places, then this means that there aesthetic meanings that our future open territory and identified themselves with is no necessity to relate to, appropriate spaces will require. the landscape? or identify with that landscape in a specific place. In other words, a kind Finding a new meaning for open By way of answer to this question, and by of “relocation” of the process which metropolitan spaces allows for planning way of conclusion, I would like to make the creates the link between the individual city projects from the perspective of a following remarks. and landscape through place. It is as if the landscapes had gone “on strike” new continuity model. We are no longer dealing with the traditional compact city We can establish that the relationship and had resigned from the job they were and its streets, squares avenues and parks, between individuals and a given landscape, traditionally assigned. but rather a new vision, the dispersed that which characterises the place where city, where new open spaces can act as they live and which supposedly should be These two simultaneous processes, the a cohesive factor, become accessible and able to interpret and refer to questions of a new role of mobility in configuring living be the new strategy which defines the social nature such as their own culture and spaces and the feeling of belonging to a shape the metropolis takes on, perhaps identity, is at present a weak relationship. place that is paradoxically relocated, in fact even resulting in a new stratum which

98 / Papers 47 / superimposes itself on the multiple strata typologies: from the forests of the corridors which would link the different of construction and meaning which make metropolis to urban agriculture, and from spaces of natural interest in up metropolitan reality. land drainage systems to environments the metropolis. with added value. The third section In this new relationship between city and proposes recovering urban, ecological and By way of illustrating the possibilities territory, where the city is metropolis and metropolitan continuity via an open space of this kind of development within open space is one of the basic strata in programme as a new regional planning the context of neighbouring urban its makeup, ecology laws will have to be tool to cope with the inevitable urban environments, I would like to give two respected, environmental alternatives sprawl phenomenon. examples from the town council level, reinvented, new paths will have to be but which are a positive contribution sought within the agroforestry world in to complementing the metropolitan metropolitan areas and, of course, we 1. Planning and urban parks ecological matrix. These examples are the will have to know how to incorporate all system of parks in Sant Cugat del Vallès of these issues into urban and territorial The most common form of urban planning and the Sant Climent to Viladecans urban planning projects of which they will be an here in Catalonia in recent years has corridor torrent. integral part. This stratum that begins from been, and still is, to develop relatively the landscape and runs through all levels, small sectors according to an urban model In both cases these are proposals that from the metropolis to the city, either (a partial plan or similar) which tackles attempt to establish a system of parks revitalising major geographical features problems specifically linked to that spot within the city, taking advantage of the of our landscape, or rescuing or inventing according to previously established voids generated by the city as it has taken small landscape phenomena found parameters and guidelines. Land set aside over land. In both cases, these voids are everywhere, or that could be found. for open spaces and facilities accounts for torrents that have been turned into new between 30% to 50% for the sector’s open spaces in the city and have given rise Landscape architects work from a surface area. to continuities for pedestrians that were perspective which is found in a third inconceivable before. approach: trying to explore the possibilities The typical land development process of landscape planning, somewhere focuses planning on the logic behind These systems of parks have become between the high-handed attitude of new street plans or the best property the best regional planning project option industrial society and the ingenuous development option, therefore, making to begin the future development of these attitude of ecologist movements. This open spaces and facilities available cities, and offer three clear advantages in third viewpoint is not resigned to generally takes on a very secondary and a single operation: first, the city acquires apocalyptic visions which forewarn the fragmented role within this logic. Another many open spaces and the natural values end of public space or the destruction of common tendency is to consider these of the original territory are preserved; genuine urban spaces for everyone. Such spaces from the logic of a very local second, they allow for controlled city concerns are well-argued by Margaret perspective, related to already existing growth with the addition of new districts Crawford in her Narratives of loss,2 which urban fabrics or as a new centre for a which round off the previous urban predicts that the only open or free spaces proposed urban fabric. continuum and which define the borders of possible in the future will be private open the system of parks; and third, a sequence spaces (shopping malls, leisure areas, These urban development plans encourage of spaces is secured which connects the theme parks and tourist spots, etc.) or breaking up open spaces into various inner city to neighbouring natural spaces. mobility spaces (motorways, train stations, pieces which are scattered around the The link between new city growth and ports, airports, etc.). outskirts of locations considered ideal establishing systems of open urban for property development. A common spaces offers a further clear advantage: it This third approach gives rise to new tendency is to reject the possibility of facilitates joint financing of the entire area. landscapes, but not those which result in exploiting already existing geographical or artificially preserving some form of nature landscape features in the location, and so In Sant Cugat del Vallès, the embryo of (or some relative historical representation they establish a new order that will be built the system of parks allows for a route of agricultural) which is fated to lose the according to the dictates of the projected that runs from the city centre to either personality we assign to it today. This is streets and buildings, and consequently the Torre Negra agricultural park and the what Oriol Bohigas claims is the case for new open spaces will have to be designed Collserola Park, or as far as Sant Llorenç urban culture in his book, La ciutat, refugi from new criteria which are undetermined del Munt crossing the hypothetical Vallès del paisatge (The city: the landscape’s when the sector is being planned. green corridor. refuge).3 Models for developing autonomous In Viladecans, the open spaces that have The present-day renovation of landscape pieces of land have regularly left out the been generated around the Sant Climent planning employs very different views surroundings, whether the city that has torrent have established a sea-mountain of reality which, in principal, are very already been built or the nearby landscape, route which both breaks and joins with heterogeneous: designing public space, rejecting the possibilities of open spaces the entire municipality. On the one hand, the environment, regional planning, as transitions between densely populated they are linked to the Garraf natural park agroforestal management or regulating cities which needed green zones and system and, on the other hand (seaward), natural resources. These are superimposed nearby natural or agricultural landscapes they come into contact with the Llobregat in an effort to define new open space which were losing their meaning and agricultural park and with the nature models for a sustainable city. value. reserves of the Delta.

In an attempt to look closer at the A more sustainable urban planning In Sant Cugat del Vallès, various open possible role of open spaces in the model should pose a unitary and grouped spaces resulting from independent urban context of metropolitan areas, this article treatment of all the open spaces of a development operations have ended is organised into three sections: planning new sector, it should find a layout in the up giving shape to a system of parks, and urban parks; the new metropolitan territory that would promote transition despite the fact that there was no formal open spaces; and urban, ecological or change between the already-built city municipal plan to that effect. Spaces of and metropolitan connectivity. The first and the nearby landscape, it should take different typologies have ended up finding section analyses the links between the advantage of the existing geographical or a unity in continuity and the vegetation, planning model used and the resulting landscape features as generators of new to the degree of achieving a unification types of parks. The second section open spaces, and it should try to connect of an agricultural valley reconverted into gives examples of new open space these spaces to potential ecological a system of parks: the Central park the

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 99 open spaces of an urban development much more detailed urban and landscape forestry production management, nor (Monestir park) and the park which study was able to identify the possibility promoting static conservation without runs along a torrent (Rambla del Celler of transforming this thin thread (which any kind of management. Intensive forest park). In the case of the Central park and proposed urban planning projects had management favours planting fast-growing the Rambla del Celler park, the original almost erased from the map) into the trees, with continual forest renewal geographic feature, the torrent, has most important geographical feature in the and a preference for regular and single become the centre of the park and the sector, capable of heading the municipal crop spaces. In contrast to this kind of organising characteristic for the entire government’s most ambitious urban planning, management systems can be sector. In the case of Monestir park, a planning project and gaining sufficient set up which promote forest diversity and conventional urban model has eliminated momentum to become the system structural complexity, with uneven masses all the previous landscape features and of urban open spaces the city was of trees comprising different species and has encouraged the breaking up of open looking for. varying surface areas. With this kind of spaces into quite fragmented pieces which management one can foment positive only recover some kind of unity through exploitation of the natural resources while the visible presence of vegetation. 2. The forests of the metropolis respecting the beauty and environmental role of the forest. In Viladecans, the municipal impetus Urban land use only accounted for 16% to recover the Sant Climent torrent has of the surface for the Barcelona region in The Parc du Sausset in the banlieue become a global plan which dictates all 1992,4 and 25% in terms of potential urban of Paris, is an excellent example of future projects along the course of the land use according to prevailing planning in a practical park built on the basis of torrent. The design of this park is based on 1998. Despite the significant percentage recovering agroforestry systems as urban the logic of the natural system of torrents of free land, this is not the feeling one gets systems capable of being used in the and has mapped out a park system which when travelling through the metropolis, public spaces of the new metropolitan crosses the entire city, taking advantage because within this remaining 75% a major context. This park, designed by a team of all the spaces it encounters and which portion corresponds to areas where use led by Michel Corajoud, is not a case of is turning into green link between the is non-regulated, abandoned agricultural defining a final image, but instead has mountain and the sea. areas or poor quality agricultural land. set up a construction process for the So, the infrastructures cut the remaining park which still continues. In Sausset, In these two examples, upper level open spaces into shreds and highlight this agriculture is not something that derives planning did not originally anticipate these feeling of there being little space available. from the designer’s romantic recollections, options, and partial urban development But the space does exist and could be but rather is the driving force behind plans opted for scattered open spaces used in coherent planning policies that the park and has resulted in a system located according to more conventional attempt to avoid undifferentiated urban of metropolitan forests. Rather than urban planning logic. The result serves continuums that in the long run will make proposing the preservation of some as an illustration of how these ideas can it impossible to connect the various natural existing natural value, instead a new nature be turned into reality while maintaining areas, or the various areas that could be has been constructed. Rather than using all the other urban parameters. The two integrated, into the a network of open water as a decorative device, instead it has systems of parks have been financed by metropolitan spaces. become the answer to new environmental the private sector, but under municipal problems and has led to the creation control which oversees the execution of Cities can make use of the forest as a of new water ecosystems. Rather than these projects. Viladecans is a particularly basic material to recover degraded urban employing geometry to establish new striking example if we remember that interstices: on a large scale, as a means to architectural forms, instead it has been prior to this plan there was a proposal populate extensive surface areas, setting used to create a new landscape. from the ecologist association Depana, up all manner of ecological links; and on which proposed a green corridor between a small scale, as a living reminder of the The idea here is to forest the metropolis Garraf and the marshes of the Llobregat forests that we yearn for. Metropolitan through sturdy management systems delta, located between the urban nuclei forests can be accountable in financial and new ideas that attempt to produce of Sant Boi del Llobregat and Viladecans terms, incorporating different types of rich and beautiful forests; self-sufficient itself. This corridor took advantage of an urban farming: from agriculture integrated metropolitan forests which could continue empty interstice between the two urban into the concept of the forest (controlled to generate environmental and social nuclei and became the natural boundary exploitation of the forest or traditional benefits; forests which we will see as which justified the possible expansion of plantations in the forest clearings), to having added value, not residual value. In Barcelona airport. more intensive productive agriculture that the words of Martí Boada, the forest, “Is could occupy large extensions of land not marginal”.5 This corridor never became a reality. (protected designation of origin vineyards, A number of industrial estates tree nurseries or agricultural parks). programmed into the development Metropolitan forests and urban agriculture 3. Urban agriculture project made it impossible as they took are profitable at a local level because they up significant urban stretches in both provide wood, food products or leisure Urban agriculture is our response to the municipalities. When the Viladecans spots. In addition, they can be profitable at fascination of natural and agricultural municipal authorities considered the a global level because they absorb carbon spaces that we value, or spaces that have possibility of a similar idea, it was already dioxide and can counteract climatic change made up the image of landscapes we too late to develop options at this level. because they retain water, control erosion want to preserve. Agricultural images can But, a much more detailed analysis and and prevent floods; and because they become the images of our contributions; more open-minded thinking focused become a source of biodiversity. and they can be the basis of new images discussion on a minor geographical feature that we can generate through new right in the middle of the municipality: Urban forests require multiple land use strategies. Agricultural processes are the Sant Climent torrent. The torrent management that would simultaneously part of the land culture, they are the ideal did not correspond to the dimensions of promote public use of these areas and system for managing these landscapes, the green corridor proposed by Depana, the production of raw materials in the and the strategy that allows these spaces but it ran uninterrupted between Garraf same place. In order to put such a system to be organised according to their kind and the Delta, being the most common into effect we need to overcome the of land management, giving rise to new geographical link between the valleys traditional dilemma between production images —changing over time— which of the Parc Natural del Garraf and the and preservation. It is neither a question allow us new ways of relating to the city marshes on the edge of the airport. A of setting up systems of intensive where they are located.

100 / Papers 47 / Humanity’s desire to harness nature, Second, to encourage the preservation of minor topographical depression which whether as a source of food, medicine all the land drainage systems and to store would then become another integral part or contemplation, has resulted in the available water volume at all stages would of this fundamental project. development of an array of farming lead to new humid landscapes linked to techniques and services, which have later the forests, agricultural zones and the Land drainage systems would become evolved from agriculture to decorative new urban areas. Third, applying these “green routes” in very real terms because features or leisure activity areas: from measures would also mean that in the they guarantee the inescapable link irrigation systems to monumental event of heavy rainfall, water volume could between the continuity of water and fountains, from terrace farming to garden be reduced at the upper course levels of biodiversity made possible by planning terraces, from protection systems to the rivers and torrents, and also the river projects focused on contiguous areas. hedges or garden fences, from pruning flow speed could be moderated and help The continuity of water and biodiversity to increase production to topiary art. If to prevent all manner of floods. This would could be complemented by possible agriculture is one of the origins of the not only palliate present-day problems but routes available to citizens via paths that garden, then it follows that after a long also give added value in the form of quality follow land drainage systems or connect period of extreme artificiality and lost landscapes and environment: increasing to nearby urban fabrics. A land drainage roots, one could think that parks can forest mass, exploiting irrigation channels, system project sets before our eyes the return to agriculture, be agriculture, improving ground water levels, reducing continuity of a drop of water, a bird, a boar and recover their former horticultural soil erosion, creating new humid areas that has got lost, added biodiversity, clean character. and potential ecosystems, and the air, a green citizen and everything else that possibility of generating new landscapes could be compatible with these principles. One particular case of urban agriculture is in the areas surrounding our rivers allotments located in public land in peri- and torrents. Fourth, putting various urban areas. Although they are considered measures into effect at the same time 5. Environments with added value as marginal in areas such as the Barcelona could be, in the case for Catalonia, the metropolis, this is one activity which, best water management strategy to Environments with added value are the if carefully regulated and even suitably avoid meaningless projects and actively result of carrying out the best possible promoted, can contribute to structuring involve the entire country in water-related study on the environmental impact of the peri-urban areas, generating laudable problems. Furthermore, this would project we want to put into effect in the landscapes and satisfying the needs of add clear economic benefits to evident territory. They are the positive balance many people. Examples of this can be ecological advantages that are not only from a positive interaction between the seen in the outskirts of many central viable but could even be indispensable. planning project and the natural potential and northern European towns and cities. of the landscape which it has to manage. Private allotments can be compatible with Rediscovering watercourses through land Environments with added value are spaces traditional open spaces or incorporated drainage systems allows us to bring to that can complement the natural and into new metropolitan open spaces. spotlight the notion that indiscriminate land public spaces in the metropolis. Transforming this avocation, removing it occupation has discarded: the continuity from marginal spaces and relocating of outdoor spaces. If we rediscover These environments can be a value added it in suitable locations where it can be watercourses we will be able to recover to a given land development project regulated, is something which needs to the ecological continuity of land drainage which is in progress. The impact of land be done, but we can also see it as a good systems and we will have taken the first development projects is often regarded solution to shaping to our open spaces. step towards the continuity needed in as always damaging to the landscape and Many European cities are going back to our metropolis. If the only stratum with that it is therefore necessary to ascertain the policy of including allotments in public continuity in the present-day dispersed city the impact on the environmental so parks, thus reclaiming the tradition begun is the infrastructures, then remembering that subsequent necessary corrective in Germany at the end of the 19th century. that land drainage systems can also measures can be taken. As Ramon Folch provide continuity will help us to begin states in his book, Que lo hermoso sea constructing a new stratum composed of poderoso 6 (Oh, that the beautiful were 4. Land drainage systems all the metropolitan open spaces. powerful), these measures unfurl as follows: Land drainage projects begin from the Recovering land drainage systems entails premise that water is a basic resource and designing a rational water cycle, which “The last chapter in this process begins when their primordial objective is to maintain and in turn makes water processes visible the civil construction work is coming to an protect a flow of clean water. The point to citizens and leads to a new urban end, although it can continue long after it is here is to rethink something we already ecosystem composed of water collecting finished. This is the healing of the wounds know: without the river or land drainage, areas: small reservoirs, storage tanks, that have been inflicted. Attempts are made now or in the past, there would be no secondary drainage systems, various to set up screes, regenerate zones affected river valley. To understand the central role alternative water supply networks, waste- by temporary stockpiling of materials and of fluvial corridors means studying the water treatment plants and green filters. installations, build paths for animals that have entire river basin area. A comprehensive Furthermore, it would provide for an to cross this stretch, and so on. understanding of the natural system infinite range of possible spaces which, allows us to adopt a more thorough alongside the main streams, rivers and This process is far too often reduced to ecological approach and can help us to coast line could act as a framework for the summary circumstantial gardening that determine the best solutions to conflicts metropolitan hydric system. has little to do with any real attempt at that we commonly find in the more urban global restoration and, furthermore, tends to developed zones. The continuity of a land drainage system be expensive to put into effect and extremely allows for recovering original geographic expensive to maintain. What was already Storing water and irrigating the territory features when building cities. Water there has been destroyed unnecessarily and not only helps to cope with our water management seen from the these cost nothing, and what did not exist has been needs, but can also lead to generating parameters and planning spaces linked to placed there, in poor conditions, and is very new landscapes. First, this would mean this kind of management, would allow us costly.” adopting small scale water management to put into effect a system (by definition strategies: storing it so that it can be continuous) that would not only take into Environments with added value need to accumulated, slowing down the river consideration the major watercourses make sense for their own sake and they flow, irrigating the territory and controlling (rivers and torrents), but would also be need to become a landscape feature that it in forest, agricultural and urban areas. visible at all levels and would include any rises above the specific planning project

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 101 they coexist with. This means working what we could call “green infrastructures”: park is in fact the result of a landscape actively with the materials the landscape hybrid versions of a specific programme project that looks at the bigger picture and itself provides, avoiding disaster and and landscape; a new open space focused on overcoming the complexities designing with nature, confident that typology. Environments with added of the problem and hopes to develop a one is working towards a better world. value can be projects that are congruous public park for the nearby city districts. Lewis Mumford, in his introduction to the with general notions of metropolitan This park is a landscape that has been acclaimed book by Ian L. McHarg, Design open spaces or perhaps simply isolated built from the perspective of topography with nature,7 puts it in the following terms: operations related to a specific problem and agriculture, but it is also a complex which has arisen. Whatever the case, this structure right in the middle of a road “Although it is presented as a call to means contributing to building the best network intersection which is intended to action, it is not aimed at those who believe metropolitan landscape. be used as an open space. The solution in intensive programmes or immediate that was adopted attempts to link this spot solutions. Instead, what it offers us is a fresh The Roques Blanques metropolitan to a hypothetical system of outdoor spaces path made up of pebbles running over an cemetery and the Garraf land fill are two through the continuity of various rows of already existing landscape. In this book we examples of environments with added trees which enter the city accompanied by find the foundations of a civilisation which, value. Both are being developed over different motorways. This park is a “green without doubt, will replace a contaminated natural areas which make up part of a infrastructure” and the result of handling a world: terrains mistreated by major earth system of metropolitan open spaces. project with particularly difficult points of movements, dominated by machines, The cemetery is developing a complex conflict. dehumanised, threatened by explosions and programme of sepulchres in forest areas which at the moment is disintegrating and located next to Collserola, while the land The Tramvia park occupies the spaces that disappearing before our eyes. By offering fill was sited in a deep valley in the Garraf regional planning projects had originally us this striking vision of the exuberance of massif and recently has been the object of reserved for a motorway. When work organic elements and human delight which a landscape restoration programme. began on this infrastructure it was met by ecology and ecological design promise to persistent complaints from the municipal unravel, McHarg restores confidence in the The Roques Blanques metropolitan government who successfully argued idea of a better world.” cemetery is a group of gardens inside the for it being semi-covered, making land forest. Each cemetery is a small garden available for constructing a park. The Design with nature, lets us resolve these where the view of the sepulchres is park now occupies a series of previously land development programmes from the overshadowed by the features of the entire fragmented spaces that were poorly linked basis of a thorough knowledge of the landscape. This cemetery project allows for to the nearby urban fabrics, and the hope landscape’s social and cultural values and a preserving the perimeter and interstitial is that this park will become an element concern for producing programmes that forests, maintained by the cemetery, of urban connectivity and a metropolitan are able to incorporate what ecologists and implementing these new garden- forest which could cross the entire stretch already know. The recovery of degraded cemeteries which will be absorbed by the of motorway. The end result is a green spots or the old industrial sites, is an forest with the passing of time. route that connects two municipalities and opportunity to use this knowledge to a metropolitan forest that can continue to try and produce new landscapes which The Garraf land fill indiscriminately expand: the environs of an infrastructure will become part of the image of the occupied a valley in the Garraf natural park. with added value which the municipalities metropolis. The project for the final exploitation stage can continue to build on. defines the end topography that will be We could go back to the way we worked achieved and has provided for exploiting These two projects show us the before and deposit our marvellous products resulting gases as an alternative energy possibilities offered by infrastructures to on natural areas that are still uncorrupted, source. The objective of the restoration provide open spaces in the urban environs but we have already seen that our products project is to return the spot to the natural they cross through. The solutions adopted are not always compatible and that nearby park by creating a new landscape seen in here show only a part of the immense nature is often degraded as a result. The terms of a productive agricultural area. range of possibilities that could be added value of these land development A series of different farming terraces exploited if one could programme major projects could be open spaces that would outline the projected landscape and infrastructures from the perspective of help us to integrate the corresponding establish all the elements necessary to “green infrastructures”. A joint approach object into the overall framework of the regulate it, from the end of the land fill project that considers both infrastructures landscape project for that spot. stage to the crop planting that will be and the urban environs can offer a great required. deal of added value to the city and help to These open spaces could be the environs build on a system of open spaces in our best suited to correcting environmental The Trinitat intersection park and metropolises. impact, or the result of an established the Tramvia park, located within the land development project seen as if it Barcelona ring roads, are two examples were an open space. In both cases, this of the intrinsic difficulties of transforming 6. Urban, ecological and metropolitan means considering all the elements as infrastructures into “green infrastructures”. continuity a single landscape unit which groups Here we have two examples in the together a specific development project Barcelona area of projects for infrastructure The new “green systems” are built on and its surrounding areas. This unit should environs that have managed to correct the the idea of recovering lost connectivity, simultaneously dictate the features of the inadequacies of the original infrastructure but they are also built over the base of development project and the environment project. The former is the development each of the new open spaces that can be in such a way that they would be seen as of a park within a major road network established. These new open spaces (on inseparable. Environments with added intersection, while the latter project is the outskirts of the city or at metropolitan value would not only be the open spaces of attempting to develop a new landscape interstices) cannot be designed exclusively individual projects, but also those related over the covered stretch of a motorway. from a local development project to a global system of metropolitan open programme, instead they have to take on spaces, satisfying and complementing civic The Trinitat intersection park is the area and assume the role that falls to them and ecological purposes. around an infrastructure and a landscape within a hypothetical ideal system. These in itself. One could say that this park is open spaces could become part of a series A metropolitan infrastructure plan with the the result of a thorough study into the of spaces which attempt to establish some necessary installations, if approached from environmental impact of a complex and kind of connectivity or could be essential the perspective of added value, leads to necessary infrastructure project. But the for recovering degraded natural spots.

102 / Papers 47 / These new parks could also be linked to (September 1995), Journal of Architectural developed along the various main existing potential natural systems or to Education, vol. 2, no. 1, Southern California roads granting access to the city. The Institute of Architecture. new natural systems that could be set countryside, small towns, and rural 3 Bohigas, O. (1985); Reconstrucció de Barcelona, up to develop ecological values that have Barcelona, Edicions 62. settlements were upset and absorbed been nullified. 4 Acebillo, J., i R. Folch (2000); Atles ambiental de into a chaotic and irrational hodgepodge. l’àrea de Barcelona, Barcelona, Ariel Ciencia. Many logistic and infrastructure problems Building on these new green systems 5 Boada, M.; «El bosque no es marginal», El País, still afflict Italian cities. In particular the requires establishing multiple connections August 8th 1999. relationship between the periphery and 6 Folch, R. (1990); Que lo hermoso sea poderoso, or green links between the different areas Barcelona, Editorial Altafulla. the center of the cities, where the center of the city and between the different 7 Mumford, L. (1967); «Introducció». A: McHarg, I. L. remains the site of nearly all functions existing open spaces. Green links are a (2000); Design with nature, Barcelona, Gustavo Gili. and services. The transformation of modern version of Olmstead’s systems of Italy’s agricultural landscapes shows the parks or interconnecting parkways. They various phases of civilizations that have encourage walks, engender a great deal marked the country. Their division into of interest in the metropolis because they Agrarian landscapes in lots, their grid work of sharecropping allow citizens to interact with all the open the Italian metropolitan farms, have become vacant lots awaiting spaces, and they are the foundations of environment buildings or areas to place unhealthy a network which offers the possibility of The case of the South Milan industrial plants. In this manner not only being able to choose and expand routes. Agricultural Park the visual, aesthetic properties of many Italian landscapes with their historical Green links would basically be understood Fabio Renzi and cultural identities are upset but as tree spaces which could also serve also the deeper structure of ecological for draining city water. The continuity relationships is likewise traumatized. of routes for pedestrians or cyclists is ”Là dove c’era l’erba ora c’è una città, e quella This will lead to a progressive process essential, because it is essential to find casa in mezzo al verde ormai dove sarà?” of degradation of the areas surrounding good solutions for all the intersections “Where once there was grass there is a city, cities and the impoverishment and loss and junctions that will be created with and in that house in the green, where might of their biodiversity while fostering other infrastructures. Green links could it be?” particularly aggressive pollution. Such be simple urban walkways or be closer pollution particularly jeopardizes the to the ideas of an ecological corridor Il ragazzo della Via Gluck – a song by hydrographic system, putting the guaranteeing continuity of nature. Adriano Celentano groundwater at risk. Transforming these spaces into land drainage systems seen from the city 1. The years of urban expansion So the Italian cities find themselves poorer means exploiting rainwater to create humid not only find their formal and aesthetic areas that would turn green links into part Over the second half of the last century, elements, but also the social aspects, due of the system of parks and into a self- like other European countries, Italy to the lack of services and infrastructure contained natural system. Green links are underwent an intense urbanization and particularly the lack of green. another piece in the urban routes that can process which caused both a territorial be established in our cities. and social transformation. Above all this transformation altered the largest cities. 2. The community’s new demand for The metropolitan landscape has to be One need only consider that during the quality: Agrarian landscapes and constructed based on simultaneously 50’s and 60’s Turin became the largest urban parks exploiting the values of urban connectivity, “Southern” city of Italy, due to the many ecological connectivity and metropolitan immigrants from the south who came to The aggression towards our territory connectivity. Urban connectivity is work at Fiat. was facilitated by a legislative vacuum achieved from urban public space projects, that lasted more than twenty years. Only recovering the positive aspects of the This urban expansion and building boom in 1968, with the introduction of the compact city which we still wish to was carried out with little or no city urbanistic standards, did urban green areas preserve. Ecological connectivity can be planning and an emphasis on profit. The become a theme in city planning. It was built from the metropolitan interstices physical and visual results make up the a substantial step forward even though it projects, based on the inevitable environment and background of many did have its limitations. The letter and spirit application new ecological values. Italian films of the post-war period. The of the standards concentrated on more Metropolitan connectivity we have to roman countryside with its suburban quantitative and compensative aspects learn to programme given the need to towns and the new neighborhoods of the (including payments for damages) as a regulate the values of the dispersed city outskirts are seen in Pasolini’s movies. solution to the frightful deficiencies in where we live. The intentional layering of De Sica’s and Visconti’s films show the citizen services and structures. Gardens these continuities is the first tool when it beachheads on the landscapes of the and areas for sports facilities were the comes to renovating landscape planning Lombard countryside which have since dominant in the planning of public green in the new metropolitan parks, and the become the infinite city that covers the areas. It was not until some years ahead, best instrument for building a better area from Turin to Venice. Francesc Rosi’s in the 70’s and 80’s Italian city halls made metropolitan landscape. beautiful and intense film, “Le Mani sulla use of their more mature, complex and Città”, tells the story of the “sack of articulate experience. The trauma to the Public spaces can be the visible image of Naples” under Mayor Lauro (of the famous agricultural space near or between cities, metropolitan continuity. The composition shipping family). This radical and profound historical gardens, hydrographic networks of these spaces can be dispersed and change in both the physical and human rather than physical augmentation became fragmented, as a logical consequence of backdrop of the country would become a fundamental component of urban the diversity of elements that it contains; the subject of ever popular protoecologist planning. The emergence of a public and but it can also be coherent and continuous, Italian pop song, Il ragazzo della Via Gluck collective demand regarding the quality of as a direct consequence of the new ideas by Adriano Celentano. life (from workplace safety to the livability that we need to implement. of the city), and its subsequent political In almost every large Italian city, this renaissance which impacted many Italian urbanization brought about the existence administrations, led to the spread of city 1 Rykwert, J.; «El jardín del futuro, entre la estética of working class suburbs, unauthorized planning experiences aimed at the creation y la tecnología», Rasegna, no. 8. of parks both inside and beyond the city 2 Crawford, M. «Contesting the public realm: settlements and the new neighborhoods limits. struggles over public space in Los Angeles» on the city outskirts, all of which have

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 103 The city of Ferrara selected about 1,200 environmental sections: from water to It is a Park that interweaves, in a way that hectares of productive agricultural land air. The case of water is characterized by is perhaps unique in Europe, the reasons (at the time corn, wheat and beets were a torrential flow of the hydrographic net for safeguarding and protecting the prevalent) which ran from the Po river to which is unable to receive the enormous territory with the defense of an economic the northern walls of the city, with the volume waste water flushed by millions of function like agriculture which has marked aim of maintaining the direct relationship citizens and industries. The case of air is the history and development of this area. between the countryside and the city made particularly critical by northern Italy’s It is a Park that must take into account walls which dates from the end of the orography. The mountain range creates the ever growing community demand for 15th century. The setting aside this area a continuous and impervious barrier to open, useable, and culturally rich spaces, as a park (as part of the 1977 general wind ground currents. Obviously the all of which in one of the country’s most regulatory planning variation) had dual urban and infrastructure policies with their developed metropolitan areas. objective: overwhelmingly centrifugal design with resect to the city of Milan, form a formable This territory truly has nothing that can — At the territorial level, the possibility obstacle for the ecological connectivity of be genuinely defined natural. It is in fact to determine a positive relationship the territory. a constructed landscape as Cattaneo between the city and the countryside, writes, from the hydraulic works to the optimizing the agricultural employment Already in the 1970’s the first regional use of the water resources which are so of the area while also recreational use of experience were founded, which were rich in this province. The constant, hard the same area, in particular the area particularly daring in some cases. It began work of has been employed to regulate near the river. with the Regional Park of the Valley and model the course of water for its of Ticino. With over 90,000 hectares military, agricultural, and commercial and — At the urban level, the improvement of of terrain which underwent a special traffic transport value. the facilities and services located in the planification aimed at safeguarding the area next the walls, including sports, most important river flow in North Italy, Having been founded in 1990 under cultural and leisure time facilities, which brushes against the western the strong push of committees and within an organic and unified design. Milanese area. It is home to the most associations, the park must seek to important plains forest of the Po Valley safeguard the antique agricultural vocation Bologna developed the idea of a hilltop (mainly oak-hornbeam with formations of this territory, reconciling it with the park and an agricultural park near the city of elm and alder), but also extends over present need for green spaces and the which uses the hydrographic network as a particularly valued agricultural territory chance for urban citizens to socialize and a strategic element in the upkeep of the and distinguished by the cultivation of rice. enjoy themselves. It has an enormous open spaces that interrupt the continuity Immediately after it touched a stretched and yet unexplored potential to make of buildings. of land particularly assaulted be the the concept of multiuse profitable and advance of cement at the gates of Milan lucrative. The agricultural sector is called to Florence, beginning with the Cascine Park, which extends northward to the ancient invest in this concept. intervened along the Arno with a strategy geological terrace formed by river and of public spaces and equipment. glacial movement. This area is the Groane h e a n d s c a p e o f agriculture Park, instituted in 1976, and composed of T L These are just some of the events which almost 4,000 hectares of oak and sylvester The story of the grassa (Italian agricultural developed in Italian cities during that pine woods (which were cultivated there argon meaning “fertile”) agricultural period which announced the process in the period of Maria Teresa of Austria and plains south of Milan intersect with the of reevaluating agrarian landscapes as later grew wild) with large arid clearings slow, constant and systematic adaptation something more than a gap between occupied by precious heaths at the foot works realized by man to satisfy his own buildings. From a social and cultural point of the mountains. Later an urban park needs. Being both rich in water and well of view, as well as when considering was instituted within the regional park extended, the great plains of the southern practical planning, it is significant that the system, the North Milan Park, which still Milanese province had an almost certain central and northern areas of Italy were represents one of Italy’s most important destiny: to become a vast cultivation the center of this process. The south of the ecological recuperations of abandoned crossed by draining ditches, canals and country was not involved, and still today industrial areas between Milan, Sesto San farming machinery. the cities of the south remain the site of Giovanni and Cinisello Balsamo, Italy’s illegal building and aggressive urbanization. little Ruhr. Soon man realized that the hay for cows One need only think of the area near grew abundantly among the hedges and Vesuvius, the Conca d’Oro of Palermo, the rows of trees in Po valley fields. Agriculture Valley of Temples near Agrigento or the So u t h Mi l a n Agricultural Pa r k took hold of this territory and made it one agrarian landscapes of the Calabrian Coast. Certainly the bravest and most innovative of the most fertile agricultural zones in operation was that which brought the world. In the transformation of the about the institution of the South Milan terrain the Cistercian monks of the Lower Fr o m t h e Pa r k s t o t h e Sy s t e m : t h e Agricultural Park. This Park actually Milanese region with their abbies and the e x p e r i e n c e o f t h e Re g i o n o f Lo m b a r d i a embraces the entire southern sector of intense system of work and prayer played The metropolis of Milan, with over five the province of Milan, the least overcome a fundamental role. million inhabitants distributed over a by the advance of cement due to its territory that extends from the regional extremely profitable agriculture. For Through the grandiose strategy of capitol to the prealpine hills, surely centuries this area has benefited from canalization of the countryside, which represents one areas in which the gamble extremely fertile soil and an abundance connected irrigation ditches and to preserve diffuse natural environments, of wells. These were optimized with waterways, in order to make up “water landscape elements, and even the works of monumental relevance at the meadows” (fields upon which a thin layer identity of the territory is most difficult. end of first mediaeval period by the of water is present year-round, which There the urban coverage is based on an monastic orders seated in a great abbatial heats and protect during the winter, extremely compact model, where the complex: the three Cistercian abbacies allowing the flourishing growth fodder phenomenon of urban sprawl is confined of Milan of Chiaravalle, Mirasole and grasses) and the use of groundwater to the outskirts, while (especially in the Viboldone. The Park spreads over 50,000 from wells (small natural oases in the North sector of the city) the area covered hectares of primarily agricultural land in 68 countryside). The monks made this a by urban buildings can reach over 70% of municipalities, disseminating the wells and unique area from an agricultural point the total territory. This density has led to springs innervated by a dense network of of view. Even today the secular work of serious environmental crises in all of the irrigation. hydraulic-agrarian transformation of this

104 / Papers 47 / countryside is testimony to the history of the silence of the countryside circled by a been done. Take for example the giazzera this territory and extraordinarily represents network of rural streets, tow waterways, (icehouse) of Cornaredo, the agricultural the signs of transformation and the care bicycle paths (finished or being finished), museums of Albairate and San Giuliano, of the agrarian landscape. drainage ditches, canals, locks and and the restructuring of the cascine in springs. Abbies emerge, a witness to the Albairate, Assago, Buccinasco, Milan and The once dense network of water reclamation work done under the orders of Rozzano, which were transformed into meadows and springs has slowly the Chiaravalle (Cistercian), Mirasole and exposition and cultural centers. Within an disintegrated. Modern agricultural Viboldone (Humiliati) Monasteries. Agricultural Park the structure of peasant techniques have privileged cultivation origins, linked to the so-called “lesser” methods of greater productivity and Other structures remain hidden below rural architecture represents an important decreased expense in manpower. The the rice fields and water meadows. A rich cultural, educative and recreational overly costly and difficult management patrimony of monumental goods present resource. of the springs and sluices for the water in the Milanese ground is waiting of to be meadows faced the profits obtained with discovered and appreciated. The development of simple rural tourism insolates (animal fodder obtained through a which is compatible with the environment fermentation process from corn and other The presence of castles provide testimony (agro-ecological education, direct sales cereals). That is why the Park proposes of the times of the Visconti and of the of typical products, restaurants in the incentives to farmers who maintain the Sforza in this territory. For centuries ancient osterie outside the city walls, water meadows. these buildings were used to oversee the instructional walks through the traditional countryside and the agricultural work. The rural landscape, etc.) are an important path The cascine (traditional square court castles of Binasco, Cusago and Melegnano towards the revitalization and appreciation farmsteads of Lombardy) and the places are of considerable value, as are those of of the rural architectural patrimony. of peasant civilization selected offer a Cassino Scanasio (14th century), Locate perspective of the characteristic agriculture and Peschiera (15th), Buccinasco and Th e n a t u r a l l a n d s c a p e of the Park South. Macconago (16th), and Rocca Brivio (17th). The villas around Milan, which often The Park wrapping around Milan presents In the Park there are more than 1,400 developed along the waterways, were the a greater extension of agricultural areas farming enterprises which employ vacation homes or hunting lodges of the than wooded areas. approximately 4,000 workers. The area Milanese nobility during the 1700’s and of the Park is characterized as one of the 1800’s. In the beginning, there was a dense most intensive agricultural zones in the forest made up of various oaks and white nation. Beside this testimony of a most noble hornbeams, mixed with lime, elm, ash, past there is the genuine beauty of a poor maples, wild flowers and wild cherries, The raising of cows and pigs is the primary and more concrete farm, the cascine and which substituted the current landscape of activity (in terms of revenue produced) prized rural hamlets, with their annexed agricultural uniformity. with 305 farms in an area equal to 30% of icehouses for the conservation of food, the agricultural territory of the Park. and little chapels and windmills. The wetlands and riverside environments were also diffused. There were oxbows The most widespread and characteristic From amongst the cascine the fortified and meanders of the Lambro and other cultivation of the area is that of cereal agricultural complexes of Carpiano, water flows, with flowering zones on its (43% of the agricultural territory), followed Fagnano, Gudo Visconti, Tolcinasco, banks (just below the ground level of some by rice (22%) and grass(16%). There are Settala, and Coazzano emerge along with of the plains). Springs and swamps hosted minor percentages of sunflowers, soy, the rural hamlets of Cascina, Resenterio, the typical vegetation of wetlands, with vegetables, water meadows, floriculture, Selvanesco, Conigo, Cassinetta, Bagnolo, black alders, poplars and willows, as well greenhouses, poplar plantation and and Sarmazzano. Besides these, there as beds of reeds and rushes. This created wooded areas. are the ancient windmills like those of a rich ecosystem capable of supporting Bazzanella, Vione, Gudo Gambaredo; the the presence of precious fauna: herons, The safeguarding and qualification of the ancient farm structures with towered raptors, swans, egrets, wild geese, night Agro-sylvo-cultural activities is one of gates like in Dresano, Locate, and Zivido. herons and other swamp animals which the key points of the Park. That is why There are the cascine whose structures have since disappeared like the otter, one of the Park’s goals is the adaptation show their monastic origins such as in beaver, wolf, bear and deer. of “measures and initiative aimed at Colturano, Gaggiano-Vigano, Mediglia, and sustaining a progressive reduction of the Tribiano. There are interesting examples of There are however a series of green areas ecological impact of agricultural activities, 19th century neogothic cascine in Cisliano, of naturalistic area which is still spread aimed at agronomic practices which are Rozzano and Zibido. Finally the country across the territory which serves to testify more compatible with the safeguarding of villas of Bareggino, Corbetta, Gaggiano, to the unique and irrepeatable natural the environment”, that is to say organic Trenzanesio, and Vittuone are well worth wealth of the area. agriculture. mentioning. An important role is played in this area The Park occupies a surface area of There are many architectural elements by the springs. The springs are sources approximately 46,300 hectares for which, although they may not be of any of water which spout where the ground agricultural use. This agricultural territory value at all, still make up a fascinating water encounters impermeable clay spreads out like leopard spots from the testimony to rural architecture and are layers which allow the water to rise to the limits of the Park, spotted between 19,000 of a cultural significance which should surface. The water shoots out forming a hectares of urbanized territory. be maintained. They serve as a physical font that is a source which is the origin memory of the passage of the past of the so called spring. Alongside this, a systems of production. rich, flourishing vegetation develops which Th e c u l t u r a l l a n d s c a p e creates a natural oasis in the countryside. The South Milan Agricultural Park also The recuperation of the architectural and represents a cultural resource. In it, monumental goods for a use coherent The Park has selected some zones to one finds buildings of architectural and with their origins represents an enormous safeguard particularly important natural historical value distributed in the less well opportunity for the Park. Some significant resources. These are the Fontanile Nuovo known corners of the territory. Houses examples of the recuperation of the (Bareggio), Muzzetta Springs (Rodano) and buildings, witnesses to the peasant’s cascine and of other elements connected and Lacchiarella Oasis Natural Reserves. way of life and work, are supported by to the agricultural tradition have already In them there are zones which curate the

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 105 appreciation of the landscapes formed by the management of the territory in a The goals of the project, agreed upon with the integration of nature and agriculture manner to avoid the introduction of new the Region of Lombardy, concern: which are typical of the plains. It is a infrastructure and buildings that could landscape in which the main role is filled bring about a fragmentation or alteration a. The forestation of uncultivated areas by hedges and rows of trees (consider the of the rural building patrimony (except and the floristic requalification of the area west of the Park around the cities of for transformations for agricultural existing forest areas. The vegetable Cusago, Cisliano, Bareggio and Vittuone), purposes). species to put in place have been and traditional cultivations (rice, water selected from among the indigenous meadows, grass) of the “set-aside” fields b. The Natural Reserves of Fontanile plants of the Lombard plains woods by (a practice instituted and subventioned by Nuovo, Muzzetta Springs, the Woods the technicians of the Park, by ERSAF the European Union in order to limit excess of Cusago and the Lacchiarella (Regional Entity for Agriculture and agricultural production and favor, among Oasis. These are the most esteemed Forest Services) and by the Regional other things, the formation of a refuge for naturalistic areas of the Park. Center for Autochthonous Flora, which wild fauna). collaborated on the project; c. Zones dedicated to the promotion of In other zone of naturalistic the landscape. It is a zone in which b. The creation of two centers for interest, incentives are provided for agriculture assumes a particular environmental education and naturalistic naturalization interventions in the territory importance in the characterization of use near the Lake of Basiglio and the for woods and wetlands: the Woods of the landscape. Traditional cultivations, Fontanili di Rho Park; Cusago, Riazzolo, and Carengione and set-aside fields, and the improvement of the wetlands of Lamberin di Opera, the hedges and trees is promoted. They c. The reinforcement and requalification of Pasturago di Vernate and Paullo are are set up for cultural, recreational and the ecological passages of the Park. just some of the significant examples sports use. in terms of scientific interest and the During the course of the predisposition evolution of the vegetation. Additionally, These include sub-zones (“parks of of the definitive-executive project a the use of agricultural techniques which existent or projected local interest “, list of tree, bush, and grass species are more compatible with the wealth “existent and projected sports and was written up to be used in the and biodiversity of the ecosystem are recreational structures and centers”, renaturalization interventions. The supported, such as organic farming, and and “abandoned mines”) which bridge selection criteria considered the purely naturalization interventions along the the areas outside the park and the phytogeographic elements, excluding vegetation strips parallel to the course of agricultural areas of the metropolitan a priori all species that were not the river (including intervention through belt. autochthonous to the valley, as well as naturalistic engineering). the stational ecological characteristics Alongside the activities of agricultural of the project area, the ease with which enterprises in this zone, it is proposed such species take toot and the available h e e x p e r i e n c e o f o o d s in t h e c i t y a n d T W to carry out interventions aimed at the of the Center for Autochthonous Flora to t h e Ca v e Pa r k cultural, recreational and sports use of attempt, based on previous experience, The Cave Park in the eastern belt of Milan the Park. the experimentation of cultivations, and the area of the Woods in the city, particularly in regard to the herbage occupy a surface area of over 2 million d. Areas for the cultivation of mines as plants. square meters within the South Milan Park. industrial and conventional archeological sites. The activities in these areas Fr o m t h e Pa r k s Sy s t e m t o t h e e c o l o g i c a l The requalification plan issued in 1997 are regulated in accordance with the Ne t w o r k o f t h e p r o v i n c e o f Mi l a n brought the 33 initial hectares of the Cave province level plan for mines and the Park up to the current 110 hectares. The laws regarding areas connected to The newest project in the recuperation Woods in the city, which spreads over archeological value. of metropolitan landscapes is the Green 80 hectares, is one of the first examples of backs project of ecological passages urban forestation realized in Italy. It began conceived to recuperate the connection Pr o j e c t s f o r t h e So u t h Mi l a n in 1986 with the volunteer actions of the of green with the heart of the metropolis, Agricultural Pa r k environmental association Italia Nostra. setting aside spaces between urban areas It is also for this reason that it received the In the Accordo Quadro 2002 (2002 and the major axes of infrastructure. The important “Treasure of the world/ Unesco” General Agreement) between the Ministry construction of the green back requires a recognition which is given by Unesco of the Environment, the Ministry of the substantial activation of the municipalities clubs to site of particular natural, cultural Treasury, Budget and Economic Planning through the institutions of the Local parks and social interest which are cared for and and the Region of Lombardy funds were of Supermunicipal Interest. recuperated with the full cooperation of the made available for projects in the regionally local community. Despite the extraordinary protected areas, aimed at the acquisition These types of parks, only foreseen in success and the notable recognition, of areas of naturalistic value, requalification the regional legislation of Lombardy, are today, this precious urban green area is projects, studies in fauna or the areas that are realized from the round up, threatened by urbanistic pressure. environments which produce reports and from initiatives from the municipalities management plans for the conservation of called to coordinate amongst themselves habitats and species. for the urbanistic safeguarding of the Th e Pl a n n i n g territory. 17 supermunicipal parks have Through the Piano Territoriale di Among the projects planned, the Park been instituted in the province of Milan Coordinamento or PTC (Territorial Plan and the Region have agreed upon the alone (70 in all of Lombardy), and many of of Coordination) the South Milan guidelines and the end of the project named these are actually areas left over Agricultural Park has selected different Ecological requalification interventions – from the urban advance, often lacking “types” of territory or zones: Forestation and floral requalification of the their own naturalistic value, but deserving South Milan Agricultural Park. During the of protection as a “benchmark” in the a. Agricultural territory in the metropolitan preliminary drawing up of the project, the ecological project of the province of Milan. belt and green areas of the urban belt 61 municipalities of the Park were called It is not so much to safeguard the These are the areas dedicated to upon to collaborate and make available natural environment but to reconstruct professional agricultural activities city lands (when the cities had such land a natural trauma which has been lost in closet proximity to the city. The available), where such interventions could over the last few decades through the agricultural activity is preserved through be carried out. disorganized occupation of the terrain,

106 / Papers 47 / and to create a new natural metropolis. non-urbanised territories to enrich the connections that link the various nuclei at Initiative have already been identified structures of major cities. In other words, a local and territorial level. They trace the which, beyond the institutional activation, ignoring the Country-Town tension. directions in which these nuclei develop, call the community and citizen’s how they are expressed as a system of associations into play. New woods are When Geddes, biologist and precursor of cities, and at the same time constitute the already growing in North Milan, thanks to modern theories about the metropolis, basis for terrestrial communications and the efforts of volunteers, school groups, tries to explain to us the basis of this supply lines at a regional level. and elderly groups. Often these have often overlooked Country-Town approach, been coordinated and encouraged by he resorts to the example of a valley The Besòs and Llobregat river basins, in associations such as, above all others, the which, as a synthesis, illustrates the fact, constitute a stretch of the natural Circoli della Legambiente. capacity of environmental features to route that enters the Iberian Peninsula give order to land development. A valley from Europe. Hannibal with his army and provides tangible evidence of an already elephants crossed the Martorell gorge as existing order in the territory which did Augustus later; the same point was Recovering metropolitan urban development strategies have to the dividing line between what would later river landscapes understand if we want to avoid wasting be Medieval Catalonia and the territory The project for recovering the economic resources and wreaking occupied by the Moors for almost two Llobregat river environment and aesthetic havoc. In other words, what is centuries; and, once again, the gorge was landscape in the Baix Llobregat region called for here is the need to articulate an to be the pass through which Napoleon’s organic relationship between urban areas troops commanded by Saint-Cyr entered Ramon Torra i Xicoy and their metropolitan environs, which the peninsular during the Spanish War of Antoni Farrero i Compte at the same time opens up the debate Independence. So, it comes as no surprise Victor Ténez i Ybern. about the potential of the environment to that nowadays the Llobregat river is play an active part in the structure of the accompanied by three double line railway metropolitan city. networks, a motorway, an expressway How should we embark upon an and at least two secondary road networks understanding of the city in relation to the Almost one century later, Geddes’ (the BV-2002 and the N-340) which countryside? (...) warnings about the dangers of are, nonetheless, very important for the uncontrolled urban sprawl left to the metropolitan area, in a strip of land that is After a little study we can move on to the devices of the Town-Country logic quickly little over one kilometre wide. generalisation of the “valley section” (...) come to mind when we consider a metropolitan river such as the Llobregat: In the case of major infrastructures such as This profile is associated with a diagrammatic from the urban perspective it is the vestige the AP-7 motorway, the A-2 expressway representation related to the early occupations of a road running through the territory, a or the High Speed Train line, they have conditioned by this relief. level location suitable for building over been planned out according to the criterion more or less organised grids and it even of reducing impact on urban fabrics. The This serves as an introduction to the rational constitutes a precarious, but practical, result of all this is a river trapped between geography of cities from the point of view of drainage and sewage system (albeit a giant system of banks which support its regional origins. To begin with, they can said with certain irony). The river also these infrastructures and protect the be better studied and understood if we start provides a vast extension which is a kind settlements from floods, even though by from the valley and its resulting occupations of paradigmatic “vague terrain”: although doing so they have inevitably confined with the consequential types of human not always a river as such, it will be from the river within a reduced and isolated settlements (...) time to time as it runs between wider fluvial space from an ecological and public and narrower avenues. This is a space perspective. This principle of “geographic control” is of which is resistant to the processes of land vital importance both for understanding cities development, yet difficult to classify and It should be remembered that the as well as the layout of new cities; and their far too often left abandoned to its destiny Llobregat Valley has not just attended to disastrous violation, (...) is an important cause of becoming marginalised. the need to sustain a flow of vehicles: a of constant economic waste and aesthetic huge number of installations, the majority havoc. So, recovering the river does not simply buried, take advantage of unoccupied mean asking how we can preserve it in the spaces with gentle slopes. All manner of «The valley section», Patrick Geddes face of urban development which tends channels supplying substances, energy to degrade it, but, first and foremost, or information wind their way alongside In Cities in Evolution,1 Patrick Geddes understanding how the river can enhance a large number of hydraulic waste pipes. suggests that when considering cities the metropolitan city. There can be no Generally speaking, these tend to be that spread across the territory we should strategy for halting the adverse effects of discrete but they can be determining begin from the two-way tension between river urban development which does not factors for operations such as planting two approaches to the matter: that which contemplate making use of the river in the forest zones, excavations or managing is based on the Town-Country tension city. The history of the urbanisation water drainage or filtering for the territory, and the opposite, or corresponding of the river and the civil engineering works etc. approach, the Country-Town tension. to make use of the river in the Barcelona metropolitan area are the topics elaborated Although time and translations of Th e r i v e r : p r o v i d e r a n d b a s i s o f a c t i v i t i e s his work have come and gone, this on over the following pages. consideration by Geddes’ still holds As Xavier Latorre explains in his book, true when we talk about this reversible Història de l’Aigua a Catalunya (The History tension between the city and the 1. The urbanised river of Water in Catalonia),2 the first projects countryside, the urban reality and its that envisaged channelling the waters of the Llobregat for use in Barcelona date environs. From as far back as 1915, Th e r i v e r a s a r o a d Geddes, with remarkable prophetic back to the mid sixteenth century when foresight, drew attention to how urban The coast of Catalonia is an exceptionally the city proposed a dam project sited development processes, as generators uneven territory. In such cases, rivers, at the elevation of the Martorell Gorge of metropolitan regions, tend to transfer even small rivers like those we find in the in an attempt to reinforce the flow of their immediate needs to the territory, the metropolitan area, become determining the Rec Comtal. The proposal failed due Town-Country tension, far too often factors, not only for locating settlements to the opposition of the Baix Llobregat ignoring the potential of incorporating but also for tracing out the dynamic water concessionaires, and so the first

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 107 successful undertaking to improve Just as Geddes claimed, the valley and Abercrombie’s plans for the metropolitan hydraulic exploitation of the river was the the river are determining factors in the area of London, himself one of the most major 19th century water civil engineering layout and structure of settlements and eminent followers of Geddes. In fact, both works, although the strategy adopted their development around the Llobregat, at scholars were present at the presentation was focused more on land irrigation than least up to the beginning of an awareness of the 1932 Regional Planning report as supplying water to urban areas. The of a metropolitan Barcelona, which can well as the Pla Comarcal. However, careful Infanta Luisa Carlota Canal and the Dreta be dated back to the 1930s, the moment study of the Pla Comarcal reveals that del Llobregat Canal were opened in 1819 when the first attempts were made to plan although one can establish clear parallels and 1861, respectively, consolidating out this new reality. in methodology and particularly in the exploitation for irrigation and defining underlying urban planning ideology, it a key urban figure that would explain also becomes evident that the planning Th e p l a n n e d r i v e r the evolution of the territory during the of these two metropolitan areas had quite following 150 years: the “regants” (the The 1932 Regional Planning, with different objectives. Catalan term for those authorised to use visionary foresight, identified the the water for irrigation purposes). need to tailor the development of the The anticipated major population growth areas around Barcelona to pre-existing (that would rise from some 1,200,000 Although the irrigated fields later receded territorial features, clearly establishing a inhabitants at that time to a threshold of to a certain degree, they proved to be the correspondence between the Llobregat 4,000,000) was distributed across the only type of agricultural land able to resist fluvial environs and the main focus of various municipal nuclei attempting to the dynamics of urban development. The Catalan land development. At the same avoid an accumulation of the population in dry farming lands, with a very strong time, to paraphrase Manuel de Torres i the metropolitan centre as was proposed tradition of vineyards, olive groves and Capell,3 it also clearly introduced the idea by Abercrombie. However, the structure fruit orchards up to the first hird of the of boundaries between areas set aside for of the proposed growth and its zoning 20th century, diminished dramatically. urban development and the unoccupied was unclear in terms of a hierarchical Although this was due in part to the territorial structures, the former being the settlement logic and even less so as pressure of urban sprawl, the main determining element. a proposal based on a reading of the reason was the breakdown in the physical geographic layout of the territory. “masia” structure (the traditional As regards Llobregat, the 1932 Regional The Pla Comarcal included activities Catalan farmhouse and associated land Planning proposed a structure from the which had already started up under little structure) located at elevations above sea to Martorell, that was perhaps a trifle or no administrative control. The division the valley nuclei. Details in the 1953 Pla simplistic and not particularly metropolitan into zones, much more detailed than Comarcal (Regional Plan) and American given its high degree of territorial in the previous cases, was presented, orthophotomaps, show that there were specialisation. But, it was well defined in however, in a confused manner over still major extensions of agricultural land on terms of its relationship with the physical an asymmetrically sectioned Llobregat. the lower slopes of the Garraf, Ordal and environment as it set out industrial areas The right side incorporated the territorial particularly Collserola; these had almost on the left bank of the river over the mobility axis while the left side included a completely disappeared in favour of forest delta preserving the neighbouring river minor road hierarchy bordering the nuclei areas when the Pla General Metropolità forest areas. The industrial fabrics would around Collserola and was accordingly (General Metropolitan Development Plan only reappear from Martorell onwards adapted to the degree of encroaching on, -henceforth referred to as the PGM) was being located over the double structure sometimes drastically, the irrigated river drawn up in 1976. Today, dry farming of the Llobregat and Anoia. Between plain. Similarly, land uses were scattered has diminished significantly in the Martorell and Sant Boi the irrigable plain irregularly across the two sides. On the mountains on right side and has almost was preserved the same as was done left bank the Molins and Sant Feliu nuclei completely disappeared from the left below the Somontà axis in Gavà and fused into a disproportionate industrial side, particularly downstream from the Viladecans. All of this allowed for a garden grid, and a Sant Joan Despí, Cornellà confluence with the Rubí torrent. city continuum above the river nuclei and Sant Just conurbation was proposed (which could be seen as a permeable for the strip taken up by major industrial As regards the original structure of the fabric adapted to the environment as companies that were occupying the settlements, the municipal nuclei offer in the Howard or Unwin examples), central space between various types of characteristics that let one clearly see occupying the foot of the lower slopes of residential fabrics, added without any their position in relation to the river, the mountains, always above the territorial apparent logic. To the south Gavà and from which three clearly differing types communication routes, and defining the Viladecans were fused and major industrial can be identified. Those which, like edges of the alluvial plain. The subsequent areas were set out below the Somontà Castellbisbal or El Papiol, begin at a regional planning presented an identical bank, right in the delta zone. In contrast, distance from the alluvial plain and whose section of the river up to the summits above Sant Boi the proposal drastically structures therefore reflect negotiating on the two sides, and at the same time reduced urban land use for Santa Coloma the slopes. Within this category we could alleviated an area from the pressures of de Cervelló and Sant Vicenç dels Horts, also include the more distant mountain the most intense urbanisation; an area mainly residential uses, to change municipalities which are scattered across comprising dimensions that could be the Quatre Camins areas where the the mountains of the Garraf and Ordal, considered critical for the metropolitan presence of the Molins bridge generated always located in relation to a main torrent area as a whole. an extensive industrial agglomeration, which generates the access route in the centred on the junction, which almost relief morphology. At the other end of This major scale trial was immediately reached the scree. the scale we find the more river nuclei in followed by the Pla Macià (Macià Plan), the strictest sense, such as Pallejà and which expressed the metropolitan Although the Pla Comarcal begins to put Sant Andreu de la Barca. They begin from structure based more on the coastline forward protectionist measures for spaces a nucleus at the edge of the flood plain than on the river areas. The next was the considered to be of value, how it relates followed by suburban growth along the 1953 Plan de Ordenación de Barcelona to the river is somewhat confusing. This river bank paths that continue forming a y su Zona de Influencia (Regional Plan is so apparent that the Pla Comarcal characteristic elongated shape. The third for Barcelona and its Field of Influence), transmits a strong sensation of running category comprises municipalities such also known as the Pla Comarcal (Regional aground against the tensions generated as Sant Boi de Llobregat, which are also Plan), the first attempt at planning with the by the emerging metropolisation, leaving located close to the river but located Metropolitan Area as the prime focus. It is the ability of the environment to shape the slightly above the plain, thus protecting common knowledge that the Pla Comarcal city completely neutralised. It should be them from floods. follows the lines set out in Patrick borne in mind that the Pla Comarcal was

108 / Papers 47 / drawn up before the first Spanish State urban continuums of the fluvial face. An was basically to analyse the state of the Statutory Land Law and raises a certain extensive and clearly defined strip is left spaces, their function in the context of the degree of doubt as to whether it could be in the middle of these two infrastructures, metropolitan region and to determine their implemented in a coordinated manner,4 as set aside for agricultural use. By protecting potential. was also the case for the later 1959 Plan the arable plain, the PGM began a Provincial de Ordenación de Barcelona process of evaluating the river environs The first publication to emerge was, (Barcelona Regional Development Plan). which recognised the river’s ability to Criteris i tendències per a la recuperació Nevertheless, assigning land uses and establish and order development which, dels espais fluvials metropolitans classifying types were to be conditioning despite now having almost heaped up (Recovering metropolitan river spaces: criteria for later attempts: first for the 1966 facades, appeared to secure a more or criteria and trends), which focused on the Esquema Director del Área Metropolitana less homogenous section to the central Llobregat and Besòs river basins within (Master Outline for the Metropolitan Area), part of the valley. In spite of this, the the metropolitan area. This was a first and then the 1976 PGM itself. demand for land continued to prevail over draft document that was the beginning of acknowledging the valley tree structure a practically continuous series of analyses The Esquema Director pursues a clear and its ability to establish an order: the and proposals for metropolitan river spaces metropolitan decentralisation objective: industrial areas would occupy the torrent proposed by the Mancomunitat. This defining a new and significant increase plains denying their vocation as open first document spelled out the enormous in the area of influence, which almost space structures, while the low-population complexity of this kind of operation and, extends to the boundaries of Region I, residential fabric would continue to scale at the same time, put forward a clear and proposing a grid development model the slopes degrading the quality of the methodology in order to make progress in to alleviate central population growth environment and the landscape. handling fluvial spaces. First, it established congestion. The intention was thus to give arguments in favour of carrying out priority to new poles of development in At the end of the day the PGM was a research: finding working guidelines to pursuit of an economically homogenous step forward, as it reinforced measures neutralise the environmental degradation territory. It proposed new centres of to protect areas which it considered to be of the rivers that would harmonise with activities with the objective of providing ecologically valuable, generally measures changes to infrastructures and with the the various sectors with an isotropic associated with forest areas that would urban spread of the river municipalities infrastructure grid that would have to be take on a systemic character. However, with the final objective of reconverting the able to spin out activities such as industry it did not do the same for fluvial spaces, rivers into living spaces for metropolitan and the tertiary sector to meliorate urban which would only acquire the category of cities. development in the second and third belt. systems in areas strictly determined by For all of these reasons, and bearing in water supply and less for agriculture even This approach begins from reading the mind its characteristics, typical of major though, as time has proven, the latter territory, and more specifically, for the scale operations, we could say that this were the most fragile. Generally speaking, first time questions related to water was the plan that was furthest from the PGM advanced attempts to organise play a central role in interpreting the the ideal of creating a dialogue with the the valley and delta section, but it did so capabilities of the environment: the river river, or with the territory in general. The from the basis of a protectionist principle determines the various homogenous discussion concerning alternatives, based of emphasising the mutual exclusion zones, incorporating the area of the on five models, reveals the high degree of between urbanised land and land that torrents as part of the fluvial system indifference of the infrastructure proposals could be developed, territory considered and an environmental approach prevails. towards the actual physical geography of as reserved and environmentally valuable In addition, while working within the the territory and, consequently, the fluvial space. Today we know that this setting up confines of what were then infrastructure network in general and the Llobregat river of boundaries, clearly necessary in 1976 and urban development proposals in particular. The proposed polarisation, to halt the predatory urban advances since (incidentally, quite close to the present day seen as a catalyst for the development the 1960s, introduced this problematic reality), an analysis was also made of the impetus at that time, reveals a perception tendency to marginalise open spaces in vestiges, often completely erased, that of metropolitan dynamics limited to the metropolitan context. had traditionally been the links between interpreting the territory as an obstacle to the river and the nuclei (not forgetting overcome. Among these alternatives in The search for a new and mutually agricultural areas) in an accelerated the Esquema Director, the fourth coincides invigorating relationship between the process of transformation. with the ‘’Barcelona 2000” proposal by occupied and unoccupied areas of the the mayor Porcioles. This envisaged a valley, was to be the very guiding star The 1995 “Proposta Marc per a route running from the capital city towards for subsequent research: first by the la recuperació dels espais fluvials Vallés by means of various tunnels running Corporació Metropolitana de Barcelona metropolitans” (Framework proposal through Collserola, a “Gran Via” (Major (Barcelona Metropolitan Corporation) for the recovery of metropolitan Road) crossing an urbanised delta in the and then later by the Mancomunitat de fluvial spaces) now made it clear that form of a megastructure and a major Municipis de l’Àrea Metropolitana de these spaces were needed to redress capacity axis to the right passing through Barcelona (Association of Town Councils territorial desequilibrium, as a source of cornice strip over the municipalities, for the Barcelona Metropolitan Area). environmental and landscape resources, from Martorell to Castelldefels. This opening up the debate on which human proposal, without a doubt, marks the activities they could accommodate. Re s e a r c h i n t o t h e r i v e r c i t y height of indifference of metropolitan Whatever the case, it underlined the need planning towards the physical geography After various studies had been carried out for far-reaching changes to redirect the of the territory. In contrast, however, the focusing on metropolitan agricultural plains ever-accelerating process of degradation integration of existing structures was to associated with the rivers in the 1980s, of the metropolitan rivers, pointing out the be one of the main guidelines in the next the first step taken by the Mancomunitat complexity of the operations given the stage: the PGM. de Municipis de l’Àrea Metropolitana de wide range of authorities involved and the Barcelona in its undertaking to include river need to assign major resources. The PGM incorporated substantial new spaces, started towards the beginning changes compared to previous planning. of the 1990s. It set up a multidisciplinary Not surprisingly, efforts to recover the It split the local roads and regional roads team within the heart of its own river were to receive support from other removing the latter which were located technical resources, aimed specifically institutions that sponsored a variety of on both sides of the river like polders in at researching river spaces. The task studies and proposals, among which I the eventuality of floods, while the local undertaken by this first river team, headed would like to make mention of two that, roads make up the lower bank of the by Jaume Vendrell and Serafí Presmanes, from all standpoints have been essential

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 109 for the Llobregat. First, around 1994, dimensions and characteristics. The 5. Enhance the hydrologic performance of the Diputació de Barcelona (Barcelona delimitation of the fluvial space could the fluvial system. Regional Council) began to push the Pla be practically automatic if we consider Especial del Parc agrícola del it from a multidisciplinary perspective: 6. Preserve the interaction between Baix Llobregat (Special Plan for the Baix geomorphology can indicate the limits surface and ground water. Llobregat Agricultural Park), which took of the alluvial plain, as can hydraulics, ten years to be given final approval. It if we relate them to the laws defining 7. Improve the quality of the water. proposed protecting 3,332 hectares of what a fluvial zone is. Nevertheless, the agricultural land managed by the Consorci complexity of the pressures to which 8. Improve vegetation structures and del Parc Agrari del Baix Llobregat: a the Llobregat fluvial space is subjected quality. new management system to improve transforms this decision into an overall the economic feasibility of the irrigable strategy and, in fact, almost into a project. 9. Promote natural habitat diversity. stretches in Vall Baixa and the Delta, and Thus, apart from the aforementioned a programme to promote the integration points, we need to bear in mind urban, 10. Integrate national heritage. of agricultural lands within its confines, infrastructure and landscape issues, as well as to enhance its landscape especially ecological questions, to 11. Determine accessibility and make it qualities. Second, the Agència Catalana de approach delimitation from a multi-factorial compatible. l’Aigua (Catalan Water Authority) backed analysis standpoint. The result was not the Pla d’Espais Fluvials (Fluvial Spaces the delimitation of a single fluvial space, 12. Carry out specific operations, evaluate Plan) which studies the Llobregat as well but instead an entire system of spaces of results and programme maintenance. as other rivers in the inland basins of interest, incorporated into the scree zone Catalonia from the perspective of water and the banks, which was superimposed The deployment of this project entailed supply, not only considering surface water with a series of more accessible spaces programming a total of more than management but also the entire hydrologic that attempted to recover the traditional 50 operations that covered the entire cycle and its ecological implications. ways in which the various nuclei had lower stretch of the river basin. This interacted with the river. Furthermore, the meant that river works were not limited The formal setting out of these issues, Projecte Marc began to conceive of the to fluvial system specific operations as stated in the Programa Marc, was to river in terms of a hydrologic system that and, furthermore, they incorporated be the objective of the following step would incorporate the complex system the analyses from a wide range of within the MMAMB itself: the Projecte- of torrents and canals comprising its river proposals such as new sectors for urban Marc de recuperació ambiental de l’espai basin, in a gesture that made its complex development in the municipalities in the fluvial del Llobregat en la comarca del relationship with the territory even more regions, so as to determine how these Baix Llobregat (Framework-Project for evident. proposals can contribute to improving the environmental recovery of the Llobregat river. So, in cooperation with the town and Baix Llobregat region fluvial space).5 Beginning from the basis of delimitation, councils and other institutions involved, This was the outcome of the agreement it was possible to define a diagnostic for jointly agreed operations can be proposed signed to this effect by the Consell each zone and the corresponding strategy which are related to the operations so Comarcal del Baix Llobregat (Baix to be employed with the clear precondition as to achieve the best results from the Llobregat Regional Council), the Diputació that preserving the environment in environment and which also have a clearly de Barcelona (Barcelona Regional Council) good condition is the starting point for urban function: to structure a part of the and the MMAMB in 2001. The work, recovering fluvial space. So, by analysing Metropolitan Area from the basis of the managed this time by Fidel Vázquez, was the interrelationship between the physical fluvial system, that is, those municipalities carried out in close collaboration with environment, the natural environment and which make up the Llobregat river basin. those municipalities affected which, this the human environment, it was understood time, embraced all of the Baix Llobregat that any works in the fluvial space riparian municipalities. Attempts were territory that might affect environmental 2. Recovery of the river now made to identify in specific terms equilibrium would be produced by actions the types of areas of operational areas to taken in the physical environment or At present, the various studies that have create the necessary databases to deal in the human environment, but that been carried out during the last two with the complexity of the fluvial territory these would have a direct effect on the decades have received a significant boost and to lay out clear and methodologically natural environment. To bring about this to the development potential of specific well-defined objectives. improvement, the Projecte Marc called for, operations thanks to the establishment first and foremost, making both the public of the Consorci (Consortium) for the This task required, first and foremost, a and politicians aware of the value and recovery and conservation of the major deployment of resources focused the need to recover the fluvial space, to Llobregat river. This is a new institution on compiling the enormous amount of later be able to put forward a progressive that has come about as a result of the information necessary to deal with an recovery programme that would define the collaborative efforts of a diverse range of area of 50 kilometres of river with a direct degree of space restoration works as being administrative bodies: the Administració link to a surface area of more than 1,600 inversely proportional to corresponding general de l’Estat (General Spanish hectares and an even larger surface area maintenance needs. State Government) represented by the of territories linked to the project. This was Ministerio del Medioambiente (Spanish an area that, in addition, was undergoing Finally, and as a result of the study, the Ministry for the Environment), the continual transformation and that also Projecte proposed a 12-point programme Departament de Medi Ambient i Habitatge needed to be appraised from wide range for river management: (Department for the Environment and of perspectives such as mobility and Housing), the Departament de Política territorial logistics, surface and ground 1. Follow a policy of joint management. Territorial i Obres Públiques (Department water supply, urban development and for Territorial Policies and Public Works), management of open natural spaces, etc. 2. Maintain or increase the river open the Diputació de Barcelona (Barcelona spaces. Regional Council), the Consell Comarcal This compilation of data helped to del Baix Llobregat (Baix Llobregat Regional establish three main objectives: to delimit 3. Check the march of urban land Council), the Entitat Metropolitana dels the fluvial space, establish a methodology occupation and antagonistic uses. Serveis Hidràulics i Tractament de Residus and operational criteria, and finally to put (Metropolitan Body for Water Services and forward a projects framework concerning 4. Establish communications with the Wastewater Treatment) and the MMAMB the fluvial space embracing varying infrastructures. itself. All have joined forces and resources

110 / Papers 47 / to begin a whole series of projects is an essential factor for its recovery. The (and I would enfold this city in high and lush focused on recovering the Llobregat River Projecte-Marc had already pointed out this green trees) environment and landscape. absence from its own detailed research Josep Carner into which paths had historically linked Two executive projects were drawn up in urban nuclei and its case by case analysis 2006 which were approved and assigned of the possibilities of recovering them. This 1. Restoration of urban peripheries in May 2007 by the MMAMB, accordingly proved to be a difficult task given that in and landscape improvement delegated to act by the Consorci, and are at the majority of cases the construction of present in the implementation phase. Two major infrastructures made this infeasible. In metropolitan contexts, urban peripheries stretches of the river have been chosen as This is why it has been necessary to — understood here as the outskirts of the first operations for which projects have consider, at certain points, new strategies cities — have often been forgotten areas; been drawn up to recover the environment to integrate the river into the urban network places that have not enjoyed the attention and landscape. One runs from the Martorell of open spaces, perceiving it as a new that we pay to historical quarters or newly- Gorge to the confluence of the river with type of open space at a metropolitan scale created residential areas. They are areas the Rubí torrent, affecting the municipalities comparable only with Collserola because of that almost always take on an unfinished, of Martorell, Castellbisbal, Sant Andreu its magnitude and possibilities. precarious and impersonal appearance, de la Barca and Pallejà. The other begins and in many cases, are associated with at the Sant Boi de Llobregat municipal The recovery of the river for the general negative ideas of marginality and lack of limits and passes through Sant Joan Despí, public and bringing it back into the minds public safety. Cornellà and Hospitalet reaching the C-31 of metropolitan inhabitants constitutes viaduct running over the Llobregat in the a project theme that we can see as a The urban peripheries of metropolitan El Prat municipality. Despite the spatial strategic objective in a large number of areas are often the meeting point between diversification of the proposals for the metropolitan areas around the world. The two visible worlds (the urban world, in river derived from studies carried out in work by Anne Whinston Spirn and James the strict sense of the word, and the the Projecte-Marc, it has been decided Corner in Philadelphia, the recovery of rural world), generating an often uneasy to begin important work on the scree the Anacostia in Washington or the Don dialogue and a landscape that seems and nearby fluvial area, even though the in Toronto, the IBA-Emsher Park, the disturbing because it fails to conform to choice of stretches corresponds more to an Thames and the River Lea in London or either the tidy image of city centres or interim situation. It was decided to continue the impressive project for recovering the the more or less bucolic image of the monitoring the fluvial stretch that would be Cheonggyecheon in Seul, demonstrate the countryside. affected by the land taken up by the high- vital importance of recovering the river in speed train line until construction finishes. metropolitan contexts as elements that In recent decades, the dispersed nature The objective was to avoid interference generate environmental and landscape of urban growth and the uncontrolled and to be able to assess the effects of quality and, all things considered, as proliferation of peri-urban activities have these works on the fluvial system, and spatial structures capable of building the contributed to an expanding area displaying thus be able to adapt environmental and metropolis, oddly enough, from their non- some of the characteristic traits that landscape recovery operations to the urban character…just as Geddes called for. are attributed to peripheral landscapes, corrective measures needed to counter such as disorder, lack of identity or the the impact of the train line construction “banalisation” of these areas. work. These two stretches, which are 1 Patrick Geddes, Cities in Evolution, 1915. Taken presently under construction, are various from the Spanish translation edition, Ciudades In addition, the distinction between en Evolución, Ediciones Infinito, Buenos Aires projects run by various agents that have city centre and outskirts is becoming 1960. The Spanish edition includes texts and 6 been determined by tender. All in all, both some photographs from the exhibition on cities by increasingly weak in contemporary projects, as well as the intermediary stretch Geddes from 1905 onwards. metropolitan environments, and we which has been developed to the stage of 2 xavier Latorre, Història de l’Aigua a Catalunya, are seeing the creation of areas an advance project, show certain common L’abecedari, Premià de Mar 1995. that are difficult to categorise using the criteria and characteristics and which will 3 Manuel de Torres i Capell, La formació de la conventional categories, and which urbanística metropolitana de Barcelona, MMAMB, have to guarantee conceptual unity. These Barcelona 1999. are above all characterised by the are projects which focus their operations 4 Antonio Font, Carles Llop, Josep Maria Vilanova, hybridisation of uses and functions. One on the environment and the landscape, La Construcció del Territori Metropolità. of the dangers of this dynamics is the which is why they have been drawn up by Morfogènesi de la regió urbana de Barcelona, formation of a landscape that is hard multidisciplinary teams able deal with the MMAMB, Barcelona 1999. to read, while at the same time being 5 For more detailed information on the methodology depersonalised. specific demands of the task. of the Projecte Marc, see Fidel Vázquez Alarcón and Ramon Vázquez López, La transformación del Apart from the issue of recovering the espacio fluvial del Llobregat en el Baix Llobregat, Within this context, the accesses to urban environment and landscape, the task of Ramon Folch (Coord.), El territorio como sistema, centres become tremendously important regulating access to the river has also been Diputació de Barcelona, Barcelona 2003. in the processes of evaluating urban 6 The Martorell to Rubi torrent project director a central consideration of these projects. peripheries; on the one hand, because is the architect and landscape designer Alfred They include, as a minimum requirement, Fernández de la Reguera; the lower stretch is they establish the relationship of function a pedestrian and cycle path on each bank headed by the company of architects Batlle i Roig. and significance between cities and their along the entire stretch of the river, which metropolitan environments, between are situated just next to the scree edge in inside and outside, between the past and the area of the public water supply. Also, at the present. On the other hand, because certain given points, the projects propose RESTORATION OF PERIPHERAL they become a great opportunity for re- new access means from the nuclei to the URBAN AREAS conquering peri-urban areas for public use fluvial area. It would be far to simplistic Project for improving the landscaping and for creating more liveable places. to set the objective of environmental of the access to Granollers along the improvement in opposition to works that BP-5002. This article deals with the importance of facilitate frequenting these areas, providing trees and the arrangement of uses and they are adequately planned. The almost spaces in configuring the entry points non-existent relationship between the Jaume Busquets i Fàbregas to cities, and describes the landscape public and the river could be considered improvement project for the access to one of the determining factors behind Granollers along the BP-5002 road on the the marginalisation of the fluvial space, “…i aquesta ciutat la voltaria d’unes arbredes Palou plain, in the Barcelona Metropolitan therefore to re-establish this relationship altes i verdíssimes” Area.

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 111 2. Accesses to city centres and the began, with policies aimed at recovering — The improvement of the urban role of trees public areas, pedestrianising old town infrastructure on the approach to this centres, introduction of speed limits, city along the BP-5002. There was a time when the approaches etc. Almost three decades later, this to the majority of towns and cities process is far from over, and we now — The preparation of the area for were along roads lined with leafy trees. live the apparent paradox of having to pedestrian use. Travellers knew they were approaching a balance a growing number of cars on the built up area because a kilometre before roads with the demand for cities that are — The improvement of the general road arriving they would find themselves better places to live and for safer traffic safety conditions. travelling through the green archways conditions. As with all man-made things, formed by the trees at the entrances to the automobile, far from being a panacea, — To dignify the image of a particular the towns. And apart from the approaches has shown itself in all its complexity, with environment —the Palou plain — by to the towns, trees formed a common both undoubted advantages and serious maintaining its rural character. part of the make-up of many roads and drawbacks which we need to learn to stopping places. deal with rationally, to be able to make The draft landscape improvement project cities more comfortable places to live in was drawn up by the Landscaping Later, the country experienced economic and with a better quality of life for their Service of the Office of Architecture & growth, and the car became the vehicle of inhabitants. Landscaping in 2005, and the executive choice for the middle classes and project was produced in 2006 under the one of the icons of a society that was Today the need to improve urban direction of architects Quim Rosell and striving to distance itself from the peripheries and make driving a more Natalia Bernárdez . The total surface area poverty of the first decades of the Franco pleasant experience means that trees acted upon was 29,000 sq. metres, and dictatorship. In the nineteen sixties, with have regained their importance and the total cost of the work (co-financed by the increased popularity of the motor potential in the configuration of urban the three signatories to the agreement) car, public areas and roads had to be areas that are more people friendly, and was 1,869,743 €, with a pass-through adapted to its needs and demands. Old this potential can be seen as especially of 70.00 €/m2. The tenders for the work roads were widened, pavements were useful in defining the accesses and were awarded in 2006 and the work was narrowed, parking areas were set aside approaches to towns and cities. In this completed in 2007. (often at the cost of public areas), etc. In sense, the restoration of roadside trees a short time, the automobile had become should not be thought of as an exercise in The Palou plain, to the south of Granollers, lord and master of our towns and cities, nostalgia, or simply an act of decoration, was formerly a district belonging to the at the same time as becoming a work but as an opportunity to design decent village of Palou, until it was absorbed into tool for many and an instrument of leisure approaches to towns and cities, to the city in 1928. It consists of a flat area for an increasingly broad swathe of the improve the environment and increase bounded by the railway line and the River population. people’s quality of life. Congost. Its agricultural nature has been maintained as a result of the desire of The elimination of trees from our The project presented below shows the city council to preserve the area as roadsides was a part of this process of how trees have been used in an urban non-developable. The plain consists of transformation of the urban environment periphery restoration project, in a case an agricultural patchwork made up of a and infrastructures, in order to satisfy where it was not possible to replicate the network of rural thoroughfares such as the the needs of an ever growing level of traditional model of planting a double row Ral road, along which stand a number of traffic. Many still recall the sight of freshly of trees in tunnel form, since the width of farmhouses and a church of Romanesque felled shade-giving plane trees lining the the road made this option impossible. origin. Other elements of historical interest roadside and the striking image of include the lines of terraced houses, the roads left desolate. These were the occupied in the 18th and 19th centuries by times of the development boom, and 3. The project for improving the farm workers, grouped together in small trees were seen as an obstacle to landscaping of approvach to rows alongside the road. progress, as an element associated Granollers with a world that seemed condemned In recent decades, its closeness to the to disappear, all in the name of a better The project for improving the landscaping built up area and the city’s progressive future. The press of the day talked of of the southern approach to Granollers, expansion, together with the proliferation of security, avoiding accidents, adapting to in the area known as the Palou plain, is activities and buildings typical of peri-urban change, etc. The truth however is that set within the framework of landscape areas, have partially altered the traditional other options that might have achieved improvement initiatives envisaged by make-up of the Palou plain, although the same goals by less drastic means Law 8/2005 of June 8th, concerning it still preserves its particular farmland were not even considered. An example of the protection, management and character in one of the most active areas an alternative strategy was that adopted arrangement of the landscape. Among in the region of Vallès. This preservation by numerous French towns and now other actions, this law establishes The has been possible due to the firm stance reinstated, of turning two-way streets landscape improvement of the peripheral of Granollers City Council in recent years into one-way thoroughfares; a system areas and the access roads to towns and in defending the area’s non-development that allowed a great number of trees to cities, and also the elimination, reduction character, a posture which culminated in be saved, many of which are now over a and transferral of the elements, uses the approval in 2007 of the Municipal Urban hundred years old. and activities that degrade them (Article Development Plan, which classified this 8b) as one of the kinds of landscaping area as non-developable land. Later, the country embarked upon an actions embarked upon by the public intensive phase of political reform, with authorities. For practical purposes, the BP-5002 the holding of democratic local road, which runs along the length of elections. The new local authorities The project was carried out between 2005 the Palou plain, has until now been the had to deal with high urban deficits and and 2007, by means of a collaboration main road for accessing and entering confront many social challenges. By agreement between three administrations: Granollers for vehicles coming off the AP-7 then, some of the drawbacks of the age the Department of Land Policy and motorway, and has suffered some of the of the motor car were already becoming Public Works’ Office of Architecture & most common problems in this type of evident (ever-heavier traffic, gridlocked Landscaping, Barcelona County Council thoroughfare: heavy traffic, lack of road roads, chronic shortage of parking space, and Granollers City Council. Their safety, poor urban infrastructure, lack of pollution, noise, etc.), and a new trend objectives were: comfort, uninspiring landscape, etc.

112 / Papers 47 / 4. Scope and aims of the project the distribution of space, and the layout vegetation where these roads form of buildings and the diverse elements crossroads with the main road, in such The project covers a 1.5 kilometre long that accompany the thoroughfare. The a way that a logical visual connection is stretch of the BP-5002 from the motorway road runs in a north-south direction, from established between the two road systems access junction to the centre of Granollers. Granollers to the motorway junction. that attenuates the separation between the Up until the middle of the 20th century, The eastern side of the road has the main road and its surrounding area. as was common in many approaches greater amount of buildings and activities, to towns and cities in Catalonia, it was whereas on the western side, next to The main actions that have allowed the characterised by rows of trees planted the river, the physical occupation of the goals of the project to be achieved are along both sides of the roadway, as can be area is less pronounced. This leads to an detailed below: gleaned from photographs and chronicles intermittence of views on the mountain of the period. side, and a more constant view on the Restructuring o f t h e w i d t h o f t h e r o a dw a y river side, where the majority of the This arrangement was to disappear, as farmhouses and the small village of Palou The width of the roadway was reduced was the case in other roads in the stand. In a north-south direction, the significantly: from an average width of region, with the increase in popularity sector closest to Granollers, some 500m 9.5 m including verges, it was reduced of automobile use. The felling of trees long, is practically free of buildings, which to a width of 7 m for vehicles. This reduction allowed the number of lanes to and the laying of tarmac changed the are in contrast concentrated in the half that be retained, while promoting a reduction appearance of the area, and it was further is further from the town. in traffic speed to 50 kph, as in any urban altered by the gradual appearance of new area. Traffic lights, improved signposting constructions and activities along the sides Finally, it should be noted that the BP-5002 and the setting out of parking areas of the road (housing, workshops, shops, road landscape improvement project were other actions that contributed to warehouses, restaurants, etc.). is part of a more ambitious process of municipal actions aimed at restoring the pedestrian safety and mobility. When it came to evaluating the Palou plain whole Palou plain. The more important The slowing down of the traffic rate was project, the appearance of this area was of these actions include improvements to a key aspect of the proposal, since the not substantially different to a great many the Ral road that runs alongside the main reduction of the space available to traffic other accesses to town and city centres road and the river, the dredging of the enables pavements to be installed with (partial and broken urban development, river bed and the creation of a flowing enough room for planting vegetation and lack of functionally defined public areas, current, and other more specific actions creating a more agreeable environment disordered presence of advertising, the aimed at strengthening other significant for pedestrians and residents. In addition, continued existence of obsolete elements, elements. it has enabled the creation of new areas etc.), yet it had one remarkable feature: designed to enable people to relax and the coexistence of this set of problems take in their surroundings. together with an exceptional landscape 5. Features of the project potential: a quality environment, wide views of the Palou plain farmland, The main idea behind the project for Construction o f p a v e m e n t s improving the landscaping of the southern availability of areas to act upon, etc. The construction of pavements along the access to Granollers was to develop the whole stretch allowed pedestrians to walk landscape of the area so as to restore The specific goals of the project were in safety and comfort. The size of the its character as a “gateway to the city”. aimed at putting right the multiple deficits pavements was adapted to the dimensions that the area presented, and involved: In this context, conceiving the road and elements of the stretch of road itself, as a “gateway to the city” meant that although maintaining a minimum width of — Restoring an overall unitary image of throughout its length, the BP-5002 had to 1.5 m at all times. Some elements were the approach, adapting the width and become a privileged route from which to maintained constant throughout, such as level of the road to the current physical perceive the approach to the town and the the paving and lighting, whereas others determining factors and functional relationship existing between the city and were installed in a discontinuous though needs. its surrounding areas. A second important coherent and unitary manner, such as the idea, closely related to the first, was the urban fixtures. — Planting roadside trees as a continuous improvement of the thoroughfare’s urban element along the whole of the route, functionality and comfort, especially for The paving consists of prefabricated while strengthening the area’s most pedestrians and local residents. concrete paving stones. Two colours have valuable visible elements and filtering been used, yellow and red, with similar out the less fortunate sites. The project envisages the road as an shades, and these are interlaced in such a element integrating the activities and way as to create a pattern that evokes the — The formal definition and delimiting buildings that lie along its length, and as adjacent agricultural structure. The project of the areas adjacent to the road in a prominent and structuring element of maintains vehicle access to the properties terms of their safety, functionality and the wider Palou plain restoration project. by means of sloping kerbstones on the harmony. With this end, it provides a wide-ranging pavements. and coherent response to the succession — The setting out of public areas for of situations and needs arising along The installing of new urban fixtures along pedestrians to move around and spend the thoroughfare, at the same time as the route and new lighting along the time in. strengthening the visual and unitary western pavement completed the work perception of the area’s landscape. of adapting the pavements and the public — Slowing down the traffic flow by area as a whole. redefining the road width. One of the features of the Palou plain already mentioned is the lack of symmetry Pl a n t i n g o f n e w v e g e t a t i o n — The provision of urban fixtures. between the two sides of the road. The project resolved this asymmetry by Together with paving, vegetation is one of — The removal of overhead cables. designing a differentiating width of the two the main elements that define the road’s roadsides, combined with a homogenous new image. The presence of vegetation, One of the most important challenges of treatment of the same throughout its particularly trees, enables an order and the project was to find a suitable solution length. In addition, it reinforces the continuity to be introduced over and above to the asymmetry that existed between presence of the network of small roads the heterogeneity of some often clashing the two sides of the road, both in terms of on the Palou plain, by selectively planting forms and elements. In addition, trees

THE CHALLENGE OF LANDSCAPE IN METROPOLITAN AREAS / 113 enable a rhythm to be established that acts or removing them altogether leads to an was inaugurated by the Minister of the as a guiding element on the route, as instant improvement in the appearance of Territorial Policies and Public works of well as providing comfortable areas of the landscape in any setting. the Generalitat, Joaquim Nadal (July 14th shade. 2007), in the presence of the Mayor of In the case under study, there were Granollers, Mr Josep Mayoral, and the In the project, the vegetation has been various sets of hoardings standing at Director General of Architecture and structured into three arrangement criteria, right angles to the road. The intention of Landscaping, Mr Joan Ganyet, was a clear which pursue clearly separate aims and the project, though not a straightforward sign of how well-accepted this type of results: matter given the existence of the various project can be by its most direct users. legal procedures to be overcome, was — The planting of a sturdy line of trees to remove the hoardings, and where The execution of the Palou plain landscape that accompany the main road on its appropriate, to regulate these elements in improvement project has provided a eastern side and enable the road to be the future to ensure that no more of these solution to some of the important urban identified as a new civic thoroughfare, eyesores could again be put up. problems concerning local residents, while at the same time harking back to as well as giving added dignity the its former design. The species chosen Im p r o v e m e n t o f t h e w a l l s o f a d joining environment in which they spend their for this row of trees is a variety of daily lives. Both the residents and the p r o p e r t i e s maple, Acer Freemani: the trunk size public passing through have been able to and dimensions (approximately 15 m The presence of various unsightly and see how an area that had until that point of height reached within 20 years). poorly-maintained property boundary been peripheral, unsafe and difficult to together with the seasonal colour walls is another aspect to be considered in access, has been transformed into an variations of this tree make it especially this type of operation. The local residents accessible and comfortable area that attractive for urban environments. often put up walls at the boundaries of encourages the establishment of new, their land, be they residential or properties more satisfactory social relationships. — Formation of small clumps of trees, on or cultivated terrain. This leads to the the western side. The main function of appearance of a repetitive element that Faced with the recurring and specific these clumps is to highlight and create does not respect any common guidelines, landscaping problems presented by the new points of interest, normally related and results in the forming of poor quality approaches to urban areas, and certain to junctions with country roads or to environments. bad practices that have often led to the areas of activity. They are made up of gateways to cities becoming a haven for trees of a single species — poplars, The project proposed installing a single untidiness, and which have led to the Judas trees, liriodendrons, chinaberry type of boundary wall, with the aim of destruction of a historical heritage of trees trees, ginkgoes, etc. — that offer an regulating and unifying the criteria for their with an undeniable landscaping value, attractive and varied counterpoint to installation. This was also a difficult goal to there is a need to promote actions that the homogenous rows on the opposite achieve, given the pre-existence of these restore order and value to such areas. side of the road, while at the same time features, and the difficulty of intervening helping to frame or highlight certain directly in elements that form a part of Public administrations have a special visual elements. private property. responsibility in this task, since it was their neglect and their errors in the — The planting of a grass verge, made up past that was often the root cause Ma i n t e n a n c e p r o v i s i o n of a single species in a compact mass of these processes. Along the lines and uniform texture and outline, to — With regard to vegetation, both initiated by the Law regarding the border the road. Grass was planted on the materials and the plant species protection, management and ordering the banks and areas marking the limit employed were selected to ensure of landscapes, interventions in such between the fields and the pavement, maximum durability with minimum areas has become both a priority and and also in the openings made for maintenance. Species were chosen a challenge. The Department of Land the planting of trees between the that would adapt perfectly to the Policy and Public Works, by means of its pavements and the roadway, in such conditions of the area, and which, Office of Architecture & Landscaping, a way that, in some stretches, the once consolidated, would not require and thanks to the collaboration with other pedestrians pass between them. watering. Nonetheless, a number of administrations, is determined to promote minimum maintenance tasks was landscape improvement projects like the envisaged, such as annual tree pruning one described in this article, i.e. those e t t i n g o u t t h e t e c h n i c a l infrastructures S and the mowing of the grass. aimed at restoring landscapes and capable The rationalisation and improvement of of standing as examples. the technical supply infrastructures was — In addition, the choice of concrete another of the project’s main actions. paving was made to ensure the In this same vein, 2007 saw the first The work carried out to redesign the maximum durability of the pieces and announcement of the granting of tenders areas created the opportunity for running the maximum ease of replacement. for public area landscaping improvement power lines underground and installing the They were laid on a concrete base to actions for avenues, boulevards and other telecommunication network (including ensure both the stability and durability tree-lined thoroughfares in municipalities the providing of empty ducting to cover of the paved surface, even in the in Catalonia; an initiative which springs future growth in the current network). In event of vehicles running on them. from a desire to have a positive effect on addition, the existing network of drains and Lastly, the models of urban fixtures the improvement of public urban areas by sewers was also improved or renewed, chosen were the most suitable for using roadside trees as a leading element and the water supply optimised. public areas, however, as these in these projects. are elements susceptible to acts of vandalism, they are the ones El imin at ion o f a d v e r t i s i n g h o a r d i n g s that require the greatest amount of The presence of a large number of attention by the maintenance service. advertising hoardings arranged in a disordered manner is a factor that has a negative affect on the quality of the Conclusions landscape. They are intrusive and act as visual barriers that hide or limit views. The strong turnout by residents of the Arranging them in a more ordered way Palou plain on the day the finished project

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