HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION Reimagining Horsh Beirut OPEN COMPETITION رابطة المهندسين اﻷخصائيين في التنظيم المديني HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION Reimagining Horsh Beirut Open Competition TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. COMPETITION BRIEF I. Framing the competition II. Objectives III. Competition’s action zone IV. Historical overview 1. from the pine woods to the public garden 2. Post-war reconstruction challenges 3. The Hippodrome and the Pine Residence V. Socio-cultural dimension of Horsh Beirut VI. Current situation of the park a. Horsh Beirut: Landscape features b. Rules and restrictions inside Horsh Beirut VII. Existing legal framework a. National regulations and directives b. Local regulations and masterplan VIII. Appendices Appendix 1: Surrounding areas Appendix 2: Violations, threats and regularizations Appendix 3: Photographic survey Appendix 4: Maps and aerial views Appendix 5: Law no. 131 dated 30/4/2019: Protection of Horsh Beirut Appendix 6: Horsh Beirut in the “City Greening Plan” (Plan Vert) and the “Soft Mobility Plan” (Liaison Douce) Appendix 7: The “Horsh Beirut for All” Campaign Appendix 8: Relevant sources and web links. 2. COMPETITION GUIDELINES I. Competition type II. Eligibility III. Awards IV. Competition schedule and milestones HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION BRIEF 2 a. Competition’s site visit b. Question and answer period c. Submission of entries d. Jury e. Jury deliberations f. Announcement of finalists and press release g. Exhibition and awards ceremony V. Deliverables a. Concept note b. Report c. Drawings d. CD-ROM e. Other VI. Official language VII. Exhibition, Publication and promotion VIII. Ownership of entries IX. Handing of deliverables HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION BRIEF 3 “HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION” Reimagining Horsh Beirut COMPETITION BRIEF This design competition is organized by NAHNOO (referred to herewith as the “Organizer”), in conjunction with POMED (Project on Middle-East Democracy) and BEIRUTIYAT, and under the patronage of the Order of Engineers and Architects (OEA) in Beirut, in collaboration with the Urban Planners’ Association UPA. I. FRAMING THE COMPETITION “Cultures and climates differ all over the world, but people are the same. They’ll gather in public if you give them a good place to do it.” Jan Gehl What is commonly known as Horsh Beirut is a fenced green triangle measuring 330,000 sqm located at the southern administrative limit of Beirut. It is the largest green public space remaining in the city and it is continuously threatened by the construction of illegal buildings, cutting down large green areas and limiting access to the park. Because of its geographical location, Horsh Beirut has been perceived for a long time as a space at the limit of the city: It was a pine forest outside the walls of the medieval city (Beirut intramuros), then it became part of the demarcation line during the civil war and today it is the limit between Municipal Beirut and the suburbs. A historical overview of the site (section IV) reveals a slightly different story. Beirut’s pine forest, also known as “Horsh Al Sanawbar”, used to cover 1,250,000 sqm. General maps dating from 1876 (map No.1) and 1921 (map No.2) show the extents of the forest before urbanization and the creation of the roads. A comparison between these maps and recent ones (map No.3) reveals that the surrounding areas of the Hippodrome, Badaro, Furn El Chebbak, Mazraa, Tariq el Jdideh, Ghobeiry and Chiah were all once part of “Horsh Beirut”. Even though an accurate detailed limit of the initial forest’s boundaries couldn’t be found in records, officially recognized parts of Horsh Beirut can be found in cadastral maps, proving that the official borders of Horsh Beirut extend significantly beyond the triangle’s limit. The land registry delineates “Horsh Beirut” as plot no. 1925 – Mazraa, with a total area of 506,199 sqm as well as plot No. 2639, measuring 24,620 sqm. According to the cadastral map (maps No.4 & 5), the limits of plot 1925 are defined beyond the high-speed roads, including lands across 22 November street and Jamal Abdel Nasser street. Presently, these residual lands that emerged from the creation of the high-speed roads are legally part of Horsh Beirut; however, they are occupied by illegal buildings, cemeteries and religious institutions, some of which benefited from regularization. (Appendix 2 and Map No.4). Reminiscences of Horsh Beirut are HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION BRIEF 4 also found in 9 other plots that are adjacent to plot no. 1925, as detailed in table 1 here below (refer to section III – Competition’s action zone). Today, Horsh Beirut is a segregated entity as a result of historical, socioeconomic, political, and urban developments. The massive and unplanned urbanization of the area, in addition to years of civil war and consequent political instabilities, resulted in the gradual loss of Horsh Beirut’s role as a public space that connects different urban entities, both socially and spatially. Instead of functioning as a link between mixed and socially diverse neighborhoods, Horsh Beirut became a neglected, green island; poorly maintained and with most of its parts inaccessible to the public (Section VIII). Furthermore, Horsh Beirut is protected as a national natural landscape since 1942 and is part of the zone 9, Non aedificandi, in the Beirut Masterplan, meaning unbuildable. Consequently, constructions built on Horsh Beirut are illegal (Section IX). Map No. 1: Map of Beirut in 1876 by the Danish vice-consul Julius Loytveld. North is directed towards the bottom of the Map. Horsh Beirut can be seen on the top left corner of the map. (Source : Bibliothèque Orientale, USJ, Beirut in BORDES, A., ASSAF, R., (2004)). N HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION BRIEF 5 Map No. 2: Map of Beirut in 1921. (Source : Bibliothèque Orientale, USJ, Beirut in BORDES, A., ASSAF, R., (2004)). Map No. 3: Map of Beirut in 2001. (Source: Ministry of National Defense, Directorate of Geographic Affairs). HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION BRIEF 6 Map No. 4: Cadastral map of lots 1925, 1924 and 1906 – Mazraa. HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION BRIEF 7 Map No. 5: Lots No. 1925, 1924 and 1906 – Mazraa in their context (Cadastral map of the lots overlaid on the 1:2000 zoning map). HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION BRIEF 8 As part of its efforts to reclaim public access to Horsh Beirut’s entire area, and in line with its advocacy campaign to protect the site from all types of infringements, NAHNOO is launching a design competition to solicit alternative visions for re-activating and re-vitalizing Horsh Beirut as a vital urban park. The aim is to propose context-sensitive design and planning interventions that connect the surrounding, socially segregated neighborhoods to the park, and benefit the community at large. This is an open call for students and professionals (architects, landscape and urban designers, planners, sociologists, anthropologists, lawyers, environmentalists, and any other related fields specialists) to submit proposals for research, design ideas along with related planning and regulations tools that unlock the potential of Horsh Beirut as an inclusive public space. The aim is to promote socio cultural inclusivity, stimulate soft mobility, create more accessible, resourceful public spaces that strengthen the voice of neighboring communities, encourage the interaction between different social groups and reconnect them to Horsh Beirut. The competition calls on participants to tackle two scales of design intervention: 1. At the city scale, considering Horsh Beirut as the area officially delineated by plot no. 1925. The intervention should bring solutions to reconnect the park to the city from different sides, in order to open up the entire focus area delimited in map No. 6 (Section III – Competition’s action zone) and make it pedestrian-friendly. Candidates should propose a master plan to that end, along with the regulatory tools that would serve their concept, whether within the existing legislative framework (zoning, regulations, etc.) or through recommendations to modify it. 2. The scale of the current park itself: The triangle of 330 000sqm. Candidates should propose urban design interventions within the park that complement their proposed master plans (pathways, landscaping, urban furniture, and equipment where relevant etc…). These interventions should fall in line with the main goal of opening up Horsh Beirut and strengthening the relationship between the focus area and the surrounding neighborhoods. Candidates are requested to suggest programs and scenarios to achieve a new vision to the park sector for both project scales (as defined in section III). These can include the rehabilitation of existing functions, the creation of new functions related to the park that serve as urban anchor points (such as piazzas, community spaces, pocket gardens, etc.), and/or interventions that facilitate accessibility and placemaking in the area. Candidates should submit a design proposal that tackles and includes all sections of Horsh Beirut as defined by plot No.1925 (i.e. the cemeteries, the hippodrome, cafés areas, residual green pockets, etc.), studying their relationship to the main park and the surrounding neighborhoods. II. OBJECTIVES - Improve accessibility: Ensure easy and pedestrian-friendly access to the park. - Enhance interaction and connectivity: Transform Horsh Beirut into a central space connecting the various, surrounding neighborhoods. - Reclaim a network of connected, public community spaces leading to the park: opening up the entire area of Horsh Beirut – Hippodrome – Qasqas within the boundaries defined by map No.6. - Create a design solution that can generate an active, physical and functional dialogue with the hippodrome, the green spaces used as cemeteries, and the adjacent neighborhoods. HORSH BEIRUT COMPETITION BRIEF 9 - Claim and develop atypical community spaces (i.e. privately owned, unused, or rarely used spaces) into community assets (for example: the cemeteries). - Identify and propose innovative functions and roles, create “Changeover spaces” - Propose a solution on how to tackle existing violations and regularized infringements, towards reclaiming these areas as shared community spaces.