EXTENDED ABSTRACT

URBAN DESIGN PROJECT IN ’S NORTH WEST TERRITORY

BENFICA’S STADIUM / COLOMBO INFRASTRUCTURE AND PUBLIC SPACE

João Paulo Costa Abreu Pereira

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Mestre em Arquitetura

Júri

Presidente: Professor Pedro Filipe Pinheiro de Serpa Brandão

Orientador: Professor Carlos Moniz de Almada Azenha Pereira da Cruz

Vogal: Professor Nuno José Ribeiro Lourenço Fonseca

Outubro 2012 INTRODUCTION

This report focuses on the role of road infrastructures, developing an analysis around them and relating them to the development of Lisbon’s North West territory. The work aims to highlight the importance of road infrastructure in the urban environment and to show that the design of road network is also a way to explore new solutions of Urban Design.

Urban mobility occupies nowadays one of the most significant aspects of the contemporary city life, due to the number of people traveling each day on different directions, but also, by the impact generated by its various structures. These infrastructures are systems of an enormous complexity, yet they leave a side some aspects that have to do with the conception of a city, such as the design of public space, the consolidation of the urban grid, the relationship between urban tissues and landscape design.

The study area is located in Lisbon’s north-west territory, bordering the municipalities of Amadora and Odivelas. Within the municipality of Lisbon, it covers the areas of , S. Domingos de Benfica and . Over the past twenty years, this area has been asserting itself as a new center within the city of Lisbon, providing and attracting both public and private services. The consolidation of this urban polo has mostly to do with its location, situated near the Municipalities boundary, between the city center and the suburbs. The infrastructure development, mainly roads and speedways, but as well as equipment, made this a prominent place not only within the city, but also at the regional scale.

This work is developed in four main parts: The chapter A infraestruturação e desenvolvimento do território, presents the strategies of urban development that took part in the study are, during the past decades, especially during the second half of the twentieth century. Análise Física do Território characterizes the physical environment of the study area and, in greater detail, the project area. Casos de Estudo, presents four examples on the design of infrastructures that served as a reference to the proposal. The final chapter Proposta de Intervenção describes and justifies the urban design options.

KEY WORDS:

INFRASTRUCUTRES | ROAD NETWORK | PUBLIC SPACE | BENFICA’S STADIUM | COLOMBO THE INFRASTRUCUTRE NETWORK AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT

The understanding of the urban evolution from the late fifties and early sixties of the twentieth century is important to understand the process of formation and expansion of the contemporary city, and the causes that lie behind the creation of new road infrastructure. The sixties opened a period of fast and intense urbanization of the territory, through the installation of new services and industries in Lisbon’s Metropolitan Area. The upcoming labor force, for the new industries and services, gave rise to the increase of new urban areas in Lisbon, such as in Benfica and S. Domingos de Benfica.

With the entry of into the European Economic Community, the economy associated with the housing market, services and industrial production, grew. The funds that were before invested in agriculture are now put elsewhere in the economy, particularly in the secondary and tertiary sector. This leads to an increase in population in cities and suburban crowns, creating an unequal balance in these territories. It is in this context of regional development, that Lisbon’s suburban areas grew, with operations of urbanization promoted by privates in Benfica, which led to the development of a spontaneous and disarticulated urban grid. With the increasing distance between the workplace and living places, soon it was necessary to establish new connections through the creation of new speedways within the urban environment.

The infrastructure and mobility technologies occupy now a prominent place in the territory, they are, according to Alvaro Domingues in Cidade e Democracia: 30 anos de transformação urbana em Portugal, the main element of rupture with the logic of growth and formation of the city. This new mobility system plays a crucial role in the city's urban form. We come to inhabit the structures on which we move at an increasing speed, dominating farther territories. It is the suburban phenomenon, or in other words, Sprawl.

Mobility has become an inevitable issue nowadays. According to the French sociologist François Ascher, in Novos Compromissos Urbanos, physical accessibility and the possibility of meeting became the greatest capital of urban places. From this point of view, these infrastructures play a major role as part of urban design.

The city center was the most relevant urban place, but, the emergence of new centralities and the creation of new highways, thru a vast territory, gave rise to a new city, polycentric and multifunctional. There are not one, but several centralities, increasingly associated with the choices that result from the creation of large public, and private facilities. These new infrastructures, as well as large equipments, are the main references in the city’s urban design.

The study area is situated within the limits of Lisbon’s municipality. It is bounded by major traffic routes. In the north-west part it is bordered by CRIL, in the South by radial de Benfica, in the East by Eixo N/S. There are also two major roads crossing it, Segunda Circular and avenida Lusíada. TERRITORIAL ANALYSIS

The study area is situated mostly in an area with little steep topographic variation, where the topographic events that are the most notable are: the hill where lies the Colégio Militar, the park Bensaúde, Alto dos Moinhos and Quinta da Granja park.

It is well perceived the stamp that the urbanization of the territory prints on the ground, through the making of an artificial topography. It can be particularly noticed the cut produced by the design of major urban corridors, including the Segunda Circular and avenida Lusíada, but also, the changes produced by large equipment, namely Colombo, the Hospital da Luz, Benfica’s Stadium and also the Metro facilities.

Concerning the soil characteristics, it is noticed the alluvial soils along the water lines, but predominantly, the clay soil types, which feature low permeability to water. Sandy soils, in Quinta da Granja and Bensaúde park, are also one of the reasons for medium high permeability levels.

The study area is marked by a large amount of water lines that have their origin in the more rugged slopes to the north, and south slopes of the Monsanto Forest Park, which together make up the Municipal largest river basin, the Alcântara’s basin. In practice, this means that the path of rainwater upstream toward the river will have to necessarily go through here before reaching the valley of Alcântara. Hence, the relationship between the urban systems and the water lines, as well as humid system is relatively disjointed i.e. there is no clear strategy to protect this urban ecological system. To the west and north, the extensive occupation of buildings and transport infrastructure along the main water basin, creates an impervious layer that reduces soil capacity of holding rainwater, therefore, contributing to the overload of the main drainage system.

Regarding the road network, it is drawn concerning mainly, the high speed access, holding a design which does not seem to be only due to the adjustment to the topography and slope, but moreover to the earlier soil order, in small farming parcels, since this division of property remains in the design of the urban structure. An urban development mainly marked by the parasitic relationship of new real estate promotions, relatively to the new transport infrastructure network.

CASE STUDIES

A SEGUNDA CIRCULAR

Segunda Circular was originally conceived in 1947 by De Groer, when the major infrastructure systems where thought together: "airport, , port, big axes, urban neighborhoods, hospitals, universities»

"In the beginning there was six lanes and gardens around. After that, the town grew, stole space to its gardens and settled almost on top of it. "

Initially built predominantly on rural fields, Segunda Circular held various processes of urbanization in its surroundings, alongside with a growing demand for individual transport and housing demand, served by a good transportation network. This speedway has enabled the creation of a new peripheral corridor, connecting the city center with its regional environment, by linking to the A1 highway, towards north, and to IC-19, towards West, in the direction of Sintra and Cascais. It also enabled the growth of several urban poles around Lisbon, namely, Cacém, Queluz, Sintra and Amadora

EIXO NORTE/SUL

Eixo Norte/Sul is a motorway route, for fast transportation within the city, resembling a highway. The ambivalence of its status is due to, on one hand, to its integration in urban areas, on the other, to the type of track profile, similar to a high speed track.

It was first conceived in 1966, with a track that stretched out over 14Km, from the Aqueduto das Águas Livres, until Sacavém, connecting the Ponte 25 de April to that location. However, because it didn’t had such a strong meaning back then, that would enable its investment, and due to the lack of funds from Lisbon’s Municipality, the project was not sent forward.

Only later, in 1989, when Krus Abecassis was Presidente of the Municipality, the project was recovered. The will was to implement it into a wider strategy, whose main ambition was to create a road network connecting Portugal to Spain and, to the rest of Europe. For this to be done, it was necessary to create a motorway between Lisbon’s southern shore, through ponte 25 de April, until north, through CRIL, ensuring a corridor that stretches from north to south, passing through Lisbon.

Soon the realization of an infrastructure of this size in urban area, has proved of great complexity, due not only to the length of its path, but especially to the impact provoked on the urban tissue, particularly in historic areas.

AVENIDA LUSÍADA

Lisbon’s Master Plan from 1967, was the first document to make 'reference to an "Axial road," to develop between Benfica and Carnide, predicting that this zone was assign to a new governmental and administrative facilities. With respect to the characteristics of the track, trace, profile and relationship with its surroundings, there was no mention. The vagueness of its features was a recurrent issue in the various plans and can be considered as de main cause to the solution that has been reached today.

The 1977 version of the Master Plan, is the first to draw it, «between Benfica’s Cemetery and the intersection between avenida Egas Moniz with the avenida dos Bombatentes», but adding little about its character.

The final project emerges as one of the conditions required by the municipality to SONAE group, owner of the shopping center venture Colombo. This was a way to solve some of the road network problems by integrating the private initiative into the public interest, with a cost around 15 million Euros (back in the 90’s) according to the local newspaper Público on 23 January 1993. It is therefore not surprising, that the adopted solution is in a certain degree indifferent to urban values and interest, contrary to the Municipalities expectations.

ANTAS DETAILED DEVELOPMENT PLAN

Within the organization of the European Football Championship in 2004, the Câmara Municipal do Porto, foresaw the possibility of rehabilitating a large area of the eastern city, through the construction of the new stadium of FC Porto. The Antas Detailed Development Plan should use the dynamics of the stadium to create a new centrality, linking two areas of the city with distinct characteristics, and segregated back then.

The proposed Project stands out from other stadiums built for Euro 2004, by using the Antas stadium to carry out a Detailed Development Plan which included the definition of public space and new infrastructures, and the use of an equalization scheme, «provided by Executive Law no. 380/99, dated 22 September 1999, and the negotiations with the main landowners»1 . This system aims to «ensure a fair distribution of both the costs and benefits of the overall project enabled each owner to enjoy all the buildings rights allocated to ii within the area covered by the Antas Plan»2. In general terms this means that the construction plan assigns rights to each of the owners in accordance with the building area proposed for their plot of land, thus translating rights of land ownership into rights of construction. The application of this system introduces a degree of freedom in terms of urban design that allowed in this particular case, to articulate the

1 Salgado, Manuel (2005). O Projeto Urbano das Antas, pp.25-26. - authors translation 2 Idem, ibidem. stadium as sports equipment, with a number of other urban systems: public space, transport interface and road network.

«The Antas Plan clearly bets on the structuring nature of its public spaces. Their main point of reference is the new Alameda das antas, which prolongs avenida dos Combatentes da Grande Guerra and ends to the east in a set of spaces and objects dominated by the Dragão Stadium. (…) The enormous circular platform around the stadium distributes spectators, resizes the entrance space and provides pedestrian articulation with the service roads and above all the Inner Ring Road (VCI).»3

The Antas Plan necessarily deals with the VCI, seeking to mitigate the cutting effect produced by its path. It is in this sense that Plan proposes to redesign the Wholesale Market intersection "that articulates the VCI with both the city and the stadium and its interface».4

The Plan looks at the design of infrastructure not only in mere road perspective, but «as one of the structuring elements of the area’s overall urban and architectural form. The concept resisted the usual temptation of considering these infrastructures as a necessary evil and something which falls outside the scope of the urban narrative that the designers are seeking to achieve.

The infrastructure is part and parcel of the architecture, and the stadium “rides atop” the VCI and promiscuously confuses itself with it, thereby generating images with a strong impact.»5.

The Plan represents a change in Modern Urban Planning (in Portugal), not only because the responsible for managing the Plan are architects, but also for what tells us Manuel Fernandes de Sá, that it is «this proactive and planned activity that contributes to the creation of a new centrality»6 taking advantage of the design of infrastructure as a mean to affirm urban design.

3 Idem, p.61. 4 Salgado, Manuel (2005). O Projeto Urbano das Antas, p. 62 - authors translation 5 Idem, ibidem 6 Idem, p.57 THE PROJET

STRATEGIC PLAN

The group proposal has two levels of intervention: the first one has to do with the heavier and structuring systems of the territory, avenues, urban axes, built structure, and a second level which concerns the continuity of the green structure, footpaths and cycle paths. In both these levels the intervention strategy considers the axis of the avenues Gomes Pereira, Uruguai and Cidade de Praga, as one of the morphological elements capable of regenerating and unites the disjointed pieces that form this place.

Noteworthy is the strengthening of the unity and continuity of that shaft, connecting at its ends the Monsanto Forest Park and Telheiras. Through their transversal section resize, the avenues of Uruguai and Cidade de Praga, decreases the width of the roadway for a total of four lanes. In Telheiras it is proposed the extension of the alameda, eliminating the roundabout and strengthening the connection of avendia Cidade de Praga to Telheiras.

To ensure and enhance the visual axes, it was set up a new avenue connecting the Padre Cruz neighborhood to Pontinha’s square, leveraging new interactions for this neighborhood, relatively segregated from the rest of the city. Flanking this avenue, there is an urban park that surrounds the entire structure of Metro structure connecting the new avenue with the historic district of Carnide.

At the other end in Monsanto, the connection is ensured by a new intervention at the railway station, permitting, from it, to cross the railroad tracks and cross the different terrain levels. Between Colombo and the Benfica’s Stadium, it was proposed a new square, as means of clarifying the urban image of these two equipments, but mainly as a way of creating public space. This urban void is also the aim of resolving conflicts between accessibility and the conflicts between the road network and.

In the second level of intervention, we propose a pedestrian path that links the various green spaces, which starts at the Polytechnic, and ends in the urban park along the Metro infrastructures. This route searches the terrain outline contours, in order to minimize the slope of the pedestrian path. Thus it is created two routes: one main road that connects the most important nodes, and one secondary, which connects multiple pedestrian nodes. URBAN PROJECT

The search for urban values is also dependent on how one reads the urban phenomenon and understands the matter that makes up the city today, which has to do with the discontinuity of the built mesh, with urban voids, large equipment and infrastructures, stadiums, shopping centers and motorways that inhabit suburban areas. This interpretation allows to recognize that if today the city lost its compact form, if today reaches wider territories, then Urban Design needs to find this new urbanity in territorial systems that correspond directly with the geography of these places

«Interesa un nuevo concepto de urbanidade, como algo que, precisamente, para la urbanización contemporânea (global, territorial, híbrida y dispersa), es su mayor riqueza. Es la urbanidade nueva de las distancias y los silêncios de las periferias incipientes, de los testellos internos es las intersecciones en los descampados…

Esta urbanidade de la matéria está hoy en la periferia extensiva, vacía y discontinua, al igual que en la ciudad densa y compacta. Y también en los Centros Comerciales o en los polígonos de vivendas, así como en los márgenes de las infraestructuras solitárias o de los hub intensivos.»7

This project aims to create a new public space design, capable of providing the intervention area of discipline in terms of built elements and clarity in its image. It also has the ambition of making Colombo a major player in public design space.

OBJECTIVES

01. Redesign avenida do Colégio Militar – Decrease its barrier character's by redesigning its path;

02. Redesign infrastructure | Road Node - Redesign the road stadium intersection in order to lessen the impact of the structures of the road network;

03. New Square - Creating a new public space that will improve the relationship between Colombo and Benfica’s Stadium, as well as the network of public space;

04. New topography | Walls - building a system that allows walls to create a new topography and level the pedestrian link between the stadium and Colombo;

05. Redesign of the stadium entry - Articulate access to the stadium with the system of public space;

7 Solà Morales, Manuel, De Cosas Urbanas, p.147. 06. Strengthening municipal ecological structure - Reduce the risk of flooding, contribute to the retention and infiltration of water and, to reduce its flow velocity, as well as the decrease of water entering the drainage system; harmonize the green network system;

PROJECT’S DESCRIPTION

With a new path and profile, avenida do Colégio Militar assumes the role of backbone of this intervention, participating actively in the public space design. The number of lanes was reduced from a total of five to three; the avenue is replaced by a transverse profile suitable for the hierarchical level to which it belongs, with an overall width of 9.75 m.

Situated between Columbus shopping center and Benfica’s stadium, comes a new plaza that responds to the desires and ambitions of creating a square that can introduce some order and clarity in the urban image, but also, to improve the spatial continuity between those two equipments. Simultaneously appears in response to the intentions of strengthening the municipal ecological structure by increasing the permeable area, enhancing the role of green spaces. The square is defined by a new system of walls along the avenida do Colégio Militar, which in addition to fulfilling its primary structural function, embodies this new urban void and establishes a new topography.

The Stadium’s entry remains in the same location, but it is widened by the fact that it has been eliminated one of the connections to Segunda Circular, improving mobility conditions for pedestrians. It was anticipated that this entry could also communicate with the parking entrance of Colombo, in order to allow fans to use that parking place, and walk directly between the stadium and the car park. Entering the grounds of the stadium, we found a new ramp that connects the Stadium’s north platform, thus solving the problem of access for fans.

Due to its importance in the context of mobility and public transportation, the bus station was also redesigned, taking into account its privileged position among an urban park and a shopping center and next to a subway station. This operation aims to adapt the terminal area to its function, but also, to reinforce the importance of Quinta da Granja under the Municipal ecological network, promoting the continuity of the green system and increasing the available area for the urban farming.

CONCLUSION

The discussion on this matter, around the development and integration of large infrastructure and equipment in the city, can bring to public, a debate on how the Instruments of Land Management, provide the Portuguese municipalities means to call the various entities responsible in the urbanization of the territory, in the quest for an integrated urban design. The Portuguese law defines that the Municipal Master Plans, as Instruments of Land Management, are obligatory on both the public and private entities, hence, it would be interesting that the solution of this centrality could pass by a joint action between the various entities, public and private, (municipality, Metro, , SONAE and Sport Lisboa e Benfica), in an articulated and coordinated action, around a single ambition.