URBAN PROJECT | NÓ DO LUMIAR and the Lisbon Northwest Gateway
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URBAN PROJECT | NÓ DO LUMIAR and the Lisbon Northwest Gateway Gonçalo Duarte Pita Architecture Dissertation | Instituto Superior Técnico Coordinator: Prof. Carlos Moniz de Almeida Azenha Pereira da Cruz ABSTRACT The following report presents the work carried out for 2010/2012 Final Project course. The conducting element of this report is the impact road infrastructures may have, particularly when inserted in the urban context, whether they are generators of that context or the main cause of its frag- mentation. The mono-functionality of the road layout, which is a consequence of a mono-disciplinary approach to its conception, led to the incapacity of the structural road system to be part of the contem- porary city as an integrated actor of the urban space and therefore becoming an intrusive element. Supported by a reflection on road infrastructures, the goal of this report is to analyze the Lisbon struc- tural route consisting of Calçada de Carriche and Av. Padre Cruz. — the Northwest Gateway —, and the conception of a project on Nó do Lumiar, its main articulation point. Being one of Lisbon’s main gateways for centuries, the Northwest Gateway was responsible for defining the mobility structure of the North Ring when it was still part of the city’s periphery. Today, due to redefinitions of its route and section, it is an element of urban discontinuity along with other high performance roads as Eixo N-S and 2ª Circular. Nó do Lumiar is at this moment a dysfunctional urban centre due to the powerfull impact of its road system. Despite allowing an effective accessibility to automobiles on a broader range of the territory, its impact does not allow for a comfortable use of the space where it’s inserted, a space made up of elements of undeniable historic, patrimonial, cultural and administrative value. This project aims to re- qualify this site, rebalancing the different forces inserted in it, allowing the creation of a rich, high quality public space. INFRASTRUCTURE | CENTRALITY | MOBILITY | CONTINUITY | DIVERSITY 1 The road infrastructure The road infrastructure is an element constantly marginalized from a broader reflection on city creation. The traffic growth led to an excessive specification of the road system design and traffic flow manage- ment, making it a faster and more effective type of mobility and therefore allowing it to grow. The basic design created to meet those goals proves it. A highway is a territorial piece with very specific features despite being made of different modular elements that offer some flexibility, as allowing a smooth tran- sition with another highway or with a local road system. However these specific qualities inevitably lead to the creation of discontinuities on the surroundings. The need for speed, which leads to a need for greater security, is the main aspect responsible for the incompatibility between the conception and the surroundings. A highway needs a central reservation (usually achieved by a traffic barrier), with larger lanes and shoulders, with its limits defined by guar- drails and verges, everything with a security purpose. All these features do not enable a natural mesh between the road infrastructure and the urban space, slicing it into different parts or creating difficulties for a new urban fabric to emerge. The road infrastructure, instead of working as one more layer inserted in the urban space, ends up creating an impenetrable, and at times impassable, “securitarian trench”. 2 The North Ring Fig 1 Until mid 20th century, the North Ring was a zone marked by a rural lifestyle, preserving a peripheral status in contrast with the historic city centre. However, it was the North Ring, where there were farms and villas attached to ancient roads leading to the capital that provided it with goods and gave shape to the suburban landscape. At the intersection of these roads were the main population settlements, with prominence to Lumiar, Luz and Charneca. In the first decades of the 20th century, the first palace-like residences emerged, as a complement to the suburban character of the North Ring. In the 1950s, the first land allotments were made, especially along Alameda das Linhas de Torres, the main road connec- ting the urbanized Lisbon with the yet peripheral Lisbon. For many times, and since de 19th century, different administrative teams of the Lisbon municipality search for ways of integrate this peripheral ring into the rest of the city, through the creation of new avenues that would structure the whole capital. However, various proposals with the same goal were not executed and the Lisbon road system ended up having the layout that prevails to the present day, supported by two radial axes that start in Downtown Lisbon — departing from Av. da Liberdade and Av. Almirante Reis — and ending when they arrive at 2ª Circular. The road infrastructure is one of the main defining elements of the North Ring, where Eixo N-S, 2ª Circular, Av. Padre Cruz, Calçada de Carriche and CRIL pass by. The concentration of highway roads in this city zone can be defended by the city growing style, which led the northern areas — Carnide, Lu- miar, Ameixoeira, Charneca — to remain forgotten from the urban planning. This situation was respon- sible for the suburban character of the North Ring to stay practically untouched until mid 20th century as a vast, expectant area. Therefore, the North Ring had enough free space to develop a big part of the investment in road infrastructures, providing the city with a mobility system that allows a fast crossing and a fast intra-municipal commutation. 0 2000 4000m North Ring 2ª Circular Eixo N-S Northwest Gateway Fig 1 North Ring | Adaptation: bing.com/maps 3 Northwest Gateway and Nó do Lumiar Fig 2 Done through a road “embedded” in a valley connected to Várzea de Loures — Calçada de Carriche —, where it was always more comfortable to surpass the existing topography, the North Gateway would continue through Alameda das Linhas de Torres until reaching Campo Grande and having Nó do Lumiar as its main articulation point. However, with the growing pressure upon Alameda das Linhas de Torres in the mid 20th century, as a consequence of the population growth in the North Ring and in the Lisbon periphery, the Northwest Gateway changes the second half of its route for the new road Av. Padre Cruz, a highway similar to Calçada de Carriche. In Nó do Lumiar there is a clash of a vast number of roads with different functions and scales. Besides Calçada de Carriche, Av. Padre Cruz and Eixo N-S, it can still be found Alameda das Linhas de Torres, Estrada da Torre, Azinhaga da Cidade, Rua Prof. Manuel Valadares, Rua Alexandre Ferreira, Rua do Lumiar and Estrada do Lumiar. With Nó do Lumiar as an area with this big confluence of routes and provided with a big offer of public transportation — including the subway system — and close to various facilities of undeniable value, Nó do Lumiar needs to work as a public space capable of dealing with the different requirements inflicted on it. It is characterized by a big diversity of urban typologies. The west side is mainly made up of old farms and villas from 16th to the 18th century divided by narrow roads, most of the times without a distinction between the space for vehicles and the space for pedestrians. The east side is mainly made up of seven to fifteen floors high residential buildings from the 1970s and 1980s. The centrality of Nó do Lumiar is also influenced by the diversity and importance of the uses existing there. In this centre is found Fregue- sia do Lumiar, Cemitério do Lumiar, Museu do Teatro, Museu do Traje, Parque de Monteiro-Mor and, in the surroundings, Parque do Vale Grande and Quinta das Conchas e dos Lilases. 0 500 1000m Fig 2 Nó do Lumiar | Adaptation: bing.com/maps 4 The whole Northwest Gateway, but specially Nó do Lumiar, is a space that owes its own existence and simultaneously its problems to road infrastructures. This is an example of the influence these com- munication systems have on the territory, being even capable of generate centralities. However, this influence has to be controlled and taken into consideration by urban planning and therefore not allowing the mono-functionality of its different elements which leads to a difficult interaction between them or even to the invalidation of the whole. Right now in Nó do Lumiar, the road system prevails, preventing: • the adequate operation of the municipal and local road system • the existence of a high quality pedestrian mobility system • the people’s knowledge and usage of public facilities of undeniable municipal and national impor- tance • the adequate preservation of sites and buildings with patrimonial and historic value • the creation of a high quality public space It is clear how harmful the outcome of a mono-disciplinary approach to the design of infrastructures can have on a public space like Nó do Lumiar. The urban planning, which always requires multi-disciplinary approach, has inevitably to assume an important role on it. Functionally related with its surroundings or not, just an approach with that quality can allow for the conception of road infrastructures to be confron- ted with the natural complexity of the public space. 5 Fig 32ª Circular —MADT | North Ring ascritical asthe one 2ª Circular has on the whole city. Calçada de Carriche and Padre CruzAv. — including Nó do Lumiar — has a sectioning effect on the offeringthereforeby conditionsstrengthenNorthcontinuitiesmadeurbanthe the routeto on The Ring. p.3) N-Sallowing Eixo conclusion of With a new paradigm in 2ª Circular enabling its own transformation into a “urban and withavenue” the Marechal and the to Prior waterfront to Gomes Velho extends from through daCosta.