Squared street | Riccardo Russo

The site area is considered a big opportunity for inner city growth. Its condition as a “transitional” point between housing developments and heavy infrastructure suggests an urban strategy able to be a smart interface for these two poles. In order to reach both urban quality and adaptability, in the project the main concepts are overlapping and integration. Urban strategy works especially on coexistence of different functions, programme, building, materials, trying to reach a smart complexity through the presence of layered buildings. On the other hand, the integration of the main street as “public infrastructure” with public spaces between the buildings, allows to reinterpretate the relationship between architecture and street activites. The urban structure of the proposal uses public space and overlap as a generators of spatial opportunities. The urban scale of the project starts with a consideration about present and project fluxes, from the existing functional distinction of fluxes to an adapting overlap of programs based on a central pedestrian main road. The central street is no longer a car dominated axe, but becomes a public infrastructure, intersecting buildings to create an heterogeneous urban landscape. The street dimension is centered on people, bus stop and bike routes are increased. The street axe curves, to slow down cars speed. The project increases the number and type of parkings: underground parking, park and ride,multifunctional and close to concert hall. The relationship with car parking is not of delimitation, but of intersection, in order to exploit those spaces for other public activities (playgorund, exhibitions..). The idea is to create a complex public space, which crosses through the whole site, connecting spaces with different features. The whole forms a completely new pedestrian area, with different themed gardens, which communicate with the architecture. The two possible scenarios are a campus and a housing district. In the first one the central area is occupied by 2 schools, in addition to the other school building in the south part of the area. The main services and facilities are hosted in the squared upper blocks, and are linked with sport facilities. In the second scenario the central part of the project is a residential area, striped shaped buildings with private green gardens on the top. The street is an overlaping of open spaces (squares) in which different activities can coexist by outlining the street in a complex way the cars are forced to reduce speed in a natural way, and thus give priority to the pedestrian a street in which the vehicle is not the main character. In addition the project operates few changes of formal heitghs of the municipal plan, redistributing them on the whole site in order to reach a larger amount of green spaces, adding private gardens on the top of upper blocks and on some intermediate levels. The courtyards provide access to the buildings and define their relationships. The intent in creating a duality between street and courtyard was pursued in the choice of materials and fragmentation of buildings at firts floors. The facades, instead of imposing a single image on the project, participate in creating the varying atmospheres of the spaces they envelop and delimit. Empty spaces in the courtyard and circulations increase the value of complexity, with the aim to create a genuine ‘plus’ for the residents.