Project Name: Aveiro – Urban Park
Location: Aveiro, Portugal
Category: Academic
Project Team: Amália Miranda, Carlos Dias, Diogo Saldanha and Marta Seabra
Project Year: 2013

The proposed landscape intervention is developed in the area defined by the urbanization plan of the city of Aveiro in Portugal as the future urban park.
The design was based on an analysis of existing elements and characterization of the surrounding spaces. Given the scarcity of the financial resources of the municipality it was intended to create a plan that promotes functionality, ecology and scenic quality, without jeopardizing the sustainable function of living systems in relation to users, due to the current situation of the commissioners.

The proposal acts as mediating space between the urban, rural and green, trying to foster a sense of community and their active participation in the functions of the park in order to create a place of experiences and activities.

The intervention aims to ensure a variety of recreational activities. There is a market that could be used to sell the local goods produced in the agriculture fields and a restaurant area with terrace integrated in a square located in a strategic view onto the park.

Next to these facilities, visitors can also recreate themselves in the orchard with picnic tables or produce their own products at the urban agriculture plots provided by the municipality.

Visitors can experience different atmospheres while wandering in the park. The typology of the green spaces goes from the dense and sparse forest, protecting the wind from the north, to the open clearings in the south area. The presence of the car is mitigated by the vegetation and terrain modeling creating more comfort for the users.

The urban places were treated as well in a way that allows the fluid connection of this park with the surroundings. It could eventually expand if the agriculture fields no longer perform its function, without being necessary the change of the layout of the park or demolish any built elements.