Jennifer Beitel (Germany)

Felix Wernli (Switzerland)

Elie Abi Sejaan (Lebanon)

Ana Čajić (Croatia)

Nadia Corsetti (Canada)

Victorine Lefebvre (France)

Dimitri Leimgrübler (Switzerland)

Lizaveta Rebkavets (Belarus)

Georgia Ryan (Ireland)

Farid Taher (Germany)

Oliwia Tatara (Poland)

Florian Van De Voorde (Belgium)

Public spaces are hard to find all over Lebanon. Out of historical reasons, the Lebanese don’t have a feeling for shared public spaces anymore. In addition to that, the government is not interested in improving this issue. First NGO’s, founded by citizens, started trying to intervene, call attention to the lack of public spaces and bringing people together.

Nonetheless, the support of the government is very limited.

Through the initiative of MEDSworkshop, a cooperation with the municipality of Amchit was achieved and the project of “running loops” was established in the local environment. Then volunteer students from around the world have developed interactive urban interventions according to the wishes and needs of the people spending time at Amchit Boulevard.

The first days, the students spend their time with research and gaining a feeling for the location of Amchit Boulevard. Therefore, observations and interviews have been made with the locals on-site.

Using the Design Thinking Method, the group developed first tendencies for their final ideas. At the same time, the group defined a focus on activity constructions as the majority of people visit the place for sports and activities. As a second priority, ideas for relaxation and playground construction for kids were developed.

In addition to the stations, the group created a concept for visual communication which included a logo for Amchit Boulevard and a signage system. A map guides the pedestrian through the individual stations. The individual stations are named after parts of a car. The omnipresent car, which remains unused on this boulevard for once, accompanies the pedestrian across the individual stations.

Apart from local pine wood, surrounding waste materials such as car tires and ropes were reused and upcycled. Thus, the project reduced waste from the coast and is less pricey for the MEDSworkshop at the same time. Furthermore, the students learnt how to work independently with power and hand tools.

A total of eight stations were implemented:

• A versatile seat for recreation,

• Balancing boards for children and sportsman,

• A long balancing bar which can be used for balancing and push-ups,

• Lying surface boxes for yoga and abdominal exercises,

• A pull up bar for pull ups,

• Two long ropes for arm training,

• Inserted tiers for coordination training,

• Two small goals for football,

• and a few modular seats to enjoy the sunset.

After installing each project, the people immediately started using the constructions and thanked the team for their work and effort. Moreover, the team even got directly help by people passing by which shows how much each improvement of public spaces is welcomed and appreciated. This direct feedback helped to keep the motivation upright and even elaborate on some designs and constructions. This involved the testing of each object, from which one of the stations could be redesigned and fixed right away.

In the end, the team reflected and evaluated the constructed interventions which gave a further outlook on what can be done in the future. The team discussed the whole workshop in groups and gave valuable feedback. The experience of the whole circle from research to evaluation was really important for the project of “running loops”. The students could learn to secure the unpredictable and we as a team were able to ensure that our intervention could be tested and handed over to the user adapted to the conditions of the environment. A further cooperation for a continuation of the project with locals was suggested by the organizers.