From leftover spaces to a new connection

Abstract

Nowadays, cities are quickly growing and therefore infrastructure is a very important element in the urban environment. Large scale infrastructure like highways and railways connect the cities from distant places to each other in an efficient manner. The hard and dominant structure only provides for connection on top of it, but acts as a barrier for the perpendicular connections, which can even lead to separation of the two sides entirely. Large scale infrastructures were built from the perspective of the traffic on it and took little consideration of its surroundings and lead to the creation of the undefined spaces around it. The spaces that are created around large scale infrastructure usually only function as buffer zones. These are needed to keep a certain amount of distance between the highway and its surroundings. This distance can vary depending on the type of surrounding. While these spaces are used as buffer zones, the presence of the highway also causes certain limitations on the functionality and other usages of these spaces. This then often results in the spaces not being used or even being abandoned and neglected all together. This phenomenon occurs all over the world in large cities where highways go through urban areas. Especially in such a small country as The Netherlands, the space we have is limited. Nowadays we always stress the fact that we should be making multifunctional spaces, but these spaces around the highway usually only have the function of buffering between highway and its surrounding. However, these spaces have the potential to become something much more than just the leftover spaces of a highway. In my graduation project I want to address this issue, especially when considering that in the near future, most of the cars will be using electricity instead of fossil fuel, which will decrease the air pollution and noise from the engine. With this, the view on the spaces around the highway will change for the better and will allow for more different uses of these spaces. The main research question of this project will be: “How to transform the leftover spaces created by large scale infrastructure into places that can incorporate new functions that can solve the local or urban issues, while at the same time stays coherent?” Rotterdam was chosen as my location, because it is the longest orbital highway of the Randstad cities, it has many different types of areas it goes through and highway itself is also tightly encased by the city for most part. For the analysis I separated it into different layers, representing the leftover spaces and infrastructure, the potentials on large scale networks and the triggers for development. When overlapping these layers, we can see which potential is best suited for which area. The ring road is strongly divided into two halves. And within the halves, it breaks up into smaller pieces. So it is important to start with strong relevant ones. One of these important spots is the area near Kralingse Zoom. This area has the potential to improve the blue-green connections. As a conclusion of the local analysis, there is a wish to connect the city center with the green areas in the north, but the infrastructure form a strong barrier in between. And the forest itself is also only facing towards the south, making the connection to the north harder. By looking at the different heights and environments of the infrastructure, different zones are marked. And with the main goal in mind, each of these zones can contribute to by reacting in their own way. By utilizing the different spatial qualities that the area already has, the area around the large scale infrastructure can be divided into different parts, that each can react according to what that specific area needs. For instance by lowering the ground to increase the height of the structures, so both sides can be united.