Case Study Nürtingen 3

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Name	name of project
Location	location
Country	country
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Core Question 1: In how far does this project reveal your concept of future landscapes?

L-warps is what we would like to define as our vision for a futuristic phenomenon, a particular aspect that drew our attention to this project’s typology was how in contrast to conventional flow of urbanity, here it is reversed and instead of urban sprawl, an opposite phenomenon emerges and brings nature back into the city, we believe that this represents our vision for landscapes of the future.

Landscape and/or urban context

During the 19th century Emscher Park, which lies in the Ruhr valley of northwestern Germany, was the center of Europe’s steel and coal industries. Following the last 30 years of industrial reform and the new understandings for ecological and environmental awareness this industry had slowed down and had eventually come to a standstill, leaving the region in a state of physical dilapidation, environmental degradation, and an unprecedented rate of unemployment.

By the 1980s the government began to question whether the money that was being spent on the development of this area was achieving positive environmental and social changes, but in fact this whole region of the Rhuhr valley was seemingly depressive because of the industrial exploitation, people were leaving the area seeking healthier and economically more viable areas. The population had declined, and when an investigation was sprung by the authorities it turned out that the main reason was the lack of cultural, environmental, and architectural qualities that the area had fell into.

Illustration: Map; sketches; short descriptive analyses

Cultural/social/political context

The state of Northrhine-Westphalia, faced with the consequences was up for arms to resolve this situation, but they could not rely on the private sector to redevelop the region separately. They had to create a unified regional development plan and so a state-supported entity (IBA) the international building exhibition was founded in 1989. A very important regional planing entity that would play a vital role in the shaping of this landscape as a whole. IBA was given 10 years and DM 35 million Deutschmark to undergo the project.

While smaller project developments were the responsibility of their relevant developers, most of them were jointly financed by the local governments and private companies, except for one of the main components of this development ‘the Landscape Park in Duisburg-Nord’, which was completely funded with public money. For the complete project development, we know that in addition to local-governments, the EU, had in 1993 also upped support by another DM 2.5 billion, of which 1.7 came from public funding.

Politically, one of the most difficult challenges for the project was to overcome the diverse political viewpoints, for the development was under the influence of different regional conditions, part of the stakeholders were more in favor of decentralization while others were more in favor of concentration, some wanted the implementation of innovative techniques and others wanted continuity of previous policies instead. Polycentric, small sized towns and cities, none of which dominated, 5.3 million people in total, of which 2.5 were inside the industrial zones, cities that are run separately, each with its own mayor, political and regional development had to all have a word on the project's development.

A key element vital to the success of this project development was the collaboration that it required between these different political entities; local authorities, environmental groups, professional associations, private industry, and citizens. 17 municipalities had to be coordinated by IBA, but the outcome was the formation of an unprecedented concept for a Metropolis formed by these scattered parts, yet united by the Landscape Park.

Economically, the project meant reinvigorating the economy of the region, the number of jobs that were created, the land that was reclaimed, and the number of projects that were completed were all an element of pride for the region and the governing state. Legal reason had helped the economic implementation of the project as well. Legally, Germany employs a federal structure; in hierarchic order; state power, then regional, and then local authorities, although the most important are the federal laws, the local and regional governments act to enforce these laws. The Emscher development had opened awareness of the federal governement to the creation of several new laws at the time that came into play;

• Environmental Cleanup Law, which forced the companies that had caused damage to the environment to pay a liability fee.
• Soil Contamination Laws, which force liability to cleanup and restore the polluters of the areas
• The State Real Estate Fund Program, which assisted the region's urban renewal, by buying derelict sites and reusing them or preserving them as open space. (350 Ha) of 484 Ha were successfully reused.

Bearing in mind that the development area was comprised of 60% green space. IBA’s vision was to integrate this green belt into a 70 kilometer long park with various towns, cities, and key project developments into one coherent landscape metropolis. Between Duisburg and Kamen 120 projects had been developed and implemented in an area of over 800 sq. km.

IBA's Role was to;

• Implement the latest ecological and economic criteria for the regeneration of this ruined industrial zone.
• To transform the region’s production structure towards environmentally friendly ones
• To design future urban communities
• Encourage inward investment.
• To seek the best possible futuristic designs by conducting competitions for the project
• To coordinate the requirements of the different stakeholders in the project
• To re-utilize already exploited open space in order to prevent the exploitation of new green fields
• To reuse and extend the lives of buildings, structures, and landscapes that had been already exploited instead of dismantling and demolishing these older structures in the most intriguing way these relics of a past, the monstrous machinery have remained like a healed scar of a wound, always reminding their inhabitants of an industrial past that had better not be revisited.

Illustration: Bullet points, image, background notes

Spatial analysis of area/project/plan

• What are the main structural features?
• How has it been shaped? Were there any critical decisions?

Illustration: Map/diagram/sketches photos and background notes

Analysis of program/function

• What are the main functional characteristics?
• How have they been expressed or incorporated?

Illustration: Map/diagram/sketches photos and background notes

Analysis of design/planning process

• How was the area/project/plan formulated and implemented?
• Were there any important consultations/collaborations?

And most importantly, to initiate ‘Baukultur’, an important concept that allowed for architecture to play a vital role in the development of the masterplan; by understanding the different situations generated by present architectural conditions it allowed for a 2-way direction in planning, architectural situations would inspire the master plan as much as the master plan would have forced its fluxes onto the architecture and its immediate landscape.

Illustration: Map/diagram/sketches photos and background notes

Analysis of use/users

• How is the area/project/plan used and by whom?
• Is the use changing? Are there any issues?

Illustration: Map/diagram/sketches photos and background notes

Image Gallery

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References

• [The mobile forum for presenting art and engineering in North-Rhine Westphalia] http://www.mai-nrw.de/IBA-Emscher-Park.7.0.html?&L=1

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