Glories Regenerative Systems
2016
Could Plaza de Glories, a space regulated by transport infrastructure become, in the next 40 years, the city´s central waste management hub where waste would serve to construct configurations of a public space for the citizen?
By intersecting the three major roads of Barcelona at this traffic node, Cerda planned Plaza de Glories to be the city’s ‘new urban center’. Though Glories remained
underdeveloped due to a lack of public and commercial program, instead acting as a space regulated by transport infrastructure. The plaza is unable to function as a unified and occupiable public space due to the sectioning of the major roads, creating a barrier to pedestrian circulation via spatial and occupational division. It is also an expansive plane with scarce shelter, with few facilities for communal or recreational use, locals do not identify Glories to communal space. The plaza currently houses the Encants second hand market, The Disseny Hub Design Museum, the landmark that is Torre Agbar, a modern shopping center and is surrounded with residential neighborhoods. To create a link between these structures, address urban disjunction, and lack of public activity, Glories Regenerative Systems is a design solution to Barcelona’s waste accumulation and energy consumption, as well as a sustainable alternative to the mass transportation of products.
Active Public Space – Glories Regenerative Systems is a project of IaaC, Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia, developed at Master in Advanced Architecture in 2015/2016 by:
Students: Peter Geelmuyden Magnus, Utsav Mathur, Tobias Deeg, Martin Hristov, Rana Abdulmajeed, Nour Mezher, Jean Sebastian Munera, Lili Tayefi
Faculty: Edouard Cabay, Rodrigo Aguirre
With help from: Angel Muñoz, Pablo Barquin, Carmen Aquilar Wedge, Ramin Shambayati.
IaaC, Barcelona – 2016