11 minute read
2.1. Walk| Built Footpath
III. 1 Handmade drawing by the author. Footpath created by the constant walking of people on the same place.
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III. 2 Handmade drawing by the author. Built footpath: Viewpoint Tugeneset (Senja, Norway) by Code.
Walk | Built Footpath
According to Cambridge Dictionary, footpath is “a path, especially in the countryside, for walking on”. Public footpaths were originally created by people walking across the land to work, market, the next village, church, and school. Some footpaths were also created by those undertaking a pilgrimage. Examples of the latter are the Pilgrim’s Way in England and Pilgrim’s Route (St. Olav’s Way or the Old Kings’ Road) in Norway. Some landowners allow access over their land without dedicating a right of way. These permissive paths are often indistinguishable from normal paths, but they are usually subject to restrictions. Such paths are often closed at least once a year, so that a permanent right of way cannot be established in law. Cases like this use the footpath as a connector to carry out a particular journey.
Based on the above, it could be said that in past years the footpath could be mostly used to reach a destination. However, today the most common way to get to a destination is by vehicle. For this reason, nowadays walking through a footpath, built or naturally existing, can be mainly considered as a recreational activity through which public space could be generated if the surrounding context motivates it in any way. Today, the footpath is widely used as an architectural actor within different contexts, mostly located outdoors. It can be found in the form of a boulevard in the city or as an ecological trail in the mountains. It is the most common way in which the human being can relate to the context around him in a dynamic way.
Next, the analysis of different case studies is carried out. In which, the footpath fulfills the objectives of activating, connecting, facilitating access and allowing the exploration of a particular territory by simply walking.
“All of these elements are moulded into the landscape so that the visitor’s experience of place seems even more intimate. The architectural intervention is respectfully delicate, and was conceived as a thin thread that guides visitors from one stunning overlook to another”.
(Ramstad, 2014)
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The Orography next to the Highway
To access the project, the road widens into a plain in the middle of a dense orography, there a platform is formed where visitors can park their cars. Next to the parking lots, the main building is located, where a restaurant and toilets work, and on the east side of the main building is the built path, which enters the mountain 350 meters above the ground, ending in a viewpoint flying over the mountain.
Through a stairway, the project creates easy access to the mountains during all seasons of the year. The built path adapts to the orography and extends at certain points generating rest areas and / or viewpoints along the way.
The constructed trail provides handrails on both sides, due to the rocky territory and the steep incline of the mountain. In addition, as it is a path with steps, the handrail works as a support for walkers.
The materials used for the built path were designed to withstand the extreme climate of the mountain and so that it does not need more maintenance, for the stairs and landings, cast concrete was chosen in place and for the handrails, cor-ten steel.
III.3 RRA. (2014). photography: Rest area on Trollstigen Visitor Centre. III. 4 RRA. (2014). photography: Stepped footpath o Trollstigen Visitor Centre.
Trollstigen Visitor Centre - Trollstigen, Norway
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IMPORTANT REMARKS
* THE USE OF THE HIGHWAY SERVICE AREA AS AN OPPORTUNITY TO EXPLORE NATURAL CONTEXT * THE ADAPTATION TO THE OROGRAPHY WHILE CREATING AN ACCESIBLE WALKWAY FOR VISITORS OF THE TERRITORY
III.5 RRA. (2014). photography: Aerial view of Trollstigen Visitor Centre viewpoint. III. 6 Handmade drawing by the author. Diagram of Trollstigen Visitor Center location.
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Simplicity and Modesty on the Way
After the closure of the Club Med tourist complex in this unique coastal landscape, the institutions wanted to erase the footprint left by that urban development through a project directed by Martí Franch (EMF Arquitectura del paisatge) and Ton Ardèvol (ARDÉVOL consultors associats SLP), in which a large multidisciplinary team collaborated.
The initial strategy proposed by the public tender is simply to buy the property, remove the old Club Med buildings and invasive flora in order to restore the natural dynamics in the place. After the deconstruction of certain buildings, the project seeks a relationship with nature, reviving the original ecological dynamics of the Cap de Creus Natural Park. In this way, the plan became the largest deconstruction and restoration project on the Mediterranean coast.
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The project is related to identifying, revealing and finally, transforming, to adapt to what already exists. Reveal and celebrate the “real” landscape and its specific qualities. Indeed, the objective of the project was not to build a landscape, but to conceive the conditions to live its experience.
Always taking into account having the natural context as the main actor of the intervention, a simple and continuous built path is designed, which adapts the orography while maintaining the same width. But above all, it is implanted in the territory in a clear and modest way, creating a certain contrast with the surroundings, but which helps to highlight what already exists. Along the way there are rest spaces, viewpoints that frame the landscape and abstract elements, which together with nature, stand out on the route with open-air art galleries.
III. 7 Ardevol; EMF. (2010). photography: Viewpoint on Tudela-Culip Restoration Project. III. 8 Ardevol; EMF. (2010). photography: Footpath on Tudela-Culip Restoration Project.
Tudela Culip Restoration Project - Cap de Creus, Spain
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IMPORTANT REMARKS
* THE MODESTY AND CLARITY OF A PATH, WHICH MAIN OBJECTIVE IS TO MARK A ROUTE WHILE PERCEIVING THE EXISTING CONTEXT * THE USE OF VIEWPOINTS AS A WAY TO FRAME EXISTING VIEWS AND CREATING A DIALOGUE BETWEEN ARCHITECTURE AND NATURE
III. 9 Ardevol; EMF. (2010). photography: Footpath on Tudela-Culip Restoration Project. III. 10 Handmade drawing by the author. Diagram of Tudela-Culip Restoration Project location.
“Our approach was to make as minimal an impact on the landscape as possible, but still create something safe and solid”.
(Koller, 2018)
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Accesibility to Explore
III. 12 A simple staircase that goes up around the volcanic crater in an oval shape. The same width of 1.5 meters is maintained throughout the route, thus indicating the clear intention of the project, to facilitate the access of visitors to the top of the crater. Like many built trails, this one was originally formed by all the visitors climbing this crater. However, over time the terrain began to deform due to the high pedestrian traffic of recent years.
Visitors who want to get to the top of the crater, arrive by a road till the parking area located on the slopes of the crater, from there the first orange stairs begin through the cor-ten steel, standing out among the black soil of the site. if you see it from the front, but if you look at it from above, it becomes camouflaged in a certain way by the perforations in the material.
The built footpath does not have handrails, which allows the user to climb the mountain stepping more firmly but without losing that natural sensation of mountaineering. The project does not have rest areas or viewpoints neither, as it offers the experience through the contemplation of the landscape on the way up.
III. 11 (n.d.). photography: Aerial view of Sáxholl Crater Stairway. III. 12 (n.d.). photography: Close-upl view of Sáxholl Crater Stairway.
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IMPORTANT REMARKS
* THE MODESTY AND CLARITY OF A PATH, WHICH MAIN OBJECTIVE IS TO RECOVER THE EXISTING DETERIORATED FOOTPATH AND FACILITATE THE CONTEMPLATION OF AN IMPONENT NATURAL ELEMENT
III. 13 (n.d.). photography: Upside down view of Sáxholl Crater Stairway. III. 14 Handmade drawing by the author. Diagrams of Sáxholl Crater Stairway.
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Bringing the Town closer to Nature
MAAT (Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology) is located on the banks of the Tagus in Belém. On the north, it limits with the Brasília Avenue and on the south with Tajo River. As a result of it´s location, it ends up being a difficult place to access by pedestrians, who come from the other side of the highway.
As a solution for the pedestrian accesibility, a footpath bridge is built to connect the vilage with roof of the building which works as a public platform with a panoramic view of the Tajo river. The roof of the project is developed in an organic way, and so does the foothpath in form of a continuous ramp, which follows the same character of the building, resulting in the perception of both as a whole unit.
The construction of a pedestrian bridge over the highway not only facilitates access to the museum building. But additionally by maintaining the bridge for public use with a platform at the end of the road, it is giving all the inhabitants of the city an opportunity to contemplate and interact more directly with the Tagus River, managing to tear down the obstacle that the road represents to the city in front of the natural context.
III. 15 Noguiera, F. (2016). photography: Facade view of MAAT. III. 16 Noguiera, F. (2016). photography: Bridge view of MAAT.
MAAT Museum - Lisbon, Portugal
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IMPORTANT REMARKS
* THE PEDESTRIAN CONNECTION ACROSS THE HIGHWAY BETWEEN THE TOWN AN THE NATURAL CONTEXT * THE USE OF THE ROOF AS A TERRACE FOR PUBLIC ACTIVITES FOR THE INHABITANTS * THE INTEGRATION OF THE PROJECT WITH THE NATURAL CONTEXT
III. 17 Noguiera, F. photography: Facade view of MAAT. III. 18 Handmade drawing by the author. Diagram of MAAT location.
“The new building becomes a path and architecture at the same time, while allowing nature to continue around, under and within the form of the structure”.
(Powehouse Company, n.d.)
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The Footpath as the Activator
Loop of Wisdom is located in a new neighborhood in Chengdu, China, on a green terrain, used by people for regular walking or jogging routine. The building stands out in the context, through its vibant red color, which, being chromatically opposed to the green of the public park, makes the proposed and the existing stand out by contrast.
The fluidity of the red structure, which works as the roof of the interior spaces of the building, incorporates a public space for the neighbors, who use the path mainly for their sport activities. In addition to its important functionality, its sculptural form working as a unit with the building, represents an exhuberant landmark of the territory, which motivates the dynamization of the site.
This footpath is not connecting two elements separated by an obstacle, since the built footpath to walk by is infinite as it has a circular shape. Therefore, it is important to highlight how in this very particular case the walkway is used as the creator of public space, without the functional need to connect one point with another, the footpath among many other architectural/urban elements is chosen to be the activating artifact of a territory, due to the constant movement produced within it.
III. 19 Leijonhufvud, J. (2020). photography: Path view of Loop of Wisdom. III. 20 Leijonhufvud, J. (2020). photography: Stairs view of Loop of Wisdom.
Loop of Wisdom: Museum and Reception Center - Chegdu, China
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IMPORTANT REMARKS
* THE USE OF CONTRAST TO CREATE A LANDMARK IN THE TERRITORY * THE GENERATION OF DYNAMIC PUBLIC SPACE THROUGH THE FOOTPATH * THE IDEA OF THE FOOTPATH AS THE BUILDING ITSELF
III. 21 Leijonhufvud, J. (2020). photography: Aerial view of Loop of Wisdom. III. 22 Handmade drawing by the author. Diagram of Loop of Wisdom location.
