OMGEVING has won the design competition in Valencia for a four-kilometer-long landscape park with three eco-neighborhoods. The landscape park covers one and a half kilometers of train tracks and gradually phases out highway infrastructure, while the eco-neighborhoods accommodate five thousand residents.
Valencia, the European Green Capital 2024, is thus on the threshold of the largest urban development project in 40 years, since the Turia River was transformed into a park. It is the first time a Belgian design studio has won a commission of this scale in Spain.
This ambitious project fits the vision of making Valencia a climate-robust 15-minute city. OMGEVING convinced the jury with its “Green Leaves Strategy”. The elongated landscape park forms the ‘stem’ from which the surrounding neighborhoods are systematically greening. This contributes to a cooling effect in the streets during heat waves and droughts. New bicycle and walking paths will bring residents to the city center in 15 minutes via the green ‘leaves’. With this, the southern part of Valencia is initiating the modal shift to less car traffic. The three eco-neighborhoods are intertwined with this green-blue mobility network and are at the forefront of the climate transition. “The redevelopment of this part of the city”, says project leader Sven Augusteyns, “is therefore fully committed to sustainable mobility, climate adaptation, biodiversity, carbon neutrality, circularity and affordable housing.” With this, design studio OMGEVING is doing full justice to the name that Valencia gives to this 21st century urban development project ‘The green corridor’.
Drawing up the master plan to refine the competition design will take at least a year. OMGEVING can count on the support of a local team of ecologists, hydrologists, architects, landscape architects and co-creation specialists. With projects in Teruel, Zaragoza and Burgos on the agenda, the studio wishes to continue growing in Spain.
Valencia Green Corridor
Designers:
OMGEVING bv i.c.w. Peñín Arquitectos SLP, Quintana Seguí landscape, NADALVILLENA, Pablo Navarro Tena, CPS Infraestructuras Movilidad y Medio Ambiente
Image & Text credits: OMGEVING