Organizational Cybernetics and Urban Planning: The
Case of the University of A Coruña
(Part II)
Actions and Recursion levels.
José Pérez Ríos1
Xosé Lois Martínez Suárez2
1
University of Valladolid
E.T.S.I. Informática, Campus Miguel Delibes, Valladolid 47011, Spain
rios@uva.es
2University of
A Coruña
E.T.S. Arquitectura, Campus A Zapateira, A Coruña 15071, Spain
xlms28@yahoo.es
Online Appendix
2
Actions and Recursion levels1
The number of actions chosen were initially 38 (21 related to urbanism and 17 related to architecture), but this number kept increasing as new actions were added
through the Vice-Rector´s eight-year term. In what follows we will comment on
some of those actions to provide an illustration of how the framework was used
and which kind of actions were identified for the different recursion levels and
their meaning within the overall UDC purpose. Many of the actions mentioned
have already been executed.
To support visualization of the different planned actions, we will use the Recursion Levels-Key Factors Matrix, in which we can appreciate which actions were
selected for each recursion level. As mentioned previously, the Recursion Criterion used was Geographical/Urban Planning. In Figure 1, we can see the matrix
with the Key Factors that were considered of interest for the case, focusing our attention on the factors that have received more study to date. Let us now review the
basis on which some of these actions have been selected.
1.
Recursion
Level
2.
Spacial
Scope
3.
Relevant Issues/
Purpose
6.
Influencial
Institutions/Organisms
7.
Applicable
Legislation
8.
Actions
Formulated
1. Act 10/1995 on Town
and Land Planning of
Galicia.
2. Ground/Building Act
of Galicia (December
2002).
3. Act 11/1989 on
Galicia University
System Planning.
4. University Act 6/2001
5. UDC standing Rule
- Contribution of the UDC to the
Town-Planning Guidelines in
Galicia (in progress)
- URB 9. Scientific-Technological
Park.
- URB 16. University Residential
Area (Campus Elviña).
- URB 15. Research Area. Creation
of new enterprises.
0
Galicia.
- Social Function of the universities.
- Relationship with the urban policy.
- University Housing Policy.
- Xunta de Galicia.
-Ministries: Education,
Territorial Policy,
Housing, Environment
and sustained
development.
- Universities:
A Coruña.; Santiago de
Compostela; Vigo.
1
Urban Region
A Coruña
Ferrol
- Accessibility.
- Range (number of potential students)
- Visibility of the UDC in the cities,
small towns and villages.
- Economic and social development of
the urban region.
- Connection with the business
network.
- RENFE.(Spain’s Railway
System)
- Cities:
A Coruña; Ferrol and all
the rest in the Urban
Region.
- UDC.
- Xunta de Galicia.
(Commuting)
2
a) Urban
A Coruña.
b) Urban
Ferrol.
- Accessibility.
- Integration University/city
- Cohesion university/city.
- Structuring of public equipment and
urban services with the university.
- UDC.
- City of A Coruña.
- City of Ferrol.
- Urban Master plan of A
Coruña (1995).
- Urban Master plan of
Ferrol.
- URB 2. Enlargement of Urban
Coaches network.
- URB 17. Bicycle lane pedestrian
Path from the city-centre to the
campus.
3
a) Campus A
Coruña
- Adaptation to the European Union
directives on Universities degrees.
- Urban attraction
- Urban and architectonic referent
(model of sustained development).
- Functional complexity.
- UDC
- City of A Coruña.
- Urban Plan for ElviñaA Zapateira Campus
(1991) and its
modification in 2002.
- Environment Plan.
- URB 10. Area 30. Elviña Campus
coach.
- URB 9 Scientific-Technological
Park. Botanical Park. (Campus
focus)
- URB 19. Ecologic Quarter.
4
Single
Buildings.
- Functionality.
- Comfort and Environment Managing.
- Optimizing spaces.
- Reference on sustainability.
- UDC
- Institution Board.
- City of A Coruña.
- City of Ferrol.
- Urban Master plan of A
Coruña (1995).
- Special Plan Campus
of Esteiro.
Actions at each particular centre.
- URB 8. Redesign of Zapateira
Square.
- URB 20. Riazor Campus
- URB 21. Ferrol-Esteiro Campus
- URB 1. Territorial Accessibility:
shire Public Transport Suburban
Trains, and coach network.
- URB 12. Parking Lots
- Parking Lots at Railway Stations.
- URB 13. Bus, Train Station
Campus Elviña.
- URB 11. Campus Center
- URB 18. Intermodal Station
Figure 1: Recursion Levels-Key Factors Matrix (v.1.1) for UDC
(Pérez Ríos and Martínez Suárez 2011)
1
This work has been supported in part by the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación
(Plan Nacional de I+D+i) of Spain. Ref.: CSO2010-15745.
3
Recursion Level 0: The Territorial Scale of the University
Institution
The consideration of the XXIst-century UDC as a public service means that we
must identify the potential users of that service, which is higher education. These
users are not only students and professors but also the society that finances the
service. The university community demands infrastructures on a territorial scale
that must deal with two main issues: The University-Society relationship, and
University housing.
a) The University-Society Relationship
The development of ‘genius loci’ (referring in very broad terms to the specificity
of a place), through activating the potentialities of a place, the transfer of
knowledge from the university to companies, the promotion of research and education of high-quality managers in the various fields, etc. requires starting with the
discovery of ‘genius loci’ identity (understood as an evolving process open to the
different and the new).
Discovery of the ‘genius loci’ as an authentic expression of the talent available
in people and their places demands the creation of confluence areas within the
campus. These spaces must attract and contain, as privileged interrelation areas,
those initiatives, which can be a model and reference-point for economic and social development in current society. One of the UDC interventions in this area is
the creation of a Technological Park, designed as space that makes visible, as an
integral project on a global scale, what a specific university project is. The Technological Park includes a business area and a scientific area covering a constructed
surface of 10.000 sq. meters (Figure 2).
Its design and setting as an urban project, apart from the plot/building concept
of the A Coruña 1990 Urban Plan, is meant to introduce urban variables of spatial
complexity (interior streets, pedestrian walks, small squares, buildings’ interrelations, etc.) with flexibility and adaptability to changing needs.
4
BUSINESS AREA
CICA
CITIC
ASISTA
CITIC
extension
SCIENTIFIC AREA
BUSINESS
INCUBATOR
CITEEC
CITEEC
extension
Figure 2: Technological Park. Ordenación VIXA-SAU
(X. L. Martínez and R. Salgueiro) Action URB 9: Scientific Technological Park
(Image taken from Pérez Ríos and Martínez Suárez 2011)
b) University Housing
The housing needs for thousands of students and hundreds of professionals who
wish to improve their education (through masters and postgraduate studies, executive education, etc.) converts the issue of University Residence into a key piece of
UDC attractiveness on a territorial scale (Martínez Suárez 2010).
The University Residence Area of Elviña (622 beds) in the A Coruña Campus
(Figure 3), and the Sanchez Aguilera Residence Project (100 beds) in the Ferrol
Campus, have as their shared objective dealing with the housing demand of more
than 8.000 people, the majority of whom currently must rent flats on the open
market.
5
Figure 3: University Residential Area (Proyect: AQ4 arquitectura).
The construction of the Residence Area poses a challenge in many respects:
political, social, cultural, urbanistic, architectonic, economic and ecological. It also can provide, as a university-specific major research project, through applying a
systemic approach, a variety of answers to what at first might be seen as a mere
housing problem.
The dimensions covered by this ambitious intervention have the following aspects: a) Political project b) Social project c) University-research project d) Urban-planning project e) Architectonic project f) Construction and technology innovation project g) Ecological project h) Flexible project, and i) Cultural project.
Due to space limitations, we cannot go into detail about the way each of them has
been considered, but we can summarize them by indicating that the whole project
intends to be sustainable, in all the economic, social and cultural aspects, so as to
position the city of A Coruña and the UDC at the forefront of meeting sustainability objectives in university spaces.
Recursion Level 1: The Urban Region
The urban-planning variables considered by the UDC at the urban region scale
(recursion level) are related to two crucial aspects for the XXIst century city: The
Campus Centre as the “Symbolic” dimension in the Urban Region, and the Intermodal system as the “Mobility” in the City-Region.
6
a) Social Cohesion in the Urban Region and University:
The Symbolic Dimension of the University
The University must be considered as a fundamental part of the General Assets
System that operates on a territorial scale, in which a transformation process toward becoming a broad urban area is underway. In this spatial area live the majority of students, professors and auxiliary university people. It is a supramunicipal area in which urban territorial considerations have surpassed administrative limits, and in which a critical portion of the population lives and moves
daily from home to work by means of the various transport infrastructures.
Figure 4: Campus Center. JVA estudio.
7
This new city-region or urban-region A Coruña-Ferrol, with more than
600.000 inhabitants, needs symbolic reference-points that foster cohesion. The
public University as a public asset has the responsibility, in that symbolic dimension, of creating the reference-points for the new urban society.
This perceived responsibility is the origin of the UDC action proposal to build
a Campus-Centre (Figure 4), which is a mega-structure 350 meters long and
20.000 sq. meters located along the railway line A Coruña-Ferrol.
Its scale, as well as the functions which it embodies, make of this set a reference at the great urban scale as a holder of: administrative and management functions (Vice-Rectorate of Campus, Vice-Rectorate of Students, Vice-Rectorate of
the Professoriate, etc.), infrastructure connections with Urban Region functions,
housing for university community functions (Residential Area 2) or for qualified
leisure (multi-uses space), that overall also act as magnets for the non-university
population. The Campus Centre is meant to provide a powerful image of the UDC
in consonance with the new urban transformation process at work in the broader
geographical region. That is why it is part of the territorial infrastructures network,
an issue dealt with in next section.
b) University and Territory Structuring in the Urban
Region: The Intermodal Station
The General Assets and the General Infrastructures System are keystones in the
arch of the A Coruña-Ferrol Urban Scale. Their integral management is crucial in
defining the overall guidelines for a sustainable development of the area. Major
assets, such as those that provide services in Health (A Coruña University Hospital Complex), Education (A Coruña University Campus), Sports (stadiums and
sports installations, INEF-Bastiagueiro), Shopping (Historical Centers and large
shopping centers) etc., need to be connected by a network of mobility infrastructures which can be used by people living in the urban region.
Figure 5: Action URB 1: Railway line Ferrol–A Coruña and Intermodal Station
(Pérez Ríos and Martínez Suárez 2011)
8
The UDC has around 24.000 daily potential users in the campuses of A Coruña
(20.000) and Ferrol (4.000), of which 70% live in the Urban Region A CoruñaFerrol. This region contains an urban system of medieval origin (A Coruña,
Betanzos, Pontedeume, Ferrol), to which within the last 50 years a constellation of
urban settlements was added, which grew out of ancients villages and traditional
farm areas.
Intermodal station
Figure 6: Campus Center and Intermodal Station. JVA studio
Good accessibility between the Urban Region and the Campus Centre is one determinant for efficiency not only of the UDC but for the whole Urban Region.
That is why the exceptional location of the Elviña-A Zapateira Campus, with its
500-meter frontage on the A Coruña-Ferrol railway (Figure 5), positions it to great
advantage for conversion into an intermodal transport point. The Intermodal Station (Figure 6) will be annexed to the central part of the Campus Centre as a structural element. This Station will be a relationship node for both the Urban Region
and the A Coruña city center. The presence of large urban residential areas and
service-sector centers (POCOMACO, Big Shopping Centers) in the UDC surroundings makes the Intermodal Station an excellent alternative for solving the
current serious mobility problem. It will also contribute to reducing demand for
parking spaces on the university campus.
9
Recursion Level 2: The urban scale
The actions carried out at this level are focused on Mobility on an Urban Scale,
aiming to integrate the University Campus into the urban area of A Coruña. This
is done mainly through two actions: a Bike Lane network and an Urban Buses
network.
Bike Lane
Because the UDC Central Campus is only 5 kilometers from A Coruña’s historic
city center, it is very easy to use such alternative transport systems as the bicycle
to reach the campus. The fact that the slope of the bike lane connecting the urban
center to the campus limits is practically zero makes this option even more attractive. Construction of this bike lane (both inside the campus and in the neighborhoods) has already started (Figure 7).
Figure 7: Bike Lane (Image taken from Pérez Ríos and Martínez Suárez 2011)
Action URB 17: 3.5 kilometers bicycle lane from City Center to the Campus
Urban Bus Network
The shape of A Coruña, which from its birth has conformed to the isthmus of a
peninsula, to where the Hercules Tower (World Heritage Site and A Coruña City
10
symbol) stands, has been typically linear. This linear form has opened in a fan-like
shape over the last 50 years, because the city’s development model has been based
on big access roads to the historic center. Five new avenues converge on that hub,
which, located in the peninsula´s isthmus, is one of the greatest concentrations of
financial, commercial and cultural services in Galicia. The university campus is
located along two of these radiuses.
New accesible area
UDC Main Campus
Figure 8: Action URB 2: Enlargement of Urban Coach Network from city edge
through main university campus (Image taken from Pérez Ríos and Martínez
Suárez 2011)
The elongated (1 kilometers) and very narrow (barely 250 meters) isthmus shape,
having the Atlantic Ocean on both sides (beach and harbor), has concentrated
many activities and provided the area with great functional diversity: evolving residential uses (from traditional to contemporary), commercial (starting in the
XVIIIth century), large port installations (XIXth century), institutional buildings,
leisure, garden areas, bank headquarters, commercial centers and business offices
from the XXth century to the present.
This linear character and diversity are the bases for the UDC action proposing
to convert the isthmus into a university transport axis to the peninsular edge of the
Hercules Tower. This continuous line of barely 7 kilometers would promote a reduction in the tense speculative housing demand active in quarters around the
campus, which now enjoy bus service. By extending certain bus lines, we can
make a continuous portion of A Coruña attractive to students, simply by bringing
11
a great part of the city´s suburban area within commuting distance through the
provision of low-cost public transport. At the same time, this action would foster
the presence of young people (the students) in quarters that are suffering from an
aging population. Figure 8 shows the bus lines that connect the locations of the
main UDC campus to the newly accessible area of the city.
Recursion Level 3: The Campus Scale
Towards an urban planning management instrument open
to change, uncertainty and an integral sustainabledevelopment policy
Instrumentalities for urban planning have evolved since 1990, when the Campus
of A Coruña’s Partial Plan was made. During the second half of the XXth century
the application of a mechanistic paradigm to urban planning produced a city divided into mono-functional parts or fragments. The use of the “Partial Urban
Plan” as an urban-planning instrument introduced great rigidity into urban expansion, as evidenced by the emergence of large mono-functional elements in growing areas (residential, industrial, commercial and university areas) that were characterized in general by spatial and typological poverty and meager functional
variety, with the consequence of torpid city life and isolation within contiguous
urban districts, physically cut off by private mobility infrastructures (Avenues,
Highways, etc.).
The 1990 Campus Partial Plan is a reflection of its time: a campus surrounded
by high speed roads blocking off any “soft” connection with neighboring areas,
mono-functional educational use, single building style (individual buildings on
isolated plots) that reproduces inside the campus the analytical approach of urban
functionalist thinking. The effect was a marginal attention to public spaces (i.e.,
green zones in very steep or residual areas).
The alternative to that approach requires introducing a systemic view of the
campus, in which considerations of diversity, variety, complexity and multifunctionality, together with a strong interrelation with the greater environment,
can provide new alternatives to university urban planning.
12
Figure 9: Campus Ecologic Quarter (X. Martínez, C. García, F. Piñeiro)
(Image taken from Martínez Suárez 2010)
We think that the University European Space and university campuses must revise
the European Model concerning the University-City relation. The campus seen as
part of the city, embodying attributes that characterize the urban life of a European
city as are functional diversity, formal and typological variety, complexity of uses,
and relationship with the pre-existing city.
The revised outlook means that one takes into consideration the various relationships to: a) the natural heritage (watercourses, forest, etc.), b) the archaeological heritage (Castro de Elviña), c) the architectural heritage (San Vicente de Elviña Romanic church, and traditional architecture in popular settlements) and d) the
urban heritage (rehabilitation of traditional housing spaces in Castro and San Vicente). In sum, the aim of this systemic approach is to transform the Campus into
a space for research, development and innovation that will generate exemplary
proposals (Figure 9) in the fields of sustainable development and ecological architecture (Eco-quarter Elviña), introducing industrial and business functions into it
(Technological Park) as well as housing functions (Residential areas), both of
which would allow use of the Campus 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
All these proposals have been presented to the A Coruña Town Hall, and have
been accepted and incorporated into the A Coruña General Urban Plan, now in
process of being approved. The organizational cybernetic approach was a major
determinant in providing a systemic, coherent visualization framework for such a
great variety of actions.
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Recursion Level 4: The Building Scale
The Building Scale and Its Immediate Environment
One of the more exciting issues in the experience of managing the university
space refers to the study of the relation between the buildings (faculties, centers)
and their neighboring environment and the city quarters in which they are inserted.
We adopt as a starting point the idea that the university space in its totality is an
integral educational or didactic space and as such must be understood as a part of
a viable system open to continuous transformation in a society characterized by
uncertainty and change.
This guiding principle drives us to consider the huge potential that the university space has by virtue of its function as ‘locus’, acting as a trigger (energizer) of
behaviors and worldviews (Weltanschauungen) in consonance with a contemporary democratic society. Such a university provides, as a public service, an opportunity for higher education whose enjoyment is not restricted either in time (the
traditional youth years in the classic/twentieth century university) or space, in contrast to the older, sometimes “monumental” or simply ‘finished design’, which in
effect was always a closed, hermetic space that reflected an immutable, when not
elitist or segregating, worldview.
Our question, then, is how universities might become, through their governing
policy actions, environments open to ‘urban design spatial research’, in new forms
that overcome the divorce between university and city implicit in campus models
from the second half of XXth century.
Several interventions in the UDC tried to answer that question by checking the
viability of this proposed campus model. Let us review three interventions related
to that issue (on the A Elviña-A Zapateira, Riazor and Esteiro campuses). They
correspond to actions made at recursion level 4 (individual buildings and spaces).
1. Action Carried Out in the UDC Central Campus (ElviñaA Zapateira)
The Central Campus of the UDC in the city of A Coruña unfolds in two main areas: one located in Elviña-A Zapateira (on the city periphery) and the other located
in Riazor (inside the central urban core). The Elviña-A Zapateira Campus, built
between 1970 and 1990, is organized around a great open space, with various
buildings constructed around it, each independently dedicated to the Architecture
Technical Schools and Sciences Faculty. The central open space inside was used,
for almost 30 years (1974 – 2004), as a large parking area for more that 150 private cars, used by students and professors to reach the campus.
Because this space was close to the buildings and their entrance doors, it was a
choice parking lot for the entire university community. The consequence was conflict and tension between car owners and the pedestrian users of public transport,
with a massive and aggressive flow of traffic.
14
Figure 10: Action URB 8: Redesign of Zapateira Square: Before (left) and after (right) the
intervention. Urban and architectural referent/model of sustained development (below)
(Images taken from Pérez Ríos and Martínez Suárez 2011)
15
This outcome followed from the initial refusal to consider the university as a
public space that first should serve relationship and education. A negative ‘interface’ was therefore built into this space from the beginning, devoting it to uncritical use, even though its size (more than 10.000 sq. meters) and location between
buildings made it the geometrical and functional center of the university enclave.
It seemed that nobody questioned its “natural vocation” to be an empty space at
the service of private cars. However, the application of the organizational cybernetics approach made it clear that the original plan was unviable. Besides its poor
capacity for fostering human and university relations, and its creation of a conflict
arena, it provided a (bad) example of how to use public space for higher education.
Once this recursion level (buildings and spaces) was selected, the intervention
process started by identifying the various elements and their inter-relations operating at that level. The starting point was the recognition of a space that was culturally, ecologically and anthropologically impoverished, subjected to parking private cars, when in fact its physical centrality equipped it with great potential for
university and pedagogical uses, and made it a reference-point for “good practices” in university urban planning and construction. The aim of the intervention
was to recover for this space its role as a center for university citizenship by converting it into a space of relationship among academic centers and all members of
the university community.
To meet this aim, the intervention affected every element and relationship. The
great open area was transformed into a large civic area, which reflected the different functions of the various buildings. It became a space, which related those
buildings to each other and a meeting point for students, a green area for relaxation, a venue for university events, a space for occasional lectures, as well as a recreation area with exceptional views over the city of A Coruña.
The buildings themselves were also subject to partial redesign, connecting
their ground floors with the outside space, and promoting possible new uses
(commercial, services etc.) that would increase the functional complexity of the
whole area and act as a catalyzer, multiplying chances for interconnection and the
exchange of knowledge and information among the various university faculties.
This action, closely related to the actions 1, 2 and 17, allowed the complete
removal of private cars from the square (Figure 10). The images show the area
before and after the intervention, demonstrating the strong visual effect of the spatial transformation.
2. Action Carried Out on the Riazor Campus
The second example is related to the campus located in a central urban area. The
issues at stake in this case have to do with the process of civic construction, with
the historical meaning of buildings seen not as “monuments” but as a materialization of a citizen´s view of the city and the role of its physical development in connecting past and future.
16
In a city without many great monuments, civic spaces in general do not lend
themselves to rhetorical interpretations that help citizens read their own-shared
history. These modern spaces do not narratively convert complex urban history into a visible ‘exceptional’ lineage in the old way, by populating it with kings and
heroes and so they marginalize citizens away from their own role as principal actors.
This lack of traditional monumentality makes such streets, squares and buildings extremely vulnerable to an alienated vision, which denies the dimension of a
common heritage and gives priority, whatever the price, to the singular wishes of
individuals. In our hyper-individualized society, then, there is a tendency to neglect the strong cohesive dimension possessed by those spaces that were created
by collective initiatives that stood, at the time, for social achievements, which
symbolized modernity and progress.
Figure 11: Removal of architectonical barriers (walls) Riazor before (left) and after (right)
the intervention. (Images taken from Pérez Ríos and Martínez Suárez 2011)
Quite simple interventions, like the UDC policy in this case, allow us to reassign spaces to their original potential. They are like books containing hidden pages
unread by those who think and act as if social time and space are simply extensions of individual time and space. Over dozens of years, university buildings at
Riazor remained concealed behind high walls, which seemed to confine thought
and knowledge, thereby contradicting the university’s role as a public asset dedicated to providing ‘education for citizens’. The design of space ‘limits’ symboli-
17
cally isolated university and city, preventing any possible relations between them.
On 14 April 2011 the UDC removed a wall, 100 meters long and 3 meters
high, uncovering a fine example of earlier architecture, the old School of Commerce. With the removal of that barrier, a strong dialogue was established with the
surrounding buildings, and a ‘new’ urban landscape was recovered. In Figure 11,
we show images of the place before and after the intervention. There are additional historical meanings in this action, that have to do with citizen initiatives in the
early XXth century that promoted the creation of an Industrial and Commercial
University, whose first structures went up in 1936.
The symbolic content of this intervention is an important part of the recovery
of historical memory, in its spatial and physical dimensions. The interrelation of
buildings and spaces previously isolated and unconnected (the Schools of Commerce, Education, Languages, Navigation, the Conservatory, the UNED and Salvador de Madariaga and Rafael Dieste Institutes) lends a new meaning to the connecting streets and spaces (Paseo de Ronda), which are no longer empty but
become genuinely public again, even didactic. The guiding idea is to let the city
speak with itself again, by restoring relations between elements of different scales.
By returning lost landscapes to collective enjoyment, the city restores to daily
life a story that connects symbols (Hercules Tower) with spaces (Riazor football
field) and with kinds of architecture (the Schools of Commerce, Education, Languages, Navigation, the Conservatory, the UNED and Salvador de Madariaga and
Rafael Dieste Institutes), in a narrative wherein the university spirit should emerge
as an essential reference-point inside the urban fabric.
3. Action Carried Out on the Ferrol-Esteiro Campus.
A University Enclave in a Peripheral Urban Space
With the UDC intervention in the Ferrol-Esteiro Campus, once again physical design was the way of responding to certain questions. These were: Does it make
sense to build a university public space as a fenced enclosure at the beginning of
the XXIst century? Alternatively, on the contrary, can university spaces help compensate for ‘urban-character’ deficits in the surroundings? Should university management apply spatial policies that strengthen and deepen relations with its environment? These are the kinds of questions that the UDC tried to answer, with the
help of the organizational cybernetic framework in the Ferrol-Esteiro Campus intervention.
The intervention started by modifying the ‘limit’ (boundary) separating the
campus form Esteiro´s quarter. The first step was to remove the existing fence and
place the new ‘limit’ where it could exert greater impact in restoring a relationship
with its environment.
18
Figure 12: Esteiro, Ferrol. Before (left) and after (right) the intervention.
(Images taken from Pérez Ríos and Martínez Suárez 2011)
On one side was a large concentration of campus buildings: the Humanities
Faculty, Administrative Services, the Ferrol UDC Vice-Rectorship, the
Politechnic Superior Engineering School and Students Services and the cafeteria.
On the other side ran a low-traffic service street that separated the campus from a
large public green around the Campus library (Casa do Patin).
Despite the fact that the Esteiro Special Plan for Urban Internal Reform (PERI)
considered keeping the space closed, the action we are describing changed the
function of the buildable plot, turning it into an open 1000 sq. meter area which
provides wide access to the Campus and constitutes a transition element between
the ‘interior’ (university buildings and gardens) and what was considered ‘exterior’ (the street and public green area). New construction was confined to a side area dedicated to various services (cafeteria, cultural activities rooms, exhibition
spaces, etc.) for students and the public (Figure 12).
Today the UDC and the Ferrol Campus offer Ferrol city a public square and a
university-civic building which serve to link the campus with the Esteiro city
quarter. This kind of action lets a public university move beyond rhetorical gestures, spoken only inside the lecture hall, and makes its service to the public a tangible reality by means of urban architectonic practice.
19
References
Martínez Suárez, X. L. (2010). Estratexia de aloxamento universitario e UDC. In:
Hooper D., Martínez Suárez X. L. et al. (2010). Areas residenciais universitarias.
A Coruña, Concello da Coruña. ISBN 978-84-95600-8-13.
Pérez Ríos, J. and Martínez Suárez X L (2011). Professional Systemics in Urban
Planning: The case of the University of A Coruña. Keynote speech, 7th. National
& International HSSS Conference, 4-7 May 2011, Athens, Greece.