PASSEIG COMTE D'ÈGARA
The project is located in one of the main urban axes of Terrassa, between Portal de Sant Roc and the Industrial School, on a section of Passeig Comte d'Ègara about 125m long and 15m wide, with an asymmetrical cross-section formed by a consolidated façade to the north and a public garden to the south.
The transformation, which is part of a project to extend the pedestrian area of the city centre, has as its main objectives traffic calming, improving connectivity with the gardens and introducing areas for neighborhood socializing.
The result is a 'street-square' divided into two strips, one for circulation, with priority for pedestrians, and the other, which solves the transition between the street and the garden, formed by flowerbeds and benches arranged with the aim of breaking up the linearity of the street and forming spaces for socializing -chatting, resting, playing,...- on an almost domestic scale.
The connection between the street and the garden is increased, blurring the boundary between the two, which are joined in a single public space, extended to the Passeig northern façade.
The continuity of the urban axis Portal de Sant Roc - Industrial School is reinforced by removing obstacles, rearranging the terraces of the bars and building a stairs at the west end of the Passeig to overcome the existing difference in level between the garden and the street.
Ceramics is the prevailing materiality of the project, linking with the industrial past of the city. The 'circulation strip' is paved with the tile used throughout the city centre, while the paving of the 'transition strip' is a hand-made brick laid on edge, giving this area a specific character but at once integrated into the whole.
The project introduces heritage elements, such as an old stone fountain converted into a flowerbed, some stone benches coming from the garden or the granite cobblestones hidden under the asphalt for decades, replaced to form 'rugs' in the 'domestic spaces' of the 'transition strip'.
The public space is renaturalized with trees and vegetation of medium and low strata using species of reddish foliage to give continuity to the prevailing materiality of the project, and the filtering surfaces are increased -until 25% of the 'transition strip'- contributing to restore the natural water cycle and improve the level of the aquifers.
CO2 emissions from the construction of the Passeig are limited by the following technical and material solutions: firstly, all the ceramics in the project is manufactured in biogas kilns; secondly, the aggregate for the concrete of the bases and foundations is recycled; finally, part of the gravel is reused from the existing bases and the rest is made with recycled aggregate.
