Developing strategies for Castellterçol town
Emplacement
Castellterçol, Barcelona
Partners in charge
Alexis Cogul / Emiliano Armani
Associates
Juan Trias de Bes
Project Type
Master Plan
program
Multifunctional area + new housing development
Plot surface
75.000 square meters
Build Surface
30.000 square meters
Project date
June 2009
Phase
finished
Client
Copcisa + Private owner
What do you want to be? This is always asked of someone who needs to make a decision.
What does Castellterçol want to be? Has someone asked it? Castellterçol “IS” today? Is it a municipality loyal to a model? Does it maintain its essence? Is it recognized in its place and in turn, does the population believe in its future?
Perhaps these are questions that when considered from a strictly technical discipline do not intervene; however, in turn are innate values of a place and a population which gives name and tradition to a community.
This book attempts to introduce certain visions and lectures that may be attributed to the small population of Castellterçol— municipality situated on the Oriental Valley and considered a small oasis in the catalan landscape given its characteristics and its peculiar geographic situation. Cold in winter, hot in summer, Castellterçol, has always remained as the grand unknown of the valley. Only 45 minutes from Barcelona, this small population today raises its voice.
A few years ago, a group of Castellterçol residents began voicing their concern regarding the absence of growth and the continued degradation of the town as it affected their economic activity, as well as the lack of initiatives from younger generations and its previous migration. Also alarming is the progressive disappearance of traditional small businesses which contribute a level of interest and ambition to the residents of a community emerging from post-war repression.
The zeal to defend goodwill and the inheritance of a legacy, these resident saw in the revision of the new POUM a unique opportunity to have their proposals heard— realizing a collective conscience. As a result of this yearning, as of a few years ago and even more recently a team of architects collaborating with a group of professionals: anthropologists, geologists, demiologists, demographersand engineers, have initiated a body of work in relation to the debate over the decisions of the new strategic plan for urban growth. A parallel discussion revealing untapped municipal potentials as well as existing conflicts are the objective of this small investigation. It is presented as a non-traditional methodology of work in the Urban Analysis— an inductive process to recognize tensions and conflicts among the population; above all, the discrepancies between political intentions in territorial development and the actual needs of a population in decline.
Added to the exhaustive work of insertion of new morphologies and new methods of growth, as well as the premises for sustainable urban growth (eco-urbanism) in harmony with the new plan, is the investigative work of the place and the more than 40 interviews with singular community personalities producing a body of work that has served as the precedent to present proposals for intervention.
See online : Field work: www.ctcproject.tumblr.com
