Vacant land in city: potential functional, ecological and aesthetic role in the urban landscape

Abstract

The growth of contemporary cities has been accompanied by the appearance of forgotten and abandoned spaces, as well as derelict structures that are part of a broad category of neglected and unoccupied spaces within cities. This situation which arises for economic reasons, property speculation, and the consequent expansion of the suburbs has become an important topic subject, as can be seen from the international bibliographical review about the “reuse” of vacant land and derelict structures in cities. Traditionally urban planning dealt with growth which was the centre of attention. Modern urban planning arose in the 19th century associated with the need to find suitable housing for a growing urban population, and it retained this function over almost the entire 20th century. Although during that period there were some amounts of ruins that urban planners had to cope with, such destruction was occasional and scattered, linked to cataclysms or other exceptional circumstances. In the final quarter of the 20th century urban planners were faced with situations that had been unknown in the lives of cities. Suddenly they found that not only the central areas of agglomerations but also entire urban regions were losing residents and businesses instead of growing. These “perforated/random” abandoned or vacant spaces are a potential challenge when it comes to assigning them new “functions”. Most of these spaces house ecological formations. Some are the remnants of gardens or derelict green structures that survive over time and very often also perform a social role, but usually underperforming. This study seeks to raise awareness of the aesthetic, functional and ecological qualities that these abandoned spaces can bring to a city and discuss ways of integrating them into the urban landscape that go beyond the conventional urban restoration models but rather represent alternative intervention solutions that may be applied permanently or temporarily. The refurbishing or reorganising of these spaces will strength the urban ecological structure in addition to green spaces and so contribute to the promotion and preservation of biodiversity, urban resilience and risk mitigation. The study presented here is part of NoVOID Project – “Ruins and vacant lands in the Portuguese cities: exploring hidden life in urban derelicts and alternative planning proposals for the perforated city”, funded by the FCT and which is based on the identifying and classifying of the main vacant and derelict urban spaces (ruined buildings and public places vacant plots and abandoned or suspended projects) and assigning them an occupation in line with the new trends and sensitivities of architecture, landscape architecture and other specialist fields. The project, based on genuine situations in Portuguese cities Lisbon and Barreiro, seeks to contribute to sustainable urban and landscape proposals, of a permanent or temporary nature, that enhance their potential functional, ecological and aesthetic role and, in some cases, be an alternative to the conventional models of urban landscape restoration.