STRATA. Urban fault reinsertion at the fabric of Tarragona harbour district

The history of a site that is told by its layers: from the Roman ruins hidden underground, to the last remains of the harbor district industrial warehouses. The aim of the project is to give life back to this as central as isolated and ignored point of Tarragona. Through a new heart for the neighborhood that opens it to the city center, highlighting each strata.

Heritage, Urban Links and the Articulation. Treated as a whole, the response is displayed by three different matters that follow the same objective. This division simplifies the methodology of giving answer to each demand, and at the same time made possible to work at different scales in all the topics. The heritage. How do we make visible the history of the place, that is coexisting in different layers in the same site? From the level of the remains of the ancient Roman leisure center, passing through the variety of industrial structures until the visible foundations of a modern building that luckily was stopped on time. The treatment of an archaeological urban ground floor, turns the site into a park that without interruptions unify this first layer with the same fabric. Giving back the heritage that belongs to them, the incredible spaces inside the warehouses are open to the neighbours allowing the continuity of the park and becoming spaces ready to be inhabited. Urban Links. There are two main directions in the project, as in the Roman cities, Cardo is the north-south and Decumanus the east-west oriented connection. The 18 meters urban drop leave more than 300 lineal meters of the harbour district isolated. The Cardo sews this wound with the city center generating links and stops at the various strata without breaking the park continuity and adding elements such as the “floating urbanism” that together with the symbolic lift mark the Articulation. The Decumanus treats the closer relation of the various encounters with each district. Articulation. The floating urbanism is an elevated platform that leads the first step of the ascension, the level which all the new facilities will be facing. In order to put this area in social and cultural equality with the rest of the city, the industrial buildings that are in the best condition are preserved and conditioned to house a neighborhood library, the civic center and an indoor street food market. All respecting the preexistence and focused on the platform that has the aim to be the “floating” public space, an activity joint above the park.