Towards Sustainable Urban Regeneration of Industrial Areas in the Basque Country: Case Studies in Donostia and Pasajes.

• Autores: Ekhiñe Egiguren
• Localización: EESAP13 International Conference 2022, 5-6 October Donostia-San Sebastián: Akten liburua = Libro de actas = Proceedings book / Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura de San Sebastián (dir. congr.), 2022, ISBN 978-84-1319-499-8, págs. 72-84
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • The industrial development of the 19th and 20th centuries brought with it, in addition to the impact on the economic, social and cultural spheres of Basque society, a profound transformation of the landscape, the urban fabric and the territorial planning of the Basque Country. From the 1970s onwards, the industrial crisis and the reconversion of industrial activities, together with the increasing presence of the service sector, led to the disappearance of most of the industry from the city centers and the creation of new productive fabrics in peripheral areas. This urban transformation, based on environmental justifications and the profitability of the resulting urban development operations, had two fundamental consequences. On the one hand, the loss of a large part of the built industrial heritage. This was due to the lack of social awareness of the heritage value of industrial facilities, the absence of legislation to protect these elements and the urgent need for land of great centrality for residential requalification. On the other hand, the consequent zoning of large-scale uses. The segregation of residential and industrial uses decoupled population centers from industry, encouraged urban mobility based on the automobile and facilitated the artificialization of rural land. This urban sprawl strategy, still in force today, has given rise to a diffuse and unsustainable city model. The municipalities of Donostia and Pasajes have not been alien to this reality. The aim of this paper is to analyze the industrial urban transformation of these two cities in the last years by means of the examination of reference bibliography, heritage cataloguing, urban plans of the area and field studies. The evolution and interventions in their industrial sites, the types of intervention applied and their degree of sustainability will be discussed, thus confirming that the actions carried out confirm the indicated trends. The main conclusion is that the urban regeneration of industrial areas must be approached from a metropolitan and territorial scale, facing the opportunity of a sustainable intervention on the existing city. To this end, it must seek the mix and diversity of uses, the proximity of the productive fabric and the enhancement of the industrial heritage. This analysis is framed in the context of a broader research that consists of determining the bases of a new urban paradigm to combine the conservation of industrial heritage, sustainable regeneration and circularity criteria.