urban strategies
stratgical city-scape
elasticity in time
architecture & duration

Trieste / Italy 1994
Urban Study
“Urban Strategies for Trieste”


Nowadays the old harbour for conventional goods is hardly used, but in its central position it is a barrier between the city and the sea. The intervention takes this in consideration and has worked out an overall-infrastructural concept for Trieste on the bases of the proposal for the old harbour.

The "City Catalyst" is situated like a link between the old grid town Borgo Theresiano, the railwaystation and the sea. It includes a re-organisation of the Piazza Liberta’ with the special aim to bring the Piazza back to the sea by:
(1) a "Negativpier", (2) the "Parco Rosso", a lunapark which is bathed into red light at night and (3) "Isola", a very dense hotel and offices island.

The "Strategical City-scape" on the main area of the old harbour is conceived as a structural concept. Therefore, the old harbour is moving back little by little, and at least to the new harbor on the other side of the town.

The borderlines between the function city and the function harbor (Free Trade Zone) are designed as canals, which are connected by the sea. These borderlines can be moved from one canal to the next in-between the new structure.

There are no buildings suggested, only conditions of many different disciplines regulate the play (urban zones, temporal phases, road systems, fragments, neighborhood conditions, and an urban development board defines how long a field is available). The system should be elastic relating to the economical and urban demands. Time defines the contents of the structure. This requires rethinking the architectural term of duration.

Foto: Urban Strategies for Trieste and Languages Laboratory
© margarethe mueller I paul rajakovics