Pont du Jubilé
Competition, 1st prize
In collaboration with JDMA and Landinzicht
Brussels, 2018 - … (ongoing)
The competition brief asked for a pedestrian, cyclist and wheelchair-accessible connection between the monumental art nouveau “Pont du Jubilé” and the new Tour & Taxis park 9m below it. The winning proposal would replace a temporary scaffolding structure which had fulfilled this role for the last three years, since the opening of the park.
After a site visit and a critical analysis of the brief we concluded that this connection could be easily realised with a slight adaption of the existing park terrain. The available budget for the project, which was estimated for a punctual architectural intervention, became available for a more extensive series of landscape interventions, with the purpose of finalizing the more or less accidental park layout. Remaining in line with the material vocabulary of the other sections of the park (gravel paths, stairs in recuperated blue stone) a series of lateral shortcuts are superimposed on the park’s existing longitudonal path system, crossing the park’s valley-like section (actually the ancient railway trench leading to the Tour & Taxis warehouses).
Additional pedestrian accesses, one in each corner of the bridge, make for a consistent and meaningful connection between the park with the urban fabric. A couple of generous steel stair with blue stone steps and a pronounced lanterns — referring to the supposed existing lanterns which once crowned the pillars of the existing birdge — are the only architectural elements of the project, and are implemented to bridge the major height differences between neighbourhood and park.
The entire design is an exercise in modesty and an economy of means, where the available resources are put to maximum effect.
> bMa Project Fact Sheet
> Article in BRUZZ (NL)