The Madrid City Council has presented this Friday the five winning projects of the international ideas competition for the Metropolitan Forest, a 75-kilometre green infrastructure that will encircle the capital. ‘Aguaila Madrid Puerta de la Sierra’, ‘Butterfly Effect’, ‘A flor de yeso’, ‘Spring South’ and ‘Del Manzanares al Guadarrama’ are the works chosen for the green areas that will be built over 12 years in Madrid with an investment of 77 million euros to the municipal coffers.
1. ‘Aguaila Madrid Puerta de la Sierra’
The winning proposal, explains the city council in a press release, for the first lot is from Pino Forestal Ingeniería, SL and will connect El Pardo with the Valdelatas hills and Casa de Campo.
Thus, for the Manzanares Norte area, it proposes to consolidate and renaturalize the river path parallel to the course of the river and the accommodation of the San Fernando Bridge, while for the Valverde area it is committed to ornithological and cultural tourism, promoting the connection with the Quinta del Duque del Arco.
In the Mina del Cazador he plans to renaturalise the environment of the existing elm grove, as well as an artificial lagoon and an aromatic garden. And for the Valdegrulla area, it establishes a botanical path with a bird observatory along the route, the creation of a new area of holm oak mixed with cork oak and pine forests and a nursery and an interpretation center for traditional forestry trades.
2. ‘Butterfly Effect’
The proposal of the team formed by the UTE Climent-Climent-Navascues-ARZV acts in the northeast on a consolidated urban space occupied by communications infrastructures. However, it contains elements of great environmental and landscape value, such as the southern edge of El Encinar de los Reyes, the Valdebebas Park, the Juan Carlos I Park, the Capricho garden or the Cuña de O’Donnell, Vicálvaro or Parque of Valdebernardo.
For this reason, the main action is the design of a 23.82 km forest avenue as the backbone that connects all the existing parks, through a road that allows the circulation of pedestrians and cyclists, on separate roads. The ditch of this road stores water to allow the maintenance of deciduous tree species, which provide shade in summer and allow sunny walks in winter.
forest avenue
The proposal also includes gaps in the existing open pit mines, which will even allow the implementation of a water sports park and ecoducts to connect natural spaces, as well as footbridges for cyclists and pedestrians.
3. ‘A flower of plaster’
to flower of plaster
This project by UTE Uxama Ingeniería y Arquitectura, SLPU, Gestión Integral del Suelo SL, and Eslava y Tejada Arquitectos SL aims to include natural spaces such as Arroyo de los Migueles or Cerro de la Herradura within the life of the city, as well as undevelopable land around Valdemingómez. In addition, paths for cyclists and pedestrians will be provided, ponds will be created for their colonization by amphibians in the area of the Los Migueles stream and pylons embedded in the ravine.
In addition, the project proposes the creation of a circular economy research, training and development center; a trade school, an agrological center, and islands of biodiversity, which propose a different and particularized forest treatment for those areas with a strong presence of uncontrolled discharges or old dumps, generally promoting their plant regeneration.
4. ‘South Spring’
South Spring
The scope of this project is the southern basin of the Manzanares, which is one of the main entrance routes to Madrid and is where the main treatment plants are located. Thus, the winners of this lot, Alday Jover Arquitectos SLP, make a proposal to change the perspective of these facilities. For this reason, the water from the ‘Madrid Sur treatment plants’ will be used to build two types of reservoirs to accumulate water for the summer periods: wetlands and ponds.
As for mobility, it is structured by prioritizing the existing paths and ravines and the implementation of new ones for their connection, with two main axes: the continuity of the longitudinal path of the Metropolitan Forest through the pine forest that accompanies the M- 45and the historical connections of the ravines that accompany the Arroyo de la Gavia to Vallecas; and the Manzanares river promenade, which is given continuity on both banks of the river from the existing linear Park to the Manzanares-Jarama agro-fluvial Park.
5. ‘From Manzanares to Guadarrama’
From Manzanares to Guadarrama
The proposal elaborated by Rubio Arquitectura SLP acts on the southwest, a territory where the mountains of Madrid converge with the dry plains of the southeast of the Community. And it intends to structure a wide green corridor that connects the Manzanares with the Guadarrama and Madrid with its mountains. The objective is to protect the river beds that act as ecological corridors, promoting the movement of animal species, the dispersal of seeds and biodiversity.
Regarding mobility, the project has the objective of expanding the cycling green ring from Madrid to the metropolitan area, managing to connect the Manzanares and Guadarrama courses. For this, two large cycling arches will be created: the Butarque arch and the Guadarrama arch. Continuity will be carried out through ecoducts.
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