7 Appendix

7. APPENDIX

Recordings by Sharon

A – Sightseeing from the train

It was Sunday night, going back to my student apartment from my parents place up north. It was winter and cold, but luckily the trains didn’t have delays and I could relax and look out the window while the landscape was passing by. Because it was dark early, you couldn’t see much. Only some small lights from houses far away and traffic. It was a pleasure to look at and time was going fast like the train. In the distance, three big sculptures lit up. They were a statement, an icon in the dark valley surrounding it. While looking at them, time passed very slowly spontaneously and I enjoyed looking at them for the time being. Afterwards I needed to transfer the train to the next station and the bridges became a marking spot in time to remind myself to get out on the next stop.

B – Driving through the trees

Going to my boyfriend’s parents, my boyfriend and I were discussing the developments of our study courses. I told him that we were going to research the Calatrava bridges, but I had not seen pictures yet of the bridges or the landscape they lay in. He told me about his course, while it was dark and driving on the highway from The Hague to Haarlem. When we passed the sign of Nieuw-Vennep, I asked my boyfriend if we could see the bridges. While driving and looking at the busy road, I didn’t feel like I could see them, my surroundings and therefore time was moving very fast. But my boyfriend saw one and pointed it out to me. It was hard to see, because of all the tree’s standing next to the highway and covering the view on the bridge, but I could see it for a short moment. But I only saw one and kept looking for the next two. When I spotted the next one, I felt like time was very slow for a moment, so I could see how it was shining through the tree’s. After that, I stopped looking, because the road was very busy and I needed to stay focused on the next highway exit. I felt sad that I couldn’t see the third one and also not seeing them together in the landscape.

C – Speed of driving along the road

As I drove from Nieuw-Vennep to Hoofddorp, the first bridge I encountered was the Harp. This bridge is perpendicular to the Hoofdvaart; it’s going over the Hoofdvaart in the direction of the highway. First I drove underneath the bridge, while driving along the Hoofdvaart. It was visible from afar, so it made the duration of the bridge feel long before reaching. Underneath it felt like this heavy wide bridge with lots of people around, walking and cycling. Afterwards, I drove over the bridge, where only cars were passing. The driving-stroke was small, so cars slowed down before me. As I drove over the bridge, I could count the steel-rods, which made time even slower than my driving speed.

The second bridge was the Citer, a bridge for bicycles and destination traffic. Normal traffic won’t go over the bridge, only underneath. The Citer was parallel to the Hoofdvaart, so my first experience was driving along the bridge. Because I needed to stop before traffic-light, I had a short time to experience the bridge, but I needed to pay more attention to the traffic surrounding it. When driving underneath the bridge, to the traffic-lights, it was also a short experience. Due to its construction characteristics, being high and small, the feeling of the bridge’s present was very small and time went by fast.

The last bridge, the Luit, was a roundabout laying next to an intersection. This made driving over the roundabout quite intense; the focus as a driver was more on which lane I needed to have and not on the bridge. The traffic made it a short time-experience, where I figured that this bridge wasn’t supposed to be experienced as a driver, but walking.

D – Walking on the canal

After driving along the Hoofdvaart, I started walking back from Hoofddorp to Nieuw-Vennep. This meant that I first encountered the Luit, then the Citer and at last the Harp. The Harp was very far from the other two, so I drove the car back to walk up to the bridge. From the car, I started walking to the Luit and it was remarkable that there was no pathment along the Hoofdvaart; I walked on the bike-lane. So the connection from bridge to bridge was not possible for walkers.

On the Luit there was a small path for walking, but the space on the bridge was mainly meant for cars. While walking on the bridge, it was clear that the time spent on the roundabout was not meant to be very long in experience; it was only for going from one side to the other. On the other side of the Hoofdvaart was a path down, to go under the bridge. This led to a podium on which you could sit and enjoy silence. It was clearly meant for walkers to have a resting-spot or a place to gather. But I could only find one cigarette as garbage, suggesting that this space has not been used to its potential. This bridge was clearly meant for the slow speed, the walker, to enjoy. But without a clear path and direction, this function of the bridge is not well-used.

Walking up to the Citer, I needed to walk on the road and bike-lanes. It gave me the feeling to stay focused on my surroundings and couldn’t enjoy the walk. While arriving at the bridge, it was clear to me that I couldn’t go over it. There was no safe crossing for walkers and only a bike-lane going to the bridge. I didn’t feel comfortable crossing and went back to the car. So the experience was actually non, it was meant to cross for bikers only. While driving under it, I spotted a stair on the other side of the bridge, ending into a grassfield with no connection to its surroundings. It looked like it was not useful for walkers and it made the connection at this speed impossible.

To walk up to the Harp, I needed to park the car in a neighborhood full with single houses and no spots for visitors. It was clearly meant for villagers to enjoy, but not for visitors. While walking up to the bridge, I came across a nice park along the bridge. This was very enjoyable and it felt like I spent a lot of time at the bridge. It was noticeable that there was a path going up to go walk over the bridge, but no one was using it. It felt very busy with all the cars on the bridge and there was more space under and next to the bridge to enjoy. So this bridge could be defined as a bridge used by cars, but the surroundings made it placent to be around as walkers, which was very different then the other bridges.

Architectural Positions Temporality