Post-Industrial Urban Waterfronts and Trails URBAN WATERFRONTS SHOULD BE DEVELOPED WITH ATTENTION TO SIX KEY PRINCIPLES: PRINCIPLES:
PLACES:
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Link land - water uses & activities. Preserve, connect and frame open spaces. Optimize public shoreline access. Understand the shoreline environment. Envision specific waterfront urban form. Consider the changing climate.
and bicycle circuit at the water’s edge, have replaced the former thicket of ship masts, barrels, cranes, and stevedores. In a similar vein, the move to integrate urban trails as part of a city’s linkage to nature has driven the redevelopment of former railroad’s right-of-way and stormwater drainage canals into vibrant and active public spaces. These post-industrial artefacts are frequently located in dense urban areas and have outlived their singular engineered purpose to be reborn for a variety of new uses. Because they are often flat and can extend for miles, their proximity to high-density neighbourhoods allows these new urban trails to function as alternative linkages for pedestrian, bicycle, sport and recreation, and even commuters. Critical to their success, is their essential connections with the surrounding network, enabling people to move where they want to go, and their
Inner Harbor, Copenhagen, Denmark. Western Harbor, Malmö, Sweden. Dominos Sugar Factory, New York. Hunter’s Point Park, New York. Olympic Village, Vancouver, Canada. West Palm Beach, Florida.
ability to create an outstanding user experience. With a changing climate and the need to mitigate volumes of urban flooding higher than what they were designed for, former hard-edged concrete canals are being dismantled in favour of a more nature-based approach to flood control. With these new urban trail interventions, opportunities to engage and educate public for a better understanding of their local environment ensue, while providing options to get close to wild open spaces and be a part of natural flows. This particularly resonates in Bodø, as the Norwegian culture is intimately connected with an appreciation and desire to live close to nature. This inseparable identity with nature will help Bodø further respond and adapt to the challenges of a changing climate.
Outside Perspectives
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