La Petite
Ceinture
The Petite Ceinture is a former railway line, which once encircled Paris inside the Boulevards des Maréchaux. Its tracks are now a haven for a rare biodiversity of wild flowers and fauna through its abandonment.
The project aims to revitalise an abandoned railway urban space by bringing the community down to the tunnel through a common goal to redefine a Parisian Landscape. The abandoned state of the track allowed for the entire tunnel to be engulfed by wild nature, transforming it into a green belt around Paris. To retain the organicness the Petite Ceinture, the project proposes to create an organic programme with light structures. The site needed to unite cultural and work programmes, while solving the refugee problem in Paris. This could be achieved through food and urban farming. A sustainable process is created by utilizing refugees in taking care of the urban farming landscape for cultural and work programmes. The connectivity of the Petite Ceinture allows for the such an urban farming landscape to bleed and continue throughout the entire Paris, as the tracks become a transportation boardwalk for cyclist and pedestrians as well as future needs for train access.
w h e r e | La Petite Ceinture, Paris, France.
w h a t | Mix-Use Urban Landscape
Design Process
The brief called for a temporal space space that could transform depending on the needs of the city. This influenced the design to be lightweight and have minimal wastage. Reusing shipping containers allowed the design to help with Paris' oversupply of shipping containers while fitting the requirements of the brief. The ultimate design of the space could be taken down or transformed if need be.
