Workshop Ria de Arousa An environmental study for development and protection of the territory

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Workshop Ria de Arousa

An environmental study for development

and protection of the territory

Location

Ribeira (A Coruña)

Dates

6 June - 11 July 2016

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Introduction

Letter from David Chipperfield to the local mayors of the region: Dear ( ... )

A team in David Chipperfield Architects is undertaking a study of the coastal area that can be loosely described as the north side of Ria Arosa, running from Porto do Son to Rianxo and the mouth of river Ulla.

I have observed the modest changes over these years and my general interest, beyond this study, is how we can accommodate change and development, and encourage investment in our cities and in our rural areas while hanging on to, protecting the inherent qualities of the place. Globally we are struggling to balance the need to develop and the desire to protect.

I am particularly fascinated by this issue in the context of Galicia. Why? Because Galicia contains the extreme conditions, firstly an unambiguous quality in terms of nature and place, still relatively unspoilt, and on the other hand an urgent need to develop local economies.

It should be accepted that Galicia’s greatest treasure is its nature, it is of course fragile and in the short term difficult to exploit without ruining it.

Galicia’s particular climate has protected it from the advance of global mass tourism, and inadvertently has been protected from itself; however as an architect it is difficult not to observe the disappointing quality of urban development and the damage done to the towns and villages over the last 40 years.

Protection is regarded with suspicion and is seen to be the enemy of development but in Galicia the protection of nature and consequently the general environment is critical to its economy. The quality of the water is not only important to protect but it is fundamental to the fishing and marisco industries, not to mention tourism.

Galicia as a ‘brand’ is related to high quality produce, related to the image of Galicia as ‘unspoilt’. This image benefits not only the particular tourist industry but also the food products of Galicia, fish, marisco, farm produce, wine etc.

It is difficult for a poor economy to take a long term view on treasures it cannot necessarily take immediate advantage of, but it is important that this blessed land is not compromised by it’s difficult present condition, that the immediate concerns and long term future are both engaged.

Within this context it is clear that planning the future, encouraging certain types of development in certain areas, protecting other areas, creating a long term vision within which short term plans might be made, is critical.

From my experience this planning is difficult to put in place, if for no other reason than lack of resources. For this reason we would like to engage with the five administrations of the immediate area and with the support of regional government and hopefully European as well as external expert advice we would like to develop a guideline plan for the area, combining commercial and ambient concerns. We enter this exercise with the sole intention of working towards a plan that may become a useful tool for future work and by taking a non-authoritative and objective position perhaps develop a blueprint for further work.

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David Chipperfield David Chipperfiel has launched an initiative for the development an protection of the

north area of Ria de Arousa in Galicia. This is the introductory letter that David sent by way of introduction to the study:

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Approach

Program

The purpose of this workshop is to set a basis for the research and discussion of an integral plan for the development and protection of the territory, presuming a possible adaptation of legislative framework for the “Plan Territorial Integrado” by the Xunta de Galicia. The workshop aims to be a plan and an experience that can be exemplary for other areas along the Galician coast. It will focus on the exhaustive analysis of the reality, both physical and socio-economical, and on the maximum involvement of all the stakeholders in the region, in order to create a forum of discussion and networks of collaboration.

The process of mapping out the territory and the continuous dialogue with the authorities, local organisations and the rest of the society will allow all the problems, demands and proposals to be brought together and seen as part of a bigger picture identifying the conflicts and potentials. Through a series of debates, the aim is to start linking the data, identifying common points and lines of research for further work.

Strategic approach

Taking Ria de Arousa as a territorial unit, the project aims to bring together the claims, needs and plans of the whole area in order to draft an integral territory plan.

The municipalities involved in the initiative will be Porto do Son, Ribeira, Pobra do Caramiñal, Boiro, Rianxo, Catoira, Vilagarcia de Arousa, Vilanova de Arousa, Ribadumia, Meaño, Cambados, O Grove and Illa de Arousa. Several proposals will be developed in specific locations, setting some examples for similar places in other municipalities.

This initiative follows non-confrontational strategies and aims to be inclusive and collaborative. Dialogue with authorities and social organisations will be central to creating synergy and partnership.

The study will be developed over the course of the next two years. During the first stage an objective study of production activities and conflicts, and an exhaustive analysis of the territory, will be developed in order to establish key background knowledge and set a starting point of understanding.

The first Workshop will take place in June 2016, defining an agreement of scope and collaboration. A selected group of professionals will work over this period to develop different proposals for different locations. Every proposal will follow an integral and over-arching strategy which will set the guidelines for specific actions. These proposals will have a grounding in the previous research and will take into account a countinuous dialogue with the local organisations and authorities in order to guarantee their success.

A second Workshop will take place in June 2017 with the draft of the study. In October 2017 the final document will be presented.

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Cultural Patrimony Identity of Galicia Productive Sectors Natural Patrimony Tourism

Galicia is a singular region located in the North West of Spain with a population of 2,7 million inhabitants. Despite being only 6% of the Spanish population, the number of settlements represent 50% of the Nation’s total spreading of the population over the territory in over 30,000 towns. Only seven cities account for more than 50,000 inhabitants and the most populated is Vigo, with almost 300,000. This continuous network of settlements has a strong relationship with their productive environment, which are traditionally the primary sectors such as fishing and agriculture.

The identity of Galicia is closely related with the sea. Multiple and different landscapes compose the 1500km of sinous coastline and 1000km more in islands and islets. The most characteristic geographic formation of the Galician coast are the “Rias”, coastal inlets formed by the partial submergence of a river valley. This environments provide special geomorphologic conditions, water quality and temperature which creates a great richness of flora and fauna.

The importance of Galician coast is not only environmental, but also demographic, concentrating four of the biggest cities and 50% of the population, wich a myriad of towns and villages in close relation with the sea; and economic, with 86 ports and docks, more than 5000 fishing boats and 40000 direct employees in fishing activities. The Rias support a great diversity of maritime activities like aquaculture , shellfish collecting, mollusk farming, etc. combined with traditional open water fishing. However, even if the economic impact is big, it is important to highlight the small scale and traditional fishing techniques that characterise most of the exploitation activities and the social economy developed in the Rias.

Approach (continuation)

Inlet of Esteiro, Cedeira , A Coruña

After a certain period of time of development globalization is quickly eroding the uniqueness of the territories. There are signs that they are loosing their identity and that the traditional and sustainable ways of exploitating the resources are being replaced by alien forms of production. At the same time the population of the smaller communities are decreasing and new touristic and estate developments are invading the coastline. As a result the image of the coastline has nothing to do with the identity of the fishing towns.

Instead of getting obsessed with the need of attracting investors and promoting development that puts at risk the values of the region, it is time to focus on protecting the identity of Galicia. A concept that has always been its natural environment and the sustainable ways of exploiting its resources, that have shaped the human settlements and configured their cultural patrimony.

Going forward and following this concept, touristic strategies can make sense by taking advantage of the existing environment, local products, patrimony and traditions.

This workshop will focus on exploring ways to develop the region while protecting its values. A common development for the whole region strengthening the productive sectors and creating networks of collaboration. Breaking the boundaries between the municipalities and the economic sectors and fostering an integral way of thinking of the Ria as a territorial unit.

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Strategies

Planning and collaboration

Previous research and visits to Galicia show evidence of bad management in many sectors and areas of the region: Lack of a global and integral thinking; lack of planning and common management or conflicts between authorities and their responsabilities. This issue not only hampers the development of the economy but also leads to waste of resources and a negative impact in the environment.

Integral Strategy

The Ria must be seen as one territorial unit. The different municipalities and

economic sectors should follow the guidelines of development for the whole region. A common management and planning can help small councils to face challenges in the future.

Diversification

Plans for development should avoid a strong dependency on only one sector or industry. This is a fragile and risky situation that can change completely if any external factor affects that product. Strengthening the secondary sectors and creating networks of collaboration and interdependency between them can contribute to the common benefit.

S4 S5 S1

S2 S3

One-sector dependency Diversification

S4 S5 S1 S2 S3 S6 S4 S5 S1 S2 S3

View of Ria de Arousa over Cabo de Cruz, Boiro, A Coruña

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Strategies

A two-stage plan

The strategic approach to the plan must be designed carefully in order to optimise the efforts and resources. A poor explanation of our intentions or skipping steps in the process can create mistrust and opposition in society.

In order to make the plan useful, successful and easy to understand, the involvement of every stakeholder is needed. Creating social, sector and cross-municipal networks is not just an aim, but an essential requirement to be able to get results.

1st phase:

Analysis and proposal. Simple and feasible objectives with inmediate results. Seeking the maximum involvement of society and organisations. Involving everyone since the very begining in order to make them feel part of the plan.

The purpose is to start to exemplify the benefits of territorial plans and of breaking the limits of municipalities and sectors.

A series of specific proposals will set out the overall concept of the plan.

2nd phase:

Discarding, selecting,modulating and detailing the proposals. Taking forward the Integral Territory Plan. Involvement of the institutions, both local and regional, is needed at this time in order to draft the plan.

Setting the guidelines of an overall plan that will create and rule specific proposals.

J.16 workshop

workshop

Integral Territory Plan

now preparation debate discard select improve deﬁne negociation involvement

publish Drating the plan

-Collaboration with the government of Xunta and local authorities.

-Consulting and advising -Dialogue with sector organizations and social associations.

-Publishing and promotion series of proposals

- speciﬁc/small - feasible - visible results - examples of the plan

integral plan

integral plan 1st phase

supramunicipal multisectorial

all the proposals must be

>2 municipalities involved >2 sectors involved tourism environment patrimony products techniques industry infrastructures new jobs sports Porto do Son Ribeira A Pobra do Caramiñal Boiro Rianxo p1 p1 p2 p4 p3 p5 p1 p2 p3 p4 p5 p6 p7 p8 p9

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preparation Motivation and involvement Inmediate results must show the

beneﬁts of an integral thinking. Guidelines Strategies of development and protection which must guide the actions of future governments

Global Strategy The speciﬁc proposals

will start drawing the guidelines for the integral territory plan.

integral plan 2nd phase

J.16 workshop

workshop

Integral Territory Plan

- speciﬁc/small - feasible - visible results - examples of the plan

integral plan

J.17

O.17

preparation Motivation and involvement Inmediate results must show the

beneﬁts of an integral thinking. Guidelines Strategies of development and protection which must guide the actions of future governments

Global Strategy The speciﬁc proposals

will start drawing the guidelines for the integral territory plan.

The first requirement is to be “multisectoral”:

The aim to create networks between the different sectors of the region. As present different activities are being carried out without taking in consideration what the impact is around them. Every activity is part of a chain that is related to the exploitation of the resources of a territory.

For example: designing strategies which mix tourism with natural patrimony and fishing activities, could be a good way of getting different results: environmental protection, marketing promotion for local products, defence of traditional fishing techniques, etc.

The second requirement is to be “supramunicipal”

All the stakeholders interviewed during a visit to Galicia agreed on the very local thinking of Galician governments: “localisms”. This issue creates many negative impacts on the environment and a waste of effort and resources: every town has a port, an industrial estate or a shopping centre; while none has a good system of transport, an efficient and important port , or touristic strategies.

These two requirements in the first instance will be a way of starting to show the benefits of global planning and collaboration strategies.

Requirements of the proposals

For the first stage of the plan, there will be some requirements to set a framework for the different proposals. This process will start drawing up the overall idea of a integral territory plan. They must show some advantage of this new way of thinking.

J.16 workshop

workshop

Integral Territory Plan

- speciﬁc/small

- feasible - visible results - examples of the plan

integral plan

J.17

O.17

preparation Motivation and involvement Inmediate results must show the beneﬁts of an integral thinking. Guidelines Strategies of development and protection which must guide the actions of future governments Global Strategy

The speciﬁc proposals will start drawing the guidelines for the integral territory plan.

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Schedule

6 Wk 1 June 2016 July 2016 Wk 2 Wk 3 Wk 4 Wk 5 13 20 27 4 11 7 14 21 28 5 8 15 22 29 6 9 16 23 30 7 11 18 25 2 9 10 17 24 1 8 12 19 26 3 10 Visit to Porto do Son Form groups Field work. Research

Layout and presentations Layout and presentations Processing info Designing strategies 2x Porto do Son 4x Ribeira 2x A Pobra 2x Boiro 2x Rianxo Arrival Day Internal workshop Internal workshop

Internal workshop Internal workshop

External workshop External workshop External workshop

External workshop

W1 - Visits

Arrival day and introduction. The whole group of students will visit all the different locations in order to have an overview of the territory. Different organisations and local authorities will be introduced to the students to facilitate their approachment and visits.

W2 - Analysis

The students will be divided into 5 independent groups and each group will be asigned 1 municipality. The objective is to make an exhaustive analysis and mapping of the territory, understand their singularities, get valuable information from the organisations and society and create networks of collaboration with them.

W3 - Internal workshop

In this week the students must process all the collected information, share it with the rest of the groups, form conclusions and lines of study and present it in a clear way. A 4 day discussion will take place during the weekend with the participation of David Chipperfield, the collaborators and the organisations and authorities involved.

W4 - Processing

After the first Workshop, some agreements of collaboration must be set for further work and all the information and conclusions must be processed. All the documents must be presented in a clear way in order to prepare the second round of discussions with external experts.

W5 - External workshop

After 5 weeks of analysis, discussion and development of strategies and ideas, the last workshop will take place. The participation of external experts and consultants in different fields, together with David Chipperfield, will give us the opportunity to test our hypothesis and get some advice for further work, setting the starting point for an integral plan.

* Visits, lectures and meetings to be confirmed Visit to Ribeira Visit to A Pobra Visit to Boiro Visit to Rianxo

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The future

Objectives

— Map the territory. Develop an exhaustive research and analysis, both physical and socioeconomic that will form the basis of knowledge for further work. — Develop initial ideas, strategies and proposals for the development and

protection of the whole area, to be discussed during the workshop.

— Break the boundaries between different productive sectors and municipalities. — Consider Ria de Arousa as a territorial unit.

— Involve all the stakeholders in the debate, creating a forum and bringing together their problems, demands and proposals.

— Mediate between the parties in the existing conflicts.

— Find points in common and create networks of collaboration between the stakeholders.

— Obtain the assessment of external experts that can guide our proposals. — Set a starting point for drafting an Integral Territory Plan, which will draw up

the guidelines for the development and protection of the region.

Mapping

The process will start with an exhaustive analysis of the territory, both physical and socioeconomic, creating a base of knowledge for further work. The methodology of the workshop will be a sort of docummentary where the participants will have to develop their skills to collect as much infomormation as they can. Sometimes the collection of information can be easy when some useful documents are uploaded on the webpage of the council. But in other cases, this is not possible and a chat with different people can provide the information we need. The participants, divided into small independent groups and with the support of assistants, will have the responsibility to develop this research, sharing information with the rest of the groups and translating it into visual documents and diagrams.

Social involvement

Previous experiences showed the difficulties and opposition that a plan for development and protection can create when it has to be implemented. Many times this kind of plan comes from the top and need to be explained to the people, without a real participation of the stakeholders. This issue creates mistrust and suspicion in society and the implementation becomes very difficult.

The aim of this initiative is to achieve the maximum involvement of the stakeholders. Their participation, bringing together their problems, demands and proposals from the very beginning of the discussions is a key issue in order to guarantee the continuity and the success of the proposals.

Conclusions

After the analysis of the territory and the participation of diferent parties, some conclusions can be made. A continous dialogue and discussion with all the stakeholders must be going on during the whole process, finding points in common for all of them. The participation of external experts, consultants, organisations and authorities will be useful to set collaboration agreements which will lead to the Integral Territory Plan. A plan that would set the guidelines for the development and protection of the whole region.

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Application information

Application deadline — Application. 19th May — Response. 23rd May Application documents — CV

— Portfolio or selection of projects — Letter of motivation

Requirements

— PFC/PFG Students

— English . Certificate not required

Location

— Based in Ribeira, A Coruña

Duration

— 5 weeks (6th June - 11th July)

Costs

— Application is free of charge — Accomodation and food provided. — Project expenditures provided

— Transportation to Ribeira not provided Logistics

— All the students have to use their own laptop Contact

— [email protected] Aerial view of the mussel cultivation stations “bateas” , Ria de Arousa, A Coruña

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David Chipperfield

Sir David Chipperfield CBE, RA, RDI, RIBA British, born 1953, London

David Chipperfield established David Chipperfield Architects in 1985. He was Professor of Architecture at the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste,

Stuttgart from 1995 to 2001 and Norman R. Foster Visiting Professor of Architectural Design at Yale University in 2011, and he has taught and lectured worldwide at schools of architecture in Austria, Italy, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. In 2012 David Chipperfield curated the 13th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale. In 2014 he was appointed Artistic Director of the Italian furnishings firm Driade.

He is an honorary fellow of both the American Institute of Architects and the Bund Deutscher Architekten, and a past winner of the Heinrich Tessenow Gold Medal, the Wolf Foundation Prize in the Arts, and the Grand DAI (Verband Deutscher Architekten- und Ingenieurvereine) Award for Building Culture. David Chipperfield was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2004, appointed a Royal Designer for Industry in 2006, and elected to the Royal Academy in 2008. In 2009 he was awarded the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany and in 2010 he was knighted for services to architecture in the UK and Germany. In 2011 he received the RIBA Royal Gold Medal for Architecture, and in 2013, the Praemium Imperiale from the Japan Art Association, both given in recognition of a lifetime’s work.

David Chipperfield has developed prodigious experience and particular expertise working with challenging planning regimes and masterplanning complex projects such as Museum Island in Berlin; Santa Chiara in Pisa; and Salerno Old Town in Italy; as well as urban developments such as Teruel in Spain where the lower and upper parts of the town were stitched together. His collaborative and participatory approach to sensitive contexts has also led to further invitations to work on architectural and masterplanning projects for UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Venice, Segovia and Sudan, as well as in landmark districts in cities including London, Berlin, Shanghai, and New York.

Workshop Ria de Arousa An environmental study for development and protection of the territory

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