Project Name: Quires – Urban Park
Location: Maia, Portugal
Category: Academic
Project Team: Carlos Dias and Jóni Teixeira
Project Year: 2011

The proposed intervention focuses on the outskirts of the city of Maia in Portugal and has approximately an area of 17,000m². The Quires Urban Park is settled in a place that comprises industry, agriculture, forestry and households. It has at its disposal a range of services: a café, a laundry shop, a health clinic, a stationery shop, a hairdresser, a shopping center and it is situated near the airport, the highway and the metro station.

The concept and vision adopted was intended to blur the boundaries of the park with the urban landscape, which optimizes the organization of space in relation to man. It seeks to promote human scale, the recreational use of outdoor spaces and the contact of the users with the natural elements. This model is based on scattered trees, isolated or in clusters, above meadows, lawns and shrubs. It has great applicability in the urban context due to the high diversity of opportunities for active and passive recreation, easy installation and maintenance, functionality and visual transparency.

The proposal develops a spatial composition in three interconnected platforms. This way, the terrain modeling balance is near zero. Given the proximity to a residential area, there is a need to promote motor development of children, creating a more exciting and challenging playground than traditional equipment. It was also created opportunities for passive recreation, making use of shrub layers, urban furniture and water features. There is a proposed square next to the existing café and a multifunctional area that can provide parking places as well as being used to outdoor activities such as festivals.

Due to the water scarcity and increasingly temperatures in a frightening pace it becomes essential to preserve the water within the place. In an attempt to maximize the ecological benefits, aesthetics, social and educational purposes in the urban areas, a sustainable drainage system is proposed in the lower part of the area. It promotes the treatment of the water by evaporation, infiltration, and the use of riparian vegetation in order to clean it.