2007 / EUROPAN 09 – GENEVA – POINT DE LA JUNCTION

The Canton of Geneva is the densest territory of Switzerland with 112 inhabitants/hectare and it is the seat of many international organizations including the UNO, which gives it an international and multicultural personality. With its Opera house, its host of theatres and museums Geneva is a glamorous regional capital.

 

The project site is called " Pointe de la Jonction ". It is a peninsula located at the confluence of the two rivers crossing Geneva. It is bordered to the north by the Rhone river, to the south by the Arve river, and to the east by one of the main thoroughfares of the city that carries public transport. The extreme point is a quiet, magic spot, where the clear waters of the Rhone River mix with the muddy waters of the Arve. The site redevelopment plan from the local authorities calls for pedestrian walks on the riverbanks, a green area, and mixed housing.

 

The study focuses on a redevelopment strategy for the site that will take into account the financial burden of moving existing structures, built in recent past, that is not fully amortized yet.

Our programmatic intentions are pedestrian walks, parks, swimming areas, housing units for families and young people, artist studios, cultural centres, space for NGOs for example, with housing units and a green area and recreation and amusement centres as well as commercial and central uses for the area.

 

The theme idea is to retrieve the momentum of the area site. The former industrial - abandoned area on the junction point of two rivers - Arve and Rhone is transformed into a mixed-use area in which the new artificial landscape is formed by liquid volumes and solid structures that mingle together suggesting the memories of the former landscape. Water and soil are two elements that the new landscape suggests. The solid structures on ground level resemble the land that dissolves into the water river. The light flowing volumes on the upper levels of the design structures shape multifunctional areas and spaces of commercial/ cultural/ amusement uses that engine the life of the new urban space. Green spaces, pedestrian walks and plazas are designed in strips among the housing blocks as joins of the two river sides.