Management of Constraints to Create Meaningful Places

Do you need a landmark structure to create meaningful places? Most local communities cannot afford expensive signature projects to solve their lack of infrastructures. In the other hand, bridges and footbridges are highly visible objects that have an important impact on the places where they sit and the people with whom they interact, and therefore their design is always a great responsibility.

In this paper we are going to show how, with simple solutions and very limited resources, it was possible to find the right balance between the set of constraints and requirements we had to deal with —limited budget, tight deadlines, high flood level of the river flow, presence of three high-voltage overhead power lines, maintenance and durability issues in a rather conflictive neighbourhood,...—, and at the same time to deliver a well-integrated and aesthetically pleasant solution that provides a place where pedestrians may feel comfortable, welcomed and save, and even want to spend some time to rest, enjoy the surroundings,...

The area where the footbridge is located was a so far trivial place, but, in our opinion, with some potential for providing meaning to both, the people who crosses over the structure, and the people in whose world the footbridge is placed. We strongly think it is obvious that projects are conditioned by the places where they are located, but we also believe that footbridges may give an individual character —genius loci— to an otherwise rather plain location, creating this way meaningful places.

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