Social cohesion

"In order to make this center area attractive and dynamic, the EPASE (Saint-Etienne Public Development Agency) and the town hall of Saint-Etienne have set up an ambitious eco-neighborhood project. This project is based on public spaces that are built on an original urban park model where nature is the driving force behind the site. Nature is at the heart of this "park city" project, realized in record time: in a year and a half, the vast majority of the park's work has been carried out and the neighborhood has begun to change."(Ref. 1)

The association Initial Karlsruhe initiated the "social garden" in 2009 with the objective to facilitate access to the labour market for disadvantaged individuals by providing employment for long-term unemployed individuals with gaps in their CV. (Ref. 1) The participants can work on a 6000 sqm large former agriculture area up to six hours per day under the supervision of an agrarian engineer and a professional gardener. Harvested products are delivered by bicycle to charitable organizations free of charge. (Ref. 2, 9, 10)

Everton Park is one of the city’s precious green lungs, but it has been underused in the past. This area once housed a district of 60,000 people and was densely developed. In the 1980s, it was transformed into Everton Park (Reference 1).
The Everton Park Nature Garden is ¾ hectare walled garden located within Everton Park and is a well-kept treasure of wildlife and tranquillity. It is an established natural habitat that includes two small lakes, grassland meadows and woodland, rock types of interest to geologists and a heritage trail with guided walks available (Reference 1).
The project is part of the Nesta’s Rethinking Parks Programme which ran until 2015. It has a 1M pound national lottery funding that supported 11 separate pilot projects across the UK. The programme explored a variety of new business models to fund resource park services in the future. Everton Park is one of the pilot projects of Nesta. The Everton Park project was led by the Land Trust with Liverpool City Council and the Friends of Everton Park. The aim was to put in place a strategic plan for community management which will be part of a wider development plan for Everton to regenerate the area, provide new housing and, at the same time, secure the long-term future of the park. (Reference 2)

“Zagreb for Me” was an ambitious and comprehensive project launched in 2015 by the Zagreb Society of
Architects in cooperation with the Faculty of Architecture at the University of Zagreb and the City of Zagreb.
The goal of the project was to start a revitalization of public spaces through the realization of 17 urban
interventions in the whole city area at the same time. This distributed approach aimed to improve the general
“image of the city” and raise the quality of urban life in segments of housing, recreation, leisure and social
cohesion and revitalization of Zagreb's public spaces using public participation as a tool. This project aims to decentralize designed public spaces and draw attention to some forgotten city spots. At the same time, the project, created from a “bottom-up” initiative, establishes a new model of public participation as well as new forms of collaboration (Ref 1, 2, 3). The project "Zagreb for me" was created on the basis of Acupuncture of the city - an interdisciplinary approach and public participation, but it covers a wider urban space, ie it deals with public spaces throughout Zagreb. After the conducted urban-architectural tenders for the selected solutions, the realization is planned. Only one urban-architectural tender was conducted and the implementation of the project stopped there, but the project "Zagreb for me" was recognized as an example of good practice with the possibility of application in other cities. (Ref 5)

"Pending the creation of housing and new walks by 2020, the association Carton Plein and the EPA (Public Building Institution) of Saint-Etienne have created a temporary public space on the site known as "la Cartonnerie". A place for exchange and conviviality, the site hosts artistic installations, ephemeral installations and events. It is a laboratory conducive to imagining new ways of doing the city" (Ref. 1). The citizens also created shared gardens in this area called "Le Jardin Experimental"(Experimental garden) (Ref. 4).

The Montreynaud Park is composed of a great diversity of spaces (dense woodlands, undergrowth, meadow spaces, small group of trees ) and presents a richness of fauna and flora. The challenge of rebuilding this area is to create a real urban park, a green lung that provides the junction between the upper and lower parts of the neighborhood and links it to the rest of the city. The redevelopment of the park must meet the needs of the inhabitants by developing a place of contemplation, pedestrian paths, sports and recreational paths, and in connection with scientific, technical and industrial culture (Ref.1).

The City Council transformed Bispetorve, from a public square, to a green urban space in the autumn of 2015 - available for a wide range of events and experiences - designed to attract life and activity. Bispetorvet was aimed to also play an important role as an attractive crossroads between Strøget, Store Torv, the new harbour area, light railway stop at Skolebakken and the harbour front car parks.” (Ref. 1)

The areas around MarselisborgCenter in Aarhus get a new and better life. The project will contribute to the world's first city park that handles excess rainwater and invites citizens to health-promoting lifestyles. The area around MarselisborgCenter will be converted into a public city park for both MarselisborgCenter's users (people in rehabilitation) and the citizens of Aarhus in general. At the same time, the area will make the city more robust to future heavy rainfall. (Ref. 1)

The purpose of SPARK is to create a new, vibrant urban space in and around the Marselisborg Center, which partly meets the need for outdoor rehabilitation activities for the center's users, and partly the need for a fully-fledged climate adaptation effort in the area. These needs are united by the construction of a new public park, which also has the potential to increase social inclusion by creating meetings between the users of the Marselisborg Center and the many residents in the district. (Ref. 6)

The Leonardo Garden was a community garden in an empty building site of 8th district of Budapest, that implementation was initiated by KÉK, the Contemporary Architectural Centre. (Reference 3)
The recultivation of two neglected, empty plots of land created one of the earliest community gardens in Hungary. Plants for consumption, spices, herbs and ornamental plants were planted. The 95 plots in the Garden were cultivated by young people, families and pensioners, but the Garden also served educational purposes, as it frequently received school groups. The Garden has hosted a number of public community and cultural, gastronomic and musical events, which were well attended by both the neighbourhood and the general public. The community garden was closed in March 2018 because the company that owns the land wanted to start construction on it. (Reference 5)

Hellenikon Metropolitan Park will be a large urban park located in Hellinikon, Athens, Greece. The park will be the central attraction of the Hellinikon project. It will provide Athens with a much needed ecological boost. When finished the park will be the largest in Europe. It will be approximately 200 hectares spanning the site of the former Hellenikon International Airport (Ref 4). The project will follow an integrated approach to sustainability. The objective is to boost greenery and create high-quality spaces while minimizing the natural resources used, protecting and enhancing the ecosystems in the region, and also raising awareness and educating the public on sustainability issues (Ref 1). Initially, the project was planned to start in 2008 and to be completed by 2013, but with the unfortunate and unseeing financial crisis worldwide, was shelved. A part of the project has been completed in the first 5 years. In 2013, a new design strategy for the project was submitted as part of The Hellinikon Project. The team included Foster & Partners, Charles Anderson Landscape Architecture, ARUP and a group of Greek design consultants. The design was revised and resubmitted to the Greek government in 2018 (Ref 3). The project is now under the consideration of the Greek Ministry of Culture for infrastructure and monuments (Ref 1).