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ANALYSIS AND PLANNING HONOR AWARD
The Rebirth of the Tajo River
Joo Won Im, Student ASLA, Radhika Garg, Student
ASLA, Ji Hyun Yoo, Student ASLA, Shi Park, Student
ASLA, Ming-Jen Hsueh, Student ASLA, Monique Johnson,
Student Affiliate ASLA, Linda Shi, Student Affiliate
ASLA, Ellen J, Oettinger, Affiliate ASLA, Ahlam
Abdulla, Student Affiliate ASLA, Alexis A. Peteron,
Student Affiliate ASLA and Quilian Riano, Student
Affiliate ASLA
, Cambridge,
Massachusetts
Faculty Advisors: Christian Werthmann, ASLA; Carl Steinitz, Hon. ASLA; Juan Carlos Vargas-Moreño, Associate ASLA; Stephanie Hurley, Student ASLA |
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Project Statement:
The Tajo River, which drains the region
around Madrid and Toledo, was once among Spain’s
most majestic rivers, but is now essentially an open
sewer. This project envisions a future when wetlands
on the Tajo’s tributaries enhance the treatment
of Madrid’s wastewater, and cities downstream
can recapture the benefits the revitalized river. The
planning framework integrates the management of water,
landscape, and urbanization, and builds logical collaboration
between currently antagonistic regions.
Project Narrative:
Since joining the EU, Spain has undergone
massive changes, including immigration, real estate
speculation, extreme growth, and low-density development
along the Spanish coast and in the greater region of
Madrid. This urban growth, together with the intensified
use of water and the effects of global warming, has
led the country to a point where a fundamental change
in the patterns of use and distribution of water resources
is inevitable. The Tajo River is a prime example of
how the excessive demand of a natural resource can drastically
alter not only the quality of that resource but of the
region as a whole. Once one of Spain’s most majestic
and important rivers, the Tajo is now little more than
an open sewer.
A host of factors conspire to worsen
this condition. The autonomous communities of Madrid
and Castilla-La Mancha, the supra-provinces that govern
the upper and middle Tajo, are growing at rates of 2-3%
per year, and will be home to 1.8 million more people
by 2030. Due to climate change, rainfall has already
decreased by 50% over the last 50 years, and is projected
to fall by another 5-25% by 2030, straining water supplies
that are already at capacity. New urbanization is largely
low-density and car-oriented, impacting environmentally
sensitive landscapes that lack protection, especially
in Castilla-La Mancha. Cities along rivers turn their
backs on this resource due to the smells, the color,
and the low flows. These problems are exacerbated by
the fact that 60% of the Tajo’s headwaters are
diverted for the Mediterranean coast. While Castilla-La
Mancha is eager to increase its water supply, its political
party is opposite that of Madrid, which is run by the
same party as that in coastal provinces that receive
the diverted Tajo water.
Foro Civitas Nova, a foundation
located in the watershed, commissioned this student
team of landscape architects, architects, urban designers
and urban planners to help revive the Tajo River. The
project aimed to:
- Create a framework to hydrologically,
biologically and socially restore the watershed
- Demonstrate how cities can capitalize
upon the restored rivers
- Craft a rationale for the two
autonomous communities to collaborate with each other
To achieve these goals, the team chose to explore
the middle section of the Tajo River Basin, which
includes the Greater Region of Madrid, with special
attention to the 120-mile section of the ‘Middle
Tajo.’ This section of the Tajo is perhaps most
challenging because it has the highest levels of pollution,
very low water flow rates, and is close to urban areas.
Process and Data
The study of the Tajo River began with
a week-long visit during which students and faculty
traveled from Madrid along the Jarama River to its confluence
with the Tajo River in Aranjuez and from there continued
along the Tajo to Toledo and Talavera de la Reina. Students
returned in small groups to key sites to undertake a
more thorough investigation. To identify the most critical
locations and methods for intervention in the region,
the group attended numerous meetings and conferences
with local experts on hydrology, history, ecology and
urban development. In addition, data – in the
form of GIS data, interviews, books and publications
– was gathered from the Ministry of the Environment,
the Department of the Environment and Territorial Management
in Madrid and in Castilla-La Mancha, the Hydrological
Confederation of the Tajo, and the water utility. Some
important aspects of implementation, such as assessments
of costs and benefits, institutional changes, and amendments
to the existing law were not and could not be part of
the study.
Back at school, the team developed ‘Business
as Usual’ and ‘Alternative Future’
scenarios considering urban growth, development
of landscape, and hydrology. Using trace and preliminary
research, the students delineated the geography, criteria
and characteristics of each of these issues on the map.
These were then overlaid on top of each other so that
there were three existing conditions layers in the existing
conditions group, three ‘Business as Usual’
options maps in that scenario, and three ‘Alternative
Future’ map layers. These overlays illustrated
how the different sectors impacted each other and how
interventions might catalyze change.
With these alternatives vision in mind,
groups of two or three students then sharpened the details
of the scenarios and outlined proposals for specific
sites along the Jarama River and at Aranjuez, Toledo,
and Talavera de la Reina. At mid- and final reviews,
planning directors, water experts, and landscape architects
from Spain provided crucial guidance for the continuation
of the study. After final reviews, the team produced
a bilingual exhibition that they presented to politicians,
the media, and other stakeholders in Toledo and Madrid.
Impact of Project
The greatest contribution of this project
is the creation a framework of collaboration between
Madrid and Castilla-La Mancha, which have historically
had very antagonistic relations. The project demonstrates
the positive impacts that accrue in both regions as
a result of mutualistic behavior. At the students’
Madrid presentation, the directors of the planning departments
in Castilla-La Mancha and Madrid both appeared on the
panel and discussed how there needs to be greater communication,
knowledge sharing, management, and regional level planning
between the two governments, and that this project awakened
them to the opportunities they currently overlooked.
This type of study is not intended to
produce solutions that can be implemented immediately.
The proposals are investigations into a possible future
for the region that responds to the forces and factors
present today. They are valuable because they allow
the local entities to visualize an alternative future
that is driven by market demands, but moderated by historical,
cultural, and environmental impacts. This enables further
investigation into whether this type of future is indeed
desired, and if so what the necessary decisions will
be to achieve it.
SYNOPSIS OF THE PROPOSAL
Conceptually, the proposal follows the
path of a drop of water as it flows through the Tajo
River and its tributaries from Madrid, along the Jarama
River, flowing past Aranjuez and Toledo and ending in
Talavera de la Reina. The study includes a vision for
both the entire ‘Middle Tajo’ segment and
proposed designs at each location that offer solutions
in rapidly growing urban nodes.
The Regional Framework projects
the condition of water, landscape, and urbanization
in the year 2030. In the ‘Business as Usual’
scenario, the diversion continues to siphon water from
the Tajo, while Madrid increases its withdrawals of
water from all reservoirs and aquifers in the region.
Even so, Madrid will constantly be on the verge of water
shortages, even as cities in Castilla-La Mancha suffer
water deficits of 70% or more. Cities sprawl outwards,
entering environmentally sensitive and historic agricultural
areas. The ‘Alternative Future’ scenario
envisions the governments of the two autonomias working
together to gradually end the diversion of the Tajo.
The 60% of the river flow that is returned would be
split between the two. In return for constructing a
new dam in Castilla-La Mancha that would transfer water
from the Tajo to Madrid’s reservoirs, Madrid would
increase treatment of its wastewater that flows back
to Castilla-La Mancha. Riparian corridors, alluvial
soils, sustainable agriculture, slopes, and visual/cultural
resources would be continuously protected from Madrid
to Castilla-La Mancha, bringing a new focus on eco-tourism
to the region. Finally, growth clusters near existing
infrastructure, and links to newly restored recreation
areas.
The Jarama River flows from north
of Madrid south to Aranjuez, where it joins the Tajo.
Sewage, industrial and agricultural wastes drain into
the Jarama River from these urbanized areas, while extensive
gravel extraction operations are located in the floodplain
between the cities. A large section of the river is
protected within the Southeast Regional Park of Madrid,
the closest area of protected landscape to the capital
city, though this protection ends before Aranjuez because
it enters Castillian territory. In order to clean the
water and create opportunities for public recreation,
the proposal creates a 2.5 square kilometer wetland
treatment park located at the confluence of the Manzanares
and Jarama Rivers that would clean up to one-third of
the wastewater from metro Madrid. Gravel extraction
sites would gradually be discontinued and transformed
into lakes and wetlands. Towns downstream of the treatment
plants would reorient their existing master plans to
connect to the river, rather than sprawling towards
the valley escarpments as currently planned.
Aranjuez is south of Madrid near
the confluence of the Tajo and Jarama Rivers; the city
is steeped in history and is recognized internationally
by UNESCO for its cultural landscape and as a summer
residence to Spain’s royalty. It faces several
major challenges: a doubling of the population by 2030,
high unemployment rates, contamination of the Jarama
River, discontinuous landscape protection, and a physical
disconnect between the river, palace, and train station.
The proposed master plan links the landscapes of Castilla-La
Mancha and Madrid to the historic part of Aranjuez by
transforming a gravel extraction site along the Jarama
into a lake and restoration area, extending the Regional
Park, and providing rail access to Madrid and Aranjuez.
It also proposes the creation of a university campus
adjacent to the riverfront, a revitalized mixed-use
neighborhood near the train station, and improved pedestrian
access from the train station to the heart of historic
center.
Further downstream is Toledo, a
World Heritage Site that juts into the Tajo River and
one of the most visited sites in Spain. As recently
as the 1970s, people swam in the Tajo; now, the high
contamination and low water level make it impossible
for recreational use. In anticipation of the improved
water quality and quantity in 2030, the Toledo master
plan proposes a series of open spaces and wetlands along
the river that will further improve the quality and
quantity of water. In addition, to accommodate rapid
population growth, the plan concentrates new development
in two areas, northeast and northwest of the old city.
These urban districts areas would feature commercial
and recreational amenities, agricultural landscapes,
and riparian restoration.
Talavera de la Reina, the furthest
downstream of the study sites, rests on the northern
bank of the Tajo. In recent years, the city’s
growth has been characterized by low-density peripheral
development with little attention to the adjacent river;
future growth is expected to continue this trend. To
shift the city’s attitude towards the river, this
plan proposes creating a strip development with various
recreational activities along the river. The river park
would feature four zones of activity: urban and cultural
recreation, a research/education center on the island
in the river, tertiary sewage treatment wetlands, and
two small locks that would raise the level of the water
in front of downtown to swimmable depths. This plan
concentrates future growth between the planned rail
station further inland and the Tajo River in order to
minimize impact elsewhere, while preserving historic
views. New buildings would capture rainwater and reuse
greywater for non-potable uses. Daylighted creeks would
flow openly through the urban districts, creating a
new ‘green boulevard’ system.
To restore the region’s cultural
connection to the river, this project also proposes
a Tajo Trail that travels from Madrid to Toledo
and beyond. Visitors would be able to experience a diversity
of cultural and natural landscapes along the river,
and use the trail for bicycling, hiking, fishing, and
races. The trail could be programmed with public events
to attract people to the river, and build a societal
consciousness towards the river’s importance,
which hopefully would ultimately lead to popular demands
on government to improve the river’s conditions.
There are signs that the governments
of Castilla-La Mancha and Madrid are aware of the irrationality
of the current modes of operation. It is the sincere
hope of this project that these tools and strategies
will serve to garner the support and enthusiasm needed
to restore the majestic Tajo River to its former natural
beauty and cultural significance.
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