DUBLIN, IRELAND.- Two architects from Buenos Aires, Mauro Romero and Fernando Abelleyro, designed a proposal for recycling Father Collins Park in Ireland, entered their bids and got first place: no less than a contract to do the work with a 12 million euros budget for a large urban park having its own energy.
Mauro Romero and Fernando Abelleyro have known each other for years. They both work as teachers at the Architecture, Design and Urbanism College of the University of Buenos Aires. However, they had taken on a joint project, until Romero discovered the Dublin City Council summons for bids. “First, I thought that Ireland was a tidy country, where we would be “sprayed with insecticide” because we are Argentine natives” he admits. Then interest for the project, a 22 hectare park that will revitalize the northern zone, was stirred.
“The hardest part was coming up with a powerful idea that would synthesize the program requirements,” says Abelleyro. What was required was not small, since the park would have to consist of 17 fields, leisure and amusement areas, athletics tracks, green and forestry areas and food courts, besides sanitary and maintenance sectors.
“Once finished, supposedly by the year 2005, the park will be a site for not only sports and recreation, but as the seat for civic activities,” mentions Romero. He admits that another challenge was developing usage proposals and architectonic concept strong enough to establish a link with the population.
The urban development plan of the North Fringe area in Ireland includes a large thoroughfare that bisects the park from west to east. Abelleyro and Romero decided to create a concrete strip that would run through the park from north to south, unifying, linking and arranging the various sites and activities.
MOVING STRIP.
The concrete strip turns, goes up and down, generating space and solving problems. It starts at an area for family picnics and children’s playgrounds, and then goes up to the access to the future sports building.
Then it goes on through the different sites and high rise lookouts, and is submerged in the water, creating bays and mooring for boats and kayaks. Finally, it raises creating a slope for the water to fall.
Abelleyro and Mauro Romero have been friends for 13 years, but this is their first joint project. They are passionate about design, and agree that biddings allow large scale projects. That is why they use their Internet search engines to find attractive proposals.
Father Collins Park was named after Fr. Joseph Collins, parish priest of Holy Trinity Paris in Donaghmede in the late 1970’s. Father Collins was instrumental in encouraging the then Dublin Corporation to acquire this land to provide sports and recreational facilities for the growing population of Donaghmede.
“Parks play a vital role in enhancing the quality of people’s lives. They shape the character of the community, and improve the health and well-being of urban dwellers,” said John Fitzgerald, Dublin City Manager.
