bird park | honorable mention

The Birds Park project seeks the balance between the need for preservation, conservation and natural recomposition of the land, and the definition of qualifications for human occupation. For this purpose, the project foresees the implementation of very low impact infrastructures, with a high degree of reversibility of the area to a state close to nature, if necessary, along with reforestation strategies for degraded areas and maintenance of preserved ones, favoring a new landscape, capable of accentuating peculiarities that stimulate the complex’s regeneration as an important environmental reserve, housing the fauna and flora of the Cerrado.

Constructing the landscape

The intervention proposal starts with the recognition of pre-existing structures – the land’s geometry and its bipartition, the existence of anthropically modified areas, the characterization of green masses and their needed expansion and consolidation as typical Cerrado – and, on the other hand, the necessary balanced coexistence between ecological preservation and public use for which the park is intended, aiming its characterization as a Recreational District Park.

To achieve so, the following areas were diagnosed according to their distinct appropriation potentials:

the central portion of the park, well preserved in its natural state, corresponds to the area of highest density of arboreal individuals typical of the Cerrado, including listed species. Due to its greater potential for defining a preservation area, consolidating the Cerrado and sheltering its local fauna, the Park project proposes its full preservation in order to ensure the minimum anthropic intervention, limited to trails with exclusive circulation of pedestrians, basins of water for birds, and the implementation of bird observation platforms in order to subsidize research, always close to the bird baths. In these areas, seeking to increase the attraction of local fauna, reinforced afforestation is suggested, with typical Cerrado plants that present greater fruit production.
the northern portion of the park, where anthropic action eliminated the entirety of arboreal and ground vegetation, leaving it with exposed soil. Seeking its recovery, the project proposes the recomposition of vegetation through heterogeneous mixed reforestation, a strategy commonly used in recompositions of degraded areas of permanent preservation. Alongside reforestation, the northern portion of the Ecological Avenue will be implanted on this area, ensuring that the most significant interventions coincide with the degraded areas.
the western portion of the park, defined by the extension of the smaller plot of land in the north-south direction, with a greater presence of anthropic interventions, which are a consequence of the Metro construction site occupation. Due to the greater mischaracterization of its natural conformation, the project concentrates all the buildings in this area, with parking lots and squares that have landscaping treatment already foreseen in the program, establishing a clear delimitation between the park’s preserved areas and human appropriation spaces. With this configuration, the tranquility and natural character of the large green portion is protected, meeting the program through the creation of the needed spaces to support the park’s public use, and the scattering of construction throughout the territory is avoided, a scenario that would compromise the ecological and environmental balance of the area in case it was done. The occupation of this particular area can be done through stages, coexisting alongside the gradual removal of the Metro’s construction site.
the western portion of the park, defined by the extension of the smaller plot of land in the north-south direction, with a greater presence of anthropic interventions, which are a consequence of the Metro construction site occupation. Due to the greater mischaracterization of its natural conformation, the project concentrates all the buildings in this area, with parking lots and squares that have landscaping treatment already foreseen in the program, establishing a clear delimitation between the park’s preserved areas and human appropriation spaces. With this configuration, the tranquility and natural character of the large green portion is protected, meeting the program through the creation of the needed spaces to support the park’s public use, and the scattering of construction throughout the territory is avoided, a scenario that would compromise the ecological and environmental balance of the area in case it was done. The occupation of this particular area can be done through stages, coexisting alongside the gradual removal of the Metro construction site.
the piece of land located on the extreme west, detached from the park’s largest part by a public road, in a partially preserved state, meaning a green mass of significant size, and partially modified by the implementation of the Metro construction site. Due to this area’s greater accessibility and physical and functional independence in comparison to the park’s main area, the project implements, in already anthropically modified areas, places capable of supporting sport activities such as courts, pergolas and changing rooms, installed as an integral part of the Health Circuit. These equipments, due to their modular nature, can also be implemented gradually, allowing to partially maintain the Metro construction site in this area, if needed. In the preserved portion of this area, due to its arboreal mass and its functional independence and physical discontinuity from the large green masses inside the park, the implementation of specific management capable of characterizing it as a demonstrative agroforest is proposed, and the area would then function “as field study material for educational activities, demonstrating the ecological and economic viability of such technique”, as recommended in the Term of Reference, page 7. Alongside agroforestry, areas of organic horticulture and medicinal herbs beds are also suggested.
the peripheral portions of the park, whose demarcation is done through the definition of a sequence that works both as a protection and a transition between urbanized and natural preserved areas. To achieve so, the implementation of a 8 meters wide firebreak around the entire polygon of the park seeks to ensure the needed insulation in case of forest fires. The project proposes the implementation of a perimeter road with smooth asphalt paving, suitable for both walking and cycling, with a total width of 6 meters and divided into two independent lanes separated only by a strip of grass, measuring 3 and 2 meters (for cycling and walking, respectively). This solution takes advantage of the visual opening towards urban areas, favoring the maintenance of green areas and avoiding interference within their natural state, reinforcing the isolation and security of the park and tracing a long route associated with the Health Circuit. It also allows the eventual transit of maintenance vehicles, with possibility of maneuvering through the firebreak. Parallel to this route, the project foresees the reinforcement of the mass of trees, with species typical of the Cerrado, preferencing the ones whose blooming presents greater aesthetic effect in order to re-edit the Bird Park image for those who approach it, characterizing it as a true holder of the Brazilian Cerrado’s beauty and vitality, with permanent chromatic variations. Due to its grand horizontality, this landscape expression of blooms throughout the perimeter masses expands the Park’s contribution to the characterization of the site’s urban image.

Landscaping: nature and culture

The proposed landscape for Birk Park is designed through the overlap of two patterns, seen as distinct manifestations of the controlled overlap between the real of culture and nature: on one hand, and with great ecological and preservationist appeal, the recomposition and reinforcement of the natural structure of vegetation aims to ensure biodiversity as well as the controlled use of reforested areas, thus contributing to the preservation of an ecosystem as close as possible to the natural one, with the minimum of human intervention; on the other hand, a geometrically ordered landscape allows ordering the flows, concentrating the parking lots, preventing car traffic in preservation areas, gathering attractive activities to the public and freeing up the largest portion of the park in its closest natural conformation. This landscaping has, therefore, a great capacity of housing the most impactful activities resulting from the park’s public use, reducing their effects on the preservation areas through their correct disposition and concentration in the south portion, already considerably modified by the Metro construction site implantation. The distinction between ordering types didactically broadens the perception of use possibilities and activity restrictions according to the different levels of preservation throughout the park. Towards the west-east direction a gradation between human activities spaces – sports, recreation, leisure, culture, environmental education – and local fauna and flora preservation areas is done through the peripheral disposition of main walking and cycling routes, in addition to the Health Circuit. This transitioning space defines possible interconnections between the Metro station and the Zo: Ecological Avenue, and Perimetral Road, for maintenance and leisure. The arrangement of these two circulation elements, with distinct paths for pedestrians and cyclists, avoids the fragmentation of the large green mass on the central portion of the site, with a large number of listed species and arboreal individuals.The Ecological Avenue runs through the building complex, in north-south direction, passing under the pergola which defines a square with a mild micro-climate, making the interconnection route between the two surrounding urban equipments more pleasant. This route favors greater social interaction between park users and passersby who may use the Ecological Avenue as a shortcut.

A large boulevard with permeable and semi-permeable paving of geometric designs promotes the physical and visual integration between two fractional portions of the land, defining a linear path that unifies the sports activities areas (in the small fractionated plot of the park) with the central building complex, which concentrates all spaces for supporting public use, as foreseen in the program. Paths with smooth paving for pedestrians and cyclists run alongside the boulevard, followed by a large water mirror with tanks for growing marsh plant species, complementing the landscape. Shaped on one side by level curve 1054 and on the other side by a small embankment that rises parallel to the integration boulevard, the water mirror is filled with rainwater partially collected by the surface drainage of the land. A so-called Water Path was created to reinforce its accumulation character, conforming a 100 meters spaced regular mesh which redraws regular paths in the form of basins, executed in mortared rolled pebble, conducting all the water coming from the surface drainage of the park towards small birdbath tanks, located at the intersection of each grid line. From these, the water is conducted by gravity to a large accumulator tank located at the lowest level of the park. From this tank, a small booster pump conducts the rainwater to another tank at higher level, nex to the sanitary facilities on Ecological Avenue, which aims to replenish drinking fountains during dry periods of the year. The rainwater captured on the roofs of the park’s buildings is also fully reverted to the water mirror, through an apparent conduction in order to reinforce the didactic nature of the park, evidencing the water resources conservation and the park’s hydrological cycle diversity.

The large water mirror is designed to enhance the landscape’s seasonal variation of the water level, thus seeking to reinforce the landscape variation imposed by distinct dry and rainy seasons. To achieve this, its variable gutter, with a slight inclination, corresponds to an extensive mirror during rainy seasons, leveled with the tanks of varied geometry, re-editing the same graphic pattern seen on the grand boulevard’s floor. During dry seasons the water level will naturally lower, and the water surface will be reduced to the central section of the mirror. In this scenario, the marsh vegetation cultivation tanks will stand out from the flooded base of the water mirror. On the wet margin, temporary cover vegetation will naturally emerge, once again reinforcing the landscape’s transformation due to seasonal change and rainfall. To ensure the water containment and said varied conformation of its margin, the entire basin must be waterproofed using a layer of canvas coated with white clay, tabatinga type, whose layer, reasonably thick in order to favor the growth of vegetation, reproduces the favorable environment needed for aquatic microflora proliferation. The water mirror’s central section perenniality is ensured by the accumulated rainwater and, in critical scenarios of years worth of scarce rainfall, by artesian well supply. This alternative, by avoiding the use of treated water from the public supply system to fill up the water mirror, makes the preservation of the micro flora and fauna possible, allowing it to develop in the aquatic environment, while also significantly reducing the park’s maintenance costs.

Buildings: sustainability, reversibility and environmental qualification

The design approach for the definition of the built spaces that house activities of leisure, culture and education in the park sought to ensure the maximum adequacy of the intervention to the place, minimizing impacts that could be a consequence of its implementation, use and maintenance. To achieve so, the use of semi-industrialized constructive principles, corresponding to the logic of dry assembly, will allow the implementation of a very low impact construction site. Furthermore, the use of ecologically correct material, steel structures, with high capacity of recycling and reuse, and sealing walls made out of certified reforestation wood, with glued laminated finish, was also foreseen, accompanying the dry assemblance logic that allow, if necessary, the removal or relocation of parts of the building or its entirety. The modular logic adopted also allows it to be implemented through stages, at the same time it favors the expansion of any space according to demands of use over time without compromising the constructive logic and the park’s general principle of ordering.

A pergola of Glued Laminated Wood, associated with a superstructure of metallic profiles is proposed over the volumes that house various activities, all of each are independent constructions. This element finely marks the transition between open areas and buildings, with a shaded and mild micro-climate space. The operational nature built blocks are located to the west, close to the entrance route through the large boulevard, corresponding to the administration, with a reception that functions as a general information center for the park. At the opposite end, an open to the public coffee shop shares a loading and unloading area with the cafeteria and employees’ changing rooms, adjacent to the services shed, which opens towards the service road, allowing direct integration with the maintenance flows through the perimeter firebreak, without defining an isolated construction.

All spaces of cultural or educational public use are located on the easter side, such as the Taxidermy Museum, Library, Energy Space, Auditorium and environmental education which open towards the inner path of the pergola and also the forested area of the park. This arrangement reinforces the shaded central path, exclusively for pedestrians, which functions as an open extension of the said adjacent spaces. Between the built blocks, shaded intervals allow the extension of ornamental landscaping as a way to enhance the environmental qualification and said micro-climate. Following this same logic, the water mirror enters the shadowed area, passes next to the cafeteria. Like the other buildings, this block is elevated on metal stilts, reducing interventions on the ground and making its implantation compatible with the topography’s gentle slope.

On both sides, the significant extension of the pergola in relation to the location of the blocks reinforces the solar protection and reduces its incidence on workspaces. The pergola’s elevation also helps with the heat transmission towards indoor spaces, while the gap between blocks avoids a visual and physical barrier between the entrance boulevard and the forest areas.

Two pergolas on the extreme western portion of the Heath Space complement the building complex, creating a shaded space for athletes and users of the sports courts. Under its shade, following the same principles of the main set of buildings, a block with changing rooms, gym equipment and a small shed of agroforest production, horticulture and medicinal herbs demonstration completes the complex.

Lastly, toilets are arranged under lookout platforms along the Ecological Avenue, at its two turning points. These platforms create small squares qualified for resting and taking a break from walks.