The reclamation of the disused area of the former provincial tramway complex in Parma, between the original office building, the Turbine plant and the enclosure wall, has become an opportunity to create a new crossed square. The project is proposed as an opportunity to serve the city’s higher education system, not only with the newly recovered spaces, but also with the route connecting Viale Caprera with Via Pintor, opened up to give students direct access from the provincial bus stop to the Oltretorrente high school complex, located behind it on the Lungoparma. The design of the public space superimposes new designs on ancient layouts: it connects the main thoroughfare with the various nuclei of the complex. It introduces a new figure in the square along which there is a continuous stone bench that refocuses the public space around the circular green space that leads back to the post-unification well/flower bed. Starting from this initial unitary element, the ground design is arranged in relation to the entrances. It defines internal areas characterised according to their potential uses, as in the case of the open-air classroom built behind the Barrier or as at the southern entrance to the building, intended to be the theatre/gymnasium. The contemporary roof, which replaces an incongruous building at the bottom of the square, slants downwards and is separated as much as possible from the historical structures, establishing a critical distance from the context while reinterpreting its heights and horizontal lines. In retreating to expose the original wall at the back, it becomes a simple plane suspended at the level of the neoclassical stringcourses. To make this roof as autonomous and independent as possible, the support system is concealed in various ways, in the border wall, inside the internal ventilation grid and in the different shoulders of the glazed doors of the two entrances.
Provincia di Parma
Parma, 2009-2012
Strutture Marco Pedrini
Impianti Bruno Guerci
Photography Carlo Gardini
