URBAN PLANNING
A future healthy diversified economy and green environment in Saida
One of the projects of Saïda was greening the old railway tracks to be a recreational space in the city. This project is a product of the ideas shared by the Saida USUDS Strategic Diagnosis report and by the “Shajar wa-Bashar” NGO in Saida.
Tags: Green City, Urban Regeneration, Public-Private Partnerships, Spatial Planning
Challenges addressed
- Promoting environmental health
- Connecting the city with its surrounding
- Coordination cooperation and networking
- Lobbying with national institutions for the legal framework
Main objectives
- Security and Stability
- Upgrading the abandoned railway tracks into a green corridor
- Ensuring sustainable management of green areas
- Creating public-private partnership to promote the city
- Branding the city of Saida as a green city
- Enforcing hybrid legal framework for the railway corridor
- Enabling dialogue between all parties as the railway corridor is a neutral ground inclusive to all cutting across different section of the city
- Empowering the public to negotiate the right to landscape
- Encouraging small initiatives of local NGO’s and businesses creating local platforms for reconciliation and peace building
Facts
Project type Leisure and Sports
Promoter Saïda Municipality
Date 2014
Budget 175.000 $
Project description
The railway was an abandoned track owned by a public institution. Stretching from the extreme north to the south, the corridor passes by the Ain El Helwi camp what gives it potential to become a green connector and inclusive public space as the spatial corridor of the railway remains intact. Waiting during years for a reactivation the city council (explained in the USUDS Strategic Diagnosis report) together with the NGO Shajar wa-Bashar decided as it is part of the city’s memory, to create a new promenade for citizen’s use.
In this first phase of reflection about what to do with the old rail way track, the Metropolitan Area of Barcelona (AMB) provided technical assistance to the city regarding the organisation of green and open areas, which concluded with the proposal of a system of public and green spaces and the analysis of two case studies, one of them the green railway track.
With the proposal of the case study in mind and the aim to transform the railway track into a green pedestrian/cycling corridor for recreation at city level, the project was launched in 2014 and divided in three phases to be executed (Phase 1: Executing one section of the track, 3Km north of Saida, phase 2: Execution of other sections including connection in the camp, and phase 3: Implementing tram shuttle).
In the approximated cost of this project it is included the cleaning of the area, planting new trees, buying new street furniture, building cycling and pedestrian paths, installing of lighting, etc.
This project runs in parallel with an initiative taken by the local NGO of Shajar w Bashar to claim the right to this landscape. They have received funds from PACE international NGO to construct an advocacy campaign, raise awareness and establish the project.
Impact and results
- 200 members of the created consultative committee
- 6 working groups
- 95 participants
- 20 meetings
- Encourage public-private involvement
- Establishment of cooperations
- Reduction of emissions
- Historical and technical approach
- Technical innovation
