Análise morfológica de alguns espaços públicos: Cidade do Porto 1910-1974

Abstract

The main goal of the present work was to study and analyse the form of public spaces built in Oporto city between 1910 and 1974. Therefore, the following quality and noticeable case studies were selected: Marechal Gomes da Costa Avenue; the axis between the Rodrigues de Freitas and Carolina Michaelis schools; the social neighborhood of Costa Cabral; the D. João I square; the 1st phase of the Ramalde housing complex; the set formed by the Francisco Sá Carneiro square and the Eça de Queirós Alameda. It was intended to decode the physical shape of those public spaces to identify their root elements, their order and coherence, their main identity and the elements in which relies their perception - with the ambition to apprehend methods and intervention standards that are still valid to the contemporary city. The strategy for building an interpretation of those public spaces relied on: a (re)visit and observation of their current configuration; research of their historical materialization; the study of their forms through the drawing. The graphical analysis was based on a systematized grill that, according to three observation modes (Urban fabric, Study Unit and Synthesis), aimed to facilitate the confrontation / comparison between the studied examples and the understanding of their urban lessons. The study of those cases, now "old within the city" and integrated into consolidated areas, allowed to observe that the evolution of its urban sedimentation, such as well as the assertion of their identity and expression, derive and coexist with an exact syntax - compositional gestures that enforce regular shapes, geometric alignments and axial systems. It's highlighted the geometric accuracy of the layouts as the fundamental basis for understanding and for the clear legibility of those examples. The recognition of their shape and the perception of their physical and symbolic continuity in the overall structure of the city, are the characteristics that determine their image and timelessness, and also what enhances their delightment. The accuracy of these urban layouts did not mean a lower adaptability to new spatial practices, but establishes an important instrument for urban design given the multiplicity and changeability of the contemporary city.