Our proposal for the transformation of the Porte de la Villette marks a major transformation of a site marked by the passage of infrastructures, discontinuities, nuisances and pollution. Through massive planting, a softening of the ground, and the deployment of a network of gentle promenades that take advantage of the unlocking of a few key points, the gateway is transformed into a large triangular garden square. This central space is being developed in its entirety, in the short term, from the first phase onwards, building on what already exists to create a sober and resilient project.

The large central triangle, an emblematic figure

At the heart of the project, a large triangular public space of around 5 hectares is tucked away beneath the infrastructure. This garden square is on a scale commensurate with the challenge of connecting the two: it forms an identifiable figure, providing a way of situating oneself and imagining the site. In this respect, it echoes the great Parisian squares built within the former city walls, such as Place de la Concorde and Place de la Bastille. This urban piece, entirely developed in the short term, will very quickly transform the road and infrastructure nature of the current gateway.

A large garden square and two parks

The extensively planted garden square forms a central hub, a new living space that is both local and metropolitan. On its banks, the Canal and Bertrand parks are both spaces for people to explore and local parks for residents. Together, they form a network of parks that completes the system of open spaces in the North-East Paris area. It establishes a new, reconciled relationship between infrastructure and nature. Each park provides the neighbourhood with well-sized spaces that meet the challenges of use, habitability and safety.

New continuities

The project opens up clear, unbroken continuities across the infrastructure. The diversion of the Périphérique slip roads will create a new passageway under the freight line, 35 metres wide and entirely reserved for pedestrians and cyclists. This passageway, together with the completely redeveloped Avenue de la Porte de la Villette, creates two major North-South routes between Paris and the towns of Aubervilliers and Pantin. Transversely, the Bertrand and Canal parks create new connections and establish a long-range East-West link, from canal to canal.

Promenades

The square and the parks are linked by a simple and coherent network of promenades, which participate in the activation of public spaces and ensure their openness, their connection with the various surrounding neighbourhoods. Accessible to all, these promenades are at once spaces for strolling, places for meeting and conviviality. This system makes it possible to concentrate the intensity of use to the benefit of legible, lively and reassuring itineraries, and thus to limit the impact of human frequentation on biodiversity within the parks.

A network of nature and resilience

The missing links in the network of existing open spaces, parks are large enough to create a fertile living-human cohabitation. They interweave the different flows of life while including “dedicated” spaces for both biodiversity and urban life. Generating a truly bioclimatic neighbourhood, this network of nature brings together places dedicated to uses, others that allow water to infiltrate, cool, shaded spaces in summer and sunny ones in winter, and quiet places, refuges on the fringes of busy itineraries.

A Greater Paris destination

Porte de la Villette is becoming a new destination at the interface between several areas of the Greater Paris region and at the crossroads of numerous residential districts. New programmes and facilities will strengthen the existing cultural and community dynamic. The Nouvelle Commanderie is a radiant programme that brings life to the garden square, a mixed-use programme that offers both cultural and festive activities and events for businesses.

Active space

In addition to the district’s flagship destinations, active ground floors and public spaces that are used both day and night contribute to a sense of security. In the lower part of the buildings, all the programmes that support collective urban life are located on the squares and parks: facilities, services, shops, community premises, crafts, culture and sports leisure activities. Open spaces, transparencies, terraces and shop windows accompany the major routes taken by pedestrians and cyclists.

Diversity of uses and users

The project reinvents the role and status of a major Parisian gateway, as an intense place for people to mix, mingle and be inclusive, an essential interface between communes and territories. Its role as a place of solidarity is being maintained and extended; community facilities and food services are being installed in the new projects, addressed to the public space. The parks encourage a wide range of practices and uses: sports, urban culture, rest and relaxation, and play all coexist in a calm and safe environment.

Living in the green belt

The infrastructural gap at Porte de la Villette means inventing a new way of living, protected from nuisance but open to the exceptional open spaces offered by the site. The peristyles enveloping the buildings form a new layer that brings comfort and flexibility to the homes, bringing in nature and the landscape, while providing climatic solutions adapted to the context of global warming.

A bioclimatic Porte

The project incorporates the objectives of the Paris Agreement at a local level, and is a pioneering district in the new bioclimatic Local Planning Scheme (PLU). Decarbonised and efficient, the new buildings consume little energy, provide bioclimatic comfort for homes and promote low-energy lifestyles. Porte de la Villette inaugurates a new register of Parisian public spaces that are conducive to active modes of transport, a new way of being outdoors, in the city, in a fresh, resilient environment that is adapted to climate change and to the very high social expectation of nature.