In the light of today urban planner’s role to find the potential of urban ecotones, the purpose of this paper is to understand how neglected areas can be seen as an opportunity to build better cities. Sennet R. (2018) argues that “when people imagine where the life of a community is to be found, they usually look for it in the centre, where planners try to intensify community life. This means neglecting the edge; the community turns inward as a result. Which is an error.” This paper will focus on the case study of Moshi, a small town in northern Tanzania that is strongly shaped by a neglected Train station built during German colonialism. The empty strip of the railways acts as a boundary, dividing the city into two: the main centre in one side and the unplanned and informal city on the other side. But what happens if we start ‘opening’ doors in this boundary? What if we emphasize the natural condition of the area to act as an ecotone? It is the responsibility of the planner to see beyond the boundary and to think out of the box of the spatial planning. A special attention will be dedicated to understand why the today planners challenge is to create membranes (Sennett, 2018), with even more emphasis in the ‘global south’ cities where inequalities among different communities have a great influence on the spatial planning and on the everyday life sphere, aiming to sew up fragmented urban fabrics in order to consolidate the territory and the relationships and exchanges among its inhabitants.
El potencial de los ecotonos urbanos como herramienta para construir mejores ciudades: el caso estudio de Moshi (Tanzania)
LAIA GEMMA GARCIA FERNANDEZ
2020
Abstract
In the light of today urban planner’s role to find the potential of urban ecotones, the purpose of this paper is to understand how neglected areas can be seen as an opportunity to build better cities. Sennet R. (2018) argues that “when people imagine where the life of a community is to be found, they usually look for it in the centre, where planners try to intensify community life. This means neglecting the edge; the community turns inward as a result. Which is an error.” This paper will focus on the case study of Moshi, a small town in northern Tanzania that is strongly shaped by a neglected Train station built during German colonialism. The empty strip of the railways acts as a boundary, dividing the city into two: the main centre in one side and the unplanned and informal city on the other side. But what happens if we start ‘opening’ doors in this boundary? What if we emphasize the natural condition of the area to act as an ecotone? It is the responsibility of the planner to see beyond the boundary and to think out of the box of the spatial planning. A special attention will be dedicated to understand why the today planners challenge is to create membranes (Sennett, 2018), with even more emphasis in the ‘global south’ cities where inequalities among different communities have a great influence on the spatial planning and on the everyday life sphere, aiming to sew up fragmented urban fabrics in order to consolidate the territory and the relationships and exchanges among its inhabitants.I documenti in SFERA sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
