OCT 09 / 15.30 pm – 17.30 pm / BME K210
Chairs:
Dr. Domonkos WETTSTEIN PhD / Budapest, H
BME Department of Urban Planning and Design / research & education platform
Prof. Ľubica VITKOVA PhD / Bratislava, Sk
STUBA Department of Urban Design and Planning / personal webpage at STUBA
SUMMARY
Post-Socialist Transformation Challenges on Seasonal Landscapes
Freedom appeared on a new scale but with a different meaning in eastern and western landscapes after the Second World War. While in the West, freedom emerged in the form of the right to leisure, in the East, holidays became a means of consolidating social policy. The increasing infrastructure capacity has opened up new opportunities for domestic tourism and recreation for a wider range of society, while it became a showcase for socialism for international tourism. However the building process transformed the landscapes spectacularly, the buildings were designed just to meet the functional needs of seasonal tourism focusing on a short period of land use. Simple and lightweight, experimental buildings soon became widely popular and deeply positioned in the collective memory as landmarks.
After seventy years, new trends in landscape transformation are taking place. Post-socialist resorts are now being shaped by privatization and tourism concepts instead of socialist ideology. Formerly modern tourist monuments today struggle with problems of heritage protection and rehabilitation. The buildings, once built for seasonal purposes, should now be redesigned to meet the needs of year-round tourism. At the same time, communal memory still looks with nostalgia at the modern architectural monuments of early mass tourism.
The new forms of freedom pose new challenges to the post-socialist leisure escapes.
How have new tourism trends transformed landscape identities?
What rehabilitation challenges and tools are emerging in the renewal of tourist facilities?
In what ways is it possible to define new concepts for post-socialist leisurescapes?
We look for answers at different scale levels: In addition to landscape-scale processes, we are also looking for answers to the problems of resort settlements and the architectural heritage. Abstracts can build on theoretical concepts, case studies, process interpretations and spatial comparative analyzes among post-socialist countries or between Eastern and Western Europe.
ABSTRACTS
Gabriel SILVA DANTAS & Dr. Ildikó Réka NAGY / Budapest H / Br
Resilience of Urban Forms in Context of Urban Green Infrastructure: Study Case of Ferencváros, Budapest
Resilience is a critical factor in urban growth, and it also plays a particular part in the urban renewal measurements accomplished in the 9th District of Budapest. This region has been going through different design propositions, aiming to compose the yet existing urban voids and provide cohesion to the disjointed urban fabric. That adaptive process was most intensely conceived between the 1980s and the early 2000s, a period marked by the political and social disruption of the fall of the socialist regime and the gradual implementation of the capitalist structure. Through research on design, understanding the strategies adopted in that urban operation can establish an analytical framework capable of enlightening the physical, social and mental nuances of an urban renewal process. Given the expansion process of existing urban fabrics, it is relevant to investigate the role of resilient structures in composing the urban living environment in terms of form, function, and use. In that context, identifying the configuration of the green infrastructure can also stimulate a circular approach to urban development.
Dr. Jelena MARIC / Belgrade Sr
Towards More Resilient City: Improving Public Health by Increasing the Usage of Urban Green Open Space – a Case Study of New Belgrade
The modern lifestyle has generated major stress-related issues that are seriously affecting public health in cities. Alongside the current pandemia treats, public health became one of the crucial elements of city resilience. The usage of open green space in urban, residential areas can be beneficial for citizens’ overall physical and psychological health and well-being. Although there is a trend of improving green infrastructure and usage in post-socialist housing districts, there are different types and patterns of open space usage. This paper aims to identify these differences in order to provide innovative suggestions for increasing the use of open green space in residential areas. The methodology was consisted out of theoretical and observational techniques, including a survey of 120 participants. New Belgarde was selected as a case study, with a comparative analysis done on two distinctive open green spaces in this area, combining expert observation and semi-structured interviews. Results provided essential insights into connections between spatial characteristics, user satisfaction, and usage regarding open green space in New Belgrade. Thus, this paper could present a knowledge base for developing guidelines on improving the urban design of different open public spaces that could empower their usage and, therefore, influence citizens’ healthier lifestyles in residential neighbourhoods.
Kinga SÁMSON / Budapest H
Hungarian Amusement Parks from the Fifties to Nowadays
In the fifties, a process started in Hungary to create cultural parks based on the soviet model. These parks were complex, diverse facilities in the proximity of the cities where people could spend their leisure time. Various functions were integrated, and amusement parks could be part of it too. In this essay, I attempt to explore this interesting function. In Hungary, there were around ten amusement parks at this time. Most of them were built in these times, yet today they are all closed except one. Some of them are empty and ruined, others got new functions. The main motto was ’having fun while ‘learning’. The cultural-political background wanted to control both the weekdays and the free days. The creation of the amusement parks was bound due to the forced collective work of the people and to the nearby factories through the possibilities which could offer to construct experience elements. The entertainment concept in these parks based on basic human experiences like fear, ramble or finding something. The parks combined fixed and kinetic objects to access these feelings. What kind of architectural characteristics had these places? What can we do with the empty places, to which we are mentally engaged?
David KLEPEJ & Dr. Naja MAROT / Ljubljana Slo
Planning Urban Tourism Infrastructure in Post-War Socialist Slovenia: the Case of City hotels
Tourism in Socialist Yugoslavia was redefined in the period after the Second World War as workers were granted the right to paid vacations. This represented the basis for the development of the country’s tourism industry. While Yugoslav tourism was mostly concentrated by the Adriatic Sea and Alpine Slovenia, cities gained interest for their cultural appeal and as destinations for business/conference tourism. Furthermore, the state saw cities also as a showcase of the country’s economic and societal success that could be exhibited to foreign and domestic visitors. Thus, in the 1950s and 1960s, tourism infrastructure and public facilities (such as hotels and other accommodation facilities, convention centres, sports halls, cineplexes, museums, and public swimming pools) were developed in socialist towns for both locals and visitors. This investigation focuses on hotels as accommodation infrastructure in six Slovenian cities. We have analysed the characteristics of the hotels as they were built and their main construction, outlooks, and management adaptations. Especially, we are interested in their current functions and position in their respective city structures and with regard to their place within tourism infrastructure.
Flóra PERÉNYI / Budapest H
Experimental Architecture: Examining Hungarian Campings through the Examples of Two Different Styles in the Socialist Era
Camping became a mass movement and from the middle of the 20th century it started to play an increasingly important role in the European and thus the Hungarian tourism. In addition to hotels, motels, and cottages, campings have also attracted more and more people near rivers, lakes and mountains. The camping — an ensemble of small-scale, scattered service buildings integrated into the natural landscape — has appeared as a new function in the Hungarian architecture. Due to its small volume and the lack of serious professional expectations, campings did not play a significant role in the architectural discourse, as a result of which it could become a field for designers’ formal experimentation and search for individual styles. This study examines campsites of two different architectural characters, based on their formation, the density and quality of their built elements, focusing on the experimental architectural attitude. Some outstanding examples of the modern and the organic architecture can still be found as campings, giving an opportunity to research them based on today’s perception. In addition to the original plans, photos and archive documentation, the sources of the work are site visits and photos of the current state.
in the online+ session / OCT 09 9.00 am
Olena LEMAK & Prof. Ľubica VITKOVÁ / Bratislava Sk
Transformation of the Danube Recreational Areas
In Slovakia, in the period of socialism and industrialization, tourism also developed. The concept of tourism development was linked to everyday, weekend, or long-term recreation. In Slovakia, in the period of socialism, significant investments in tourism facilities were targeted mainly at regions of international importance (in the Tatra and Liptov regions), or with the nationwide importance of recreation (in the North part of Považie and Horehronie regions), or in spas of the international importance (the city of Piešťany, Trenčianske Teplice … ). In terms of the development of recreation and tourism in Slovakia, the Danube region was included in category no. 3. In Slovakia’s tourism plan, the Danube region was to provide primarily a short-term form of recreation in relation to larger cities and industrial agglomerations. Simultaneously with the development of these thermal baths, other forms of recreation related to the Danube region and its special country also developed. The paper traces the transformation of small and medium-sized towns and rural areas, which often degrade many times, instead of becoming the site of dispersed activities, especially during the pandemic period.