The landscape layout of the southern extension of the city of GUELMA

Université 8 Mai 1945 Guelma

Project idea

New extensions of cities have been designed to avoid anarchic urban sprawl and to focus activities (mix), therefore reducing the number of trips thus giving the public all the opportunities to meet the standards of sustainable urban development. The objective of this study was to achieve a controlled spatial organization and an urban living environment different from that our cities know today, namely: congestion, social segregation, uncontrolled urbanization, spreading-out, suburbanization, saturation of the means of communication, and the growing ecological footprint.
The city of Guelma is situated in the north-east of Algeria. As many cities in the country, Guelma is suffering of housing deficit due to demographic change and this has led to the sprawl of the city and suburbanization. Knowing that the city of Guelma has experienced several civilizations (Phoenician, Roman, Islamic, colonial) and has exceptional natural and urban landscapes.
The southern extension of the city of Guelma has not escaped these phenomena, what led us to study and seek solutions for the landscape setting of the extension SUD through the intervention on the existing urban tissue, and the proposal of new solutions for future constructions.
The joint development zone; known as ZAC (zone d’aménagement concerté) have experienced a great echo and a good growth in Europe, which are the result of sustainable development, by respecting the three dimensions: economic, social and environmental. Thus, development procedures ZAC are best suited to the principles of the Urban Project (consultation, governance, flexibility ... etc), which we will try to integrate in our case with the requirements and capacities of our society, by intervening on the landscape and the urban fabric (existing and projected).
With the necessity and continuity of construction towards the south of the city, the challenge is how to make the city of Guelma more Healthier and cleaner. and creates a balance between the historic center and the outskirts of the city by creating a " A secondary centrality and reduce the displacements, and especially improved the urban landscape."

Project description

- Creation of a The joint development zone; known as ZAC that prefigures the socio-functional mix and respects the devices of sustainable development.
- Reduce mechanical traffic by creating and encouraging hiking and cycling.
- Propose circuits (axes):

O Economic and activity axis.
O Ax for relaxation and leisure.
O Ax of discovery and sport.

In order to create a relationship between the deferent entities and cancel the isolation of the peripheral districts intended for social housing, thus integrating the university pole with the urban fabric set.

- Increase the attractiveness of the southern extension of the city and relieve a little the city of Guelma by the creation of a secondary center to face the old center.

- Proposal for a project that meets HQE targets and positive (renewable) energy to serve as a prototype for the protection of nature.
- Limit the perimeter of the urbanization towards the south.

>> Synthesis diagram and proposed operation:

1. Synthesis diagram:

According to the analysis, three axes are drawn:
- Economic and activity axis.
- Ax of relaxation and leisure.
- Ax of discovery and sport.

From its 3 axes we have identified 3 poles: the 1st represents a space of culture and relaxation by the projection of a mosque pole, a museum and a large public space. The 2nd pole is a projection of a business and commercial center. The 3rd pole is the main one, located in the geometric center of the southern extension of Guelma where a ZAC was proposed.

2. Proposed operation: ZAC

In order to promote the city of Guelma and to solve the problems of the anarchic spreading of the southern extension of the city, and especially to create a secondary center that will play the role of a counterweight to the historical city center. We are going to project a ZAC constituted by a project of housing and accompanying equipment, which will be a prototype to follow for the other projects to come in the southern extension that it is by the use of materials ecological and renewable resource or By this socio-functional mix. All this by the proposal of an ambitious program and citizen.

Technical information

Making the new city of Guelma healthier, greener and more prosperous is achieved by tightening up the perimeter of urbanization and finding solutions to the evils that are plaguing the new city on the one hand and stopping to build beyond the limits of that Or the outskirts of the old city on the other. While trying to propose a new model that succeeded in Europe (ZAC), to apply the principles of Urban Project and remained in a more global and global approach that of sustainable development. The aim of this work is to draw up an urban project that focuses on a new city built in harmony with the old city and to avoid the conception of the city by parts. Protect and peripheral districts where everything is allowed, but as a whole, a place allowing the interweaving of different urban and social tissues.