Inserção Urbana do Metro de Gaia

• Autor(a) principal: Albino Pedro Pereira Baganha
• Data de Publicação: 2011
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: https://hdl.handle.net/10216/150079
• topic: Artes; Arts

The present essay focuses on the urban integration of the Oporto Light Rail system in the Republic Avenue (Avenida da República) in Vila Nova de Gaia, particularly on the first stage of works, concluded in 2005. It intends to conduct a thorough analysis of verifiable changes in urban dynamics along the avenue, while at the same time contextualizing the Metro do Porto project historically, geographically and conceptually. Resulting from a process initiated in the late eighties, the light rail system was the response to growing congestion levels recorded in the Porto Metropolitan Area. In the past century Oporto became an expanded, polycentric city, evolving from the traditional centre/suburbs and city/countryside dialectics into an extended urbanization model, with individual transportation gradually and unsustainably replacing mass transit. The light rail concept was by that time being developed and implemented in several medium-sized cities throughout Europe, and was the technical and political choice for improving the mobility conditions in the Metropolitan Area. This essay is divided into four main sections. In the first one the Oporto Light Rail System is contextualised in the European and national realities, both conceptually and historically. The second part analyses the process leading to the Urban Project, identifying continuities and changes over the choices made. The third section aims at analysing the built solution, detailing in greater depth three areas that raise different kinds of issues: General Torres Station and its rail interface, Câmara de Gaia Station and the city's Civic Centre, and João de Deus Station and the private enterprises in its surroundings. Finally, the last section tries to make a preview of the future of the project. The introduction of the light rail in Vila Nova de Gaia potentiated existing urban dynamics, and has led to the establishment of new urban attraction poles, constituting a historical moment of indelible change of the city's main urban axis. Recognizing its historical relevance, the main objective of this study is the analysis of such process.