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Pedestrian Density and Circulation
Over the past several weeks we have been mapping the pedestrian density and circulation of a section of the barrio ‘El Guinardo’. The technique for mapping was to count all pedestrians on every corner and intersection of every block in the area for approx. 5 minutes and divide the number by the time to get an average amount of pedestrians per minute. The colors as well as the lines indicate increments of 5 people per minute who are on every edge of the block and on crossing. On the image above we can see the exact number counted for both morning rush hour(s) (8am to 10am) and the afternoon pedestrian activity, which is somewhat constant. After this map was complete it was decided that this was significant enough to continue towards the other areas of the Barrio and to connect this with the public space (both green parks as well as squares).
Public Space
Quickly after making a second round at the northern parts of the barrio it became apparent that the number of pedestrians was a drastic amount less than compared to the initial area of the mapping described above. The maps below show the surprising and depressing results of the public spaces: many parks were closed to the public (in fact not public at all) others were unused and others used extremely infrequently, for example in the entire park of Guinardo we counted a total of 14 people during a 2 hour walk and therefore this mapping strategy came to an abrupt halt. As a conclusion of this we had assumed that Parc Güell, situated right next to our barrio was a choice far more prevalent. However we realized another trip would be essential to determine other potential causes.
Cars and Parking
Upon our return to the site a few days later to determine whether our results were accurate and to determine what other causes might be, we realized the number of cars in the area might be an explanation. Since the area has steep slopes and only one metro line in the sloped area it was assumable that this was a reason people take preference to their car. In addition the number of unregulated parking was a dominant feature in a majority of the hill areas. This reminded us of our first lecture by Pau Sola Morales on the history of Barcelona, in which he described pre-Olympic Barcelona streets and parking which were transformed into public spaces, boulevards, parks and organized parking facilities. However, since the public space has already proven not to be in use this would make no sense to make more, what we will focus on is the organized parking facilities.
Mapping Parking Garages
After concluding that organized parking facilities could be an interesting aspect in our project we reconsidered our mapping strategy and started mapping both public and private parking garages (seen above). Next we made a graph with the first data obtained from the site in which the used parking space is compared to the vacant spaces of parking garages. Interestingly enough there was a far greater amount of free space available than we had anticipated.
Parking Availability
The data from the 5 car parks represented in the graph was used as a strategy to continue mapping all parking garages in the represented section of our barrio. The red indicates spaces used by inhabitants, green the available spaces while purple and the checkered hatch areas were still to be determined or had no parking facility that we know of.
Conclusion
As a conclusion for our 0 emission strategy, this data can be used to place strategic parking spaces to fulfill inhabitants needs while freeing up precious space for various purposes, reduce co2 emissions as sensors (as seen in the lecture ‘Urbiotica’ by Irene Compte) can be placed in car parks and cars will no longer have to circle several times to find a parking space, a general organization of areas will free up the now chaotic parking situation, increase parking efficiency and generate an income from the users in order to keep the idea self sustaining.
