Málaga University Campus, a new natural and digital environment by Ecosistema Urbano

Project description by Ecosistema Urbano

The Louis Pasteur Boulevard project recovers and transforms an underutilized area, enclosed between infrastructures, making it the main space of the university campus. For this, it proposes the creation of new landscapes, a diverse and articulated program, a localized improvement of climate comfort and continuous connectivity throughout the space.

The proposed design has as its main objective to facilitate that everyday activities of university life - such as teaching, studying, meeting or reading - can occur in the public space, creating at the same time a new green infrastructure for the city.

Four ways to rethink the campus according to four complementary strategic lines:

●    A Connected Campus, which completes the urban fabric, links the faculties and connects the university with its immediate surroundings and with the rest of the city, betting on accessibility by public transport and pedestrian routes.
●   A Green Campus, an ecological corridor that efficiently manages its resources (water, energy and materials), generating different natural landscapes and that recovers and connects to each other pre-existing green spaces of great natural value such as the Olive Grove, the Botanical Garden or the Zapatero stream.
●   An Interactive Campus, which allows users to interact, view information in real time and adapt different elements of the public space to their needs, including the configuration of bioclimatic conditioning systems to achieve optimal environmental conditions.
●  An Open Campus, which makes available to university students and all citizens a wide variety of spaces and dissemination devices, bringing academic activity to public space and making it closer, more accessible and dynamic. Creating pedestrian routes activated by learning spaces and social gathering, as a "Hubs" or squares.

Digital interactivity, bioclimatic comfort and energy self-sufficiency

One of the peculiarities of the project is that it is committed to the use of technology oriented towards the interaction between people and the environment.

It will be the first public space with which users can interact through an application specifically designed for it. In parallel to the construction of the project, the official UMA app will be extended with open source modules that will allow access to an environment of interactivity and information.

This opens up a whole new world of connections between the digital layer and the physical space. Beyond the usual process and automation optimization in “smart cities”, in this case the network of sensors and actuators allows to reach an unprecedented level of interactivity: control bioclimatic conditioning systems, change lighting modes, send audiovisual content to screens and sound systems, know the atmospheric conditions of the spaces or events scheduled in each area of ​​the park, share comments or photos associated with specific spaces, unlock lockers or even take books from an outdoor library, etc ... all This in real time.

Technology also plays a key role in the environmental aspect. To improve the comfort of outdoor spaces, they have been equipped with bioclimatic conditioning systems such as water diffusion, evaporative cooling or geothermal energy. All of them systems of low energy consumption that feed through solar panels integrated in the structures. These systems, together with the passive conditioning strategies incorporated in the design will allow permanent use of the spaces throughout the year.

Open academic spaces connected by a natural landscape

The first phase of the project, which covers an area of ​​7Ha, is articulated around three main systems: the "Hubs" or activity nodes, the large green areas and the natural corridor of the boulevard that connects both.

The project is designed to manage the water cycle in a more sustainable and efficient way, slowing down its runoff, creating a network of infiltration areas and introducing species with low water consumption.

The Boulevard is the green corridor that connects characteristic elements such as technological “Hubs”, Open Classrooms and Meeting and Social Meeting Spaces, as well as pre-existing spaces with environmental value, urban biodiversity reserves. The main road is delimited by topographic reliefs upholstered with vegetation that characterize and protect it from traffic, improving its climatic and acoustic functioning, creating unique landscapes that disrupt the linear perspective and the breadth of the suburban landscape. In this way, more bounded and protected environments are generated that make it possible to address their bioclimatic conditioning.

The Climate and Digital Hub is the main space, located next to the Metro stop and capable of hosting large capacity events. It is equipped with a technological cover that houses an interactive screen, a digital water curtain and bioclimatic conditioning and energy production systems to cover the operation of the entire park.

The Open Classrooms are spaces conformed by the vegetation itself, protected and equipped with interactive technologies that facilitate the realization of events and teaching or dissemination activities. Its main objective is to transfer the university experience to the public space by offering areas designed to foster multidirectional learning.

The Olivar Open Library becomes a natural environment equipped at certain points with light infrastructures and furniture elements that transform the place into a space for learning, reading, information exchange, rest and creative leisure.

The Zapatero Stream is renaturalized avoiding its channeling and disappearance of the suburban natural landscape, introducing new plantations that limit soil erosion through water collection systems and infiltration areas, enhancing biodiversity.

Combining this strategic approach with specific interventions from each place, the proposal of the new Teatinos Campus adopts a vision where the combination of public space and landscape supports recreational and didactic experiences, fostering and making visible the interaction between the different disciplines of the university. only for students, but for all citizens.

An intelligent natural space, with positive energy balance and bioclimatic comfort.

A public space where collaboration, creativity and learning make up the urban scene.