Topio7’s project “Eco_corridor” was awarded with the 1st Prize at the competition of: “Regeneration and Reuse of former lignite mines in the Western Macedonia region” by the Public Power Corporation of Greece. The competition asked for strategies for the re-design of a 188ha area of a former abandoned lignite mine. The project’s idea rethinks this post-industrial landscape as a new uses’ area in order to become a public pole through its environmental, economic and social transformation. It is a cultural landscape of memory thus the proposal aims also to maintain its unique genius loci.
The concept derives from the longitudinal site’s shape that could function as an ecological corridor. The need for environmental enrichment and biodiversity, has led to a system of fluxes that organizes spatial relationships and connects habitats. The resulting landscape is being crossed by a series of ecological itineraries – the ‘eco_corridors’ with different characters, qualities and uses: cultural uses, sport – leisure facilities that offer economic benefits.
Main aim of the project is to maintain the special atmosphere of the place, by unifying and integrating through scales. The project acts as a strategy that is being expressed in three thematic axes: (i) biodiversity-ecological connectivity (ii) water net management (iii) evolution through time (iv) spatial organization of movements and rest areas, v) new uses on local and supralocal character (cultural uses, sport facilities, cultivations and leisure).
