An urban park that links the river and the city

An urban park development along the Hai River, this project takes on the studio's recurring question of "dealing with river waterfronts in an urban context" — integrating sports and leisure activities with a strongly planted landscape rather than a hard civic edge. For client Tianjin Haijing Industrial, the design prioritizes environmental quality through extensive green space — a large variety of trees, plants and grass covering the majority of the 48,000 sqm site — while wide pedestrian pathways and view corridors keep the river and the city linked together. This project creates an urban park along the bank of the Hai river in Tianjin. By incorporating public functions of sports and leisure with the natural environment of vegetation and water, this development sets out to serve as an example of dealing with river waterfronts in an urban context, and for maximizing their potential to benefit the city. In order to ensure high environmental quality in the area our design emphasizes green space. This was done by incorporating a large variety of trees, plants and grass which cover the majority of the site. Possible visual disturbance from the buildings in the site was eliminated by maintaining a low silhouette and the incorporation of green roofs. Access to the water is also emphasized, by allowing pedestrians to come right to the water's edge and by constructing wide view corridors, which link the river and the city together.