Houssay Square: Promoting New Links

Middle Density, Project, RDR Arquitectos, Territory and mobility, Urban Paradigms

Accessibility, Active Public Spaces, Air quality, Argentina, Buenos Aires, Comfort, Cultural identity, Design strategies, Energy landscapes, Greenery, Heritage, Lighting design, Mixed use, Pedestrian realm, Project, Public Space, Public space role, Rain Water Harvesting, Transportation, Urban dynamics, Urban infrastructure, Urban mobility

Located in one of the most compact and densely populated downtown areas of Buenos Aires, with more than 650 inhabitants per hectare, the Dr. Bernardo A. Houssay Plaza was created in 1975 on the grounds of the former Buenos Aires Hospital, based on a project by a multidisciplinary team that included landscape designers Pradial Gutiérrez, Aldo Mario Liberatori and Román Wellington Peñalba. Surrounded by the Faculties of Pharmacy and Biochemistry, Dentistry, Social Sciences, Economics and Medicine of the University of Buenos Aires, which together with the nearby Hospital-School of Clinics José de San Martín, host approximately 100,000 students, the square was progressively disfigured by partial and uncoordinated actions that fragmented its spatial and environmental condition, making it uncomfortable.