Strip Development in Duisburg
Built 150 years ago, the inner harbour of Duisburg was still expanding in the 1950s. With the decline of traditional industries and trade routes, however, the area then fell into a state of decay, until in 1992, the city council voted in favour of a restructuring programme. In the context of the International Building Exhibition at Emscher Park, the former harbour area is now being transformed into an attractive urban landscape with Dutch-type “grachts” and upmarket housing. An urban master plan determined the precise location of the new buildings. Laid out parallel to the canals, the two housing strips presented here complement existing structures to create a peripheral street-block development. The new strips are visually articulated by the vertical glazing to the staircases. These circulation zones, providing access to the dwellings via glazed lifts and straight-flight precast concrete stairs, have a distinctly public character. The reconstructed stone pavings to the external paths, for example, are continued internally. To reduce operating costs, the staircase spaces are not heated and have a single-glazed outer skin. The walls to the adjoining dwellings, therefore, were thermally insulated, as were the entrance doors. A wood bench outside all flats is designed to create a semi-private, front-door situation for every resident.
