Faced with climate challenges, the world’s metropolises are mobilizing to reduce their polluting emissions and accelerate the advent of greener and more resilient cities. One of the most tangible manifestations of this momentum appears in the competition Reinventing cities, which proposes to stimulate international architectural and urban planning genius with a view to developing sustainable ways of building and living in the city.
This competition serves as a large global laboratory, where architects and urban planners from around the world concoct a “green and just urban future”. Aware that cities emit 70% of the pollution on Earth, the hundred largest metropolises in the world, united within the C40 organization, launched this competition in 2017 to accelerate innovation and participate in achieving the agreed ambitions. at COP21.
The competition is inspired by the initiative Reinvent Paris, set up in 2014 by the mayor, Anne Hidalgo. The French capital then proposed a great mix of ideas to promote 23 underutilized sites belonging to the City.
It was an opportunity for architects and urban planners around the world to express their dreams for the City of Lights on a buildable surface area totaling 150,000 m2.2. Around 650 of them responded to the call and submitted some 372 proposals in what the daily The Parisian considered the project “perhaps the most important ever undertaken in the capital in decades”.
Forming the avant-garde of urban design
Since his birth, Reinventing cities crowned 39 proposals in 14 cities, including 2 in Montreal. Each participating metropolis must designate a depreciated or even abandoned site which will serve as a playing field for the candidate teams. It is from this place that they imagine a project which must respect the objectives of the City, but also the environmental and social imperatives established by C40, which require the achievement of extremely high standards in terms of energy efficiency. and carbon footprint over the entire lifespan of the winning buildings.
“ Reinventing cities is undoubtedly one of the most “challenging” competitions in the world, underlines Martin Leblanc, architect and senior partner at Sid Lee Architecture, whose proposal, developed with around twenty partners, won the second edition of Reinventing Montreal cities in 2021. Each participation requires a colossal investment of time, money and energy. »
The first winning proposal from Reinventing Montreal cities, called Haleco, is currently emerging from the ground at the western end of Old Montreal, on the former service yard on Rue de la Commune which borders the Bonaventure Expressway. On this urban mound will be erected a building displaying a drawing by the artist Marc Séguin on the facade and which will house 367 apartments, including 40 community ones, more than 4000 m2 spaces intended for businesses and shops, an aeroponic farm and an orchard.
“The avowed aim of Reinventing cities, it’s really about developing prototypes that can be reproduced elsewhere in the world and ways of doing things that bring about a transformation, adds Pascal Harvey, director of development and urban planning at Sid Lee Architecture. Creativity must be optimal because it is not only a question of shaping an architectural project: it must also be made as efficient as possible, develop its financial package, imagine how the place will be invested and what impact it will have. on its environment throughout its lifespan. »
Model environmental student
Les Ateliers Cabot, the proposal which earned Sid Lee Architecture honors, required the consultation of around twenty collaborators to take shape. The project plans to rehabilitate 72% of the remains of the Canadian Power Boat Corporation to create, on this abandoned industrial site, an artistic, entrepreneurial and community hub “anchored in the bosom of the social and circular economy”.
“If we want to achieve one thing, it’s this: develop a financial model that allows community organizations, start-ups, innovative people and artists to meet in a place like the Ateliers,” explains Martin Leblanc.
“One of our initial inspirations,” adds Pascal Harvey, “were certain neighborhoods in Europe, including Amsterdam North or Alcântara in Lisbon, which took shape from an informal appropriation of places to become culturally teeming places. and sought after. »
In addition to offering a home that belongs to the artistic and community circles, Ateliers Cabot will become a model student in sustainable construction. The proposal promises to achieve zero carbon and zero organic waste performance during its first three years of operation. At least half of the 28,000 m2 of the site will belong to green spaces, and the recycling of rainwater and gray water will reduce drinking water consumption by 84%.
Ateliers Cabot also plans for a mix of uses. In addition to the places of creation and distribution, they will include a large greenhouse, a hotel as well as an “industrial and technological incubator”. The sale of the land should be completed this year and work should begin in 2025.
A competition to break conventions
“It’s a place that goes beyond the dogmas of traditional town planning, where zoning is confined to a specific activity,” underlines Martin Leblanc. This is also one of the objectives of Reinventing cities : breaking conventions so that new, more sustainable ways of doing things can break out of the mold.
“The idea of a competition is both to mobilize talent and to encourage the testing of different proposals to find the best one,” summarizes Geneviève Cloutier, director of the Center for Research in Planning and Development. from Laval University. It can serve as an interesting spark plug to develop exceptional ways of doing things. The challenge is then to maintain this momentum on a more regular and recurring basis. »
This is also the challenge that Reinventing cities proposes to raise. “The best way to have an exceptional design is to have an exceptional order,” says Martin Leblanc. Often, projects are not necessarily based on the quality of human life or on the creation of a long-term neighborhood, but rather on a predetermined financial framework to be respected. The process of Reinventing cities develops tools that allow exceptional design not only to be realized, but also to endure. »