The quality of 'undefined space' is introduced to Maastricht in the zone between the railway and the A2

The A2 motorway, like the river Maas and the railway, slices through Maastricht as a parallel timeline. The zone between the railway and the A2 has become isolated from the urban fabric of Maastricht. The area has the potential to reunite the parts of the city east and west of these lines. This final-year project seizes the opportunity to introduce to Maastricht the quality of 'undefined space'. If Maastricht is in the throes of ironing out irregularities in the city, the urban fabric of Liège is in a state of flux. In that Belgian city, buildings lapse into disrepair and remain vacant. This process can sometimes take tens of years, giving rise during that time to any number of viable situations. The undefined space makes it possible for individuals to withdraw and become spectators, creating their own version of reality in the public domain.

This undefined space cannot exist unaided, however. In a society that puts striving after perfect solutions first, there is no place for side effects. These are denied and preferably banished as far from the city as possible. Corners, blank walls, passages, recesses and shells are spatial hallmarks of such places and are deployed in the A2 zone as modelling elements, questioning the undefined space and challenging urban life.

How inhabitants and passing motorists perceive the A2 zone is taken as the stepping-off point for getting the scales of these two groups to mesh. This introduces a new urban climate into the public plane. At the project's core is the void - as silence, as a means of emphasizing cityness, as vulnerability and, lastly, as space that gives visitors the opportunity to interpret it. The architectural quality of the surroundings can be experienced through the sequence, rhythm and succession of spaces. Layering, reflection and transparency shape and strengthen our perception of the new urban spaces. Static city and dynamic landscape converge in the zone wedged between the railway and the A2 to create an urban zone hitched to the void.

'We know that an object that is not consciously noticed at the time of a first visit can, by its absence during subsequent visits, provoke an indefinable impression.'
Ivan Chtcheglov, Formulary for a New Urbanism (Formulaire pour un urbanisme nouveau, 1953)

Place of education: AvB Maastricht | Specialization: architecture | Tutors: Maarten Terryn, Wim Cuyvers, Wim Korvinus