THE GRAND PROJECTS

Architectural and urbanistic operations after the 1998 Lisbon World Exposition

Talks about Lisbon – Parque das Nações at Rocca Lisbon Gallery 

The cycle of talks about Lisbon, organized by the Rocca Gallery with the collaboration of Architect Pedro Novo, dedicated a session to the Parque das Nações, on November 13, 2018. The roundtable had as speakers: Bonifácio Rodrigues, Professor of Cultural and Patrimonial tourism at the School of Hospitality and Tourism of Estoril and in the Isce-Odivelas, Carlos Ardisson, former candidate for president of the Parish Council of Parque das Nações and Paulo Tormenta Pinto, associate professor at Iscte.

Roundtable participants: Pedro Novo, Bonifácio Rodrigues, Paulo Tormenta Pinto e Carlos Ardisson.

The session sought to discuss the neighbourhood identity that emerged in the eastern part of the city, after the Lisbon Word Exposition of 1998. After 20 years of this event dedicated to the oceans, the recent parish Park of Nations has been consolidating itself in the context of the city, functioning as an attractive territory from a residential point of view, bringing together services and infrastructures at both National and International levels.
Although, and not undermining the real estate potential, the quality of the public space and buildings, the Park of Nations reveals a certain closure in terms of the flow to the rest of the city. This situation can be verified in the boundary of this planned area of the Expo’98 where a breakdown of the characterized morphological continuity occurs.

The session was also an opportunity to reflect on the novelty associated with the international exposition itself, and the corresponding new mechanisms of urban management that resulted in the social production of space.