Coquimbo-IronBelt.

Coquimbo port city is part of the Chilean Iron Belt. A geological province rich in iron deposits in the Northern part of Chile that extends along the Atacama Fault System of about 600 km long and 25km broad. El Romeral is one of the biggest mines in Chile located North of Coquimbo connected by train infrastructure to the port so that iron can be shipped to national and international market. An industrial and shipping centre, Coquimbo is a city that sits between the water and a mountain range on the Pan-American Highway.

The current debate of whether the mine will still be operative in the next decade opens up opportunities to rethink the relationship of the logistics infrastructure with the city's urbanity.  Students investigated urban challenges to discover opportunity projects that could foster the integration of the train infrastructure into the urban context, ot the new vocation for the waterfront.

Participants in the Spring Semester Programme 2023 examined the environmental and the functional, the architectural typologies and socio-economic profiles present in this context by analysing both tangible and intangible conditions. Each student developped their own brief to target specific design challenges relating to the insertion of new developments within the existing urban fabric. The city was understood as layers of information that together revealled drawing and mapping qualities, which in turn informed students’ own design narratives.

Students:

Karly Abou Dib Machaalani
Stephanie Achkar
Sima Fayad
Yilun Jiang
Qiongsen Jin
Inwoo Lee
Love Lee
Vincent Lin
Glory Nast
Seoyoon Oh
Sidney Joonsang Om
Miriam Soubra
Yasmine Tabet
Joseph Yu
Areti Zioga

Tutors:

Naiara Vegara
Marie-Isabel de Monseignat-Lavrov
Katya Larina