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CREATING AN ECO-COMMUNITY

In A Post-Industrial Wasteland

Robert Alcock describes how residents are redesigning a crumbling


urban settlement into a very special ecological community.

I
n January 2000 my fish in the river. Here we are We ended up in Zorro-
partner and I moved to trying to create a sustainable zaurre by sheer luck, or
a village in Spain. So far, barrio (urban neighbour- maybe fate. Looking to buy
so familiar. But this is not hood), in the face of financial a flat within cycling distance
your typical story about life and political interests that of the city centre, the very
in a sleepy rural idyll. The see the area as a playground first place we viewed was a
area where we live, the for speculative development. spacious old apartment over-
Zorrozaurre Peninsula in Almudena and I met in looking the river. Thanks
Bilbao, is a post-industrial Dublin in 1997, working to- to the decaying neighbour- Top:
wasteland at the heart of gether in a research group on hood, it was a bargain, The waterfront of Zorro-
Spain’s third biggest city. the environmental impacts even by local standards. zaurre seen from the river.
Fifteen minutes’ walk from of buildings and cities. Then To clinch it, a Brazilian friend
the Guggenheim Museum, she found a job back home was renting the flat just Above:
that titanium-clad temple to in Bilbao, the main city in downstairs – serendipity! Mural on a squat.
postmodernism, is an urban the Basque Country of north- We closed the sale, moved
village of 500 people, living ern Spain. After experiencing in and soon felt at home in Bottom left:
alongside ruined factories the mountains, the wave the low-rent, bohemian Dressed up for carnival.
with natural grass roofs, lashed coast, and a culture atmosphere of the peninsula,
where lizards dart among where life still seemed to be where local working people Bottom right:
mosses and samphire, and about quality, not quantity, mixed with squatters, immi- Nature reclaiming the flat
kingfishers and cormorants I was ready to join her. grants and the odd artist. roofs of abandoned units.

www.permaculture.co.uk No. 45 Permaculture Magazine 3


Isolation gave the community waterfront – luxury flats and As well as being a commun-
a friendly solidarity; the city shopping malls, ‘anchored’ ity strongly identified with
was just over the mental by big high-profile buildings a unique and beautiful place,
horizon. We fell in love with like the Guggenheim and Zorrozaurre was also a
the flowing light on the the Euskalduna concert hall significant area of land
river, the crumbling beauty – was spreading down river (57 hectares / 143 aces) in a
of the industrial architecture, like a very expensive rash. highly visible location at the
the diversity of life in unusual Most residents believed their heart of a major city, the
micro-habitats. The area’s homes would be bulldozed region’s economic engine.
problems – traffic, air to make way for yuppie I dreamed of an ecological
pollution, lack of services, flats, and felt powerless to barrio: where people lived
graffiti and grime – seemed resist. There was a deep-
a small price to pay for rooted cynicism and Top left:
living in such a unique place. resignation in the barrio. Beauty in the calm
In contrast, I saw Zorro- reflections.
FIRST STEPS zaurre as a huge opportunity.
One of the first things we I had read about many places Bottom near left:
did after moving in was to around the world where Part of the author’s
create a communal riverside people had created more riverside garden.
garden, together with a few sustainable settlements and
neighbours. The site – a ways of life: from Village Bottom far left:
concrete landing stage – Homes in California to Las A lush garden belonging to
could hardly have been less Gaviotas in Colombia, from a house due for demolition.
promising: no natural soil Curitiba in Brazil to BedZED
(the soil here is mostly in London... If we could do Centre top:
contaminated, anyway); the same here, it would Waterfront houses on the
intense sun reflected off have a tremendous impact. Zorrozaurre peninsula.

the water surface, salt-laden


drying winds, and no nearby
water source, the river being
brackish. We made containers
using concrete blocks and car
tyres,1 collected plant material
from wherever we found it,
imported some soil and
made more with worm bins.
It was hard to get our
fellow residents to compost,
especially in hot weather
when fruit flies became a
serious nuisance. People
were a bit more convinced
once they saw the tomatoes
that grew in the improved
soil, which also held plenty of
moisture. Our neighbour’s
son even applied for a govern-
ment grant to start a worm
farm! (Sadly, he was turned
down.) Today, after five years
and many setbacks, the
garden is still very much a
work in progress. I’d love to
hear from anyone with exp-
erience of creating gardens
under similar conditions...
But we soon became
aware that our little world
was endangered. The
redevelopment of Bilbao’s

4 Permaculture Magazine No. 45 www.permaculture.co.uk


amidst wildlife, fruit trees in the area, the residents the Forum for a Sustainable
and roof gardens, where would put their concerns, Zorrozaurre a reality. But
streets were for people and experts would come to talk first we had to convince
not cars, where the best ideas about sustainable cities. the residents’ association,
in sustainable design would Through the local resi- which was hardest of all;
be tried out in practice. dents’ association, where they didn’t trust the politic-
But how to get there from Almudena sat on the com- ians and thought it would be
here? We came up with the mittee, we began lobbying a lot of work for little return.
idea of a forum, a space for politicians for support. We The first meeting of the
open dialogue. We would found that while doors might forum was held over two
invite all the stakeholders be open, minds were not. days in March 2004. It was
There was little awareness a lot of (unpaid) work, but
Top right: in Bilbao of the global envi- with great returns. About
Salt tolerant plants growing ronmental crisis, and no 150 people came. Politicians,
on the river wall. culture of citizen activism. experts, residents, and even
a representative of Zaha’s
Bottom near right: ARCHITECTURE FOR PIGS team, expressed a great
Residents painting a We often became discou- diversity of views about
mural. raged and thought, why Zorrozaurre and its future.
should we bother? In the The press came and some
Bottom far right: end, I suppose, we bother actually wrote about it.
Reeds growing in old ferry because it’s our place, our Contacts were made inside
steps. environment. It’s where and outside the peninsula.
we stand. I think that to People told us they had
Centre bottom: be happy you need to be never thought it possible,
Aerial photo of the creatively engaged with nothing like this had hap-
Zorrozaurre peninsula. your surroundings – which pened in Bilbao before...

could mean a little riverside


garden, your neighbour-
hood, or the whole planet.
Behind closed doors,
meanwhile, powers were
mobilizing. A managing
commission for the area was
formed, made up of govern-
ment and major landowners;
the residents were not
invited. It was announced
that a famous architect was
going to design a plan for
Zorrozaurre. After much
speculation, they named
the Anglo-Iraqi ‘superstar’
Zaha Hadid – an architect
with no experience in urban
planning and no noticeable
interest in ecology; she has
been quoted as saying,
“Ecological architecture is
architecture for pigs.”2
Then a city election
brought a more sympa-
thetic party into the Urban
Planning and Environment
department. With the
Bizkaia Provincial Government

backing of the Town Hall,


suddenly the provincial
and regional governments
wanted to play too. We
had the funding to make

www.permaculture.co.uk No. 45 Permaculture Magazine 5


But we soon realised how We also held another DREAMING THE FUTURE groups in neighbouring
much work there was left to smaller workshop focused So far, it looks as if the areas – especially the area
do. In October, to great fan- on a specific location, the forum has laid some solid across the river, which faces
fare, Zaha Hadid’s team northern tip of the penin- foundations in Zorrozaurre. similar pressures. We’re
presented their plan for the sula, a fantastic site in every The residents are secure; bringing in more people
area. In some way it was way and key to the area’s the association is currently with experience of urban
better than we’d feared: all future identity. The partici- negotiating with the town sustainability/permaculture
the existing residential build- pants proposed a centre hall and the managing com- to work the residents and
ings were to be retained. But for ecological knowledge mission for money to rehab- local experts and exchange
while lip service was given which would promote and ilitate the houses. The local experiences with groups in
to ‘sustainability’, the only demonstrate sustainability, art foundation has also been other cities. Another project
real actions proposed were acting on scales from local reprieved from eviction, is to create an ‘open source’
recycling rain water and di- to regional, based on an and they’re going to release website4 to which anyone
verting traffic away from the open-source philosophy a documentary about can contribute. Here, we
main riverside street. It was and the idea that human Zorrozaurre and the forum. are dreaming of a truly
a 95% conventional plan. beings are part of nature. Sustainability even seems sustainable barrio – whatever
It seemed, from later that means in an area that
conversations, that Zaha’s could be below sea level in
team blamed the client 100 years.
(the managing commission) It is still only a dream.
for not demanding more Zaha’s plan is now under
sustainability; whereas the consideration, prior to
commission thought it was approval by the city and
up to the architects to show provincial governments,
them what a sustainable city which would be a major step
would be like: both sides towards a business-as-usual
were vaguely aware of the future for the area. On a
issue, but neither took wider scale, the region is in
responsibility for it. the throes of a property
The forum continued its boom – prices reaching ever
momentum, now with more more exorbitant levels, and
support from the residents. green fields disappearing
In November, in collabor- every day under tarmac and
ation with some sympathetic tacky suburbs. At times I
architects, a community think of Bilbao’s (malignant)
workshop3 took place where ‘growth’ economy as a
residents and others dis- monstrous beast, and an
cussed and voted on visions ecological Zorrozaurre as a
for the future of Zorro- dagger to its heart. We keep
zaurre. The results were very pushing the blade in, but it
encouraging: the top five looks like the beast will take
proposals included ‘Eco- a long time to die
City’ (in which the develop-
ment of the whole peninsula It would be an ‘observa- to be trendy in Bilbao now; MORE INFORMATION
is based on environmental tory’ to study and guide senior politicians have been info@zorrozaurre.org
criteria), ‘Green Zorro- the development of heard talking in public about www.zorrozaurre.org
zaurre’ (where priority is Zorrozaurre and Bilbao the area as a ‘car-free island’
given to green space and towards sustainability. and other such radical ideas. 1 See www.lesspress.com/
the regeneration of natural It would pay its way with We’re continuing to build ecodesign/tyres.htm.
habitats), and ‘Barrio for an organic restaurant, our network of contacts.
Pedestrians’. Those three through education, and by We are organizing events in 2 Reportedly in a speech at
ideas together express the treating the area’s sewage the barrio: boat tours of the Harvard, 1998.
essence of what I would and greywater, using a peninsula, talks on local
call an ecological barrio. selection of ecosystems history, ecology and architec- 3 Based on the ‘European
comprising a microcosm ture, and maybe this autumn Awareness Scenarios
Centre top: Part of the of the river estuary and its a ‘car free’ day. We are Workshop’ methodology.
design from the Ecological watershed. Castles in the air? talking to the politicians and
Centre workshop. Perhaps, but as Thoreau the managers, with respect 4 All Forum publications
said, that’s where they even when we don’t believe are available free from
Centre bottom: Voting on should be – now put them. We’re also strengthen- our website at:
the proposed visions. foundations under them. ing links with community info@zorrozaurre.org

6 Permaculture Magazine No. 45 www.permaculture.co.uk

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