Parque del sitio arqueológico de Miaodigou: significados de la naturaleza

   The object of landscape design is the site, whose complexity is rooted in itself and reflected in the design needs' objectives. Hence, an important working basis for landscape garden design for complexity is the awareness and ability to understand the core of the site. With this as the guiding principle of the project, the design of the Miaodigou Archaeological Site Park attempts to meet the functional needs while preserving and revealing the original traces, including the natural and human dimensions of the Miaodigou period and the subsequent development of the site. Within this multidimensional historical development, the design of the project is targeted at preserving and appropriately transforming the historical and human achievements of the site, such as the original objects of the site – the original woods, nurseries, ditches, temples, archaeological sites, and so on – belonging to different natural dimensions.

Project's background:

  The design of the Miaodigou Archaeological Site Park seeks to preserve and reveal the original traces while meeting functional needs in the modern age. Among the functional demands of a contemporary park, the key is creating an environment that is friendly to all, while preserving, sensing, and recognizing multiple states of human interaction; balancing the pressure of intensive land development due to heritage conservation and regional economic growth; pursuing the ecological and aesthetic quality of site protection facilities that are both decorative and natural. The project will ultimately be a park that encompasses the true and complete heritage essence and cultural space of Miaodigou, thus illustrating the value of heritage and being the greatest respect and protection for the Miaodigou site by the people of Sanmenxia.

  There were no blank areas within the project site, apart from the two valleys, and the current site is occupied by villages and factories, with no heritage remains on the ground. Regarding the overall layout strategy, the planning team has transformed the site's original nursery woodland into a parkland planting area, and the land vacated by the village's demolition was transformed into a park activity area. By using the trenches as a boundary, the heritage park is divided into north and south zones. The northern zone locates in the protected area of the heritage conservation unit and was intervened in a light-touch way to present the most complete information of cultural value to the public, such as the historical implication of the house base site. At the same time, the archaeological site display shed act as part of the park's display, and is proposed to be presented in the style of a thatched roof, with the archaeological site covered within it.

General situation of the area:

The park locates in the commercial and business central district of Sanmenxia, a new planning area in the city of Sanmenxia in Henan Province, where loess is its original main soil composition.

The park's north side is separated from the green space of Qinglongjian River by Yangshao Avenue; to its northwest is the Swan Lake National Urban Wetland Park; and its southeast connects to the Qinglong Valley Park along the existing floodway to the south. All the geographic connections make the park a significant node in the whole green space system of Sanmenxia City, allowing the green spaces to be linked from the urban plan dimension.

The site is approximately rectangular in shape, 900m long from east to west and 480m wide from north to south, with a total park area of approximately 43.5 hectares. Two drainage valleys run north-south through the site – Miaodigou Valley to the west and Cilonggou Valley to the east, which naturally divides the site into three zones. Therefore, the planning considered the relative independence of functions by planning the northeast corner as a cultural and creative park and the southwest corner as the Miaodigou Museum, with the area between the two being the park part of the archaeological heritage park.

The site has witnessed the times of Miaodigou and the changes in the village, and finally, the project site has formed a complex of villages, arable land, nurseries, factories, and other multi-information.

Future challenges for the Site:

1. Collapsible loess facing the extreme weather

The most challenging part of the project is the special local soil conditions - collapsible loess. Such loess is wetted by water under a certain pressure, rapidly destroying the soil structure and producing significant additional subsidence. Influenced by the natural environment, such as rainfall and ambient temperature and humidity, especially in the event of heavy or continuous rainfall, the impact of rainwater can cause massive soil erosion, leading to traps, small washouts, or overall spalling and sliding on the slope. Therefore, the landscape construction design for such soil conditions is an important technical challenge for this design project.

2. Urban parks are becoming increasingly homogeneous

The homogenization of urban design in the post-industrial era has also clearly influenced the design style and functional layout of urban park design, resulting in the majority of urban parks being homogeneous in shape and lacking in the expression of site specificity. In this context, the challenge is to create a new type of park in the middle of the city with the theme of site excavation and conservation, while meeting the requirements of different dimensions of diversity and complexity.

3. Rapid progress of industrialization and urbanization

With the rapid progress of industrialization and urbanization, the urban framework of Sanmenxia has been enlarged, and the focus of urban construction has gradually shifted southwards and westwards. At the same time, the old urban areas of Sanmenxia have seen a gradual decline in urban functions and a lack of development vitality. At the same time, the old urban areas are facing serious problems such as lack of infrastructure and public services, poor living environment, and public disorder, resulting in many "urban diseases" and negative spaces, which are in great disparity with people's expectations of a better life and in urgent need of renovation.

Two aspects of “Diversity” to face the challenges:

The planning design takes full account of the complexity of the information on site and aims to solve the problem through three levels of 'diversity' within the construction control zone of the heritage conservation unit.

1. Biodiversity

The first level is to form a biodiverse composite structure, such as linking the canopy line into patches by retaining as many trees as possible in the current state and adding trees along necessary roads as well as at the edges of existing woods. At the same time, increasing the planting of shrub ground cover creates a rich ecological space for plants, such as dense forest and sparse grassland.

Also, to preserve the valley topography from extreme weather such as torrential downpours in the wet season and heavy wind in the arid seasons, some reinforcement schemes are required.

2. Cultural diversity

The second level is to preserve the diverse cultural context and spatial functions, as to say – cultural diversity. The project aims to preserve the Yangshao period and different archeological layers of ancient times and create an archaeological storyline that reflects the archaeological excavation process of the site. The park also preserves the life of the people, such as the relocation of the Temple, which is ruined by the city's development. as well as the road net containing the old village paths, thus for to maintain the old memories.

While the project site includes a museum, a cultural and innovation center, a temple, a plant nursery, a children's activity area, a commemorative trail of the site, and an image display at the entrance. The park has become a place where archaeologists, archaeology enthusiasts, and citizens can find their own place and space for activities. The complex character of the site is preserved, and the process of its evolution into an urban park is created.

Specific planting and drainage scheme:

A major challenge in the design of this project was to cope with the local wet loess structure. The design team enhanced the stability of the wet loess infrastructure by combining vegetation and drainage systems - and by using the multiple root systems of the plants, as the wet loess soil's high-water content positively affects plant survival and root growth. At the same time, the root system of the plant community covering the slope has a reinforcing and consolidating effect on the soil, reducing the direct washout of rainwater on the wet-submerged loess garden infrastructure and reducing soil erosion. Therefore, bio-vegetation retention facilities and grassed valleys were designed to reduce soil erosion and optimize drainage.

 On the other hand, the design team took advantage of the difference in elevation between the site (e.g. the Miaodigou Valley and the Cilonggou Valley) to provide drainage channels to prevent soil erosion and slope slippage caused by rainwater, while adding vegetation and necessary protective devices and curing the valley walls to protect the vegetation and the original biodiversity of the twin valleys and their surroundings. The reinforcement works considered the preservation of the original trees and minimizing the significant impact on the original valley from the beginning.

Well-planning zone and design:

The park is divided into three zones: the museum zone, the core park zone, and the cultural and creative zone; two valleys: the Miaodigou Valley and Cilonggou Valley.

In the core park, there are entrance image display area, the cultural and leisure experience area, and the core site protection zone.

The entrance image display area, as the southern boundary of the park with the best landscape conditions, takes advantage of the original topographic height difference to set up a north viewing platform overlooking the whole site park and adopts the form of a metal "Miaodigou pottery piece" sculpture as the image of the entrance gate area.

The trench hidden through the site is used as a boundary to separate the core site protection and display area from the cultural and leisure experience area. The trench area was now unseen since It was buried with the ancient village. To narrate the story of the trench, as well as to preserve the heritage for later archaeological excavation, the team creates a lawn space and mulched it with large areas of ornamental grass to indicate the location of the underground trenches.

Most plants in the cultural and recreational experience area are preserved in their current state, with some moderate thinning and replanting. The design preserves the original plants, creates forest windows at specific locations, and sets up different functional open spaces.

The existing plant nursery is preserved to retain the existing quietness and create a 'square city' attraction. Moreover, the design strategy took micro-interventional approaches, such as paving low steel plate tiles and pine needles to form a guide on the ground with a simple arrangement and creating a link to the ancient stone age with the lightest metal sculptures and sculptural groups such as logs and stones to feel the call of the primitive.

Overall thoughts on the project:

The overall outcome of the project is based on the principle of preserving the original habitat and human history of the site, with the preservation and improvement of biodiversity as the key design orientation. The project has undergone adjustments and games in response to the diverse and mixed elements and needs of the site, and finally reached the design intention of satisfying the multi-dimensional natural appearance so that the design can further explore and express the understanding and embodiment of the multiple consciousnesses of nature in the design of this project under the orientation of understanding - interaction - parallelism.