La Rambla: Street’s Architecture, Form and Design Inducing Urban Vitality

Preface: Barcelona, Where Outdoor Activities Become A Human Right

Barcelona, the city of Gaudi, art, passion, or whatever the world wishes to call it, holds the most vibrant street in the world, La Rambla. By the virtue of the city planners’ endeavor, the city of Catalunya promises to provide its citizens with a city that guarantees outdoor activity a right for everyone. The city presents itself in a repetitive grid pattern called ‘superilles’, the superblocks. Recent urban planning happening in Barcelona attempts a more gradual shift to prioritize pedestrian activity using these superilles. One superilla consists of nine blocks of housing units and the idea is to give the roads and space inside superilles back to the pedestrian while inducing motor traffic to the roads on the edges of the superilles. Likewise, Barcelona is a city where outdoor activities are encouraged and become a human right for every neighbor and visitor.

---

1) Districts: Preservation of Ancient Catalan Streets and Identity

La Rambla locates in between two districts, El Raval to the West and Barri Gòtic to the East, the only districts left with the city’s original form and structures unchanged. La Rambla perpetuates the Catalan history by retaining its ancient streets and architecture from the medieval period, thus representing the true form of Catalunya. Yet, the street of La Rambla and its containing districts appear greatly distant to the typical shape of Barcelona.

Street Structure and Network of La Rambla

Different from the typical road network of Barcelona, La Rambla spreads from Plaza Catalunya to the harbor and is composed of five oriented segments - Rambla de Canaletes, de Estudis, de Sant Josep, dels Caputxins, and de Santa Monica. For the two districts are left untouched from their original form, labyrinthine alleys with trendy bars, local restaurants, and spaces like plazas to lure passers branch out from La Rambla making the inside journey more adventurous and mysterious. What good comes from this type of street network is that the narrow and old alleys become the perfect place to walk around and enjoy your outdoor activity surrounded by historical buildings and surroundings.

Orientation and Mystery

For La Rambla locates in the middle of the old town and has labyrinthine alleys, both orientation and mystery exist along the street. While La Rambla per se works as the straight-forward urban axis for pedestrians, a street of orientation, the branching narrow boulevards arouse the atmosphere of adventure and enclosure. Bumping into unexpected sceneries and places offer different phase of walking and lingering from the straight line of La Rambla. Moreover, the sense of privacy and locality amplifies as well along with the enclosure. Display of neighbors on the balcony, more local bakeries and restaurants show up on sight and human interactions on spot become more intimate. Whilst La Rambla as a street may contribute with the purpose and direction of a straight line, the surrounding convoluted streetscape proposes with mystery and wonders.

Next to Plaza Real, across the street from El Gran Teatre del Liceu, lies a boulevard called ‘Carrer de Ferran’, my favorite boulevard branching out from La Rambla. Carrer de Ferran with the width of approximately eight meters contains alongside, the City Hall and the Cathedral of Barcelona and more local and private shops compared to those of La Rambla. To add a personal experience, backstreets like Carrer de Ferran brought romance and admiration that requires nothing but merely the presence of oneself. Old buildings in style lit by the street neon lights and the scenery of wine, people, talking, walking, resting, or whatever you may see turns into art no painting, sculpture, or literature can compete with.

Historical Sites and Attractions Along La Rambla

-

The street offers many things. Stores, places to wander, sit and talk, opportunities for interpersonal attractions and so on. However, historical sites along the street would probably be one of the main reasons it’s visited by millions of people. From the North to the South along La Rambla, Plaza de Catalunya, El Gran Teatre del Liceu-the very first theater built in Barcelona, Marche de la Boqueria, Palau Guell-one of Gaudi’s architecture, and plaza Real are placed and attract more and more population to the street making it sort of the main corridor, or axis for sightseeing and visitations.

---

2) Mixed Land Use of Commercial and Residential

Commerce: Vital Street Full of Liveliness and Activity

The land use on La Rambla includes both that of commercial and residential. Almost every of the building lined up on the sides of the street is used for shops on the ground floor and the upper floors for dwelling. The combination of the two functions brings benefits to the street that naturally comes from the people themselves. Commerce, a city without it would seize to exist. A city essentially is commerce. It is the job of the attractive streets to make up interesting cities. And it is the job of commerce to makes up the street that beckons to people. Moreover, with the prerequisite of pedestrian road conditions-width, street furniture, safety, etc., streets full of diverse commerce create the ideal form of ‘walkable street’. These facilities induce population inward, whether stationary or flowing. The concentration of population most significantly decides liveliness of a street. What’s intriguing is that this concentration attracts more people into the street. The diverse types of shops lining along La Rambla such as souvenir shops, cafes, restaurants, bars, etc. keep the street busy day and night full of people. Thus, commerce in La Rambla itself defines a street you’d want to walk in.

Direct Control: Natural Surveillance

La Rambla accommodates a myriad of the crowd, both non-locals, and residents, every day. And the presence of the residents guides the street is to function safely without unfortunate mishaps. Natural surveillance by the owners of the street moderately controls the foreigners, meaning visitors, directly. Natural surveillance prevents potential threats in a way indirect controls like regulations can’t reach out.

---

3) Architecture: Order and Intimacy

Architectural Datum: Balance Between Order and Variety

Order refers to 'balance', 'symmetry', and 'repetition' found in buildings, streets, and public places. Also meaning the building looks and feels somewhat similar to the neighboring ones built within specific previously promised regulations in shapes, size and designs. The significant order gives out a sense of comfort and stability. And it most importantly conveys the whole picture of a neighborhood as if they match like puzzle pieces. However, too much order can destroy scenery and cause boredom harming the cityscape. Thus, the balance between order and variety is essential when it comes to collective architecture. This balance in architecture is exactly what the buildings in La Rambla and its districts have. Buildings are in similar design and shape of about the same height. Buildings have the same sized rectangular windows and balconies. Their colors restricted, heights around 100 meters, floors mostly around five to six, and edges sharp and articulate. Most dominantly, the architectural style in Catalan Gothic of medieval-style established in the late 18th century mixed with Modernism representing the true figure of traditional Catalunya. Yet, each building has individual uniqueness in delicate designs in shapes patterns of decorations, pillars, and entrance for instance. The continuous array of buildings in La Rambla and its districts per se brings up Catalan identity and sense of stability with their balance in architectural order along with uniqueness.

Compaction and Density

Back in the old era, one would consider being able to have enough space for oneself a great privilege only the rich. Only the most abundant class, the poor lived in tiny huddled housings and it was horrid. Thus, quite frankly, some of the modern urban planning labored under the false impression that owning private housings and plots detached from our neighbors is simply better. This shift in housing turned out to be a disaster. In fact, living close to one another brings contentment and positive moderating influence to individuals and communities. La Rambla, counting its accommodating residential function, achieves such compaction in a city leading to abounding human interactions and coexistence in public spaces such as streets and plazas. This establishment of fixed residential density not only enhances admirable living conditions for the residents but also stimulates fortuitous wonders for the visitors in town.

---

4) Designs in La Rambla and Plaza Real

Geometric Plan of La Rambla

La Rambla stretches out from the harbor to the city center forming a central axis of 12 kilometers. It was designed to accommodate a massive volume of pedestrian traffic and induce strong retail economy in its privileged location.

∙ Road Sections and Width

The width of La Rambla varies from 22 to 96 meters for the street is composed of long different sections. Road segments include sidewalks and carriageway on both sides of the road and pedestrian island in the middle-also where urban activities and commerce exists. Width of the sidewalks ranges from 1.2 to 12.5 meters, while the width of carriageways ranges from 4.5 to 10 meters and that of the pedestrian island from 3 to 30 meters. Carriageway are planned to manage motor traffic and parking for La Rambla’s significance as Barcelona’s urban axis. Yet, La Rambla prioritizes pedestrian activity with its distribution of space to the pedestrians.

Connection to Plazas

A plaza is a place where the city’s vision lies in physical form. It’s also a public space making a sacrifice of privacy. It offers an open space to linger and stay to the people in a formal area. It is a place where authentic interactions and communication is made among people. These are the reasons why we need plazas in urban places. La Rambla is connected to several plazas, offering a pleasant environment to walk around and spend time in the street of La Rambla.

Plaza Real (Plaça Reial)

If there is ‘Plaza Sol’ in Madrid, there is ‘Plaza Real’ in Barcelona. Plaza Real stands the most prominent plaza representing that of Barcelona. It locates next to La Rambla with its access way connected to the street to the East in the district Barri Gotic. Plaza Real has its elements and functions in the most ideal way for a plaza.

∙ Surrounding Buildings

Plaza Real is surrounded by buildings which is a prerequisite condition for a normal plaza. The buildings are under certain architectural order following that of Plaza Real of its own. Every section of the facades is in exactly the same form and structure even with the details. It offers sense of connectivity and comfort in space.

∙ Clear Geometric Form

Plaza Real is in form of a rectangle. Although simple it may be, the geometric form of a plaza I believe implies architectural meanings.

∙ Commerce

Commerce, as the same in any urban places, retain stationary populations and provoke attraction through commercial activity and shops. Just like those of the entire district, ground floor of surrounding buildings are used as shops, mostly restaurants and bars. A concert hall of Jamboree also locates among other commercial facilities. Furthermore, every shop along the façade has outdoor tables for customers to sit and enjoy their service. The scenery of people drinking coffee or enjoying meals having conversations is another factor to create an astonishing sphere.

∙ Street Furnitures

In the center of the plaza places Tres Gracies, an iron fountain designed by Antoni Rovira Ⅰ Trias. The streetlamps hang on every arc between pillars of façades evenly distant to each other. Palm trees are planted in the plaza. Last and foremost, two streetlamps designed by young Antony Gaudi as his very first work known to public greets visitors.