A Cultural Heritage, Environmental Preservation
Master Plan: Post- Occupancy Evaluation of
Emporion Park Design
Magda Saura, Ph.D.
University of California, Berkeley
Technical University of Catalonia
Barcelona, Spain
magdalena.saura@upc.edu
Abstract— In spite of market pragmatics, the urban,
architectural and environmental protection and conservation
ideas of the Emporion master plan were quickly implemented in
actual planning. Previous research conducted at Technical
University of Catalonia set the design requirements for policy-
making required in any sort of master plan. One of the goals was
to predict a successful use of space through natural environments
and historic landscapes. Social and cultural factors determined
one set of parameters for environmental programming and
evaluation; namely, how people use both recreational and tourist
infrastructure through historic places. The Getty Grant Program
sponsored university research. University research today
develops further through a longitudinal study that started once
the plan was executed and partly built in 1992.
Key words: Post-occupancy, park design; longitudinal studies
for architecture; environmental design for archaeological sites;
World Olympic Games planning.
INTRODUCTION
Design for Barcelona’s 1992 World Olympic Games
included park, street and waterfront infrastructure. Empúries
(Emporion in ancient Greek) was one of main games sites
outside the city. Innovative design and construction practices
were challenging tasks to the architects and engineers to meet
the ever-growing demands of a post-Olympic society. Since
1992 a kind of a new built environment and landscape is
emerging from the blending of traditional, vernacular rural
forms with the facilities of the post-industrialized world. In the
post-occupancy a study presented in this paper, data has been
gathered through land use, land value and observation of use of
space (recreational use of the countryside and tourist facilities
of the archaeological park). The paper encompasses the
multidisciplinary perspectives and practices of environmental
design, history of architecture, archaeology, human ecology,
and town planning. Sources found in architectural and civil
engineering treatises have provided definitions for
environmental protection and conservation policy making [1].
No dualities of architecture and engineering design have
occurred among the multi-disciplinary team members of the
Emporion master plan.
THE 1992 WORLD OLYMPIC GAMES REVITALIZED CULTURAL
HERITAGE
The purpose of the Emporion Master Plan was to integrate
the preservation of both an archaeological site and a dune,
forest protected area [2].
Emporion is the ancient Greek name for today's Saint Martí
d'Empúries, a, medieval village tourist resort located in the
Mediterranean Pyrenees region of Catalonia [3]. An
archaeological site is an environmental, behavioral setting. It
may be surrounded by nature and/or by man-made
environments. People act upon the environment by visiting
rural landscapes and places built in the past [4]. Through
tourist- and-leisure mass media, cultural identity is often
portrayed in the region as being the heritage of picturesque
mountains, valleys and sea resorts; it also represents the
cultural heritage of an ancient past. Greek colonists from
Phocaea founded in 600 Massalia (modern day Marseille in
France) and in 575 Emporion (modern day Empúries in Spain).
Temporary conditions of the games required transformable
uses of space for the future. If the pyramids are regarded as
the ultimate expression of permanence in architecture, today
‘legacy’ is one of the key-words for the London 2012 Olympics.
Only few of the buildings destined to remain will be left in
their original condition; most of them will be transformed. In
considering legacy, there is a real architectural legacy in such a
situation and the Barcelona 1992 Olympic infrastructure at
Empúries shoreline amphitheater and dune landscape emerge
unscathed and provide a true reminder of the Olympics [5]
The dune environment of Empúries is protected with
zoning and building regulations of the Empúries master plan; it
covers 200 acres of developed and undeveloped land. In 1992
it was a prime waterfront location featuring the 1992 Olympics.
18th December 1989 La Vanguardia newspaper announced that
a consortium was created to organize one of the opening
ceremonies of the Barcelona 1992 Olympics that were going to
take place in the beach of Sant Martí d’Empúries to celebrate
the arrival of the flame. The consortium consisted of
representatives of different levels of government finance
offices and planning commissions: Ministry of publics work of
Spain (MOPU), Autonomous government planning committee
and coastal officer (Ports and Comissió d’Urbanisme de la
Generalitat), and the European Commission; the consortium
was presided by queen Sophia of Spain, princess of Greece.
The torch and the Olympic flame arrived 13th Jun 1992 and
they were greeted by about 20,000 people. The Greek actress
Irene Papas said the fire was a “generous offer of the Greek
spirit willing to cooperate peacefully.” She was recalling the
peaceful, sport purpose of the first ancient games in Olympia,
which can be traced back to 776BC but also commented upon
contemporary royal and, mostly, historic ties of this part of
Spain with Greece when the first Greek settlers arrived in the
6th century BC.
The Roses Bay dune strip achieved a length of 16, 5 km,
covering a surface of 385 ha, with an estimated advance of 4-5
m/year in the southern front. In the 1930s local communities
debated a kind of sand drift bill designed to stop the onward
march of drifting sand. Coastal dune environments were as
historic as the ancient Greek ruins which at that time were
beginning to be excavated. They have been among the first
areas settled by Neolithic farmers, in Peru still provide
opportunities for agriculture, in Scotland sand dunes
accommodate potatoes and other crops, and in the Netherlands
sandy soils, associated with older inland dunes provide flower
bulbs and onions. But that was not the perception in the 1950s
for Madrid’s National Forest Service; more pines were planted
as if they were commercial forests, which caused the decline in
Empúries of active dunes.
A natural barrier to the destructive forces of wind and
waves, sand dunes in the Empúries master plan were repaired
as a first line of defense against coastal storms and beach
erosion. They designed to absorb the impact of storm surge
and high waves, preventing or delaying flooding of inland,
farming areas and damage to inland archeological structures.
The Empúries master plan aimed at operating a significant
dune protection and improvement program that actually started
in the nineteenth century but was abandoned in the 1930s. The
Roses Bay is set between the Ter and Fluvià rivers, which also
had affected dune development over centuries. Over days,
weeks and years, depending upon how hard the wind blows,
dunes rise up out of the flat beach. In time of large sea storms
waves have crashed into the dunes and the sand has been re-
supplied to the beach on front, which was eroded in the early
storm stages. In the first half of the nineteenth century dunes
started to be officially protected by the plans of Napoleon’s
officer Jaubert de Passa. His successor the emperor Napoleon
III used similar methods in Capbreton Marina on the Landes
French Cote d'Argent coast. Some specialized plants were
adapted to the accretion of sand, surviving the continual burial
of their shoots by sending up very rapid vertical growth.
Marram grass, Ammophila arenaria specializes in this, and
was largely responsible for the formation and stabilization of
dunes by binding sand grains together. The sand couch-grass
Elytrigia juncea also still performs this function on the seaward
edge of the dunes, and is responsible for initiating the process
of dune building by trapping wind blown sand.
Since 1894 stabilizing the dune involved multiple actions.
To increase the stabilization properties of the Monterrey pine,
Pinus radiata, forest trees such as Lupinus arboreus were
planted as well as Tamarisk and other shrubs kind of vegetation
to reduce the impact of wind and water.
In Europe the Tamarix gallica, the French Tamarisk of the
family Tamaricaceae, is a very rare but locally well-
established escape from or (predominantly) relic of cultivation.
In Antwerp in the 1940s was introduced on purpose in coastal
dunes as a windbreak and in sand-raised sites but in Empúries
was introduced earlier, in the 1890s. Tamarix gallica is a
deciduous, herbaceous, twiggy shrub or small tree reaching up
to about 5 meters high. It is indigenous to Saudi Arabia and
the Sinai Peninsula, and very common around the
Mediterranean region. In its native range the plant grows in
moist areas such as riverbanks, especially in saline soils.
Fences were placed to catch sand and other material.
Catwalks work as footpaths to protect the dune from damage
from foot traffic. The Empúries protection program is not
mentioned in the most recent bibliography on the subject. An
interdisciplinary from the Technical University of Catalonia
made an environmental assessment which considered the
different point of views held on the 1992 Olympic event by, on
the on hand, city officers and, on the other, by representatives
of the local community. An environmental assessment study
was done before starting the project and was implemented
thereafter into the design program of the master plan. See in
Figures below plans and drawings of the dune promenade and
archeological park facilities designed in 1989-1991; they were
part of the Empúries’s master plan project. The catwalks
design is the work of an interdisciplinary team. Magda Saura
(environmental architect, art and architectural historian) was
the main university consultant in the master plan consortium
and the conceptual architect of the catwalk, dune boardwalk.
Members of the university team were Josep Muntañola (city
planner, architect and, at that time, dean of the School of
Architecture of Barcelona (ETSAB); Elisabet Tayà (a professor
of architecture and practicing architect living in the vicinity);
Carles Saura Carulla (biologist, research forester and
environmental education expert in the education department of
the city of Barcelona); Helle Birk (an ecological associate on
bird sanctuaries); Josep M. Nolla (a professor of the
University of Girona and archeologist); Enriqueta Pons (a
historian and government overseer of archeological sites); and
Albert Pla (dean of Barcelona’s s Elisava school of interior
design and construction engineer). Other experts were later
added in the master plan design: Jordi López Vives (coastal
engineer), Luis Racionero (economics engineer), Alfred F.
Reguera (project management), Begoña Cazorla (expert on
agriculture engineering) and Ignasi Salvans (architect). After
graduation one of our university students, Jordi Solé, continued
to work on the project with local architects in 1997, by
expanding the original project to a 2.5-kilometer boardwalk to
the nearby town of L’Escala.
The Empúries boardwalk is a pedestrian walkway
constructed in 1992. It is a walking path and trail over dunes
and above fragile ecosystems, built with wood. This maritime
promenade was designed against the “modernist” mechanism
used in the in the late 1950’s planning of Spanish sea fronts.
The rigid structures of concrete paved roads and highways
running along the “Costa Brava” coast, between Sant Pere
Pescador and L’Escala, were imposed upon nature, practically
indifferent to the varying ruggedness of its site; there were
many endangered and threatened species of plants and animals.
The mixture of pedestrian and traffic, urban and maritime
accesses, services, car parks, and so on, was generally resolved
by means of the zoning kind of strips in conflictive chains.
PARK DESIGN HERITAGE
PARAMETERS
F = f (E, S, N)
F = Form variables for park design.
E = Environmental esthetics variables for
choice of building materials, recreational
facilities, and first-aid work in old and new,
park infrastructure.
S = Physical state of dune and archeological
structures variables before and after
conservation works.
N =Social and behavioral variables as
indicators of use of space.
TABLE 1: A post-occupancy, prediction model to evaluate how a Barcelona
1992 Olympics site works today. The author, in other cultural and
environmental heritage, preservation sites, implements the model.
In this paper graphic evidence is given through a work in
progress report, namely through observation and analysis of
use of the open space of the main pedestrian route that runs
along the coastline, the forest-dune landscape and where the
archaeological remains if the ancient Greek and Roman town.
.
A POST-OCCUPANCY METHODOLOGY
Post-occupancy deals firstly with evaluation of distinct land
use types in the zoning predicted by the master plan; and
secondly with social conflict related to “actual” land use. Land
use parameters involve the management and modification of
natural environment into built environment such as forest,
dunes, and the nearby, located in the site of ancient, Greek and
Roman settlement. According Horst Rittel land use is the kind
of arrangements and activities people undertake in a certain
piece of land to produce, change or maintain it. One of the
main goals of the Emporion master plan was precisely to
consider the perception people have on conservation of
historic, built environments, e.g., dunes, forest-beach areas and
other ecosystems of high biodiversity value. An evaluation
model was developed by programming environmental design
guidelines; they were approved in the original 1992 Emporion
master plan fulfilled two main UNESCO heritage
requirements: access and visibility [6].
Quantitative and qualitative analysis of land use, land value
and actual use of space has been commissioned by the cultural
affairs officer, and has been sponsored with AGAUR research
funds, of the autonomous, regional government of Catalonia. It
has been conducted with a multidisciplinary team of experts
directed by the author of this presentation.
Data on post-occupancy evaluation of use of space was
gathered from ethnographic questionnaires and images on how
today’s experience of seeing and walking through ruins, dunes
and historic plots of land can by itself tell stories.
By reshaping, consolidating and upgrading historic sites
through an environmental, holistic approach, contemporary use
of space (e.g., strolling though natural and man-made
environments) may simulate patterns of behavior of Greek and
Roman antiquity -- e.g., how the original settlers transformed
nature to shape physical scenarios of domestic, every day life.
.
The Emporion master plan works by facilitating new
circulation, urban and rural layouts, and an overall new
definition of the public and private use of space in ancient
towns. An alternative environmental design policy may be at
work for other archaeological sites treated as theme parks [7].
Pioneering the ecological park in archeological preservation
projects, in the 1992 Olympics, Empúries master plan, a new
environmental conservation sensibility emerged, prompting a
closer tie between park programming and policy makers.
Galen Cranz wrote in 2003, "The ecological park is an
emerging type among the four historic types of park design."
The role of environmental preservation master plans is studied
within the various planning movements (e.g., the park
movement) that have shaped coastline infrastructure and
tourist resorts. [3]
In man-environment relations, ethnography is particularly
relevant for "measuring" use of space in infrastructure that
negatively affects coastal environments before they become
parks. Human use of sand dune space interacts with marine
and forest environments. In 1992 the Empúries master plan
worked as a sort of corrective action plan, to correct
deficiencies and to protect cultural heritage and the
environment. [8]
CONCLUSION
Prediction models for environmental impact reports need to
be implemented in conservation of natural and cultural heritage
sites. Post-occupancy rates prove that the number of adult
visitors to the archaeological site has increased as it was
expected in the design recommendations and building
specifications formerly set in the original master plan. Future
research is necessary to evaluate the goals set in environmental
programs for kids visiting the sandy dunes that run through the
beach and the archaeological site.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
I am grateful to Josep Maria Sans, director of Catalonia's
archives (Arxiu Nacional de Catalunya, Sant Cugat, Barcelona,
Spain) for his to the support and guidance. Research has been
partly funded by AGAUR, research officer of the regional,
autonomous government of Catalonia and by the central
government of Spain (Proyecto I+D: Arquitectura, educación y
evaluación ambiental). Thanks to my students at the Technical
University of Catalonia participating in the Futureuropa
network, a European project coordinated by the University of
Milan, Facoltà de Agraria-Dipsa.
REFERENCES
[1] M. Saura, “Building codes in the architectural treatise De re
aedificatoria,” Proceedings Third International Congress on
Construction history, Cottbus (Berlin), May 2009, pp. 1309-1316, 2009.
Data gathered in this paper is part of an exhaustive research project
carried by the School of Architecture of Barcelona (GIRAS research
group) in 2011.
[2] The Emporion Master Plan for the dune, archaeological route project
was published in "Dunes/Dunas", Quaderns d'Arquitectura, COAC, vol.
196, Colegio de Arquitectos de Cataluña, Barcelona, 1992. M. Saura,
"A framework for theory applicable to environmental design: the case of
Barcelona’s public, open space system," Strategies for Environmental
Research and Implementation, [18th IAPS Conference, Vienna, 7-10
July, 2004].
[3] M. Saura, “Environmental research and implementation,” Institute for
spatial interaction and simulation, abstract, Eds. Bob Martens and
Alexander G.Keul, Osterreichischer Kunst und Kulturverlag, Viena
University of Technology, http://iaps.scix.net, (Viena, 2004).
[4] M. Saura, "A matrix landscape for the remapping of a Pyrenees border."
Abstract in Traditional Dwellings and Settlements Review, Hong Kong
Special Issue, ISSN 1050-2092, (Hong Kong-Berkeley, 2002), pp.18-20.
[5] M. Saura, "El mas Castellar de Pontós i la chora d’Empúries", El Mas
Català durant l’Edat Mitjana i la Moderna (Segles IX-XVIII), Anuario
de Estudios Medievales, 42, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones
Científicas, ISBN: 84-00-07943-4, (Barcelona, 2001), pp. 614-642.
[6] As a representative of Forum UNESCO-University and Heritage
(FUUH), the author is working in a joint research project sponsored by
the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC) and the National Archives
of the autonomous government of Catalonia (Arxiu Nacional de
Catalunya, Sant Cugat, Barcelona, Spain). The aim is to catalog
documents and floor plans into an urban form, database management
system of 700 towns and villages in the Mediterranean, Pyrenees border
region.
[7] H. Rittel, “Dilemmas in a General Theory of Planning, Institute of
Urban and Regional Planning,” College of Environmental Design,
University of California, Berkeley, (Berkeley, 1972). As Archer has
pointed out, environmental engineers currently use Horst Rittel’s
architectural design methodology. B. Archer, The nature of research, in
Codesign, January 1995. J. Till, “Architectural Research: Three Myths
and One Model,” R&D Department, RIBA, (London, 2004); T. Peters,
“Architectural ecological research: exploring the territories of theory and
practice, in Annual Symposium of The Nordic Association of
Architectural Research, May 2011.
[8] Cranz, G., and Boland, M., The ecological park as an emerging type,
Places, volume 15, issue 3, 2003, pp. 44-47. See also G. Cranz, The
Politics of Park Design: A History of Urban Parks in America"(MIT
Press, 1982). A. B. Jacobs and E. Macdonald, and Y. Rofe, The
Boulevard Book: History, Evolution, Design of Multiway Boulevards,
(MIT Press, 2002). E. Macdonald, “The interaction of Street Trees and
Safety,” Access, n. 33 (Fall, 2007), pp. 20-26. E. Macdonald,
“Structuring a Landscape/Structuring a Sense of Place: The Enduring
Complexity of Olmsted and Vaux’s Brooklyn Parkways,” Journal of
Urban Design, 7:2 (2002), pp. 117-143. Urena, J., A.B. Jacobs, and E.
Macdonald, “Usos y Seguridad en Boulevares de Varias Calzadas,” OP:
Revista del Colegio de Ingenieros de Caminos 39:1 (1997). Macdonald,
E., “Urban Waterfront Promenades and Physical Activity by Older
Adults: The case of Vancouver,” Journal of Architecture and Planning
Research 24:3 (Autum, 2007), pp. 181-198. T.M. Quigley and S. J.
Arbelbide, Editors, An assessment od ecosystem components in the
interior Columbia basin and portions of the Klamath and Great Basins,
Gen. Tech. Rep. PNW-GTR-XXX, U.S. Department of Agriculture
Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station Portland, Oregon,
(Portland, 1996).
LIST OF FIGURES
FIGURE 1: Going to the beach through time. A promenade placed along a
dune, next to a Greek and Roman ancient site, which in turn leads to a medieval
village.
FIGURES 2, 6 and 7: Elevations, master plan site plan, promenade-dune floor
plan and drawings by Magda Saura, architect and art historian.
FIGURES 3 and 4: A view of Greek and Roman remains in 1908 and a view
of the archeological area of Empúries in 1986, before implementation of the
1992 Emporion master plan. It was one of the sites of the 1992 World
Olympic Games.
FIGURES 5, 15 and 16: Today a dune, forest and archaeological garden for
leisure; a recreational area where cultural and natural heritage are equally
alive. A preserved landscape of a dune, a forest next to a beach, and an
archeological site invites visitors to enjoy nature and culture.
FIGURE 13: Evaluation of social factors in the Emporion master plan. The
local community was involved already in the 1930s in conservation of both
natural and man-made environments.
FIGURE 17: Environmental preservation policy-making is a theme park
experience and provides environmental education settings.
FIGURES 9, 10, 11, 12 and 14: Images of different stages of historic dune
preservation projects.
 FIGURE 3

FIGURE 1

FIGURE 4

FIGURE 2
FIGURE 5

FIGURE 8

FIGURE 6 FIGURE 9

FIGURE 10

FIGURE 7

FIGURE 11
 FIGURE 15

FIGURE 12

FIGURE 16

FIGURE 13

FIGURE 17
FIGURE 14

THE AUTHOR
Magda Saura (B.A. 1974 and Ph.D. 1988 University of
California, Berkeley) is an architect and architectural historian.
She is a professor of architecture in the School of Architecture
of Barcelona (Technical University of Catalonia). She works as
a consultant on historic and environmental preservation for the
Officer of Cultural Affairs of the autonomous government of
Catalonia and is currently involved in several projects in the
Catalan Euro region of Northeast of Spain and Southeast of
France. Her research at the university focuses upon
environmental design graphic communication and dune
promenade knowledge-building, the impacts of engineering
street standards on the pedestrian realm, waterfront
promenades and post occupancy evaluation of environmental
design plans and projects.