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Friday February 18, 2022 at 07:30

The URJC helps to expand the space for the families of a school in Villaverde

The URJC helps to expand the space for the families of a school in Villaverde The URJC helps to expand the space for the families of a school in Villaverde

The Madrid Borde Sur research group and the company Escofet have designed and installed a platform for pedestrians in front of the Sagunto school in the Madrid neighborhood of San Cristóbal de los Ángeles.

Raul Garcia Hemonnet

On February 22nd, the professor of the Regional Geographical Analysis Area, Miguel Ángel Ajuriaguerra, and technicians from the Escofet company will present the pedestrian platform installed in the Sagunto school entrance.

This urban endowment is allowing families to comfortably wait for their children to leave and enter school. In addition, and this is where Madrid Borde Sur intervenes, urban furniture has been added, made up of seats and modules covered in chalk for children to paint on.

As Miguel Ángel Ajuriaguerra explains, the platform supposes “more public space at the entrance of the school to favor a safer entrance and usability for schoolchildren. At first we put a platform without furniture, then we put furniture and, finally, we covered two of the modules in chalk for the children to paint, so the latter have reappropriated the space”.

Last Tuesday a workshop was held by Fine Arts teachers to paint this furniture and the concrete wall of the school.

This urban solution provides a space to stay at the entrance and exit of the school. The platform has been installed in a problematic street due to its narrowness, but, as Professor Ajuriaguerra explains, "in these few days that the platform has been installed, lines have been able to form at the school, something that was impossible before because the sidewalk has 1 '5 meters' and adds that "families are delighted by the security, by having a space to wait, in which carts fit and transit is easier and they consider the banks a success".

The educational community of Colegio Sagunto wants the platform to stay "we are waiting for what the Ministry says," says Ajuriaguerra. For the time being, the structure will be in front of the College for a three-month test period and after that time it will move to another location, also located in the Villaverde district.

Future interventions

The next destination of the platform will be the employment office of the same district, in which the Madrid Borde Sur group has identified the need to expand the space and provide a comfort zone in the face of the crowds of people seeking employment that occur every day and the problems caused by the fact that pedestrians lean on the cars parked there. "The platform is the same, although the furniture designed for it is different, in this case they will be metal benches with a wooden back, we hope that the repercussions will be good in terms of mobility and accessibility," explains Miguel Ángel Ajuriaguerra.

In addition, the group has contacted other schools in Madrid, specifically in the Atocha area. On the other hand, and within the framework of this art.83 model project (which involves a collaboration between the University and the companies), the group will continue working with the College on the site next to it "trying to find a solution to the problem of car parks from the University through the work of the students of the subject of Urban Installations of the degree of Fundamentals of Architecture”, says Ajuriaguerra, who is very satisfied with the response of the people of the neighborhood after the installation of the platform.