The Divided City: from Separation to Reconciliation
(Under the direction of Eric Sauda and Greg Snyder)
Divided cities – especially when they are products of war – provide opportunities that may be unexplored or unknown to architects and urban designers. Their role extends beyond physical reconstruction, to a responsibility to re-connect and bridge between the divided communities.
The Green Line, the barrier, the wall, the peace line are all terms for a physical divider that had transformed during the war to a no-man’s land. The former Green Line in Beirut that separated communities during the civil war starting from 1975 was a meeting place for all before then. Today, the Green Line has been built over and no longer has a physical presence in the city. It used to cut through the city center – Beirut Central District (BCD) which is now a thriving and active economic and tourism hub. Ethnic, political, linguistic, psychological, and cultural boundaries are still in place; their importance is now minimized, though not yet erased, one could feel a boundary, although it is completely invisible.
Reconstruction efforts that are sensitive to the social conditions of the divided city can promote reconciliation and facilitate bridging among the divided communities. This thesis investigates how the integration of the past as it underlies the design process and scheme can add to the historic and cultural richness of the city and be part of the reconciliation process. This thesis proposes two programmatically-related design interventions on two damaged/abandoned sites in Beirut. Together, these interventions aim to promote social and economic interaction between the city’s divided communities and therefore eventually contribute to reconciliation.
Beirut is selected to be the focus of this work due to its complex layers of war and heritage. Beirut has undergone years of cycles of violent attacks, destruction, and reconstruction. The invisibility of the former Green Line adds to the complexity of the city and makes the concept of reconciliation and bridging challenging and worth exploring.
