Archaeology and nature: hyblean cultural landscape and territorial ...

Camillo Sitte meets Robert Venturi at Berlin Südkreuz
Jorg SIEWEKE,
School of Architecture - Landscape Architecture Department, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, USA
sieweke@virginia.edu
Abstract
How can a peripheral high-speed transit hub be reconsidered as a collective public space. Sitte’s idea of
significant gathering places is scaled and accelerated in Venturi’s spirit of flows to contrast the romantic
replica of the European city with a contemporary dimension of trade and commerce. The proposal of a
hybrid space that, is on one hand based on the urban planning tradition of bracketing space by means of a
coherent geometry of place (Camillo Sittes’ European city) and, on the other hand, attempts to civilize the
neoliberal “space of flows” (Venturi’s Las Vegas): an open square measuring eighteen hectares bridges the
beltway and creates a pedestrian path from Berlin-Südkreuz train station to the adjoining residential and
commercial neighborhood. The center of the square creates a void measuring 800 by 225 meters,
dramatizing the surrounding traffic flows. The crucial idea is to update the place of exchange, of trading, of
action. The proposal suggests a market square for the twenty-first century that does not negate the
dimensions and speed of recent flows, but rather embraces and civilizes them. Südkreuz is dynamic; a
programmatic passé partout frames already existing as well as anticipated future uses.
Keywords: Public space, urban design, periphery, beltways, public infrastructure
How can the idea of public open space of an inner-city market square be translated to the world of
motorways and big box real estate? The paper critically discusses the recent development and offers an
alternative hybrid derived from both, Sittes’ and Venturis’ ideas.
Whereas in the center of Berlin the historical layout of the “European city of the flâneur” is being
reconstructed with great care, on its outskirts things are happening on a sizeable scale and at a different
speed. The rift is found just a few meters south of the compact neighborhood of James Hobrecht’s
Schöneberger Insel. Südkreuz is an essential rail-hub in Berlin with great potential for development. The ring
expressway, the beltway line of the commuter railway, and the new high-speed train connections form the
infrastructural backbone for this highly dynamic site. Due to the late insertion of the hub, the Südkreuz site is
spatially isolated from its immediate urban environment. Enormous corridors of infrastructural corridors slice
through isolated residential and commercial neighborhoods - typical for peripheral milieus. Ideological
antitheses of the urban condition are colliding here that can best be illustrated by comparing Camillo Sitte’s
and Robert Venturi’s concepts of the city.
Sitte can best be characterized by the concept of places, meaning sites of identity and living, framed spaces
with perhaps irregular structures but with recognizable boundaries marked by stability. These places are
suited to lingering; they are “gathering places under the open sky” with a “strong influence […] on the human
soul.”[1] By contrast, in his analysis of the Las Vegas Strip [2], Venturi stands for flow, for places of
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