Rescaling Kotor. Urban transformation of a post industrial city core

The decades of abandonment of industrial complex in Skaljari neighbourhood of Kotor have left strong consequences not only on the urban plot of the immediate site but on the entire city. The impossibility to reach the site caused by the lack of infrastructure and the dangers imposed by the ruins accentuate the “out of place” character of the city core. With consideration of the near proximity of the old town, the project proposes a new strategy of rescaling the urban morphology and implementing masterplan devices to achieve a cultural revival and public use of the area. Masterplan aims to propose a solution to several issues on different scales: strategy of the town, functioning of the urban core itself and their connection. The proposal is a new city center with a protruding connection from the water to the land and a variety of accompanying functions. It includes a strategy of demolition and reuse of existing buildings, addition of new buildings and two main public spaces, the square and the waterfront. By reading the existing urban fabric of the town and understanding the problems down to everyday scale it is simple to conclude the issues concerning the immediate area of the project. Aside from the obvious problems of endangerment by decaying ruins, the unimaginable sight for the location it occupies, it is more complicated to grasp the issues that radiate from the abandoned plot towards the city and issues that arise in the city itself and radiate towards the plot. What is more concerning is the fact that the overcrowding in the old town part is an ever present issue while an entire portion of the city core remains unused.