Sustainable regeneration of peripheral tourist coastal town: adaptation to climate changes/ preservation of the coastline’s natural landscape in Eilat

Eilat suffers from a chronic fracture between the mountain ecosystem and the coral reef, caused by infrastructural saturation that has transformed the coast into an impassable limit. This thesis proposes a regeneration strategy based on the concept of ‘Resilient Subtraction.’ Through the underground relocation of the primary traffic axis (Highway 90) and the adoption of the ‘ecological cave’ architectural typology, the project aims to restore biological and public continuity to the waterfront. Architecture is no longer posed as an added volume, but as a functional excavation that utilizes the desert’s thermal inertia to mitigate climate change impacts. The result is a symbiotic system where the tourist program (Diving Center and Hospitality) acts as an ecological garrison, transforming ‘industrial voids’ into new nodes of biodiversity and social identity, grounding the design in the morphological roots revealed by the city’s historical Atlas.

Eilat soffre di una frattura cronica tra l'ecosistema montano e la barriera corallina, causata da una saturazione infrastrutturale che ha trasformato la costa in un limite invalicabile. Questa tesi propone una strategia di rigenerazione basata sul concetto di "Sottrazione Resiliente". Attraverso la rilocazione ipogea dell'asse viario primario (Highway 90) e l'adozione della tipologia architettonica della "cava ecologica", il progetto mira a ripristinare la continuità biologica e pubblica del waterfront. L'architettura non si pone più come volume aggiunto, ma come scavo funzionale che sfrutta l'inerzia termica del deserto per mitigare gli impatti del cambiamento climatico.