Madrid Río is an urban park in the Spanish capital

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

, built along an urban stretch of the Manzanares River following the burial of the M-30 bypass road in this area. It is the result of a project led by the architect Ginés Garrido, who won the international ideas competition organised by the Madrid City Council in 2005 to redevelop the area. The project started with the idea of recovering the banks of the Manzanares River for the use and enjoyment of the citizens. The section of the river that is now known as Madrid Río is the section that was boxed in by the M-30 bypass road, a road that isolated the river between the two directions of the highway as well as creating a barrier and fracture between the two sides of the city, the district of

Arganzuela Arganzuela is one of the 21 districts of the city of Madrid, Spain. Geography Position Arganzuela is located in central-southern Madrid, separated from Latina, Carabanchel and Usera by the river Manzanares. The other bordering districts are ...

on the left bank, and the districts of Latina,

Carabanchel Carabanchel is a district of Madrid, Spain. It lies on the southern (right) bank of the Manzanares, spanning southward down to the M-40 ring road. The district is made up of the neighbourhoods of Abrantes, Comillas, Opañel, Puerta Bonita, S ...

and Usera on the right bank. The connection of the M-30 with the A-5 motorway, the road to Extremadura, separated the city in an impassable way from

Casa de Campo The Casa de Campo (, for Spanish: ''Country House'') is the largest public park in Madrid. It is situated west of central Madrid, Spain. It gets its name 'Country House' because it was once a royal hunting estate, located just west of the R ...

, Madrid's largest park. The project involved the undergrounding of the M-30 in this area as well as that section of the A-5 running parallel to

. There are seven dams that regulate the river as it passes through the city. They receive the waters of the Manzanares River after passing through the Santillana reservoir, in Manzanares el Real, and the El Pardo reservoir, in the municipality of Madrid, which is why they are numbered from 3 to 9. Their mechanisms and locks have been repaired and the dams have been used for the new system of crossings. Initially, the project for the renaturation of the Manzanares River as it passes through Madrid Río contemplated the opening of all the dams, except the last one, to create the conditions that would make it possible for the Madrid Río rowing school to train, but finally, contrary to what was first agreed and due to pressure from the local residents, it was also decided to also open the last one so that the river could flow freely. The water level has been dropped as the natural flow of the river has been restored. Accessible wooden boards and

fish ladder A fish ladder, also known as a fishway, fish pass, fish steps, or fish cannon, is a structure on or around artificial and natural barriers (such as dams, locks and waterfalls) to facilitate diadromous fishes' natural migration as well as mov ...

s have been added to encourage the continuity of the underwater fauna along the river. There has been a noticeable improvement in avian biodiversity along the river with herons and

kingfisher Kingfishers are a family, the Alcedinidae, of small to medium-sized, brightly coloured birds in the order Coraciiformes. They have a cosmopolitan distribution, with most species living in the tropical regions of Africa, Asia, and Oceania, ...

s being regular visitors. The Madrid Río has received the Veronica Rudge Green Prize in Urban Design from

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

's Graduate School of Design in 2015. The architects were Ginés Garrido (of Burgos & Garrido), Porras La Casta, Rubio & Álvarez-Sala, and

West 8 West 8 is an urban planning and landscape architecture firm founded by Adriaan Geuze and Paul van Beek in Rotterdam, Netherlands in 1987. It is known for its contemporary designs and innovative solutions to urban planning problems using lighting, m ...

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External links

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