In Australia, a new ribbon-inspired bridge mimicking natural bushland will offer recreational opportunities for people as well as habitat and a safe crossing for wildlife. Designed by CX Landscape for the city of Canberra as part of the Remaking Lost Connections design competition, “Ribbons of Life” stretches across Lake Griffin, creating a “forest shell” over the top of an existing road bridge.

Appropriately fluid and organic in shape, the bridge flows from one side of the water to the other, dipping down in some areas to touch the surface. Without affecting the traffic passing below, the new bridge also connects two parks on the north and south ends of the lake so animals have a safe way to get across. The landscaping recreates indigenous bushland, including windbreak forests on both sides, rocky areas, wetlands and a nectar meadow.

Concrete pedestrian paths wind through the park, distinct from the wildlife corridor, and include integrated solar panels to power lights, possible future transportation and the projection of Aboriginal art onto bridge surfaces. The park also includes a bird observation tower, plaza with water views, access to the water and a water life observation channel.

“Our wildlife corridor and the linear park have set an example for the future Garden City Plan action,” says CX Landscape. “It gives a new direction for sustainable city development, which raises the awareness of environmental threats, and correct the misconceptions of ‘Green represents Ecology’ and ‘Parks means Ecology.’ In respect of nature and local history, reflecting the spirit of the place, our design has established the future direction of sustainable urban development.”

Construction is currently in progress on a new elevated linear park running along the river Thames. Designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, “The Tide” offers a multi-level landscape for running, walking, meditation and contemplation of large-scale public art on London’s Greenwich Peninsula. The initial phase of the project, opening in July, will offer the first of 5 kilometers of walkways (about 3 miles total) which rise from the landscape like waves, some standing as high as 30 feet off the ground.

The architects envision The Tide as a network of public spaces and gardens “embedded into the daily rhythms of Greenwich Peninsula,” with programming split across the ground level and the elevated walkways. Sunken gardens, benches, integrated greenery, a long outdoor table and bike paths will be included among the park’s offerings, and Damien Hirst’s sculptures Hydra & Kali and Mermaid will be the first public art to arrive on site. Photographs of the construction process by Luke Hayes give us a peek at how it’s coming along.

“The Tide is conceived of as a series of elevated, landscaped islands where the public is invited to slow down, linger, and overlook the life of the Peninsula. Each island is distinct, defined by unique trees and planting, and by their surrounding views and sounds. These elevated gardens are designed as clusters of structural supports that create elevated planter beds, containing soil and channelling both gravity loads and water down to the ground. The sculptural structure supporting The Tide gardens above also frames and shelters the path below, creating arched pavilions that mark thresholds and passages at the ground level public realm.”

Greenwich Peninsula is a hotbed of redevelopment at the moment, with entire neighborhoods and new landmarks on the way, including a 79-foot-high glass arcade by Santiago Calatrava that will represent the Spanish architect’s first major project in the UK. The new park will sit at the intersection of these emerging neighborhoods, “diverse ecosystems and distinct cultural institutions, connecting north to south, east to west, center to periphery, and city to river,” say the architects.

Diller Scofidio + Renfro is the same firm responsible for designing New York City’s High Line, as well as the controversial new “Shed” structure in Manhattan’s Hudson Yards.

As cities grow and change, complex networks of elevated concrete highways and railways sprout up like vines, twist around each other and radically transform the space beneath them. Formerly vibrant urban districts are shrouded in darkness, and the potential to use that space is often wasted as officials fence it off or incorporate hostile features into the infrastructure to ward off loiterers and people lacking housing. Over time, some of those elevated roads might become obsolete, making the whole area feel like an urban wasteland.

But the need to make use of every available square foot of land is intensifying – and city planners working on the viaducts and overpasses of the future should probably take note of how that land is currently being reclaimed and rehabilitated to enhance its value to surrounding communities.

After the success of the High Line in New York City, an elevated linear park running along a former New York Central Railroad spur, many cities have begun transforming their own underpasses, viaducts, abandoned highway sections and even the tops of tunnels into verdant public spaces.

Atlanta’s BeltLine, Detroit’s Dequindre Cut and Washington D.C.’s planned 11th Street Bridge Park all demonstrate the how valuable the land can be to residents living nearby once it’s reactivated. These underpass parks can be surprisingly vibrant, like the 8-acre Underground at Ink Block park in Boston, Houston’s Sabine Promenade (top) or Toronto’s Bentway, which includes a 720-foot ice skate trail. Skate parks, like Portland’s Burnside ramps, are a natural fit.

Art installations brighten up cavernous underpass spaces, whether with colorful lights like San Antonio’s temporary Ballroom Luminoso installation by JB Public Art or with oversized sculptural elements like the flowers of Glasgow’s Phoenix Park. Some underpass spaces draw regular crowds as venues for movies or events, like Folly for a Flyover by Assemble in Hackney Wick, England.

In Yokohama, Japan, a notorious red light district flourished beneath an overpass for decades before authorities wiped out it, turning a bustling (if crime-ridden) area into a ghost town virtually overnight. A recent redevelopment project called the Koganecho Centre tucks a complex of new buildings into this underutilized space to make it functional for residents in a new way, adding an art gallery, a cafe, a meeting space, an artist’s atelier and an open-air piazza to a 328-foot stretch under the concrete arches.

Housing can take shape around and beneath viaducts, too. In 2005, Zaha Hadid completed the Spittelau Viaducts Housing Project as part of a waterside revitalization scheme in Vienna, Austria. A three-part structure of apartments, offices and artist studios winds through, around and beneath a disused railway viaduct, playfully interacting with it while creating a contrast between old and new. Even tiny slivers of land beside viaducts can avoid feeling dwarfed, darkened and constrained by the infrastructure when cleverly designed, like the narrow Archway Studios live-work space by Undercurrent Architects or the Koops Mill mixed-use development occupying a former brownfield (both in London.)

Unfortunately, even when they become magnets for pedestrians, cyclists, families and tourists, these urban revitalization projects aren’t all sunshine and rainbow bike racks. Some of them perpetuate cycles of displacement, pushing low-income and other marginalized populations further away from amenities instead of serving them. Urban infrastructure projects are often built in poorer areas of town in the first place.

Transforming empty space into parks and venues might improve them, but it might attract deeper-pocketed buyers to the area, too. The High Line, for example, is currently struggling to make up for the imbalances it has created in once-affordable areas of Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood. Incentivizing affordable housing developments along with all the other elements of an underpass or viaduct makeover could help build equity into these projects from the beginning phases.

In Long Island City, nearly 11 acres of continuous waterfront park have bloomed along a formerly abandoned industrial landscape, offering a buffet of recreational opportunities while protecting the shoreline from floodwaters. The second phase of Hunter’s Point South Waterfront Park, which begins south of 54th avenue and wraps around Newton Creek, is officially open to the public, adding to the features completed in 2013. Architects Weiss/Manfredi call it “a new model for waterfront resilience,” an oasis of green that can act as a buffer in extreme weather conditions.

Completed in collaboration with landscape architect Thomas Balsley Associates, the park is set along the main retail corridor of Hunter’s Point and offers a beautiful spot to gather, stroll, bike, picnic, walk dogs, play basketball, launch kayaks and more. The park serves as a gateway to the new Queens West waterfront development, which is working to transform the larger, formerly contaminated industrial property along the East River into a thriving community with 11 residential buildings, retail, public streets, utilities and two public schools.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Featuring NYC's Best Captures (@nycprimeshot)

https://www.instagram.com/p/BlGvDHPAbQI/?tagged=hunterspointsouthpark

The site of the park is a former railroad ‘cut’ that divided the neighborhood, Balsley explains.

“At Vernon Boulevard, a long sweeping curve defines a generous crescent of lawn, a contemporary village green that is a social gathering place for locals and a respite for shoppers. Court games—basketball, handball and racquetball—are accommodated in the divided spaces along the park’s length.”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Tiffany M. Card (@tifcard)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Long Island City, Queens | NYC (@gantrygram_nyc)

“An imaginative children’s play area at the western end allows the park to effectively address the needs of a cross section of ages and activities. Functional partitioning is provided by a system of low, curving walls and architectural fences. The southern edge of the park is defined by a high wall whose character changes along its length with penetrations of colored glass block and stainless steel panels. This lively, linear backdrop serves as a strong unifying element for the park.”

The new section features wetlands, pedestrian paths and a land art installation called ‘Luminescence’ by artist Nobuho Nagasawa depicting the phases of the moon. The sculptural cantilevered platform lets visitors gaze at the bustle and glow of Manhattan across the river. If Instagram is any indication, locals are eager to make use of all these new features in their neighborhood.

A massive floating plaza juts out of the harbor in Aarhus, Denmark, creating a protected area for bathers to swim and lounge in the sun. The Aarhus Harbor Bath by Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) can accommodate up to 650 people at a time and features a diving pool, a shallow children’s pool, two saunas and a 164-foot lap pool. Open only during the summer, the platform is part of a larger effort to revitalize the city’s harbor coastline.

Opening with a splash, literally ? This weekend, we celebrated the official opening of Aarhus Harbor Bath! https://t.co/SMHyZmjthR pic.twitter.com/nCcM3DBt9E

— BIG (@BIG_Architects) July 2, 2018

“This weekend, we celebrated the official opening of Aarhus Harbor Bath with BIG Partner Finn Nørkjær, Mayor of Aarhus Municipality Jacob Bundsgaard, Vice Chairman of Salling Fondene Karin Salling and Councilor of Aarhus Municipality Rabih Azad-Ahmad!” says BIG. “Springboard divers from AGF Udspring took the first plunge off the promenade that rises from the quayside and continues out over the water.”

The bath is five years in the making, offering a “unique oasis” in what used to be an industrial area in Denmark’s second-largest city. BIG is working with Copenhagen-based urban planning group Gehl on a larger framework for the harbor, which will eventually include a beach zone, volleyball courts, cafes and restaurants, a theater, a hotel, shops and supermarkets.

BIG previously completed the Copenhagen Harbor Bath in 2009, a significantly smaller floating platform extending an adjacent park over the water with pools and an urban landscape of cliffs, playgrounds, piers, dry docks and boat ramps.