IN-PERSON Lisbon Livable Cities. Section B

Abstract

This paper takes as a starting point the widespread physical presence, and continued historical significance, of shipbuilding cranes in contemporary European maritime cities. Objects like the jib or gantry crane – with the former featuring a horizontal beam attached to a vertical mast, while the latter is made up of a beam running horizontally on top of two legs, and both typically moving on a rail system – seem to be unlikely protagonists to symbolically capture the large-scale gravitational changes that have reconstructed Europe’s maritime industries and the urban waterfronts they are embedded in. And yet, cranes have become icons of these significant shifts. As objects of social scientific research, they can also help us understand how some of our most urgent urban challenges converge at waterfronts around shipyards today. The specific socio-economic and environmental dilemmas that coastal cities face are manifold, with conflictual multi-use of space central among them. All the while, infrastructures that were once key to maritime activity, but have in the meantime often become industrial heritage, are sites that are not easily turned towards new purposes. By looking at three case studies – Lisbon (Almada), Malmö, and GdaÅ„sk – I will outline some significant narratives to do with global economic dynamics, deindustrialization, and urban waterfront regeneration on the European continent today. I contend that the unpredictable transformations of urban waterfronts involving shipyards, shaped by complex material and immaterial factors stemming from the particularities of this heavy industry, represent a pivotal phenomenon that deserves more consideration.