InnovART2 : À l'écoute des chantiers: An industrial heritage sound-and-augmented-reality walking tour

Abstract

À l’écoute des chantiers is an immersive self-guided walking tour, a sound and visual exploration of the industrial heritage of Nantes’ Parc des Chantiers - with ten sound capsules (storytelling, interviews with former shipyard workers, and sound design) and two site-specific large-scale augmented reality projections of the transborder ferry bridge (dismantled in 1958) and the construction of the Brissac car ferry (1955). Accessible along Nantes’ popular green-line tourist path through signage on the ground, this itinerary describes, explains, and puts into perspective a landscape familiar to the people of Nantes, newcomers, as well as tourists, by giving keys to understanding a former industrial site undegoing rapid transformation and in the process of disappearing. The itinerary is available on the Nantes Patrimonia website, downloadable as a smartphone application or activated via QR codes present in the park. Part of Campus France's InnovART2 research project, À l’écoute des chantiers was part of the Voyage à Nantes 2022 and an ongoing part of the Parcours des Écoles, and questions the limits of smart tourism applications in an era of increasing digital privacy concerns that reduce geo-location capabilities.