Israel’s largest landfill rehabilitation: creative landscape design as a catalyst for a functioning metropolis

ABSTRACTUrban rehabilitation of brownfields advances cities' resilience and contributes to residents' wellbeing and nature preservation. This article explores the transformation of one such site-Hiriya, once the largest landfill in Israel-into a large metropolitan park. The rebirth of the area, taken to new levels by the design of German landscape architect Peter Latz, combines a regional solution to problems exacerbated by climate change, drainage, and transportation and brings social recovery to neglected neighbourhoods in the southern Tel Aviv metropolis. We argue that the success of Hiriya's transformation was a national-scale event, resulting not only from an evolved Israeli environmental discourse but from parallel processes including a maturing national planning system, a new approach to water and streams, and an overdue national plan for waste treatment problems resulting from threats to vital infrastructures. Using a range of textual and visual documents, the article examines the processes that led to the transformation of Hiriya and looks at how an excellent design turned Hiriya from a brownfield on the outskirts of the cities into a lively, green, functioning space in an urban setting, thereby providing a regional, even a global, model for creating sustainable spaces.KEYWORDS: Landfillbrownfields rehabilitationgreen infrastructurelandscape designlarge parks AcknowledgmentsThe authors wish to thank landscape architects Anneliese Latz, Aliza Braudo and Amir Lotan for their outstanding generosity in sharing their knowledge, thoughts and sources. We are grateful to Hagit Naveh Ashur and Shlomit Doten-Gissin (the Ariel Sharon Park), Riva Waldman-Hassin and Amos Rabin (Dan Region Association of Towns), for sharing sources and insights. Many thanks to Martin Weyl (Beracha Foundation and former director of the Israel Museum in Jerusalem) and Zevik Landau (Yarkon Drainage Authority) for their time and extensive knowledge. Finally, the authors wish to thank Lesley Marks for her comments and suggestions on this paper, and to the anonymous reviewers for their incisive and enlightening comments.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1 The methodological approach used in this article is a combination of Narrative Research and Case Study Research, in which the investigator explores a bounded system over time, through detailed data collection involving multiple sources of information. Creswell and Poth, Qualitative Inquiry and Research Design, 53–4, 73.2 Hughes, Networks of Power; Graham and Marvin, Splintering Urbanism; Larkin, “The Politics and Poetics of Infrastructure,” 327–43; Anand et al., “Introduction: Temporality, Politics, and the Promise of Infrastructure,”, 1–38.3 Song et al., “Nature Based Solutions for Contaminated Land Remediation, 568–9; Zheng and Kirkwood, “Landscape Architecture and Sustainable Remediation,”, 301–24.4 Engler, Designing America’s Waste Landscapes.5 See Zheng and Kirkwood, “Landscape Architecture and Sustainable Remediation.”6 Song et al., “Nature Based Solutions.”7 Corner, “Lifescape,” 14–21.8 Meyer, “Uncertain Parks,” 59–85.9 Corner, “Foreword,” 11.10 Ibid.; Czerniak, “Speculating on Size,” 19–33.11 Khalidi, All That Remains.12 Crown Lands are public land in British dominions or colonies. They usually include land set aside for various government or public purposes. In many cases, Crown Lands were used for future town planning and infrastructures such as airports, military bases, and other public utilities, or for future development and the protection of nature resorts.13 Penslar, “French Influences on Jewish Agricultural Settlement,” 37–54.14 Morris, The Birth of the Palestinian.15 More on the events in the area after 1948 and the establishment of the Hiriya landfill can be found in: Limor-Sagiv and Lissovsky, “Place and Displacement,” 32–43.16 Zevik Landau (former CEO of the Yarkon Drainage Authority), in discussion with the author, December 24, 2019.17 De-Shalit, “From the Political to the Objective,” 70–87; Tal, Pollution In a Promised Land; Galai, “Narratives of Redemption,” 273–91.18 Rabinowitz, “An Acre Is an Acre Is an Acre?,” 67–89; Golan, “The Transformation of Abandoned Arab Rural Areas,” 94–110; Falah, “The 1948 Israeli-Palestinian War,” 256–85; Fischbach, Records of Dispossession; Orenstein, Miller and Tal, eds, Between Ruin and Restoration.19 Orenstein and Silverman, “The Future of the Israeli Environmental Movement,” 357–82.20 Tal, “Natural Heritage.”21 Furst, “Ecology, Environment, Sustainability,” 238–53.22 Tal, Pollution In a Promised Land.23 Ibid.; Alon-Mozes, “Ariel Sharon Park and the Emergence,” 279–300; Orenstein and Silverman, “The Future of the Israeli Environmental Movement.”24 Alterman, “National-level Planning in Israel,” 257–300; Tal, “Space Matters,” 119–51; Shmueli et al., “Scale and Scope of Environmental Planning Transformations,” 336–62.25 Dromi and Shani, “Love of Land,” 111–36; Orenstein and Silverman, “The Future of the Israeli Environmental Movement”; Furst, “Ecology, Environment, Sustainability.”26 Greenspan et al., “Environmental Philanthropy,” 111–30; Sagy and Tal, “Greening the Curriculum,” 57–85; Dromi and Shani, “Love of Land.”27 Alterman, “National-level Planning in Israel”; Tal, “Space Matters,” 119–51.28 Tal and Katz, “Rehabilitating Israel’s Streams and Rivers,” 317–30.29 Ayalon et al., Evaluating the Activity of the Directorates for Stream Restoration in Israel.30 Feitelson and Rosenthal, “Desalination, Space and Power,” 272–84.31 Zeevik Landau (former CEO of the Yarkon Drainage Authority), in discussion with the author, December 24, 2019.32 Nissim et al., “From Dumping to Sanitary Landfills,” 323–7; Daskal and Ayalon, “Treatment of Municipal Solid Waste in Israel,” 6–12.33 Tal, Pollution in a Promised Land.34 Ronen-Rotem, “The Impact of International Philanthropic Foundations on the Urban Environment in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv-Jaffa”; Martin Weyl (Chairman of the Beracha Foundation, former director of the Israel Museum), in discussion with the author, January 28, 2020.35 On transformations in the Israeli planning system, see: Feitelson, “Shifting Sands of Planning in Israel,” 695–706.36 On the case of Jerusalem after the 1967 war and its redesign and planning by architects as agents of spatial, visual and material ideas and beliefs, see: Nitzan-Shiftan, Seizing Jerusalem: The Architectures of Unilateral Unification.37 Weyl, “Hiriya: al tzachana ve’yofi”.38 Weyl, “Hiriya in the Museum.”39 On the international design workshops and the landscape architecture competition held in 2004, see: Limor-Sagiv and Lissovsky, “The Trash Has Gone,” 354-374.40 Martin Weyl in discussion with the author January 28, 2020.41 The massive lobbying by Omri Sharon was covered extensively in the Israeli media. See for example: Rinat, “If Ted Turner Would Come to the Mountain.”42 Lis, “Ex-Olmert Confidant Held Over Corruption Charges.”43 Ronen-Rotem, “The Impact of International Philanthropic Foundations.”44 Tzadik Eliakim (of Eliakim Architect Ltd., and planner of the Mikve Israel outline plan), in discussion with the author, December 16, 2019.45 The movement for open large natural areas emerged in Europe and North America in the 19th century, in acknowledgment of the need for leisure spaces next to the growing cities, and for a gateway from their pollution. On metropolitan parks and changes in their paradigm, see: Retzlaff, “The Illinois Forest Preserve District Act of 1913,” 433–55; Veitch et al., “How Active are People in Metropolitan Parks?,” 1–8. On metropolitan parks in Israel, see: Feitelson, “Metropolitan Recreation Areas,” 81–3; Hann (ed), Metropolitan Parks and Recreation Areas in Israel.46 Amir Lotan in discussion with the author, January 12, 2023.47 On the corruption in Ariel Sharon Park, see: Hofstein, “Corruption is Delaying the Drainage Solution in Tel Aviv.”48 Kozlovsky and Feniger, “Landscapes of Calculation,” 77–95.49 Latz, “Rehabilitation of the Hiriya Landfill,” 4–67; Ulf Glanzer (of Latz & Partner), in discussion with the author, June 1, 2020; Amir Lotan (of Studio MA), in discussion with the author, 22 December 2022 and 12 January 2023.50 Aliza Braudo (landscape architect, and managing partner of Braudo-Maoz Landscape Architecture), in a lecture attended by the author, 21 January 2021 and 14 November 2021; Amir Lotan in discussion with the author, 22 December 2022 and 12 January 2023.51 Zeevik Landau in discussion with the author, 24 December 2019.52 Tzadik Eliakim in discussion with the author, 16 December 2019; Aliza Braudo, on a tour attended by the author, 21 January 2021, 14 November 2021.53 Alon Amram (Director of the Engineering Department, Ariel Sharon Park), at a lecture attended by the author, 14 November 2021.54 DePass, “Brownfields as a Tool for the Rejuvenation of Land and Community,” 601–6.55 Amir Lotan in discussion with the author, 22 December 2022, 12 January 2023.56 McPhearson et al., “Advancing Understanding of the Complex Nature of Urban Systems,” 566–73; Song et al., “Nature Based Solutions.”57 Zheng and Kirkwood, “Landscape Architecture and Sustainable Remediation.”58 Yigitcanlar and Dizdaroglu, “Ecological Approaches in Planning for Sustainable Cities,” 159–188. On adaptation to extreme environmental changes such as water-related hazards, practiced in three projects in China using the methods and tools of landscape architecture – Tianjin Qiaoyuan Wetland Park, Yanweizhou Park, and Qunli Stormwater Wetland Park – designed by Beijing landscape studio Turenscape, see: Perepichka and Katsy, “How Landscape Infrastructures Can Be More Resilient.”59 On the challenges of Israel’s parks and nature reserves, including financing, wildlife management, accommodating different communities, etc., see: Tal, “Natural Heritage.”60 Latz, “Landscape Park Duisburg-Nord,” 159.Additional informationFundingThis work was supported by the Israel Science Foundation (ISF) [grant number 2755/21].Notes on contributorsGalia Limor-SagivGalia Limor-Sagiv is a historian of landscape, environment, and waste and a PhD student at the Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning, Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel. Her research deals with the history of the landscape of Hiriya, Israel’s largest landfill for 50 years that is currently being turned into a nature park. Her interests include man-made landscapes, infrastructure studies, and the impact of brownfields on humans and nature. Limor-Sagiv’s other publications are on the establishment of the Hiriya landfill in the 1950s; The 2004 international competition for the rehabilitation of Hiriya and the coalition that fought to save the historic sycamores trees in Jaffa.Nurit LissovskyNurit Lissovsky is Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology. She is the editor of Arcadia: The Gardens of Lipa Yahalom and Dan Zur (2012); Gideon Sarig: Gardens for People (2017; with T. Alon-Mozes); Ruth Enis: Gardens of Her Own (2019; with T. Alon-Mozes); and Perspectives on the Work of Zvi Dekel (2021). Her research on the sacred landscape, on landscape architecture in Israel and on landscape design in national parks was published in Landscape Journal, Planning Perspectives, Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes, Ugarit-Forschungen, Palestine Exploration Quarterly and others. Her current research (ISF grant 2751/21) explores the American-Israel transnational knowledge flows and the making of Israel’s modern landscape.Naomi AngelNaomi Angel is an architect specialized in urban planning and design, long term comprehensive planning and urban design directives. Her work for 20 years as the chief metropolitan planner for the Tel Aviv District involved massive urban renewal and densification, infrastructure, and 4 large metropolitan parks planning and design processes. Mass transit in Tel Aviv and Ariel Sharon Park, Hyria uncluded, were her signature projects. Angel's responsibility was to see to the development and approval of plans and design directives for the park from national scale to detailed design of park portions – and foreseeing their execution and continuous upscaling. Angel directed the Hyrira landscape design competition, oversaw the detailed design, and approved the building permits of the park transformation to the manmade mountain.