Emancipation square: Old Thread, New Fabric

Emancipation Square is a proposal for a community development in Third Ward along Emancipation Avenue. This area has been underserved for a long time now. Because of this, it has suffered the impact of gentrification due to developers taking advantage of the low prices of the land and its geographical proximity to downtown. These developers have little to no care about the rich cultural and historical significance Third Ward possesses, having no problem proceeding with the aforementioned erasure. The goal of the project is to address the more pressing concerns the community has at the moment related to security, infrastructure, quality of life, housing, and job opportunities. Proposing a series of strategies based on the combination of programs such as Houston Complete Communities, Main Street America, and the Walkable Places and Transit Oriented Development initiatives provides the opportunity to address those issues while producing a physical space where connections of different natures occur. While that segment of the project is taken care of with the previously mentioned actions, an effort to preserve the history of the area will run in parallel by utilizing the concept of palimpsest, consisting in adapting a new program to the existing building while keeping visible traces of the history of it.