First set of Madrid photos!

I was so excited to ride the high-speed train from Barcelona to Madrid! Madrid is a big, funny patchwork-city: we saw traditional Spanish plazas (not as common in Barcelona) from the early umpteen-hundreds, as well as some of the newer interventions as Madrid has sought to modernize — sometimes successfully, sometimes unsuccessfully. I got to present about the Programas de Actuación Urbanistica (PAU’s), neighborhoods set up by the city to expand public services and low-cost housing. Unfortunately, not all of the neighborhoods are very well-designed. The Mirador building (square one with a hole, above), is a classic example of flashy architecture that fails to actually serve its supposed function. 

In the evening we made a cold, windy visit to the Quatros Torres Business District. The four towers are the tallest in Spain and are aligned along a corridor that reflects Madrid’s contemporary history, with the newest elements of the Business district extending out away from the city center. The towers are oddly situated in a low-density, low-profile area. I’m not convinced the business district is quite how they’d hoped it’d be.