Al Sweimeh Development Project - The Forgotten Village | Architecture Thesis focused on Community Development

Information

Project Name: Al Sweimeh Development Project - The Forgotten Village
Student Name: Lara Samara and Nancy Al-Akhras
Awards: Longlist in al Tamayouz Excellence Award | Finalists in Architecture Graduation Projects Prize of Jordan Engineers Association
Softwares/Plugins: Autodesk Revit , AutoCAD , Lumion , Adobe Photoshop

Year: 2022
Discipline: Architecture
Level: Bachelors Design Thesis
Institute: Department of Architectural Engineering - Hashemite University
University: Hashemite University
Location: Zarqa
Country: Jordan

Excerpt: ‘Al Sweimeh Development Project – The Forgotten Village’ is an architecture thesis by Lara samara and Nancy al-akhras from Department of Architectural Engineering – Hashemite University, that seeks to tackle the issue of marginalisation in Sweimeh, Jordan, through community development. The aim of the project is to create a place that values the local skills of the Sweimeh people and encourages them to invest in the development of the area through food production cycles.

Introduction: Al-Sweimeh is one of the marginalised communities, also known as the “forgotten village,” whose land was taken advantage of for investments meant to serve as the gateway to tourism. With their lands came the loss of their people’s agricultural craft, and now their productive women need a place to welcome them and say, “We are here”.

The goal of this project is to create a place that values the local skills of the Sweimeh people and encourages them to invest in the development of the area through food production cycles. This will be accomplished by having locals produce goods by hand, promoting agritourism, and marketing these goods to get rid of excess agricultural produce in the Jordan Valley while generating no waste even within the project itself through recycling (waste management). In order to address poverty and the marginalisation of the forgotten village brought about by the disregard for their local skills and the theft of their lands for use in anti-human development projects, a community development plan for Al-Sweimeh village has been proposed.

Community development, as defined by the initiative, is a methodical and collaborative approach to raising Sweimeh’s general standard of living through outreach, skill development, production, and reinvestment in the community. The aim of this project is to enhance the standard of living for the inhabitants of Sweimeh by harnessing their natural and human resources and merging them into the initiative using local tools.

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Site Context

The site chosen for the intervention is located in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Jordan is ideally situated between several Arab nations, with Saudi Arabia to the south, Palestine to the west, Iraq to the east, and Syria to the north. Sweimeh Village, the selected site, is situated in the southern region of the Jordan Valley and is surrounded by two main streets.

Located on either side of the site are agricultural lands in southern Shuneh and Dead Sea Resorts. These farmlands are closely connected to Sweimeh Village due to the agro-food production that is harvested from the fields in the Jordan Valley. The resorts stretching from the Amman Beach District to Sweimeh Beach are a popular destination among tourists.

The northern Dead Sea shore is the terminus of the Jordan River and a number of minor alluvial rivers. The terrain transitions into rocky cliffs at the sea’s eastern banks, where the steep Wadis carved spectacular, deep incisions. Preserving these intricate ecological systems is crucial.

Design Process

The Development March: The concept of the project is that while development is moving away from the village, the Sweimeh people are attempting to overcome their marginalisation and get integrated into the regional development process. The project encourages the villagers of Sweimeh to reject marginalisation and to march alongside development in an effort to draw investment into the village. This concept emerged from the character of Sweimeh and their people, who used the site’s opportunities to address the key issues the initiative was seeking to address.

The Development Lines: The development lines are shown as soft lines gathering like fabric. In order for the lines of individuals to adjust to the process of development, these lines are trying to blend in with the simple lines, indicating that the Sweimeh people will strive to go towards the light. By implementing these lines into the site through sketches and models, the functional zoning and circulation were defined, which helped determine the massing of the site.

Final Outcome

Zoning: There are three primary zones in the project. The first zone is the craft souk (traditional market), which is located between the project’s main plaza and the visitor entrance. It is home to shops and workshops selling locally created goods made by Al Sweimeh natives.

The second zone is the Al-Sweimeh axis, which begins with the Al-Sweimeh people’s entrance and ends at the mosque. It is home to the main mosque, the main plaza, the vegetable and fruit souk, and the bazaar. The main food and production workshops (kitchens), packaging workshops, product souk, and storage facilities are located in the third zone, which is the manufacturing zone in the rear.

Solid and Void: Since the project’s focus is mostly on open spaces, there is more void than solid in the design. The parking lots, walkways, planted areas, and plazas are included in the voids.

Spatial Configuration: The pathways, nodes, and the ways in which the paths link the nodes together make up the majority of the spatial configuration. The point where the two main axes converge is the project’s primary node.

Architectural Details: Al-Sweimeh village’s climate was lowered by the court element since the Dead Sea is extremely high. The mass orientation is in line with the direction of the sea breeze. Rainwater is collected via pipes found in the barrel and cross vaults. The project includes several types of roofs, including domes, flat roofs, vaults (barrel and cross), and shelters.

Elevations: With their tall and narrow openings that overlook the nearby Dead sea resorts, the elevations were modelled after the plain rectangular houses in the village to convey a sense of proximity between the project and regular Sweimeh people.

Spaces and Places: The project create spaces for the Community interaction with the tourists in an Interactive environment, the products will be exhibited in this place after invest the local skills through the productive process of the raw materials and transform them to a national product with local hands and the tourist will be engaged with this process to live a new experiment in sharing the local community their daily work.

Site Challenges: Two systems used the water that flows across the site from the mountains to the Dead Sea to breathe life into the project.

1- The Aflaj system: A technique for harvesting rainfall water that is guided by artificial channels far from the stream for use in irrigation and human needs.

2- The harvesting system: To make additional rainwater available for use throughout the project, extra winter rainfall will be gathered in tanks linked to the water stream.

The project made use of the site’s agricultural resources. It was decided to recycle the hazardous Al salm tree in order to produce Al-salm honey. Additionally, the palm trees that the people farm will have their trunks recycled to make ropes and shelters. The Jordan Valley had surpluses of agro-food, so it was decided to use the production cycles to dispose of these surpluses in the project in order to produce products that would be sold within the same project and recycle the waste generated in order to meet one of the project’s most crucial objectives: NO WASTE.

Conclusion: The project as a whole tackles the problem of marginalisation and offers community development as a solution to create a place that values the Sweimeh people’s local skills and encourages them to contribute to the area’s development through cycles of food production. The Sweimeh people are the project’s production process’s framework; the project’s success depends on investors, travellers, and farmers as suppliers as well as consumers.

[This Academic Project has been published with text submitted by the student]