Bijgaardehof and Bijgaardepark

Near the centre of Ghent, an abandoned factory site was transformed into an extension of Bijgaardepark and Bijgaardehof. Bijgaardehof is a residential project comprising three cohousing groups (Wijgaard, De Spore and Biotope) with a total of 58 homes and a community health centre. The park extension and Bijgaardehof form a unified whole in terms of design and construction. The same design team was appointed for both projects.
Bijgaardehof focuses on sustainability, both at the urban planning level and at the project level – an ambitious, mixed programme centred on meeting and interaction in one of the largest cohousing projects in Flanders.
The former Malmar site was home to an old vacant factory building with cellars and a steel and brick structure overgrown with plants. The damp cellars proved to be an ideal home for several delicate bat species (Daubenton’s bat, whiskered bat, common long-eared bat and Geoffroy’s bat). When a number of cellars where bats hibernated were removed, other cellar spaces were made suitable for bats under the park extension. The dilapidated site also contained unique ferns (maidenhair, male, scaly male, bladder, tongue, hard needle and iron ferns) hidden among the vegetation, which were first transplanted elsewhere and then replanted on the site after the work was completed. These ferns are part of the planting of both the park extension and Bijgaardehof.
Nest boxes for swifts have been built into the top of the Bijgaardehof buildings. Half of the buildable area is unpaved garden. The garden is bird-friendly, with multi-layered native deciduous forest vegetation, central grassy areas and wild edges. The garden is low-maintenance and biodiverse, with a large wadi at the centre of the project. The buildings are equipped with steel cabling with controlled wild climbing zones: this is maintenance-friendly, provides a lot of biomass, is a nesting place for birds, is insect-friendly, provides better acoustics in a very stony site, and is a climate-adaptive measure. In addition, green roofs, a roof garden for urban agriculture (Biotope) and a winter garden (Wijgaard) have been created.

Gebäude und Infrastrukturen

• Einbeziehung von Elementen, die für die lokale biologische Vielfalt geeignet sind (e.g. Vogelhäuser, die für die Vogelarten vor Ort geeignet sind, Insektenhäuser in angemessener Höhe, geeignete Vegetationsarten);
• Stellen Sie Einrichtungen mit ausreichender Fläche/Länge/Dicke bereit, um die Schaffung von Lebensräumen, grün-blauen Bereichen und Adern zu gewährleisten;
• Bau von Gebäuden unter Beibehaltung von Grün- und Freiflächen und unter Begrenzung der weiteren Verstädterung und Zersiedelung (e.g. ein höheres Gebäude oder ein mehrstöckiges Parkhaus benötigt weniger Fläche am Boden).

Bijgaardehof:

• Limited maintenance
• Garden maintenance
• Facade greenery maintenance
• Maintenance of swift nesting boxes
• Replacement of trees, climbing plants and border plants if necessary

Park expansion – City of Ghent:

• Maintenance of drainage holes in the floor slab of the vegetable garden (holes in the concrete slab depending on the humidity level in the basement)
• Annual bat count by Greenspot, appointed by the City of Ghent Parks Department
• The City of Ghent Parks Department developed a plan for the conservation of ferns and other flora.