What remains of the old Mercedes factory, in Sant Andreu, could have been demolished – that was the initial idea – and the resulting enormous site filled with warehouses, probably logistical, as happens everywhere. The enclosure could also have become a new neighborhood with its houses, streets and squares to use, if it had been reclassified for this purpose. But not. Neither one thing nor the other. These buildings, in disuse since 2007, will remain standing and will be the most outstanding pieces of a new eco-district where it will be possible to live and also work and study in an environment that is as friendly as possible to the environment. With almost nine hectares of surface and 185,000 buildable square meters, it will be the largest in Spain and one of the largest in Europe, similar in size to B01 in the Swedish city of Malmö, one of the main continental references in this type of area. .
The transformation of the Mercedes is about to take shape on the ground. After a long urban planning process with arduous negotiations between the property –Conren Tramway– and the Barcelona City Council, and with the misgivings of some neighboring residents who see the project as excessive, the first works are expected before the end of the year. It will be a university center, Elisava, dedicated to design and engineering, which will leave its current headquarters on La Rambla. The change will allow him to gain space in a building from a manufacturing past that is related to his activity. It will have 2,000 students and 500 teachers. The prior building license is already requested. The developer's commitment is to deliver the property under a long-term rental regime in the first quarter of 2026.
This 13,000-square-meter talent campus will be the cornerstone for a new activity hub dedicated to the new industry 4.0, for which 51,700 square meters with a capacity for 3,500 workers are planned, divided between the renovated warehouses of the old campus and a new complex of offices.
"We are going to speed up the transformation as much as we can," says Paco Hugas, co-CEO of Conren Tramway, convinced that the Mercedes will mark a before and after in Barcelona. “It will be a mixed-use project with a lot of personality thanks to the fact that we maintain the industrial past and adapt it to the present and future reality,” he adds. He also points out that the will is for his activity to "join the Besòs polygons". The promoters have taken ideas from successful urban regenerations such as the Renault factory in Paris, the Bonne de Grenoble, which housed military barracks, or the King's Cross factory area in London.
Waiting for the Generalitat to give the final green light to the modification of the General Metropolitan Plan (PGM) that the City Council has already approved – it is expected to do so between this month and September – the urbanization project is already being drafted and work is being done on the reparcelling The idea is to have all this planning ready before Easter next year so that, from then on, the different works can be activated. All the homes – 1,300 are planned, most of them rented and 40% affordable, for a total of 3,250 residents – should be finished between 2027 and 2028, at the same time as the public spaces. In parallel, the facilities must be built, most of them municipal, some in warehouses that will be rehabilitated and others in new construction. Between 2028 and 2029 the office complex will be built, the last piece.
The owners and the architecture office they commissioned the transformation, Batlleiroig, came to the conclusion that it was worth preserving a large part of the factory buildings despite not being protected. The main part corresponds to the complex designed by Robert Terradas in 1951 for the then Empresa Nacional de Motores de Aviación, S.A (Enmasa), which was completed in 1957 and is one of the most outstanding examples of rationalist architecture in Catalonia. An addition from the 70s will also be preserved, which is precisely where Elisava will be located. The City Council has started the process to include these properties in the catalog of architectural heritage.
“The original factory is inspired by the first Bauhaus and we want the entire space to now be linked to the New European Bauhaus, focused on sustainability and the response to the climate emergency”, highlights Enric Batlle, founding partner of Batlleiroig, which puts into value that the city is going to "regenerate itself from a pre-existing industrial site that has become obsolete". Not only will the buildings be reused, but also the demolition materials or the water. And a radical commitment will be made to energy saving and self-generation, to active mobility, on foot or by bike... "What makes the transformation of the Mercedes unique is that we have synthesized different sustainable strategies into a single large-scale project", adds Clemens Hoerter, technical director of Conren Tramway.
The demolitions that have been made will be treated with a circular economy perspective. “The material has accumulated in a mountain that can be turned into new concrete aggregates for paving, facades, urban furniture… It is about carrying out the entire recycling process in the same premises, applying a zero kilometer criterion to avoid extraction in other places and transportation”, details Hoerter. This initiative is part of the European project Circ-Boost.
The area has been configured as if it were a superblock, closed to motorized traffic. "Now cities are being asked for spaces without cars," recalls Batlle. They will access the car parks through the perimeter roads. The interior will be arranged around two large pedestrian axes that will cross, taking advantage of the pre-existing structure in the enclosure. On the one hand, they will connect the Bon Pastor neighborhood with the old town of Sant Andreu, its new Rodalies station and the future linear park. And, on the other, the Maquinista area, which is also expected to be expanded with new homes, with the Torrent de l'Estadella industrial estate. 50% of the surface will be buildable and the other 50%, free, with public areas and roads for people.
The jewel of the Mercedes is the central nave. In this enormous space, Batlleiroig will take biophilia, the naturalization of urban spaces that characterizes many of his projects, to a higher level. The metallic structure will be maintained, the roof will be opened – part of it will be covered with photovoltaic panels – and everything will be filled with vegetation. Thus, a large public square of 11,400 m2 will be created, connected with passages under the adjoining buildings that will provide another 2,200 open square meters.
The design of the spaces designed for sustainable mobility, the commitment to green and the use of materials with greater insulation capacity will create an "island of freshness" that is expected to lower the temperature by three degrees compared to the surrounding neighborhoods on the hottest days.
Water management is another new element, key in times of persistent drought like the current one. The usual thing is that the rain is lost through the sewer. Here it will be retained for reuse, mainly for irrigation. In addition, the use of porous pavements will facilitate infiltration, following the sponge-city concept. Likewise, gray water reuse systems will be installed in the buildings.
Also the energy will have a special treatment. In addition to applying nearly zero designs, as efficient as possible, in all buildings, self-sufficiency will be sought through the constitution of an energy community. Electricity will be produced with photovoltaic panels on the roofs of the buildings and in the central square, and cold and heat will be generated through a power station that could be geothermal. Overall, with the active and passive measures planned, the savings will be close to 50%.
