What I noticed when I first moved to Valencia is the big problem that it has with the water flow. Valencia it’s known for its large river reconstructed to make place for a big space for jogging, football, and whatever other activities you can imagine. Nowadays we know this river as the «Jardín del Túria» and it gives lots of green space to de city, but let’s remind why this exists: in 1957 there was a «Gran Riada» where the flow of the water passed the normal flow of the river. It was a catastrophic moment for the city, but later on they decided to make of this an advantage creating these gardens.

We can all agree that historically the city of Valencia has an enormous problem with the rainy days. Talking of nowadays there’s the same problem, but how? Well, we can take as an example the latest rainy days. We can all remember the moment of finishing our classes, our job, or just going out for groceries and coming across a new river in front of the UPV or in every road, street, square, whatever. As the image below shows, you can even rent a kayak to get back home. Even the tram had to stop due to the high water flow, where is the main problem?

Analyzing the streets, the way the roads are made, the sewerage, and the heavy rains that characterize this city, I came with the idea that all of these problems are due to the fact that the city has no altitude above the sea level. The city is badly located, it leaves no inclination for the water to flow to the sea, so it gets stuck creating temporally rivers. This can be really a problem which is not being solved with better sewerage, plans for the sudden overflow, or some alternatives for the tram that just stops working. You can’t stop a city this way just because of the weather. I assume that nowadays it’s difficult to change this issue, but just if the city were planned well from the beginning, it would be much better.

There is no point in creating a city without a plan, you have to make a good set up in order for it to be successful.