Slovenska Street in Murska Sobota

Project description:The redevelopment of Slovenske Street – South is the second phase of the redevelopment of Murska Sobota’s city centre. Previously, as part of a wider renovation in 2019, the t. i. Luther’s Alley by the municipal building, on the axis between Soboga Castle and the Lutheran Church, and Victory Square, the park with the famous Liberators’ Monument.

The urban renewal project was awarded by winning an anonymous public competition in 2107. The competition proposal covered a much larger area. The municipality intends to continue the renovation process, subject to the availability of dedicated funding.

Slovenska ulica is Murska Sobota’s best-quality, monument-protected urban environment. Alongside it are the most important buildings constructed since the middle of the 19th to mid 20th century. The buildings are in relatively good condition, but the urban space suffers from a lack of urban vibrancy and a flight of commercial content to the many commodity centres on the outskirts of the city. With the renovation, the municipality aims to revitalise the city centre and draw attention to the quality architecture that is found in the city centre.

The layout of Slovenske Street is based on the concept of unification and intensive greening of public spaces. The previous 20 or so lime trees, which were successfully transplanted to the new Ekspano development at the beginning of the construction, have been replaced by around 90 theoretical trees planted in a double-rowed avenue along the entire 380-metre development. The aim of the planting is to improve the microclimate, especially at the expense of shading in the summer months, to increase the quality of the urban space and to gradually shift from traffic to pedestrian areas. The trees are rhythmically planted in three clusters, dividing the entire street into three different ambiences. The street is paved with Pohorje tonalite, which was entirely recycled from previous partial repairs of individual street sections. The central axis is paved with cubes and the edges with slabs. In between are strips of white precast concrete, which rhythmically divide the entire route into a 4 metre long stretch, also marked by trees and urban furniture. The placement of the double axis of trees, lamps and benches gives a calm and human scale to the relatively wide street in relation to the rather low buildings. The space is subtly articulated both longitudinally and transversally, yet retains its unity and integrity of approach.

The traffic layout is designed in a flexible way, without any design changes the whole street can function as a classic two-way road, a one-way road with side parking or a fully pedestrian and cyclist surface, only accessible by public transport. The municipality plans to close the street completely to private traffic in about two years.

Authors of the project: BLENKUŠ Matej, MATJAŠEC Darja, ŽITNIK Primož, FLORJANC Nejc, VALENČIČ Grega