The city’s new bus terminal was one of the municipality’s main motivations when promoting the Detailed Plan of the Area of Castelo Branco Railway Station. An operating tool that led to the study of an extended group of alternatives in which to site the principal equipment, namely the new bus terminal.
The aim consisted in creating a transport hub that would articulate the north platform of the railway station with a bus terminal and a new car park, providing comfortable connections between the two.
In addition to the new building the project included redesigning about 3.7 hectares of public space around the station and the terminal as well as the new Carapalha viaduct over the railway line, constructed on the site of the existing viaduct.
The long, narrow shape of this plot of land, backing up onto and running along the railway line, was influential in the project solution. A large, long roof cover for the coach stands linking directly to the street at top level, over a car park connecting with the station platform on the bottom level.
The idea was to work with the terrain modelling and with the open spaces to design the new equipment as a continuation of the public space. There was also the idea of diluting the borders between the railway station site and the surrounding areas; creating new pedestrian accesses to the housing estates attached to the intervention area and reorganising and valorising the public space and the connections to the city centre.
