Rethink Athens!

[Angelos]

There are proposals to change completely the face of Athens. So far there are talks to transform completely the coastal part of Athens ( Piraeus , Faliro ) by building new Cruise terminal and the new Greek Opera by Renzo Piano, along with the new huge Hellinikon development which is currently under tender. There are also talks about Votanikon urban development but has remained stationary.

This time we are going to talk about central Athens

Official website:
http://www.rethinkathens.org/eng/project

Video :


The project is to pedestrianize Panepistimiou avenue and Omonoia square and also it will be accompanied by new Tram extension. Of course it will be combined with smaller projects which will renovate nearby streets.

Some pictures :

[potiz81]

Amazing project!!!!

[systema magicum]

Re-Think Athens Winning Proposal / OKRA
http://www.archdaily.com/338001/re-t...proposal-okra/

OKRA, in collaboration with Mixst urbanism and Wageningen University, was recently announced as the winning team of the prestigious competition ReThink Athens towards a new city centre. Changing the heart of Athens into a true contemporary metropolitan city centre requires transformation of the city triangle into a lively part of the city. The project aims to strongly contribute to the change of Athens and improve the environment of the city plus activating the area economically. The team is supported by the Greek Architects of Studio 75 and Werner Sobek Green Technologies.

Within the next months the OKRA team will further develop their ideas into an approved design for the central area in the city centre. During the execution phase it will be an International-Greek collaboration, where the Greek architects from Studio75 and Greek engineers will take part in progressing the winning competition entry to an approved plan that can be realized via European funding.

Newly gained space, as a result of the major step towards a walkable city by reducing car traffic in this area, can be transformed into a vibrant, green and accessible heart of the city. We will take contemporary ideas on climate control, reduction of vehicular movement and programming public realm one step beyond: into an integrated proposal, creating a resilient, accessible and vibrant city, not just limited by its project borders, but linking this area to its adjacent areas and being a catalyst for the whole city. Crucial part of the new transformation is that heat mitigation of public realm will be realized, which will be an issue in many European cities within the forthcoming years.

The project ‘One step beyond’ focuses on creating a resilient city, accessible city and vibrant city.

Resilient City – The city centre of Athens will be transformed into a green network, and Panepistimiou will be the central green spine, providing shade and shelter. The resilient strategy includes specific attitudes towards reducing the urban heat and improving thermal comfort). A greening strategy for Athens is combined with a water strategy, since a good condition of plantings is crucial to contribute to heat reduction. Capturing rainwater in underground basins, on top of roofs or elsewhere helps to keep the water in the area.
Accessible city – The green framework will be treated as a coherent network of public realm in all directions and linking the adjacent neighbourhoods, having its highlight on Panepistimiou. Restoration of the continuities of the crossing streets creates continuity in the walking experience. By making the new tramline clear and present and part of the grandeur of the space it contributes to the aimed cohesion. In fact, Panepistimiou provides Shared space 2.0, a new balance between slow traffic and motorized movement. The design has three characteristic places: Omonia Square and Dikaiosynis Square will become a green urban squares, with prominent lush water elements. In the middle of Panepistimou Street, a green ensemble ties the university together into an urban park.
Vibrant city -Panepistimiou will change from ‘street’ to ‘boulevard’, by adding inviting spaces to stay to the linear space. Occupying and transforming ground floors, we introduce the concept of the theatre of 1000 rooms towards vacant buildings, organizing cultural events and shift focal points who will create a new vibrant atmosphere. Small open-air podia for outdoor initiatives will be created in public realm. Programs are related to Greek philosophy, science, drama and art. An ‘encroachment zone’ will improve active frontages and create linkages between the built environment and public realm. Interactive decorative light in public realm will give the right atmosphere during evening hours.
Vibrant city -Panepistimiou will change from ‘street’ to ‘boulevard’, by adding inviting spaces to stay to the linear space. Occupying and transforming ground floors, we introduce the concept of the theatre of 1000 rooms towards vacant buildings, organizing cultural events and shift focal points who will create a new vibrant atmosphere. Small open-air podia for outdoor initiatives will be created in public realm. Programs are related to Greek philosophy, science, drama and art. An ‘encroachment zone’ will improve active frontages and create linkages between the built environment and public realm. Interactive decorative light in public realm will give the right atmosphere during evening hours.

By doing this we believe that the project tackles the anonymous space in the heart of Athens and demonstrates that urban vibrancy can be combined with creating a green and pedestrian friendly spine, contributing to quality of life and living in Athens.
http://www.okra.nl/

http://www.okra.nl/project.php?project_id=627879

[The Blond Guy]

Yeah, like there's money for that.

And even if there is money to do this, the people won't take it that they don't have mony for food and a livingplace and there will be mony spend on these kind of things.

[TimothyR]

Originally Posted by The Blond Guy

Yeah, like there's money for that.

And even if there is money to do this, the people won't take it that they don't have mony for food and a livingplace and there will be mony spend on these kind of things.

It is for the future. It seems unlikely now - but hope and plans for the future must go on - especially when the present is extremely painful and difficult.

Architects are dreamers. They are artists. The best of them look beyond the current situation.

It is actually quite impressive.

[TimothyR]

Very nice and exciting.

What does that area look like now?

[AlexsandersTan]

nice

[potiz81]

Originally Posted by The Blond Guy

Yeah, like there's money for that.

There is. European Regional Development Fund.

Originally Posted by The Blond Guy

And even if there is money to do this, the people won't take it that they don't have mony for food and a livingplace and there will be mony spend on these kind of things.

Money from European Regional Development Fund are reserved for various specific projects accross EU. You cant take these money in order to replace the projects with food or anything else. These are for public works and infrastructure.

And I don't see why the center of Athens, in the middle of the crisis, shouldn't become more livable. The citizens and the families of Athens, who suffer from the huge financial problems, definetely deserve a better quality of life. Also, doesn't Athens itself, as the craddle of the western culture, deserve a more green and overall better center?

Syntagma square:


Panepistimiou avenue:




Patission avenue:



And by far the most problematic area, Omonia square:
image hosted on flickr

[Angelos]

According the the proposals it is expected to be ready by 2015-16 along with the other projects. As potiz said it is funded by EU.

[Angelos]

Originally Posted by The Blond Guy

Yeah, like there's money for that.

And even if there is money to do this, the people won't take it that they don't have mony for food and a livingplace and there will be mony spend on these kind of things.

Who said people dont have money for food and living place ? We dont live in a 3rd world country for god shake...

I am sure 99% can afford these so please dont listen to your media. It's certain that we have lost many commodities and large percent of our quality of life ( which the previous years has reached absurd levels of spending) but most people have a home and can at least afford the basics.

[potiz81]

Omonia Square current design:


image hosted on flickr



Omonia Square future plan:

[systema magicum]

http://www.theatlanticcities.com/art...downtown/4971/
Despite Austerity, Athens Completely Revamps Its Downtown
Struggling Athens is perhaps the last place you’d expect to attempt a large-scale urban renaissance. Portrayed worldwide as the ultimate recession basket case, the city is capital of a country where money is hard to find for basic services, let alone for infrastructure projects and new cultural complexes.
It’s something of a surprise then to discover that Athens is planning a major cultural and aesthetic overhaul. Coming up next spring is a new Museum of Contemporary Art, housed in a gutted and revamped city center brewery, while a museum of underwater antiquities is also planned, part of a broader project in the Athens harbor district of Piraeus called the Cultural Coast. Located in the shell of a former silo, the museum is designed to encourage visitors catching ferries to the islands to stay a little longer, and to bring strollers and diners back to the city’s busy wharves.
These ideas look modest, however, placed next to Rethink Athens, a scheme to reshape a great swath of the city’s center. With the winning entrant to its competition announced last month, Rethink Athens is set to replace downtown cars and asphalt with tramlines, cycle paths, trees and water. Covering an area that’s filled with attractive buildings without quite managing consistent beauty, the plans could turn an area of shabby charisma into one of real, walkable charm.

It will turn three major squares – one of them currently run-down and sketchy – into green islands linked by a long, largely pedestrian boulevard. Many trees will reduce the heat island effect of a district that blazes in summer, fed partly by storm water retention tanks. Road vehicles will be re-routed to discourage cross-town traffic, with travellers redirected onto a new tramline (and possible future metro extensions) that will make it easier for suburbanites to reach downtown.
The scheme may also shift central Athens’ social balance, encouraging residents back to the rundown urban core but also softening one of central Athens’ main quirks – that its priciest district is located right next to a working class neighborhood celebrated as an anarchist stronghold. While each of these neighborhoods currently has its metaphorical back to the other, the scheme will provide a new spacious, neutral living room where residents from both areas will mingle.

Up to this point, the plan is a rare bright spot in bleak times. Whether or not it’s what Athens currently needs most is another question. This is Greece, where youth unemployment has reached 60 percent, where unions fear the state may run out of cash to pay salaries by the summer and where 11 percent live in conditions of "extreme material deprivation" – the term the EU employs to describe near total destitution.
Regenerating Athens might well help to moderate these grim statistics, but it might also just paper thinly over deep cracks. Currently, poorer Athenians live or congregate in one area covered by the scheme, a square that many currently avoid for its bad reputation. Making people feel safer here would be an improvement, but there is a risk that its current marginal occupants will end up being tidied away elsewhere, their problems unchanged.

Despite these potential pitfalls, Athenians’ reactions to the project seem to be generally approving, if skeptical. Any investment that helps revive Athens’ economy is good news, especially when the money doesn’t directly tax the empty national purse. Rethink Athens’ plans are carefully tailored to be eligible for EU regeneration money, which has helped revamp many cities across the union (and far from solely in its poorer member states). While EU-enforced – and as yet fruitless – austerity programs may currently be beggaring Greece as a whole, there is still some European development cash left in the kitty. That this situation is perverse is something people are keenly aware of, but right now Athens needs a future, and these plans might just be a part of it.

[ZKB9]

Wonderful news from Greece! Beautiful city!

[Angelos]

Faliro Redevelopment along side with the new Greek Opera, Library complex.







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