Discuss: The need/lack of high-rises in Sweden

[Jonipoon]

It's time for the Swedish politicians and people to wake up and realize that we're not living in the 1960's anymore. It's time to realize that the world is looking down at us (literally), and that 5 storey apartments isn't exactly the best kind of thing to build in 2011.

Far too long have great proposals for our largest cities been ditched over and over again simply because of the fear of destroying the socialite's damn window view. They're even using the shitty argument that church spires should be kept as the tallest structures simply because "old architecture deserves to be honoured" or something stupid like that.

When will the Swedish decision-makers realize that building high-rises is probably one of the most effective ways to solve alot of problems regarding society, public transport, criminality, housing shortage and so on. The alternative is extending the suburbs which will be much more expensive in the long term. As it is today, only the rich people and temporary students are housing in the biggest citycore, whereas the middleclass and lower class people are living in suburbs or small communities. This is not what I'd call a equal society!

Suburbs generates higher criminality plus a constant need of improving the public transport system. In the end we will pay a much higher price for the low-rises. We are too spread out in our cities, we need more density and higher buildings!

Feel free to discuss WHY we're not getting more highrises, and WHAT/HOW we must do in order to get them.

[Svartmetall]

Hm, I'm not sure I agree that high rises discourage criminality. I do, however, agree that improved mobility improves the city immensely. When one considers crime rates, one needs to realise that criminality has far more factors beyond the manner in which people live. The most crime-ridden areas in Auckland are not even outer suburban areas, but are actually mid-suburban areas where everyone is actually in detached housing. In London, the well-connnected highrise areas are actually also the most crime-ridden and uninhabitable.

As far as density goes, Paris has shown us that sustained density can be achieved by mid-rise buildings and in many ways this is actually more friendly to people at street level than massive highrises and skyscrapers. There are parts of the world that I've been to where the omnipresence of building shadows actually makes street level feel very claustrophobic and cramped - Hong Kong would definitely be one of these examples and as much as I loved the city I don't think I could live in perpetual cramped shadow at street level.

Just food for thought. I actually much prefer the built form of European cities over American or Asian cities because of the mid-rise development that they have. They offer sustainable densities without feeling cramped.

[dj4life]

Even though i am usually for higrises that complement the denselly built areas, there is still a moment that makes me doubt about the actual need of tall buildings in all the major cities. The thing is that the metro areas of the largest cities cover large teritories and parts of them usually are some smaller towns or villages which physically are still far from being the districts of the cities. Judging from such perspective building large districts with some smaller, mid-sized buildings to fulfill the gaps is more logical than building higrises. Building tall buildings in the city centers may be good for businesses, however the most common problem nowadays is shortage of housing and taking that into account we can understand why the smaller-scale architecture has more priority.
Of course, sometimes it is hard to understand why the beautiful proposals with highrises are not being accepted, however building more denselly may be a step to a start a 'highrise era'.

well, i'm an optimist anyway..

[Huggkruka]

As long as it's dense, it works - there is no need for highrises. Highrises is just one method. The medieval 3-4 story core of old towns is just as dense, or denser, than most highrise suburban projects(Highrises do demand a bit of free space around them). I like the visual impact of slim, tall towers portruding from the city mass though.

[Muthai]

Originally Posted by Huggkruka

...Highrises do demand a bit of free space around them...

Do they really?

--------

High-rises are not a single solution towards denser cities. But it can be a part of the solution.

Remember that high-rises historically only is a symptom of a dense urban area with high land value. Nowadays the high-rises are constructed to play on that historical point, that creates a illusion of a high valued area. That is often the fact in Scandinavian cities.

To create a high land value you have to build the cities dense enough so that the potential range of services, products, culture etc. will increase. That range, of course, increases with the amount of potential consumers. By "dense enough" I mean that people are living close enough to consume those urban benefits.

[Huggkruka]

Originally Posted by Muthai

Do they really?

Not by their very nature(look at New York!) but in Scandinavia you have to worry abour stealing sun hours, creating updrafts, preserving sightlines and the like - all of which might seem trivial but still affects building a lot. I guess my point is that 3-5 story buildings in dense clusters are surprisingly dense, and shouldn't be scoffed at as "low density". Look at Barcelona, the Eixample's got 33.275 people/km2, greater than that of Manhattan(27,394/km2), with practically no highrises what so ever(6-8 story throughout). Guess which model would be easiest to build in Scandinavia?

EDIT: Source, since Eixample density isn't on wiki: http://geographyfieldwork.com/PopDensity.htm

[Galro]

You aren't compared likes for likes. The reason to Barcelonas high density is a combination of narrow streets (which btw steel sun lights), but more importantly the fact that people actually lives in the inner city. If all the scrapers and highrise at Manhattan had residents in them then the it would have appeared many, many times as dense as Barcelone. Seemingly, if there only were businesses located in Barcelonas inner city then their density would be much, much lower.

It should be of no arguing that higher buildings can house more people all other things being equal.

[Muthai]

Huggkruka: I agree with you that the city pattern are as much important as the hight of the buidlings. What I opposed was that tall buildings demands a lot of free space in surrounding. Obviously the don't, looking at a lot of dense areas in for example the US and in asia. The best way to create a dense area, with the best potential for a high availability of culture, services, etc, should be a combined method with a dense urban pattern and a high average building height.

Also I question the fact that Scandinavian cities needs sun everywhere. The micro climate is important and should be considered in every development project, but there's a slightly overrated concern about how building cast shadows on the streets. The public areas in the cities are built up by places and paths with different functions. Some are for movement (e.g. boulevards and alleys) and others for staying (e.g. squares and parks). I would say that a street are less sensitive against shade than a market place or a open-air cafe.

If there would be a tall building here and there that maybe cast a shadow on parts of the surrounding streets, but not on important places, then I don't really see a conflict with tall building in a dense urban pattern.

[dj4life]

The thing is that Sweden and some other countries in our region are not denselly populated and that means there is very much space for cities to expand (then, densify the areas). The only thing that, in my imagination, would push more highrise developments into the market can be the extremely high prices of land, however it is still not a case here.

[Muthai]

dj4life: I disagree. The most important thing to make sure that the society are being developed in a sustainable way is to densify the urban areas. Transportation is a climate impact that makes maybe the the largest negative effect on the environment. The suburban islands that has been created are maybe the most important issue on the subject of social segregation. Both challenges are a cost for the society and should be considered when the municipality are planning the development.

If the environmental cost of the exceeding transportation needs and the cost of targeted social interventions against social segregation, that comes out of the urban sprawl, was included in the calculation, than I'm sure that it wouldn't be that beneficial to keep on sprawling the cities. One have to look at the whole picture.

[Galro]

Originally Posted by Muthai

Also I question the fact that Scandinavian cities needs sun everywhere.

I can't speak for Stockholm or any other Swedish cities as I don't spend much time their during the winter, however here in Oslo the sun is so low on the sky during the winter half of the year that it is impossible to not get dark and shadowly streets, while is so high on the sky in the summer that there won't be any shadows no matter what.

I posted this picture in the Oslo development tread to prove my point. This is a low density area from the 19th. century here in Oslo. Look at how dark it is through the winter times - there effectively are no sun at street level. A highrise in a similar dense street would no worse than that, and we can't on the other hand build lower than this in a modern city.

[sthlm30]

det är väll bara malmö och sthlm som behöver högre byggnader med tanke på hur otroligt fort dom städerna växer. malmö har ju klart bäst förhållande, med att dom är längst söderut i sverige och är platt mark som saknar kullar osv som slänger skuggor, och så har dom ju havet. sthlm som kommer att växa med minst ett malmö inom 30år måste bygga högre, fast mer utspritt för att undvika helt skugglagda områden, eftersom att det finns så mkt vatten och resservat och brist på byggmark. göteborg har väll fortfarande mkt mark kvar att utnyttja, och det växer inte lika mkt som malmö och sthlm, så där behövs inte mkt med höga byggnader. alla andra små städer är bara galna om dom ska bygga mer en 1-2 100+ byggnader

[Muthai]

Originally Posted by sthlm30

det är väll bara malmö och sthlm som behöver högre byggnader med tanke på hur otroligt fort dom städerna växer. malmö har ju klart bäst förhållande, med att dom är längst söderut i sverige och är platt mark som saknar kullar osv som slänger skuggor, och så har dom ju havet. sthlm som kommer att växa med minst ett malmö inom 30år måste bygga högre, fast mer utspritt för att undvika helt skugglagda områden, eftersom att det finns så mkt vatten och resservat och brist på byggmark. göteborg har väll fortfarande mkt mark kvar att utnyttja, och det växer inte lika mkt som malmö och sthlm, så där behövs inte mkt med höga byggnader. alla andra små städer är bara galna om dom ska bygga mer en 1-2 100+ byggnader

Misstänker att du inte har läst mitt tidigare inlägg. Alla svenska städer behöver sluta sprida ut sig och istället förtätas. Det är irrelevant hur mycket ledig mark som finns omkring städerna. Det kostar massor för kommunerna att bygga på bredden, eftersom det innebär stora kostnader för utbyggnad av infrastruktur och service. Man måste börja se mark som den resurs det är, och vara mer effektiv i utnyttjandet av den.

Den glesa stadsstruktur som har varit norm i Sverige de senaste 70 åren har skapat en stark social/socioekonomisk segregation. Detta får man idag betala mycket för i olika insatser, både sociala och t.ex. polisiära. Jag vill nog mena att den sociala klyftan inte hade varit alls lika stor om man hade fortsatt att bygga staden med en mer sammanhållen och integrerad fysisk struktur istället.

[mhean]

Originally Posted by Jonipoon

It's time for the Swedish politicians and people to wake up and realize that we're not living in the 1960's anymore. It's time to realize that the world is looking down at us (literally), and that 5 storey apartments isn't exactly the best kind of thing to build in 2011.

Far too long have great proposals for our largest cities been ditched over and over again simply because of the fear of destroying the socialite's damn window view. They're even using the shitty argument that church spires should be kept as the tallest structures simply because "old architecture deserves to be honoured" or something stupid like that.

When will the Swedish decision-makers realize that building high-rises is probably one of the most effective ways to solve alot of problems regarding society, public transport, criminality, housing shortage and so on. The alternative is extending the suburbs which will be much more expensive in the long term. As it is today, only the rich people and temporary students are housing in the biggest citycore, whereas the middleclass and lower class people are living in suburbs or small communities. This is not what I'd call a equal society!

Suburbs generates higher criminality plus a constant need of improving the public transport system. In the end we will pay a much higher price for the low-rises. We are too spread out in our cities, we need more density and higher buildings!

Feel free to discuss WHY we're not getting more highrises, and WHAT/HOW we must do in order to get them.

Funny you are saying that it is not the 1960s anymore which was the period when most high buildings in this country was built...

[mhean]

Originally Posted by sthlm30

det är väll bara malmö och sthlm som behöver högre byggnader med tanke på hur otroligt fort dom städerna växer. malmö har ju klart bäst förhållande, med att dom är längst söderut i sverige och är platt mark som saknar kullar osv som slänger skuggor, och så har dom ju havet. sthlm som kommer att växa med minst ett malmö inom 30år måste bygga högre, fast mer utspritt för att undvika helt skugglagda områden, eftersom att det finns så mkt vatten och resservat och brist på byggmark. göteborg har väll fortfarande mkt mark kvar att utnyttja, och det växer inte lika mkt som malmö och sthlm, så där behövs inte mkt med höga byggnader. alla andra små städer är bara galna om dom ska bygga mer en 1-2 100+ byggnader

Det verkar finnas en konstig uppfattning om att Malmö växer mer än Göteborg här på sajten. Så är det inte. Under några kvartal 2008 och 2009 var det så men Göteborg växer med betydligt fler människor än Malmö.

Göteborg växte under några kvartal 2003 och 2004, tror jag det var, mer än Stockholm men för den sakens skull kan man ju inte fortsätta hävda att så är fallet. Det skulle ju vara korkat...

[Huggkruka]

Originally Posted by Muthai

Huggkruka: I agree with you that the city pattern are as much important as the hight of the buidlings. What I opposed was that tall buildings demands a lot of free space in surrounding. Obviously the don't, looking at a lot of dense areas in for example the US and in asia. The best way to create a dense area, with the best potential for a high availability of culture, services, etc, should be a combined method with a dense urban pattern and a high average building height.

Also I question the fact that Scandinavian cities needs sun everywhere. The micro climate is important and should be considered in every development project, but there's a slightly overrated concern about how building cast shadows on the streets. The public areas in the cities are built up by places and paths with different functions. Some are for movement (e.g. boulevards and alleys) and others for staying (e.g. squares and parks). I would say that a street are less sensitive against shade than a market place or a open-air cafe.

If there would be a tall building here and there that maybe cast a shadow on parts of the surrounding streets, but not on important places, then I don't really see a conflict with tall building in a dense urban pattern.

I mostly agree, I just want to point out that the idea "tall=dense" is invalid and that it would be really hard to build the way they do abroad in our Scandinavian climate(also the economical and social climate). Some more interesting density stats: Nowhere in Sao Paulo is denser than 19000 people/km2. That's a place that is famous for looking like this:

[dj4life]

Well, there are famous resort towns where only some 70.000 people live and there are great skylines.

[Galro]

Originally Posted by Huggkruka

I mostly agree, I just want to point out that the idea "tall=dense" is invalid

Tall does mean denser than it otherwise would be, but it don't necessarily means densely populated.

[Kragom]

Originally Posted by Jonipoon

When will the Swedish decision-makers realize that building high-rises is probably one of the most effective ways to solve alot of problems regarding society, public transport, criminality

This is simply not true. Have a look around and you will find that high-rise buildings actually INCREASE criminality, whether they are in the suburbs or center. Please do not just spread disinformation because it supports your cause. Personally I find building too high makes the city ugly, and I salute cities like Copenhagen London and Paris for keeping it down. Build more dense but be careful with the height...

[dj4life]

Sorry, but what exactly relates higher buildings with criminality? Also, Paris and London don't seem to be very safe and cozy cities from many perspectives.