Monaco’s Urban Challenge – Metropolitans

In association with Principality of Monaco
Monaco is a mere mountainside sliver of 2 square kilometres. Its 36,000 people make it the most densely-populated place in the world. The city-state’s heady mix of glamour, chic and wealth is hard to resist for people with money to spend or salt away. Demand for a piece of the action is high. For saturated Monaco the only way is up.

Planning vital expansion is a constant trade-off between demolishing period properties and forcing locals out, and adding square metres.

In 1965 Prince Rainier I launched Monaco’s most ambitious land reclamation scheme, the Fontvielle district. Eight years and seven million cubic metres of rubble later the town had gained 15 football pitches worth of flat land.

A semi-submersible concrete dyke made in Gibraltar was towed into Monaco in 2002. The visible part is only half the story. You have to descend four levels of car parks to find out how this part of Monaco is attached to the land.

Monaco is not stopping here. A tender is out for a new extension.

On land it is all about height, not depth. Like Hong Kong Monaco has learned to live with public lifts and escalators. Forty assisted routes compliment traditional stepped pavements.

When the Odeon Tower project is completed its 170m height will make it one of Europe’s tallest buildings. Designed by a local architect, delivery of its units begins next summer.

This perpetual renewal raises the question of how to preserve Monaco’s heritage. New properties may be cutting-edge environmentally, but there is nostalgia for what’s been sacrificed, too.

READ MORE HERE: http://www.euronews.com/2013/09/07/monaco-s-urban-challenge/

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