The Floating Sky Walk Plan That Could Change the Face of Stockholm

[M II A II R II K]

The Floating Sky Walk Plan That Could Change the Face of Stockholm


Jan 12, 2016

By FEARGUS O'SULLIVAN

Read More: http://www.citylab.com/design/2016/0...ckholm/423690/

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A new plan proposed for the Swedish capital would see a large slice of its city center built over with densely packed towers, joined at their peaks by a dramatic zigzag of tree-lined, open air gangways.

- Sweden’s capital is one of the fastest growing cities in Europe, with a population due to swell by 17 percent in just nine years. If it isn’t going to sprawl unmanageably or become overcrowded, it’s going to have to find somewhere to put everyone. One key solution could be to densify, as the proposal suggests, by rooting out and building on every scrap of currently un-built inner city land.

- Called Klarastaden, or “clear city”, the plan comes from Anders Berensson Architects. While the group’s utopian bent might be clear from previous designs that include such oddities as folding saunas and luxury nests for swallows, Klarastaden does identify a useful site: a knot of railway tracks that could be built over behind Stockholm’s Central Station. --- As renderings show, this site could be transformed into a snaking tail of high-rises—necessarily dense so that profits can cover the high cost of burying the railway tracks within a tunnel.

- Towers of different widths and heights would be combined to prevent any building from feeling too hemmed-in or dingy, with every second building rising no more than four floors. Strung together, this would make the development’s overall silhouette resemble a badly broken comb. In a fashionable nod to look-at-me urbanism, these towers would be capped by a high-rise park, connected by pathways strung like tightropes across the chasms between the towers.

- The proposal addresses issues that many European cities faced with rising land values and limited space are currently considering. London is bristling anew almost every day with towers. Controversially, these are moving away from the financial district to traditionally residential areas, as is the case with this planned Renzo Piano cylinder. Paris is letting the odd skyscraper creep onto its fringes, while Berlin has just green-lighted a residential tower that critics have called an “architectural crime.”

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[Swede]

It's not that new a plan, it was put forward by the Center party before the last elections. Apart from the skywalks, I like it. It's not the first proposal for building on top of the railways that's been floated in the last 10 years, but it is one of the best IMO. Apart from the unrealistic skywalks (few would use them) I think it's one that makes a lot of sense.
Sadly, the Center party is very small in Stockholm with just 3 out of 99 seats in the city's parliament (sure, it's the city council, but at 99 seats it IS a parliament). So this proposal ain't going nowhere.

[M II A II R II K]

Skywalks could pave the way for the more 3 Dimensional city with extra pedestrian space, and be car free as well.

[Swede]

I agree, but there has to be enough people to actually use them. This is a strip of land 1-2 blocks wide which would have a density not far above the older parts of the inner city. Which will make for a good amount of people on the surface streets, creating people flows that would support businesses at street level. Not enough people to also have a second level of streetlife. Also, the traffic along this strip is far from being heavy.

So, i agree in principle. But it'll only work in places with far higher densities.

[thomaswhite544]

Its really interesting information to me and thank you so much for sharing this with us.