The greater Tel Aviv area has made its trash mountain, and now it has to be seated and entertained in it. A 50,000 seat amphitheater is currently being planned for Hiria – the former site of Israel’s largest garbage dump. We guess you could say that the park is being re-purposed or recycled into an amphitheater. Israel’s largest garbage dump was decommissioned for several reasons – one being bird crashes with airplanes, proving a flight risk for planes coming in and out of Ben Gurion Airport.
The site is now an eco park.
The amphitheater will be built in the northern section of the park, and is being planned by German landscape architects Latz + Partner as well as Israeli landscape architect firms Broida-Maoz and Moria Sekely. (As of 2024, the amphitheatre has not been built).
Members of former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon’s family, after whom the park is named, were the ones to express interest in building an amphitheater.
According to Danny Sternberg, the Ayalon Park project director, the family was “looking for something they could give to the Israeli public. It’s an opportunity to plan, from scratch, a large, open-air theater with all the necessary infrastructure. It will also bring ticket prices down significantly, because [promoters] won’t need to set up the stage and barriers and lay all the cables each time.”
Listening to Beyonce on a trash mountain?
In order to facilitate environmentally responsible transportation to the amphitheater, a train station is going to be built nearby. They will also be building a parking lot to accomadate thousands of vehicles, but we hope that people going to performances in the amphitheater will choose greener, public transportation.
But all of this preparation will take some time. Approval of the final plans make take up to three years, with planners of the amphitheater expecting it to be completed by 2014.
Sternberg talked about the transformation of the garbage mountain into an amphitheater for the masses, saying that “until now Hiria was a backyard that everyone suffered from, and now everyone will be able to enjoy it. This used to be a garbage dump – now it will be a park that will serve as the gateway to Israel for those coming from abroad.”
Read more about Hiriya::
Hiria Garbage Mountain Gets Green Lighting from Clean Energy
Hiria: A Garbage Dump Turned Recycling Dream
Going On a Picnic to Tel Aviv’s Garbage Mountain
Author: Karen Chernick
Much to the disappointment of her Moroccan grandmother, Karen became a vegetarian at the age of seven because of a heartfelt respect for other forms of life. She also began her journey to understand her surroundings and her impact on the environment. She even starting an elementary school Ecology Club and an environmental newsletter in the 3rd grade. (The proceeds of the newsletter went to non-profit environmental organizations, of course.) She now studies in New York. Karen can be reached at karen (at) greenprophet (dot) com.
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