Surprising Reasons Why Cities Need More Shade

Urban dwellers need more shade. A recent Israeli report explains why.

Is there anything worse than being in a hot city with cars idling, kicking up heat and pollution? We don’t think so, and apparently Erick van Egeraat agrees. The city of Unaizah has approved Egeraat’s plans to build a massive ring road around the city, as well as an underground street.

Sheikh Zayed Road in Dubai will soon play host to the world’s largest shopping mall – the gargantuan Mall of the World. Comprised of 48 million square feet of over-the-top retail, residential, and even medical services, the covered pedestrian city is expected to attract some 180 million visitors a year. I shudder at the thought.

Saudi Arabia has announced that the construction industry has five years to “green” up their business. Amid a massive construction boom, the Presidency of Meteorology and Environment (PME) has decreed that all companies must reduce their air, water and noise pollution in keeping with regulations approved in 2008.

The Kenyan government is reportedly paving the way for China to build a new city just outside of the capital. Some 100 Chinese investors aim to build roughly 20 skyscrapers in the enclave, which is expected to become a shopping destination for products from China and other countries.

How many times have you seen a big old patch of lawn in the middle of Abu Dhabi and cringed?

Three lamp-shaped towers make up the new Aladdin City that is being constructed in Dubai as part of an effort to boost the city’s profile ahead of the 2020 World Expo. I wonder what the genie thinks?

Nobody knows more about bicycles than the Dutch, but Israelis will have a chance to glean some design and urban planning wisdom from the waterlogged nation next week at the “Going Dutch” conference established by their Prime Minister and (the much more fit) Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.

Maison Edouard François designed a colorful new mixed-used residential master plan for Casablanca, a cosmopolitan Moroccan city made famous by a movie with the same name.

Luca Curci architects have designed a concept for a futuristic metropolis in the United Arab Emirates that is comprised of modular “organic” buildings on land and offshore crescent-shaped “moons.”

As Qatar prepares for the 2022 World Cup amid bribery allegations and gross human rights violations, the world is watching every move. Which may explain why the Emir controls every major and minor decision – including the new Doha metro design.

Dubai is getting another enormous development, except this time, Emaar Properties and Dubai Holding are pitching The Lagoons as an entrepreneurial and cultural hub for tomorrow’s youth.

Portal-9-Issue-2-Abdulrahman-Makhlouf-Photograph-by-Ziyah-Gafic.jpg

In the new Portal 9, the first Arabic-English journal about the city, the founder of Abu Dhabi’s urban planning department talks with editor Todd Reisz about planning crowded Cairo, working with Sheikh Zayed and practicing in mid-century Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

The Yedikule neighborhood of Istanbul is on edge as bulldozers recently razed two gardens that have been cultivated for the last 1,500 years, The Atlantic Cities reports. This is taking place in tandem with the ongoing Gezi Park saga despite a court’s ruling that the latter should not be cleared to make way for a shopping […]

Byblos, the world’s oldest continuously inhabited city in Lebanon has been named the Arab world’s best tourist city by the United Nations World Tourism Organization, and it offers a host of lessons in greening too.

In a Middle Eastern city with paltry green space, residents gather to object to new development that will destroy one of their few public parks. Sound familiar? Spin the globe, but this time stop at Beirut in Lebanon.

Activists warn that a planned highway in Beirut will ruin what little is left of the city’s remaining green and historic spaces at the same time that tens of thousands of people are swarming streets throughout Turkey following a violent government crackdown on Gezi Park protestors.

Premier-Campus-Office-in-Kagithane-by-JDS-Architects-01.jpg

Whether or not a 100,000 square meter office complex could possibly come with even a net environmental benefit is debatable, but the fact that a design wrapped in green won an international competition for such a complex signals a potential shift in Turkey’s urban planning.

Solar panels at the pyramids. In the past two years since a popular uprising ousted former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, the question of sustainability, energy and overall environmental awareness has been as evident as a clean street in Cairo. Basically, it has been nonexistent. Actually, it had been nonexistent until recently. Over the past few months, Egyptians have […]

Despite all the criticism the plan received from urban planners, lawyers, activists, academics, and concerned citizens, Istanbul has begun remodeling its central square, a focal point for transportation and protests.

Turkey is reforming its property laws according to Reuters. Among other changes, new laws will double the amount of land foreigners are allowed to buy in Turkey. Wealthy investors from Russia and the Middle East are taking a new interest in Istanbul. According to the Knight Frank Global House Price Index, Turkish property prices are […]

My nephews are fortunate. They live on a verdant property called Hungrytown Hollow among enormous trees and bucolic rolling hills outside Charlottesville, Virginia. In the summertime the two boys splash around in a lake near their property and go on long hikes with their father. They chase chickens and plant seeds and are called upon to help […]

A relief to the environment as Israel allots money to upgrade poorly services sewers in Arab towns. Last Wednesday, Israeli Energy and Water Resources Minister Uzi Landau announced the government is allocating NIS 355 million to improve the sewerage systems in Arab neighborhoods across Israel. In recent years, the neglected and dilapidated sewer infrastructures in […]

The mayor of Lebanon’s capital Beirut has launched “Beirut is Amazing,” an ambitious plan to finally green up the infamous concrete city. Following dedicated activism and scores of complaints from urban planners and designers, the city recruited the private sector to help regenerate existing green spaces and to create a few more. But Horsh Beirut, […]

Supported in part by the Egyptian German Private Sector Development Programme (PSDP), the ZERO award 2012 has extended their deadline for Egyptian designers eager to submit innovative green ideas to the country’s architecture, interior design, and urban planning challenges. The top entries from each category will be recognized publicly and internationally and the winners will also […]