Foster & Partners to build green city in Abu Dhabi

[lllARKlll]

http://www.bdonline.co.uk/Pictures/468xAny/q/u/o/fosterdubai01.jpg
'>

Foster's masterplan for Abu Dhabi's eco-city.

http://www.bdonline.co.uk/Pictures/336xAny/x/v/k/fosterdubai2.jpg
http://www.bdonline.co.uk/Pictures/336xAny/f/s/k/fosterdubai3.jpg

The emirate aims to build the world's first zero-carbon, zero-waste metropolis

Foster & Partners has unveiled these images of the world's first zero-carbon, zero-waste city in Abu Dhabi.
The 6 million sq m development, launched today at Cityscape in Abu Dhabi, is part of the emirate's Masdar Initiative to draw up a sustainable blueprint for the future.
The masterplan draws on the traditional principles of walled cities and includes a university, the headquarters for Abu Dhabi's Future Energy Company, special economic zones and an innovation centre. The city will also have a large photovoltaic (PV) power plant and be car-free. Any expansion would be planned carefully, and the surrounding land will contain wind and PV farms, plus research fields and plantations, so that the new city will be entirely self-sustaining.
Norman Foster said: “The environmental ambition of the Masdar Initiative - to be zero carbon and waste-free - is a world first. The challenging design brief promises to question conventional urban wisdom at a fundamental level. Masdar promises to set new benchmarks for the sustainable city of the future.”

Fonte: BDonline

[JVS]

E surgem Samaris pelo Golfo Persico como cogumelos...

[lllARKlll]

Koolhaas, Foster clash over ‘similar’ designs

http://www.bdonline.co.uk/Pictures/336xAny/w/w/i/OMAFort_desert_NEW_ready.jpgVS

http://www.bdonline.co.uk/Pictures/336xAny/h/m/l/Foster_Masdar_plan_ready.jpg

18 May 2007

By Will Hurst


No plagiarism but we were first, says Rem, as Foster’s deny any real likeness between schemes

Two of the world’s leading architects, Rem Koolhaas and Norman Foster, have clashed over claims of a “remarkable similarity” between two of their most ambitious projects.
In the week that Foster & Partners confirmed the sale of a stake in the firm to private equity group 3i, the practice was forced to defend its newly unveiled 6sq km “zero-carbon, zero-waste” city in Abu Dhabi (News May 11) because of its resemblance to neighbouring Emirates development Rak Gateway by Koolhaas’s Office for Metropolitan Architecture.
Koolhaas revealed his practice had sought an explanation from Foster’s because of perceived similarities, including scale, shape, sustainable aspects and the grid system both cities will employ.
Although the Dutch architect later stressed there was “no suspicion” of plagiarism, he was keen to point out that his scheme had come first. Foster & Partners responded by issuing a terse statement denying any real similarity between the schemes.
Rak Gateway, which has not been widely publicised, is a 4.5sq km project proposed in Ras Al Khaimah for the Rak Investment Authority. It will be outlined by Koolhaas at the International Design Forum in Dubai next week.

“We want to establish that we launched this project in November last year,” Koolhaas told BD.
“It needed a conversation [with Foster & Partners] about how plausible it was that these similarities could happen.”
Fellow OMA partner Reinier de Graaf said its scheme was the “most radical in the world” in terms of density and its mix of functions.
But a spokeswoman for Foster’s insisted that “apart from the square shape”, there were no similarities between the schemes. She said the firm had no prior knowledge of the OMA project, despite it being shown at Mipim in March.
“Our scheme for a low-rise, carbon-neutral university city for the Masdar Initiative … has drawn inspiration from traditional Arabic walled cities and the 16th century ultradense square cities of Yemen,” she added.

Fonte: BDonline