ZAGREB, April 3, 2019 – Croatian associations of architects, urban planners, landscape architects and art historians sent an open letter to Zagreb mayor Milan Bandić on Tuesday, saying that the recently published plans for the implementation of the Zagreb Manhattan (or “City within the City”) project were unacceptable from several points of view.
The plans ignore the legal procedure and are completely disputable from a professional point of view, the organisations said in the letter, noting that the project had not been put to public consultation.
The project is not in line with the Urban Development Plan or with the Master Plan, they warned, stressing that procedural and professional conditions should be met for the implementation of the project.
The purpose of the “City within the City” project is to transform the area of 1.1 million square metres covering the Zagreb Trade Fair complex and the Hippodrome horse racing venue into “a new innovative mixed-use urban zone for various complementary purposes,” according to a call for expression of interest.
The call for expression of interest said that Novi Zagreb, the part of Zagreb south of the River Sava, does not have sufficient public, social, cultural, entertainment, commercial, sports and recreational facilities to meet the needs of its 120,000 residents, and that the planned project would improve the overall quality of life in the city.
Eagle Hills, a company based in the United Arab Emirates, has been selected as a possible partner for the “City within the City” development project, the Zagreb mayor’s office said in a press release early in March.
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