Athenscope -<_
Title of the Urban Study:
Nea Athina: Rise and Fall of the Socialist Planned Settlement in Athens
This urban study examines the retreat of modern, state-organized construction in favor of a family- and clan-based way of life—an approach that has prevailed in the Balkans since the 19th century—using the transformation of a large-scale public housing estate as a case study.
One of the first initiatives of the newly formed government under the leadership of Nikos Zachariadis was the creation of a socialist model city in Athens—a city heavily damaged by World War II and, above all, the ensuing civil war.
Zachariadis and the Politburo were not content with simply rebuilding destroyed neighborhoods such as Exarchia, Makrigianni, Leninika, or Piraeus. Instead, they planned an entirely new type of city, based on socialist ideals, that would serve as a prototype for future urban development across the country. A new era begins—with the vision of a socialist society enjoying a higher quality of life, declared Rizospastis, the official newspaper of the Communist Party of Greece, at the time. The government's overarching goal, however, was not only architectural transformation, but above all, the pacification and accommodation of the thousands of war-displaced people
Planning and Drawings: Loukas Triandis, Ioannis Savvidis
Photography: Ioannis Savvidis
still living in temporary shelters on the outskirts of the city.Today, more than 200,000 people live in what is known
as “New Athens” (colloquially: “Staliniés” – roughly meaning “Stalinhuts”), originally designed for just 90,000 residents. The result has been rapid decay and the devaluation of what was once a model housing project. Efforts to revitalize the derelict industrial facilities have been slow. In the absence #of city-wide planning, many conversions have taken place illegally and without any overarching urban strategy.As a result, increasingly non-local but profit-driven enterprises have moved in: amusement parks, nightclubs, casinos, and shady warehouse operations. Illegal appropriation of open space is also on the rise. The neighborhood no longer follows the modern principle of functional separation of living, working, and leisure. Instead, immediate everyday needs dominate—and the family, in contrast to the once-powerful state welfare system, has returned to the center of life planning.In the end, uncontrolled densification will have brought about exactly what Nea Athina was originally designed to prevent.