Imagine this: your whole world is up in the sky. You travel through an elevator, your work and your home is in the same building. You wake up every morning at the top of the world – literally – looking at the sunrise that’s just in front of you.
This is the promise of vertical cities, the future of real estate. It’s a concept that has been circulating around in the industry for some time now. Apparently, moving forward for a better economy and environment means we have to move up until we reach the sky’s limit.
But what are vertical cities? Is this some sort of a sci-fi fantasy? Or a great reality? Find out more as we tackle the issue of leveling up our future.
Tower of promise
Remember Pieter Bruegel’s painting The Tower of Babel? This has become one of the earliest representation of vertical cities. People back then are imaging what it’s like to have a type of architecture that goes all the way up towards the sky.
But vertical city is not only about tall buildings – it’s about creating a whole skyscraper inside a formidable structure. The urgency to plan out vertical cities is running high. This is because cities of the unstoppable rise of the human population. China is already on a roll to make this dream city to a reality by the construction of the world’s second tallest building, the Shanghai Tower.
Structure
According to the book Vertical City : A Solution for Sustainable Living by Kenneth King and Kellogg Wong, vertical cities can work through a specific structure:
At the bottom is the raised multilevel podium where bicycles and pedestrians can move freely. Below it is the space reserved for parking. The first level contains the important infrastructure such as water, sewer, and power storage plants. Meanwhile, the street level should contain entrances to important establishments like malls.
To connect the buildings with each other, King and Wong propose creating a “sky lobbies” that will not only serve as bridges but also as a place where people can hang out and socialize.
Why do we need it?
Vertical cities have advantages, especially on the issue of sustainability. Here are some of them:
- Less surface area: With vertical cities, it’s a possibility to lessen the surface area that we use in land. This is an opportunity to create more space for agriculture and forestry.
- Less transportation: You no longer have to use massive transportation system in order to move to the place that you need to go. Effective elevators and sky lobbies will serve as modern transportation for people on the go.
- Sustainable materials: In their book, King and Wong propose that vertical cities should be made of future materials like graphene and bioconcrete to lessen the pollution.
- HVAC system: HVAC refers to Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning. This is a more sustainable way to perform functionality in a building’s air conditioning system.
But of course these types of projects also have disadvantages. One of which is the decrease of natural light due to less surface area. Architects must make sure that the foundation of the buildings are safe enough to survive an earthquake. Vertical transportation also requires a lot of energy to become possible.
Vertical cities in the Philippines
The Philippines is a country who’s also planning on taking a step towards creating a vertical city. Just travel along EDSA and you will see buildings getting taller and taller and providing more services to the people. There has been an increase on the demand for condominiums, and developments are happily providing. Developments are building malls and recreational spaces to their condominiums for a one stop shop convenience to the buyers.
The only problem left is integrating tropical architecture in vertical cities. The Philippines is located in a tropical region. Developers and architects must be able to make sure that these tall buildings will be able to take on the wet and dry season of the Philippines. Real estate experts are forecasting a Manila Megapolis in 2021.
Vertical cities are no longer a location that you can see on sci-fi movies and literature. It’s now coming together as we speak. There’s a solution to every sustainable problem that we face. This mega plan can be one of them.