Pyramid City
Eco and Sustainable City Concept
Promoted by
IP Direct Group
October 2008
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Imagine…

(…) an area the size of Amsterdam (150 km2), built over in accordance with
traditional urban development. With pyramid cities 7 km2 (7 pyramids of
100,000 occupants) would suffice. The remainder of the same area would then be
a recreational area or unspoilt nature (143 km2) (…)
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Picture 2 Profile of Pyramid City
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Picture 3 Floor Plan of Pyramid City
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PICTURE 4 - EXAMPLE OF SQUARE WITH TWO STOREY SHOPPING ARCADE
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PICTURE 6 - APARTMENTS
PICTURE 7 - CROSS SECTION OF BUILDING OVER MOTORWAY OR RAILWAY
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PICTURE 8 - BUILDING OVER OF A MOTORWAY OR RAILWAY
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PICTURE 9 - BUILDING OVER OF DYKES
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Sustainable city
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A sustainable city, ecocity or ecopolis is an entire city dedicated to
minimizing the required inputs (of energy, water and food) and its waste
output (of heat, air pollution as CO2, methane, and water pollution.)
Richard Register first coined the term "ecocity" in his 1987 book, Ecocity
Berkeley: building cities for a healthy future. Another leading figure who
envisioned the sustainable city was architect Paul F. Downton, who later
founded the company Ecopolis Architects.

A sustainable city can feed and power itself with minimal reliance on the
surrounding countryside, and creates the smallest possible ecological
footprint for its residents. This results in a city that is friendly to the
surrounding environment, in terms of pollution, land use, and alleviation of
global warming. It is estimated that by 2007, over half of the world’s
population will live in urban areas and this provides both challenges and
opportunities for environmentally-conscious developers.
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EcoCity definition by Urban Ecology Australia

Ecocities
An ecocity is a human settlement that enables its residents to live a good quality of life while using minimal
natural resources.
Buildings
Its buildings make best use of sun, wind and rainfall to help supply the energy and water needs of occupants.
Generally multistory to maximize the land available for greenspace.
Biodiversity
It is threaded with natural habitat corridors, to foster biodiversity and to give residents access to nature for
recreation.
Transport
Its food and other goods are sourced from within its borders or from nearby, in order to cut down on transport
costs.
The majority of its residents live within walking or cycling distance of their workplace, to minimise the need for
motorised transport.
Frequent public transport connects local centres for people who need to travel further.
Local car sharing allows people to use a car only when needed.
Industry
The goods it produces are designed for reuse, remanufacture, and recycling.
The industrial processes its uses involve reuse of by-products, and minimise the movement of goods.
Economy
It has a labour intensive rather than a material, energy, and water intensive economy, to maintain full
employment and minimise material throughput.
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Why Pyramid City 10 reasons…
1. ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTERS CAN BE PREVENTED THROUGH THE
INTEGRATION OF WORK AND LIVING
2. MANY TIMES LESS BUILDING LAND AND OIL
3. NO LOCAL TRAFFIC-JAMS AND AN ENORMOUS DECLINE IN
INTERLOCAL TRAFFIC-JAMS
4. NO ENERGY FROM FOSSIL FUELS AND NO NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS
5. UNAFFECTED BY FLOODS, HURRICANES AND EARTHQUAKES
6. THE ANSWER TO DISADVANTAGED NEIGHBOURHOODS. LARGE
DECREASE IN POVERTY
7. THE MYTH OF DENSITY
8. IDENTITY, INTIMACY, INTEGRATION
9. DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION
10. CONDENSING ON A SMALLER SCALE
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1. ENVIRONMENTAL DISASTERS CAN BE PREVENTED
THROUGH THE INTEGRATION OF WORK AND LIVING

Our environmental problems are largely caused by the strange post World War II
notion within urban development that living, work and recreation should be so far
removed from one another that one cannot function without a car any longer. In
fact, many Western countries forbid the combining of work and living: we employ
industrial estates for work, residential areas for living and shopping centres for
shopping. Even the smallest daily activity requires a car. Blinded by the mistaken
belief that economic growth will increase our overall happiness, post-war policy
has not at all heeded effective land and energy-saving urban development, leaving
us with serious environmental problems such as future power-shortage, traffic-jams,
traffic accidents, air pollution, stench and noise. While pointing the finger at the
poor Third World countries for cutting too many trees for the sake of their
economic development, we ourselves practice a far more damaging energy and
land-devouring policy. We see the splinter in the other's eye, but fail to see the beam
in our own. There is a disturbing worldwide lack of vision with regard to these
environmental issues.
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2. MANY TIMES LESS BUILDING LAND AND OIL

We will have to construct in such a way, as to no longer be dependent on vast
amounts oil, gas and building land. We will have to rid ourselves of our addiction to
energy and land through a new means of urban development. Pyramid cities (view
picture 1) can solve this problem and at the same time rise above the Vinex quality
of post-war neighbourhoods, as they are more spacious, cleaner and without noise.
Hardly any building land is required for these pyramid cities. Imagine, for example,
an area the size of Amsterdam (150 km2), built over in accordance with traditional
urban development. With pyramid cities 7 km2 (7 pyramids of 100,000 occupants)
would suffice. The remainder of the same area would then be a recreational area or
unspoilt nature (143 km2), onto which everyone has a permanent view from his or
her town square and where he or she can recreate at walking distance. When
properly spread out throughout the globe the entire world population would need no
more than 250 square kilometres of the earth's surface. For urban development a
total of land surface would be needed the size of The Netherlands or a tiny corner
of the Gobi or the Sahara desert. The rest of the world can then be used for farming
and horticulture or remain unspoilt nature. With the exception of heavy industry,
industrial estates will be superfluous. This cuts back the amount of building land by
thirty times. In such a city there is no traffic. Such a city is without traffic noise or
air pollution and tremendous savings are made on oil and gas.
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3. NO LOCAL TRAFFIC-JAMS AND AN ENORMOUS
DECLINE IN INTERLOCAL TRAFFIC-JAMS
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All vertical transport is essentially done by lift (or staircase).
The lift takes you to your living square and from there you
walk to your home (view pictures 2 and 3). The place where
you live is free of traffic noise, stench from cars, air pollution,
CO2-emission, or roads that make traffic accidents possible.
Traffic-jams will be impossible in town and will be reduced
enormously with regard to intercity traffic, as policy should
aim to have people find work as close to home as possible.
Because the cities are self-containing economic units there will
hardly be any intercity traffic-jams and the greenhouse effect
will gradually disappear.
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4. NO ENERGY FROM FOSSIL FUELS AND NO
NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS
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Because of the compact cities there is no more need
for energy from fossil fuels. There is hardly any loss
of heat, because the working accommodations have
no outer walls and the pipe network can be very
short. All heating, cooling and electricity may be
supplied by the burning of one's own household
refuse, which can be stored in the basements. But this
is also effectively possible using terrestrial heat or
solar panels. If we move to building walkingpyramids, nuclear power plants and wind mills will
no longer be necessary. Also, the household refuse
problem will be solved at the same time.
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5. UNAFFECTED BY FLOODS, HURRICANES AND
EARTHQUAKES
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Such economic units can be built anywhere,
even in the most hostile of areas, but also at
sea, along the coast, over banks or in lakes.
They are unaffected by floods and the sea level
rise caused by global warming. They can be
constructed such as to relieve any fear we were
to have had of hurricanes and earthquakes. In
that sense they act as Noah's Ark. Existing
banks could also be built over linearly, as is
shown in picture 9.
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6. THE ANSWER TO DISADVANTAGED
NEIGHBOURHOODS. LARGE DECREASE IN POVERTY
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If we were to pull down the disadvantaged or slum
neighbourhoods in and around our major cities and start
rebuilding them in phases with pyramid cities, there would
suddenly be a large increase in recreational green space in
those same cities. In addition, everyone would have clean
water, sanitary and sewerage. Furthermore, the building of
such pyramids provides an enormous impulse to the city's
employment, making possible effective combating of poverty
in the Third World, through IMF loans. People would then live
in independent economic units, enabling poor people to
provide for themselves without having to own a car.
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7. THE MYTH OF DENSITY
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It has been scientifically shown that there is a direct relationship between poverty
and unsafety, and not between density and unsafety. The fable dating from the
seventies about lemmings, claiming that they commit suicide when the population
density is too high, does not apply to human beings or other animals living in
colonies. Only wealth or poverty is of consequence. A density of 1000 residents per
ha seems like a lot, but basically does not differ from the current density in the
major cities, as long as the same measuring techniques are applied. Because in both
the pyramids and in current cities the measurements must be carried out excluding
roads, canals, parks, offices, stores, work rooms, parking space, etc. In the pyramids
these functions are located underneath the houses. In contemporary cities they are
located next to the houses. This means that in our contemporary cities one usually
looks out onto houses across the street from his or her house, at a distance of
approx. 15 meters, whereas in a pyramid city one always lives facing a large square
of, on average, 80 x 80 meters. The size of these squares can be compared to, for
example, the Great Market in Haarlem, where the Great Church is taller than the
buildings facing onto the square. But almost every fine city has one such square,
think of Siena, Brugge, Rome, Toledo, etc. etc. Pyramid cities are made up
exclusively of many of these various large squares.
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8. IDENTITY, INTIMACY, INTEGRATION
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Children can play safely again on the park-like squares. There are only closed
building blocks that guarantee intimacy and social security. Besides living there, the
squares also offer many stores, offices and schools (view picture 4). There is
enough employment in the vicinity, which ensures there are always social activities
taking place on the squares. The living and the work surface take up approximately
the same amount of space and everything can be done on foot, using escalators if
necessary. Square cities offer a sense of well-being that Vinex locations lack.
Contrary to Vinex locations pyramid cities focus on Identity, Intimacy and
Integration (of living, shopping, working, traffic and recreation). They function as
an apartment block. Via two main roads crossing one another on ground level
underneath the pyramid, totalling 2 km in length, you enter the city, leaving your
car downstairs, near the elevator belonging to your living square. Underneath this
main road lies the underground or railway, including a station at the heart of the
pyramid. The municipalities need not prepare the site for building. They do not
need to provide roads, sewerage, lighting, green spaces, etc. This means there are
no expensive preparatory costs. Road maintenance is minimal, as these roads are
located frost, sun and rain-free.
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9. DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION
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The design and construction of the square walls are entirely
free, provided verticality is the keynote, if need be
strengthened by the colour combination. The houses may have
a modern appearance or that of the Amsterdam canal side
walls, depending on the wishes of the occupants. Each house,
including the ones on top of one another, can thus receive a
different appearance. The occupants may also freely choose
bay windows, balconies and loggias. Although staple
construction is used (as it is in beautiful cities such as Dubai
and Monaco), one fifth of the houses have roofs and large
gardens (view picture 5). The building method is cheap,
because the pyramid construction can be built almost entirely
from market model parking decks.
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10. CONDENSING ON A SMALLER SCALE
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Pyramid cities are the large-scale solution to our environmental problems
and the poverty in the world. But our current cities can also be condensed
effectively, with exactly the same advantages. This can be done in two
ways, namely:
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a. by building apartment pyramids that need a much smaller surface than
our modern buildings, while offering the same advantages as the pyramid
cities (view picture 6 and 7). The NOVEM calculated some time ago that
such a building method no longer has need of fossil fuels energy.
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b. by building over existing motorways and railways. This way a city like
Amsterdam could still offer accommodation to 200,000 more residents, if
the ring road around the city was built over
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Links
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_city
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimizu_Mega-City_Pyramid
 http://www.ecocitybuilders.org/
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