Reykjavík Grapevine - 07.03.2008, Qupperneq 11

Vatnsmýri – An Introduction
Vatnsmýri is a 150 hectare area which is currently
occupied by the Reykjavík domestic Airport. Lo-
cated a few minutes walk from the commotion of
the city centre, the airport was initially built as a
military air base by British occupying forces dur-
ing WWII. It has been a fact of life in Reykjavík
ever since. Although the airport was considered to
be a fair way out of town in the 1940s, Reykjavik’s
expansion from a village of 45,000 at the time, to
a modern urban city with nearly 200,000 inhabit-
ants in the Greater Reykjavík Area, has radically
altered that reality.
Urban sprawl has troubled Reykjavík plan-
ning authorities for a long time. As the population
increases, the city’s periphery extends further
away from the city centre. With an emphasis on
sustainable development and more ecologically
responsible city planning, problems created by
sprawling cities – such as traffic congestion, waste
from excessive commuting and expensive public
transit – have become particularly relevant.
For more than 20 years, people have dis-
cussed and debated the question of whether the
airport should be relocated in order to make room
for urban development, and the question was one
of the central topics of the last two city elections.
In 2002, a new detailed land use plan for Reyk-
javík was approved, which called for a substantial
reduction of the airport by 2016, and a full depar-
ture by 2024, with the aim of using the land for de-
velopment. In order to begin preparations for the
gradual phase-out of the airport, the City of Reyk-
javík agreed to organise a two-stage international
planning competition, which called for new ideas
for the future of Vatnsmýri, in 2005. After some ini-
tial resistance and litigation, the competition was
finally launched in March 2007.
Looking For That Special Something
“We were looking for a vision for the city,” says
Steve Christer, architect and member of the jury,
when I ask him about the goal of the competition.
“We were looking for ideas on how an area like
this should develop, looking for things to make
Vatnsmýri special. There really was no vision for
Vatnsmýri. People have been debating this for
nearly 25 years, but there has never been any vi-
sion for what the area might look like. Now, we
finally have something to develop critically.”
Christer is no stranger to dealing with po-
litically charged planning controversies after his
firm won the competition to design the Reykjavík
City Hall in 1987. He maintains that although plan-
ning the area is quite complicated, it still requires
answers to specific, simple questions like how
people should get in and out of there and what
sort of lifestyle people should lead there. “People
tried very hard to understand the place, but very
few managed to come to grips with it. It is a very
complex place,” he adds.
A total of 136 entries were submitted for the
competition and, after careful delegation, the jury
declared Graeme Massie, Stuart Dickson, Alan
Keane and Tim Ingleby from Graeme Massie Ar-
chitects in Edinburgh, Scotland, as the winners.
The jury’s remarks stated that the scheme had the
qualities required as a starting point for the future
development of Vatnsmýri and offers a clear and
convincing response to the requirements of the
competition brief. More importantly, it also says
that while transport has not been fully resolved
in the proposal, it appears to be robust enough to
accommodate further developments and address
external realities.
Massie is no stranger to Icelandic planning
competitions. He was awarded first prize in a
planning competition for a new vision for Down-
town Akureyri in 2004. When I ask him if he holds
the key to the nation’s heart when it comes to
planning, he answers, “I think there are similari-
ties between Iceland and Scotland. Perhaps most
importantly with regards to the competition suc-
cesses is the idea of landscape. Both countries
have renowned natural landscapes, which can be
inspiring, and as such we find the relationship be-
tween landscape and building to be fundamental
to much of our work. In our proposals for Reykja-
vik, a landscape infrastructure connects all areas
from 101, through Vatnsmyri to the coast. This
landscape is continually changing and ranges
from a large central park with new lakes, to for-
mal gardens and coastal paths. These areas are
important in providing an escape from what will
be a dense neighbourhood.”
The Missing Puzzle
When I ask Christer what it was that attracted
him to this proposal, he explains that many of the
entries were fragile because of their complexity.
If one aspect does not work, the whole scheme
falls apart. Massie approached things differently.
“He dared to be simple. He dared to be clear. It is
a strong skeleton that you can mess about with,
but it will still keep its shape. You can change it
here, or you can change it there, but the plan will
still hold,” he says, pointing to a poster of the pro-
posal.
Other members of the jury echo Christer’s
words. City Council member and head of the
jury, Dagur B. Eggertsson, says the strength of the
proposal is how simple and effortless it is, draw-
ing on time-proven, classic schemes in Reykjavík
planning. Hanna Birna Kristjánsdóttir, another
member of the jury and City Council, says the
proposal’s basis on classic forms that still allow
for flexibility was appealing. “To me it felt like the
missing puzzle, and I thought it would fit our city
and its future especially well.”
Put simply, the proposal takes an area that
is roughly outlined by the University to the west,
Öskjuhlíð to the east, the Lake to the north and
the ocean to the south, and replicates certain el-
ements in the surroundings to create an almost-
familiar feel to the plan. The public park, Hjóm-
skálagarðurinn, is extended southwards and a
new pond established as the focus of Vatnsmýri
surrounded by new buildings, arranged in a grid
that duplicates street plans for the old Þingholt
neighbourhood. The principal development
area is in a strip between the extended parallels
of Baronstígur and Snorrabraut from Þingholt
to Fossvogur. A diagonal axis cuts this strip and
connects it directly to the city centre. Additional
housing is on the flanks of Öskjuhlið and north
of Skerjafjörður and extends the University of
Iceland campus to the new pond, while the main
transport line from east to west in the city is lead
through a tunnel beneath the area. It is genius in
its simplicity.
The simplicity of the plan allows for a gradu-
al approach and future revisions as need dictates.
“The proposal could be described as a frame-
work,” says Graeme Massie. “For the master plan
to be successful it must be robust and should be
able to accommodate change over time. We will
need to consult with all the stakeholders in the
area to ensure that their needs are fully addressed
in the plan.” He adds, “The Vatnsmýri area is of
huge importance to the ongoing development of
Reykjavik. Cities now compete globally for busi-
ness and of course tourism, and it is rare for such
global cities to have such an area of land right in
the city centre. The development of Vatnsmyri
should provide Reykjavik with an alternative to
101 as a desirable location to live, work and play.”
The Future of the Airport
Following the results of the competition, Stuart
Massie has been appointed as a consultant for the
development of Vatnsmýri and the city has estab-
lished a steering group that will oversee the future
of the area. As of now, no decision has been made
on when or how the airport will be relocated, and
the City Council majority has stated that no deci-
sion will be made this term, as necessary research
of available options has still not been concluded.
However, work will begin as early as this year on
peripheral locations that will not affect the airport
in its current form.
According to Hanna Birna Kristjánsdóttir,
the winning proposal is not binding for the future
development of Vatnsmýri, but she states that
“the proposal must nevertheless be the baseline
for future plans, as there was wide and important
agreement on it.” Dagur B. Eggertsson agrees, stat-
ing that the proposal serves as a good foundation
to work from. “I believe that we should use the mo-
mentum right now to support the development of
the overall vision as well as looking at the detailed
implementation of specific areas,” he adds.
While Christer acknowledges that we might
still have to wait a few years before developments
really begin, time is on our side. “I think it is posi-
tive that we can use this time to make sure that we
do things correctly. There are still problems that
need to be solved. We have ten years to make it
better.”
An exhibition of the 16 awarded proposals in the
Vatnsmýri planning competition is on display in
Háskólatorg at the University of Iceland through
March.
Feature | Reykjavík Grapevine | Issue 03 2008 | 11
Opposite page: Large scale model of the winning
proposal. This page: Top, Master plan for the winning
proposal. Below: Imagined street shots from Vatnsmýri