With only a finite amount of land available on Earth, and 100% of the world’s population living on just 29% of the available space, could a life at sea be the answer to population growth and overcrowding? JLL director Neil Worrall thinks so. Introducing The Next Big Thing: Aquacities
Water, water everywhere and nowhere left to live. So what’s the solution?
Land takes up under 30% of the world’s surface – a realisation that hit Neil Worrall while he was helping his nine-year-old son with his geography homework earlier this year. A realisation that formed the basis for his entry into Estates Gazette’s The Next Big Thing competition.
“I am an accountant,” says the JLL director. “I was looking at the globe and it struck me that 100% of the world’s population lives on just 29% of the space available. That doesn’t sound right, does it? When you take a step back, the answer to that problem suddenly seems quite clear.”
Introducing Aquacities – Worrall’s plan to address the real danger of rapidly growing populations and overcrowding in cities around the world.
It all starts by heading offshore, by at least 12 nautical miles to be exact – and that’s not just for the hell of it. It is all part of Worrall’s grand plan for a series of carbon positive, earthquake and tsunami–proof cities to be built in oceans around the world.
By being so far from the nearest coast they would be in international waters and so beyond the realms of any existing state jurisdiction. The plan instead would be to introduce a new UN global governance structure to ensure each of the new cities have an equal chance of flourishing.
“I would want them all to have an equal structure and equal financial systems and benefits,” says Worrall. “So an Aquacity off the coast of Bangladesh would have the same chance as one built off the coast of San Francisco.”
He adds that by building 100 cities of 500 square miles each the increase in available, habitable space would be less than 1% of the total available space on earth. Add to this the fact that, by his calculations, each city could house around 7.5m people thanks to ultra-efficient design, and that means 750m extra people on a landmass increase of just 1%.
Worrall’s idea captured the imagination of the judges of the competition, which called on the property sector to submit ideas on how to ease overpopulation in cities, and it was named the winning entry. But exactly how would the concept work? And could it ever become a reality?
Sustainable cities
The initial phase of Worrall’s Aquacities plan would be to build the first 100 sites as near as possible to existing cities with acute population issues.
On a practical, engineering side, Worrall proposes that the cities be built on a series of interconnecting hexagons which can be easily extended as required – and even created using 3D printers in the future.
The plates would be built on a hydraulic jack system which would underpin each plate so they could move up and down depending on sea levels – with specific consideration given to the expected rise due to global warming. Buildings would be earthquake-proof and would withstand the impact of other natural disasters including tsunamis.
Offsite travel would be provided by high-speed Maglev-style trains on bridges raised well above high tide sea levels. As for other goods, Worrall proposes that they be delivered by drones.
And he is quick to highlight the sustainable aspects of the cities: “The cities would be carbon positive,” he says. “Energy would be provided by a combination of clean energies, they would be car and aeroplane free. Modern paving systems would convert footsteps to energy and there would be an eco-friendly metro or bus system.
“Rainwater harvesting would be implemented and so would sustainable fishing strategies. And there is ongoing research into developing crops which can survive in salty water,” he adds.
Rental revolution
On the governance side, things get more complicated. Worrall concedes his plan is still at an embryonic stage, but he does say there would have to be systems in place to avoid the cities taking on the financial demographics of the land masses nearest to them.
“Perhaps not allowing real estate ownership is the answer,” he says. “Rather, everyone rents to avoid big companies going in and buying up a load of apartments and selling them on to make money. It needs to be a place for people rather than a place for organisations.”
He adds that while he does not want to see identikit cities springing up all over the world, they would all need to adhere to certain design regulations to ensure the buildings were safe. But he adds that the local culture and food would “represent the part of the world they are built in”.
As for who would govern, what nationality those born in the city would be, even what their passports might look like – Worrall is yet to decide.
But he has worked out that funding would have to come from every UN country, even though not all of them would have an Aquacity off their shores.
“This will be a challenge,” says Worrall. “China and other Asian countries are likely to need more of these cities near them but everyone would need to feed into the global structure. There needs to be a recognition that this is a global issue and even if you aren’t affected right now, growing population figures will affect everyone if we do not address the problem. We can’t just say ‘It’s not our fault China, go and sort yourself out.’”
But the big question is, could the idea work in reality? Worrall thinks it has a shot. “Lots of the technology to create these cities already exists,” he says. “Large oil platforms are built straight into the sea bed. The principles are there.”
And The Next Big Thing judges added that the Aquacities principle has great potential. Estates Gazette editor and judging chair Damian Wild said: “This entry captured the imaginations of everyone in the room. A hugely ambitious idea that carefully walks the line between futuristic and realistic. We were particularly impressed by its scalable nature. The option to grow the cities as they develop showed how much thought had been put into solving the problem of global population growth. Given the additional pressure on energy resources, the fact that Aquacities also offers a carbon positive solution convinced the judges that this was a worthy winner.”
• Do you think Aquacities will sink or swim? Share your thoughts on Twitter @estatesgazette #nextbigthing
The Next Big Thing is a new international competition launched by Estates Gazette in association with Cluttons. Over the last three months we have been calling on the property industry for ideas to address a very real issue for the future – urban population growth and overcrowding. In a rapidly expanding world innovation is key. We called for suggestions on how we can ease the overpopulation to our global cities are facing.
The competition was judged by some of the biggest names in international property and design.
