Maspero Triangle Masterplan

1 – We propose an exchange of properties that will allow private investors to develop the Nile waterfront – with the exception of a New Museum – and will at the same time allow the public sector to secure property of the popular neighbourhood in order to upgrade this area using the revenues of the sales of the land along the waterfront and the taxation on real estate profits. This exchange allows not to displace the inhabitants of the popular neighbourhood. 2 – Inside the popular neighbourhood – that after the property exchange will be entirely owned by the public sector – we propose a series of small interventions (restorations, completions). These interventions will not compromise the identity of the area, on the contrary they will bring new life to the neighbourhood by introducing new productive activities such as workshops for craftsmen and services. New construction technologies will be experimented in the upgrading of the area. 3 – In the spaces between the popular neighbourhood and the waterfront we propose to develop a series of new residential settlements, where the Cairene middle class – that in the last years abandoned Downtown Cairo – could come back to a new, intense, metropolitan life, directly linked with the attractions of the centre and of the new waterfront. 4 – We propose a new waterfont made of residential towers that ends with a new hotel at the northern end of Maspero Triangle. At the centre of the waterfront there will be a New Museum. The New Museum (that could be developed in close partnership with similar international institutions) will combine a new public square open onto the Nile, an elevated platform for laboratories, ateliers and artistic production and a system of exhibition spaces grouped in a circular volume. 5 – We imagine a system of new green islands along the river that will contain public spaces open to the city and a new, elevated Botanical Garden covering the colossal road interchange which separates Maspero Triangle form the Egyptian Museum.