New white paper from Adapteo and BSK Arkitekter suggests: If 10 to 20 percent of new city plans are dedicated to flexible buildings, cities will become more sustainable and future-ready
Cities are facing major changes. They must be built with less climate impact and at the same time adapted to the climate changes that are already taking place. At the same time digitalization, demographic changes, and new mobility services are creating new needs. One way to meet these challenges is to make flexible buildings a natural part of new city plans. That is the conclusion in the new white paper The Flexible City - A vision of a sustainable and future-ready model for urban planning, written in collaboration between Adapteo and BSK Arkitekter.
The pandemic has accelerated several trends that affect how cities are planned. Increased e-commerce reduces the need for retail space and increased remote work creates new needs for workplaces and housing. However, the report states, the planning tools and slow processes used for urban planning today create urban environments and properties that are already built for old needs once they are ready.
In big cities, it often takes at least ten years from the time a need is identified until the building is completed. The buildings are often completely tailored to their intended task and therefore become both costly and time-consuming to adapt to changed needs later. Not to mention the waste of resources and the sustainability challenge that follows when relatively new concrete buildings are being demolished and replaced by new ones as the needs change.
“There is a great need for more flexible cities, where buildings can change function in step with changing conditions and needs, while it opens up for more recycling, more environmentally friendly materials and a greatly reduced climate impact. With our report, we want to show the opportunities that flexible wooden buildings create both to meet rapidly changing needs and requirements for lower climate impact and recycling,” says Hanna Wennberg, Senior Vice President, Marketing, Communication and Sustainability at Adapteo Group.
The report states that municipalities assign space corresponding to a share of 10 to 20 percent for flexibility in new urban development, which will enable a society that can be adjusted to new needs and rapid changes. If more space is created for flexible buildings that can be adapted, moved and reused, this will also drive innovation of flexible, high-quality and sustainable products in urban construction.
About the report
The flexible city - A vision of a sustainable and future-ready model for urban planning is written in collaboration between Adapteo, which offers adaptable and circular buildings for public and private organizations, and BSK Arkitekter, an award-winning architectural firm in Stockholm with a strong focus on urban planning.
You can download the report here in Swedish.
For more information, please contact:
Erika Regnér, media.relations@adapteo.com, +46 73 841 81 02
Adapteo in brief
Adapteo is a leading flexible real estate provider in Northern Europe. We build, rent out and sell adaptable buildings for schools, daycare centres, care, offices, accommodation and events. We know that our society will go through an immense change in the years to come. Whatever the future brings, we believe that adaptability is the best solution. With our buildings, we can transform, repurpose, scale up and scale down in a matter of weeks by using a modular and circular building concept. Our buildings can be used for a few days or indefinitely, always optimised for current needs. That is how we build adaptable societies.
Adapteo operates in Sweden, Finland, Norway, Denmark, Germany, The Netherlands and Lithuania. In 2020, Adapteo’s Net sales were EUR 231 million.
