Urban Landscapes

Sports Eco-City

Seville, Spain

The concept of ‘sports eco-cities’ responds to the ambitions of integrating the principles of eco-urbanism with healthy living in a context of overall sustainability, capable of satisfying the aspiration of football clubs to own first class sports installations. Sports eco-cities are lived in, specifically designed for sports training and performance. The urban development strategy of such sports eco-cities is to bring new centrality to a region and existing urban environments by accommodating mixed and balanced activities with emphasis on innovative economies, enhanced by a state-of-the-art sports infrastructure to attract talent and create employment.

From an ‘eco-design’ point of view, the eco-city of sport which will host the seat of the football club Sevilla FC is very green. The large scale sports installations, the mini-stadium and the training grounds provide a special opportunity to green the city. Some large sports structures are located within the built up area which converges onto a traditional, large scale public square, while open training fields are surrounding the sports eco-city like a green belt. The diverse areas of activities are connected by green corridors which run through the mixed development, including residential buildings, accommodation for sportsmen and women, live-work premises, workplaces and seed corn incubation spaces for emerging companies and SMEs. The green network is connected with the riverbed and its wide banks. In the tradition of Andalusian architecture, there are also water gardens, orchards, olive groves interspersed with places for innovation and learning.