As part of the projects undertaken by the Unification of Archaeological Sites of Athens S.A. (EAXA), the French specialist Roger Narboni has produced a study of the general lighting of the axes and key points of the entire area in which EAXA operates. Its aim is to achieve long-term planning of the lighting and of the impressions it creates in these redeveloped areas.
At the same time, a preliminary lighting design was prepared in collaboration with the team of architects responsible for the redesign of Dionysiou Areopagitou and Apostolou Pavlou streets, so as to ensure that the lighting of these parts of the city is consistent with that of the unified archaeological sites.
Urban lighting: a definition
Urban lighting helps us envisage the night landscape and the form of the city along an inverted vertical axis, so that we can gradually bring out its identity, its distinctive features, its dynamism and its atmosphere. At the same time, it helps us achieve long-term, controlled planning of public lighting. This discipline, born in France in the late 1980s, has now become largely integrated into urban planning and development policy. In France, more than 200 communities and wider urban areas of all kinds and sizes have adopted a Lighting Master Plan (LMP). Abroad, many cities have embraced the idea, among them Brussels, Edinburgh, Newcastle, Milan, Rome, Quebec and Singapore.
The LMP study serves a number of objectives:
- It informs the responsible authorities and makes them aware of the visual and psychological effects of urban lighting.
- It links the various departments that are concerned with urban lighting in one way or another.
- It brings public and private initiatives together in a single night-lighting plan.
The Lighting Master Plan study consists of the following:
- A logical analysis of the current night-time condition of the city.
- The development of a master plan that takes into account the city’s history, landscape, architectural heritage, personality, distinctive features and evolution.
- Control of the city’s future night-time appearance, identifying possible points of intervention and those that have potential interest.
- The ranking of priorities.
- Giving substance to the city’s night-time form and to the visual impact, near and far, of the various planned lighting installations.
The study makes it possible to focus in turn on the city as a whole and on individual areas (the city centre, historic heritage zones, major axes, outlying districts, industrial zones, etc.).
The city of Athens
Present-day Athens is a complex city, made up of visual collages in which images of the past, a warm Mediterranean landscape, a remarkable urban morphology and an exceptional topography all play a part.
Athens is a city composed of a cluster of neighbourhoods that reflect different periods of occupation, and that grew up gradually around the Acropolis and the Agora and along large urban arteries that open up broader vistas.
The programme for the unification of the archaeological sites
The archaeological sites of Athens cover an area of approximately 7,000 stremmata. They are scattered through the urban fabric with no visible links between them.
In order to create a continuous space that would include the monuments and archaeological sites and link them with public spaces, green areas and cultural and leisure venues, and also to upgrade infrastructure and services, the Ministries of Planning, Environment and Public Works and of Culture set up the public limited company “Unification of Archaeological Sites of Athens”, which has been charged with implementing and delivering the unification project.
The unified archaeological sites comprise six zones that integrate the ancient and the modern city.
The whole of this area is the subject of the Lighting Master Plan study.
The night-time situation as it stands
Night-time impressions
The centre of Athens is, overall, very brightly lit, or rather, over-lit. The great majority of the monuments and a large number of private buildings are floodlit, often with an element of excess. The illuminated signs, which are particularly numerous, by themselves define the night-time atmosphere of some neighbourhoods.
Finally, if we also take into account the air pollution, which is very evident in the city, the Athenian night belongs to the past. The sky is covered by a particularly dense, orange-tinged haze that allows one to see clearly and walk around even when there is no lighting at all.
The Lighting Master Plan for the Unified Archaeological Sites
Fundamental principles
The LMP for the unified sites is based on the following basic principles:
• To give the unified sites an overall night-time identity.
• To make the most of the landscape and topography of the city centre.
• To highlight the historic heritage.
• To create an authentic night-time atmosphere in the neighbourhoods.
• To reinforce the pedestrian character of the redeveloped public spaces.
• To give rhythm, variety and continuity to night-time strolls.
Linking the archaeological sites through the night landscape
The various types of landscape lighting installed along the public spaces that frame the archaeological sites will gradually link the sites with one another and help us better understand the historical continuity.
The green oases will be connected to one another in an illuminated continuum that will guide strollers and visitors from one space to the next, with no abrupt breaks between public and archaeological spaces. In this way the night landscape will regain its essential role as a precious jewel case enclosing the various archaeological remains within the luminous urban grid.
Today the archaeological sites are clearly delimited and surrounded by green areas, at a respectful distance from the urban fabric. The Byzantine churches, by contrast, stand isolated and surrounded by the urban weave. The neoclassical heritage is usually absorbed into the modern city.
The lighting of the historic heritage must make it easier to express these different types of relationship with the city, on the basis of the following principles and choices.
Lighting schemes at the archaeological sites must leave a dark zone between the monuments and the green areas, which will be sparingly lit, in order to symbolise the very particular relationship of the archaeological site with the city and the landscape. In this way the major monuments will emerge dynamically from the darkness, dominating the surrounding night landscape.
The floodlighting must allow the natural rock to be distinguished from the built walls, not through artificial colours but through the correct positioning of the luminaires. In this project the emphasis is on lighting vertical surfaces, while the ground and horizontal surfaces are deliberately left in shadow (in contrast to urban floodlighting, which favours horizontal planes).
The Byzantine churches
The lighting of the Byzantine churches, which today sit at a lower level than the public spaces, must make this difference in level visually apparent, as a symbol of the slow but relentless layering of the city. The churches should be lit from below upwards, starting from their original level, which today lies about two metres below the current one, in order to bring out the ancient topography and to emphasise the buildings in an unusual way in night views. In this way the churches will look as if they are literally emerging from the ground.
The tiled roofs, domes and vaults, all characteristic features of this architecture, must be included in the lighting scheme.
The neoclassical buildings
These buildings (the Parliament, the Zappeion, the Academy of Athens, and the various houses and residences) bear the stamp of 19th-century Greek society.
The lighting schemes must be deliberately very sparing and must not contrast sharply with the lighting of the surrounding area. The luminaires should be placed outside the buildings. Fixtures mounted on the façades must be removed, because they spoil the classical image, the distinctive style and the very elegant relief of these buildings.
The neighbourhoods of the city centre
Athens is known for the variety and picturesque charm of its neighbourhoods. For this reason, sectors have been grouped together to be given a uniform lighting treatment, so as to give each neighbourhood its own particular night-time atmosphere. The type of lighting, the choice of fittings and the way they are installed will help us gradually define the different night-time impressions.
The axes and the large squares
In the various neighbourhoods, the main streets (pedestrian or vehicular) weave urban links and reveal historical continuities. These streets should be lit uniformly along their entire length (type of lighting and equipment, method of installation). Their lighting will assert itself visually over the night-time impressions created in the neighbourhoods.
Identifying the main axes
The major urban axes that cross the sector of the unified archaeological sites must receive special lighting treatment.
The lighting equipment on the major avenues must be installed on both sides, to maximise night-time visual perception and bring out the axial vistas. We propose lighting the main traffic arteries with contemporary lighting columns of simple, elegant design.
Promoting pedestrian streets and preserving important views
The lighting of pedestrian streets must promote the human scale and a comfortable night-time atmosphere (lamps in direct line of sight and glaring lamps must be eliminated for good).
The pedestrian streets that frame the archaeological sites must be lit from one side only, the side opposite the sites, so that night views of our important monuments are enhanced. It would be advisable to maintain an aesthetic unity of lighting equipment across most of the pedestrian streets.
Dionysiou Areopagitou Street
The lighting scheme for Dionysiou Areopagitou Street was developed as part of the Lighting Master Plan.
Areopagitou Street will be lit with a single light colour, warm white, using ceramic metal halide lamps, in line with the principle of a single light colour that the LMP set out for the archaeological sites as a whole.
The basic principle of the night-time scheme proposed for Dionysiou Areopagitou is to concentrate the lighting on the south side, at the base of the façades, and to reduce it gradually towards the north and the shadow of the Acropolis rock. This maintains the necessary darkness until the moment of revelation, and the emotional shock produced by the illuminated Acropolis rock as it looms colossal and majestic.
The lighting should be evenly distributed, with an emphasis on the pedestrian walkway. In this way it connects naturally with the built city to the south of the avenue. On the Acropolis side we find the typical Athenian landscape, which is enhanced by soft, diffuse lighting that uplights, irregularly and unevenly, the trees and shrubs on the north side of the street.
On the north side of the avenue, the trees and shrubs on both sides of the fence are uplit, in an irregular manner, with in-ground luminaires.
Squares and small squares
These key spaces, which give rhythm to this great avenue, receive special night-time treatment linked to the urban redevelopment works, so as to create visual breathing spaces and mark the opening up of the space for night-time strolls.
The perpendicular streets
Along Dionysiou Areopagitou Street, we propose systematically marking the ends of all the streets that meet it, large and small, with two specially designed luminaires of equal height (or, for example, by uplighting the shrubs), so that access to the area is clearly visible at night.
The various perpendicular streets will be lit from one side, with luminaires mounted at the base of the façade and at a height of 6 to 7 metres.
The Parthenis Triangle
This garden, which links the west side of Dionysiou Areopagitou with Apostolou Pavlou, will be lit with 4.5-metre ground-level lighting columns (indirect or diffuse lighting), and will be the terminus of many junctions of the streets now being created.
Apostolou Pavlou Street
Apostolou Pavlou will be lit as an extension of Dionysiou Areopagitou, with the same warm white light colour from ceramic metal halide lamps.
The principle of the night-time scheme proposed for Apostolou Pavlou is identical to that of Dionysiou Areopagitou. The lighting is denser at the base of the façade, on the west side of the street, and is gradually reduced as we move towards the east side and the shadow of the Acropolis, the Areopagus and the Ancient Agora, so as to maintain the necessary darkness.
The lighting, evenly distributed and with an emphasis on the pedestrian walkway, connects naturally with the buildings of the city. On the Acropolis and Ancient Agora side, the night landscape is enhanced by diffuse lighting that uplights, unevenly and irregularly, the trees and shrubs on the east side of the street.
Apostolou Pavlou Street is lit from one side, with an emphasis on the pedestrian walkway. The luminaires are moved to the opposite side, towards the Ancient Agora, along the line of the trees and about 3.5 metres from the façades. This lighting, at a height of 5.5 metres, asymmetrically distributed and correctly aimed, allows us to light a zone about 8 metres wide in a sparing and discreet way, starting from the base of the lighting column, at a level of 20 to 25 lux.
To the north, as we approach the triangular park, the line of lighting columns follows the curve of the park, then crosses the line of the underground and meets Ermou Street.
As in the case of Dionysiou Areopagitou Avenue, what is favoured is the light and the redesign of the ground, rather than the luminaires themselves. This principle helps us fully free the night-time view of the Acropolis and adequately light the base of the façades, making night-time movement easier, for instance residents coming and going.
