The role of public buildings in the irrational creation of the urban plan of Athens under king Otto

DENIS ROUBIEN
Dr architect N.T.U.A., Msc in restoration N.T.U.A. & C.H.E.C. Paris

Tech. Chron. Sci. J. TCG, I, No 3

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Abstract
In king Otto's Athens, in contrast with what happened in other European capitals, public buildings preceded the other elements of urban network. In consequence, instead of the urban plan defining their location in the city, the opposite happened. Most of the public buildings were built in locations completely different from those predicted by the general urban plans, which led necessarily to those plans' modification, so that the latter would be adapted to the buildings. Although under king George I the situation tended to a more rational relation between public constructions and urban plan, Athens, during the whole 19th century, preserved a particular relation between the urban plan's evolution and public architecture.

1 INTRODUCTION
The present article tries to enlighten the relation between the urban development of Athens and the policy concerning the urban plan's expansion. The article's originality lies in the use of unpublished sources from the Public Record. Their study explains the irrational urban development of Athens during the first decades after Independence, with its consequences.

2 THE SITUATION IN ATHENS UNDER KING OTTO
During the reign of Otto, while the most important and monumental specimens of the official architecture of Athens are being built, one observes not only a total absence of a city services network, namely of streets, illumination, telecommunications, transports, but also the absence of serious efforts to cover those needs. Namely, in contrast with what happened in western European capitals, where the urban network's creation went together or even preceded the construction of public buildings, and in contrast with what was predicted by the general urban plans, first that of Stamatios Kleanthis and Eduard Schaubert and then that of Leo von Klenze, in Athens public buildings preceded other elements of urban network. That also is a sign of the particularities of Athens' evolution and also of its population's still superficial urbanization. The latter hasn't been able to follow the respective rhythms of western European cities, although those constituted the model for every similar effort in the Greek capital. This gap will start being covered only many years after the ascension of George I on the throne.

3 CONSEQUENCES ON THE URBAN TISSUE OF ATHENS UNDER KING OTTO
As public buildings preceded the urban tissue in Athens, it was inevitable that, instead of the urban plan defining their location, the opposite happened. The accomplished public constructions of the Greek capital were finally built in places totally different from those predicted by the urban plans. That way, in almost every case, especially when it was a question of a big building, the approved urban plan had to be modified.

The most important example is the Royal Palace, the location of which, because of its importance and its volume, influenced more than any other public construction the final aspect of Athens' urban plan.

Apart from that, according to the idea dominating in 19th century Athens, interventions in the city's appearance had to take into consideration the public buildings to which every district was associated. Inevitably, the Royal Palace was again the main reference.
Moreover, in many cases, modifications of the urban plan were necessary, because the urban arrangements predicted originally ignored the topography and the existence of very ancient routes, the tracing of which was not random at all, but followed the form of the landscape.

In addition, as many public buildings were being built not in the location originally predicted but on any lot available, in several cases that lot happened to be out of the urban plan's limits. Consequently, the latter had to be extended in order to include the area where that building was.Finally, another sort of interventions done for the sake of public buildings was the tracing of streets, because very often these buildings were built in totally wild areas.

4 THE EVOLUTION OF ATHENS AFTER KING OTTO
The aim of the present article being a documentation of its subject based on unpublished records, it is not possible to write much about the reign of George I. And this because the relevant records of that period became only recently again accessible to researchers, which means that their examination is still at a primal stage. What can be said is that the fewer, for the moment, known elements from unpublished records, dating only from the early years of the reign of George I, show a continuation of Athens' particularities.

Thus, during that period there are still several cases where the urban plan is extended in order to include public buildings constructed out of its initial limits. In other cases the building is within the plan's limits, but the latter has to be modified by the abolition of streets or the modification of their tracing, for the better insertion of the building in it.
The modifications of the city plan also include the creation of blocks (usually at the expense of squares) for the construction of public buildings, the necessary land lacking in the city centre. There are, however, cases where those modifications were made in order to create symmetry axes and visual relations, always connected to the public buildings, proving thus the symbolical importance attributed to them.
The research in the recently re-opened records of the time of George I having started, we can suppose that the cases of public buildings affecting the creation of Athens' urban plan from that period must be much more than those mentioned here. The subject is sure to be very far from being exhausted.

5. CONCLUSIONS
The particular conditions dominating in 19th century Athens, due mainly to the new Greek state's financial weakness, led to an original as well as irrational relation between the urban tissue's creation and official architecture. This resulted in the city's evolution depending on the largely random location of a few buildings which formed a very small part of the city's whole built volume. These buildings, however, had in the social conscience an importance inversely proportional to their volume. The result was, as it is proved by the public records ot that time, that it was considered natural for the evolution of the capital's plan to "submit" to them and follow them.

DENIS ROUBIEN
Dr architect N.T.U.A., Msc in restoration N.T.U.A. & C.H.E.C. Paris

Tech. Chron. Sci. J. TCG, I, No 3