French Architect Designs Floating Manta Ray-Shaped City

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French Architect Designs Floating Manta Ray-Shaped City


Sep 24 2015

By Ada Carr

Read More: http://www.weather.com/photos/news/f...cques-rougerie

It’s an ocean lover’s dream: a floating city populated by researchers and students dedicated to studying marine life. It may seem like a concept pulled from a sci-fi movie, but visionary architect Jacques Rougerie aims to make it a reality within the next 50 years.

- “Considering the dimension and size of the international scientific community - 7,000 people spread on the entire structure - I designed the City of Meriens in the form of a manta ray because it was the best design to accommodate such a community with regards [to] the best possible correlation between space and stability needs,” said Rougerie. --- With a height of almost 200 feet and the lowest level measuring a depth of around 400 feet, the floating city would have the capacity to house the population projected by Roguerie throughout several levels that feature an assortment of lecture halls, classrooms, labs, living areas and cultural relaxation and sports zones.

- The mobile city will be large enough to accommodate an interior lagoon that can hold research vessels of different sizes, as long as they do not exceed 295 feet. The research vessels available would include Rougerie’s SeaOrbiter, a unique international oceanic station with a scientific laboratory. --- Designed to be fully autonomous through the use of renewable marine energy, Rougerie’s concept respects the principles of sustainable development with its zero waste program. The City of Meriens is designed to have hydroponic greenhouses at the ends of its wings and aquaculture breeding farms on both sides of its interior lagoon. The structure of the hub itself was studied to resist storms and all harsh weather conditions.

- “City of Meriens would revolutionize the world of underwater studies due to the fact that people would have a permanent contact with the ocean, as well as a direct access to the underwater world, as part of the City is completely underwater,” said Rougerie. “Regarding the world of water vessel design, the City of Meriens will hopefully inspire designs that place the man in complete harmony with the sea.” In addition to his architectural endeavors, Rougerie has his own foundation; the Jacques Rougerie Foundation aims to encourage scientific and technological innovation and promote an awakening that leads to the humankind developing a new relationship with the sea.

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