Five structures that could have changed the world — but were never built
Across the world, architectural marvels have astounded people with their majesty and complexity. But history is also rife with marvels that never-were and could have changed much of the world today. Here are five structures that were never completed but could have had a lasting impact on history.
Seine airport — Paris, France
Imagine you’re visiting Paris, France, and about to take a picture of the Eiffel Tower only to have your shot interrupted by an incoming passenger jet. In 1932, famed modernist architect André Lurçat envisioned having a floating airport on the River Seine just feet away from Paris’s most famous structure. Though this idea was not taken seriously by the French government or its citizens, its construction would have massively changed how tourists experience the city of light.
Depthscrapers — Tokyo, Japan
While almost every country in the world looked to the sky for their megastructures, the Japanese decided to look in the opposite direction. Still reeling from the devastating 1923 Great Kanto earthquake that left Tokyo devastated, Japanese architects explored innovative ways to construct seismically safe structures. This included the depthscraper — essentially, a skyscraper turned upside down descending its multiple stories of commercial and residential spaces deep into the Earth. Though the Japanese government opted for several other design options, the depthscraper remains a curiosity that even earned a feature in the November 1931 issue of Everyday Science and Mechanics.
Arcade railway — New York, USA
Decades before the first groundbreaking on one of the world’s most famous underground transit systems, engineer Egbert Ludovicus Viele thought to instead raise the pedestrian roadways to make room for local trains. In 1867, Viele proposed repurposing New York’s roads as railway lines and erect pedestrian and carriage roads above the trains. Business owners opposed the idea, which led to its ultimate demise, but it’s also easy to see how Viele’s idea could have helped inspire one of New York’s newest and most interesting tourist attractions, the High Line Park walkways.
Multiway bridge — Sydney, Australia
In 1922, the Australian government looked for inventive ways to cross the massive Sydney Harbour. One of the proposals came from engineer Francis Ernest Stowe, who suggested having the bridge meet in the middle of the harbour and then split off into two different directions. At the centre of this idea was a roundabout situated in the middle of the bridge from Goat Island, allowing traffic to smoothly flow through the multi-directional pathways. This centre structure would have also doubled as a war memorial. Though this idea received praise for its novel approach, it was ultimately rejected in favour of the steel through arch style proposed for what would become the Sydney Harbour Bridge that opened in 1932.
The Minnesota Experimental City — Swatara, USA
During the 1960s, the promise offered by nuclear power inspired inventions that were seemingly pulled right from science-fiction pulp stories. American inventor and futurist Athelstan Spilhaus conceived an idea for a dome encapsulated city — powered by a nuclear reactor — where air-pollution could be removed using technology that would recycle 100 per cent of the waste. Possibly the most astonishing fact about this proposed project is that US President Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration was presented the project and it almost went ahead, but ultimately failed to get off the ground due to local opposition in Minnesota.