News and Media News

11. July, 2008

With the yesterday’s fourth meeting, Emonika d.o.o., the initiator and founder of the Emonika Project Civil Council, concluded the first round of consultation meetings. The concluding meeting was intended for the evaluation of the first three consultation meetings and presentation of the answers of Emonika d.o.o. to the initiatives and viewpoints of the members of the Emonika Project Civil Council, presented during the first three meetings. The agreement reached at the fourth meeting was that the Emonika Project Civil Council would continue working in September.

Emonika d.o.o. founded the Emonika Project Civil Council aiming to establish communication with the inhabitants of Ljubljana, project partners and the professional public. The investor also invited its project partners – the Slovenian Railways and the Municipality of Ljubljana – to play an active role in the Emonika Project Civil Council.

The first three Emonika Project Civil Council meetings were intended for the following relevant and topical themes: the deepening of the railway tracks, and the respective adaptation of the Emonika designing process; while the participants at the second meeting discussed traffic organization and environmental impacts, and the third meeting was intended for a discussion on architecture and landscape planning of the Emonika Project.

An essential finding presented at the meeting about the deepening of the railway tracks, was that in technical terms the Emonika Project made the deepening possible, whereby the investor was going to respect its contractual obligations and also cover additional costs incurred in connection with this. Hence, the conceptual framework of the Emonika Project and its technical implementation enable the deepening even if it is carried out at a later date. The technical part of the execution of Emonika is prepared in such a way that the high-rise will not prevent the deepening of the railway tracks, which has been confirmed by both the Municipality of Ljubljana and Slovenian Railways. Naturally the deepening of the railway tracks is not under the responsibility of Emonika, and cannot be influenced by Emonika.

Accessibility, good logistic links of Emonika in combination with a shopping centre will encourage more frequent use of the means of public transport.

Emonika will build the infrastructure around the Emonika centre, which includes the construction of a new road. Emonika will enable an intelligent signalling system from a greater distance.

At the second meeting, when environmental impacts and traffic organization were discussed, the representatives of Emonika d.o.o. guaranteed that they would respect all instructions from the Environmental Report which is currently still in preparation. As regards traffic organization, Emonika will do even more than provided by law. Aware of the problem of traffic organization, Emonika additionally commissioned an in-depth traffic study taking into account the models made according to the calculations of traffic peaks in the surroundings of Emonika. Emonika will apply in the project all possible measures mitigating the pressures on the environment, including noise emissions in its immediate vicinity. Emonika will be a pilot project in the use of alternative sources of energy. All possible solutions are in the process of analysis and study of the possibilities of installation.

At the third consultation meeting where participants discussed architectural solutions and landscape planning of the Emonika Project, the participants underlined in particular the criticism of why the investor did not publish a public competition for the Emonika Project to also include the local architects. The selection of the author of the conceptual framework for the entire Centre was one of the responsibilities and duties of the investor. Both the Municipality of Ljubljana and the Slovenian Railways gave their recommendations in this respect, and the Investor respected them. The selection was based on references, reference projects, experiences and capabilities. However, the competition of architectural conception of the public-logistic part was won by the Ravnikar-Potokar Architectural Studio.

Upon the initiative of some members of the Emonika Project Civil Council to have the Emonika design evaluated by a group of international architects, the Investor replied that the Emonika design had already been evaluated by the profession, receiving a prestigious award of MAPIC in Cannes in the category of the »Best Architectural Solution« for the concept of the Emonika City Centre. It was also short-listed in the finals for the »Best Retail Shop Design – over 20,000 m2«. Yet, Emonika d.o.o. is also ready to present the design and share opinions with other architects.

The investor would like to continue with the process of dialogue and participation of the professional public, suggesting therefore that the members of the Emonika Project Civil Council should continue to actively cooperate, and contribute to the relevant contents of the following consultations. For the autumn period Emonika therefore proposed to hold one consultation meeting a month, to coordinate the topics and dates of meetings with the members in advance, and to keep a similar format of the meetings.

All information in connection with the Emonika project Civil Council is available on the Emonika website: www.emonika.si/eng/civil_council.

For questions and usage contact Mateja L. Nacevski / Marketing & PR Manager