Truths and lies about construction
In raging fury, Giorgos Stasinos, president of the Technical Chamber of Greece, on Thursday intervened in the public debate to defend the incentives that the New Construction Regulation (NCR) offers contractors – it allows higher and larger buildings if these are “climate-friendly.” In a statement of about 3,400 words, titled “18 truths and lies about the NCR’s incentives,” the head of the engineers’ union in effect declared that the only people who should have a say in how our neighborhoods are shaped are the engineers who build according to their interpretation of the laws and Constitution. Citizens, mayors and the judiciary who dare to demand a say are described as “shouting” and as “Pharisees” (i.e. hypocrites). “It is time for us to say some truths: None of those who have been shouting about the height of buildings cares about the environment. They only care about serving personal or collective interests,” he declared.
With his own shouts, Stasinos could himself be accused of hypocrisy. Because, as the country’s “chief engineer,” he cannot but realize that the nice argument according to which he and his colleagues will save the planet by building “climate-friendly” apartment blocks, in place of houses with gardens, clashes with reality. A reality in which every grain of soil is torn out to give way to concrete basements that cover the whole plot, which is then almost totally covered by the building. With the bonus of extra height and square meters, the new construction becomes a wall which deprives all around (whether on the ground floor of a house or in the penthouse of a smaller apartment block) of the sun, the sky and the breeze which blew unhindered among the now lost gardens.
Contractors have every right to exploit the possibilities that the state gives them. But they should not underestimate how much they degrade the quality of life of others, nor the responsibility of mayors, judges and citizens to defend it.
The New Construction Regulation was the subject of public discussion before it was ratified in 2012. But the crisis, and then the pandemic, had led to a freeze in construction. So, perhaps no one realized then what would follow. Today’s explosion in construction, in which illicit money and imported funds distort the market, shows the need for a substantial dialogue. The reasoning of the Council of State decision which calls for a suspension of buildings with these incentives describes the magnitude of the problems. As do the cries of Stasinos, who does not want any change to the current situation.
