Malaga wants to grow up in Paris and dreams of organizing Expo 2027

Malaga is a few hours away from meeting face to face with its immediate future. Paris hosts this Wednesday the decision on the venue for the 2027 International Exhibition, an event in which the Malaga candidacy competes with a sustainability project for large cities and which is considered key in the transformation of a city whose national and international projection is has multiplied in recent years.

Four other candidatures choose to organize an event that will be announced after 2:15 p.m.. The Malaga delegation will defend, for the third and last time, its proposal The urban age: towards the sustainable city before the delegates of the 172 assembly of the Bureau International des Expositions (BIE). They will be followed by Bariloche (Argentina), Minnesota (USA), Phuket (Thailand) and Belgrade (Serbia), respectively, at an event to be held at Le Palais des Congrès.

It is expected that the representatives of the Malacitana candidacy —supported by four institutions: Málaga City Council, the central government, the Junta de Andalucía and the Provincial Council— will speak at 9:35 a.m. and during their presentation they will delve into the leitmotiv of their proposal. A theme that concerns all countries and organizations on a global scale: the sustainability of cities in the face of their foreseeable increase in inhabitants in the coming years.

“In the almost two decades that would separate this Expo from the one held in Shanghai in 2010, dedicated to the future of cities, the world population will grow by 1,600 million people who will mostly settle in cities. That is to say, in 2050, more than three quarters of the world population will live in cities and it is necessary to reflect on how to make demographic growth and sustainability compatible”, has remarked the Malaga City Council.

If the Malaga candidacy were chosen, the Exhibition would take place between June 5 and September 5, 2027, and the plot on which it would be held has an area of 250,000 square meters.. This figure rises to 800,000 euros if the surrounding land is added, in which a series of infrastructures are planned that articulate part of the legacy that it would leave for the city.. The construction of 1,440 homes, at a time when its price has skyrocketed in the city, is one of the most talked about. Like the expansion of the Palace of Fairs and Congresses to meet the high demand for congresses, seminars and technical meetings that the event would generate; the new Auditorium; the Coastal Axis; the construction of the Distributor Road; the A-7054 highway or the extension of the C-2 commuter line.

The heart of the Expo would be a circular space, with a radius of 220 meters, and an area of more than 150,000 square meters, where open spaces for events, multipurpose plazas or the auditorium will be located.. This central area, in addition to the daily activities, at the end of the day will function as a large stage space where the shows that are planned will take place.. It will be endowed with shady places and, giving continuity to the topography, starting from the Merino channel that is recovered, it will be a large wooded area.

The built area inside this circle is 13,500.30 square meters, corresponding to the three thematic pavilions, each one of them focused on one of the three sub-themes: citizenship, innovation and environment.. Also included in the central part, taking advantage of the natural slope, is an amphitheater of around 4,000 meters that allows a capacity of 3,000 seated spectators.. In addition, there will be cafes or restoration and rest points.

From the nucleus, by means of two non-concentric circles, the built-up ring is developed —with an average width of 34 meters in average width— that houses the Expo pavilions on two levels.. This circle occupies a floor area of 60,000 square meters —which will be expanded depending on the forecasts of participating countries— and is crossed vertically by the eight internal communication nodes. A service car park and storage areas will be located in the basement.

3.1 million attendees

Malaga City Council highlights that the Expo is integrated into a large green lung, where the flora of each continent, of each area, is represented not only by trees, but also by shrubs, climbers and herbaceous plants, which reproduce ecosystems that are places Learning. “This space will also be one of the best legacies of Expo 2027 for the city”.

The organization anticipates that, between countries and international organizations, in addition to NGOs, there will be a total of 131 participants, to which must be added the logical presence of Spain and its 19 autonomous communities and cities.. The pavilions at your disposal will have an extension of 1,000, 750 and 500 square meters, although there will also be much larger collective exhibition areas.

The estimates made conclude that the Expo would be visited by approximately 3.1 million people that would produce around 7.5 million visits. And it is considered that there will be a number of visitors who will repeat the experience an average of 2.4 times.

The mayor of Malaga, Francisco de la Torre, before the microphones of Canal Sur, affirmed this Tuesday that he was not nervous about the crucial appointment in the French capital. “We have good feelings, a good job of coordination has been done, there is very clear support from the Crown”, as well as from the “central, regional, provincial and local government”.

The councilor stressed that the theme of the Malaga candidacy “is very good”, because the sustainability of cities is “the great challenge, or one of the great ones, of the 21st century”. “Sharing these good practices is going to be a great experience if we are chosen,” he said..

De la Torre, who in his inauguration speech said that “we have hatched and now we are going towards an even more promising future”, wanted to inoculate against a possible disappointment. Although the capital has first-class infrastructure and a powerful hotel complex, and has organized events such as the Spain-United States Forum in 2014 or the Spain-France Summit in 2017, among others, there is fear of dying on the shore, as It happened when he aspired to the European Cultural Capital, the European Medicines Agency or the America's Cup of Sailing.

Candidatures with which it was desired to make that long-awaited international leap that would put the focus on the city and which is now expected to be facilitated by the 2027 Exhibition. The mayor, however, defended that, “with Expo or without it, the Malaga brand already transcends Andalusia and Spain, sounds at a European level and has global repercussions. In the coming years that significance will be even more intense”. The city, he insisted, “is experiencing the beginning of a new stage that will be splendid”.