Plans in the works to build whole new city on Tata Steel site
A partnership of investors and construction companies has serious plans to build a whole new city in the area where Tata Steel is currently located. The city, named Wijkerduin, would include 40,000 homes and other industries for the people who live there to work in, entrepreneurs Adriaan Kroon and Floris Busscher, the initiators of the plan, told Nieuwsuur.
According to the conglomerate, the steel factory near IJmuiden is no longer viable, polluting, and outdated. “With architects, construction companies, and remediation companies, we want to clean up the area and start a new chapter for IJmond with housing and nature reserves,” Kroon said.
Tata Steel is on shaky ground. Two weeks ago, the company announced a major reorganization, cutting 1,600 jobs. The company suffered a loss of 1.5 million euros per day last year, due to high energy and low steel prices. Tata Steel has also been negotiating with the government for years about billions of euros in state aid to become more sustainable and turn into a “green steel” factory. Tata Steel is the largest CO2 emitter in the Netherlands.
Tata Steel meant a lot for Dutch prosperity, Kroon acknowledged. “But now we have to ask ourselves whether we want this in IJmond in the 21st century, or whether you do it somewhere else in Europe. And what can you bring back in terms of industry, businesses, and homes?”
Should Tata Steel go bankrupt, the Wijkerduin partnership is ready with plans for what they consider a realistic alternative. “That prevents you from only thinking about what to do with the area when it is ready,” Kroon said. It also gives the government a Plan B in the negotiations with the steel factory. “You are always stronger in negotiations if you have options. Now that we are further developing that plan, we are increasingly discovering how many opportunities there are for people.”
The 750 hectares currently covered by Tata Steel holds space for 40,000 new homes, the entrepreneurs said. Instead of steel production, the area could be used for other sectors, like shipbuilding and microchips. “Things that we are good at in the Netherlands,” Kroon told the current affairs program. “This will be a city where you can live and work.”
Cleaning up the Tata Steel site after decades of pollution will cost an estimated 12 billion euros. The companies in the conglomerate are willing to take on that job and costs, Kroon said, instead of the government having to clean the site as usually happens.
If the city does come, it will hold space for Tata Steel’s history, Gideon Maasland, who is involved in the plan as the director of the architectural firm MVRDV, told Nieuwsuur. The factory’s blast furnaces can be repurposed, for example. “You can see how those buildings can also be incredibly beautiful in their ugliness. And how they can shape the character of the new district, in combination with the greenery, the dunes, and the sea.”
Tata Steel spokesperson Martin van de Velde told Nieuwsuur that the company is not aware of the conglomerate’s plans and has no intention of shutting down or moving to a different country. “We are implementing our own Green Steel plan on our site. This means that we will be producing cleaner steel and that we will thus contribute to future generations of Dutch people living in prosperity in a country with a strong economy.” Van de Velde stressed that steel will also be needed in the future, and plans other than green steel would be a less good financial choice.
