Courts Metro Station Plaza Redevelopment, Athens

The “Dikastiria” metro station is one of the 15 stations of the new landmark Line 4 and one of seven new stations created in the center of Athens through an open public architectural competition.
The city invests in architecture not only to build mobility infrastructures, but also to establish new landmarks, meeting points, and exemplary public spaces within its neighborhoods.

The “Dikastiria” station is situated in a distinctive zone of Athens composed of diverse urban fragments and uses: Pedion tou Areos, with its dense vegetation and generous public grounds; the Evelpidon Courts, with intense footfall during specific hours of the day; the dense residential fabric toward Kypseli; and significant public green spaces such as Alsos Evelpidon and Protomagias Square.
Within this context, the station emerges as a new landmark: a circular canopy resting on a circular plaza becomes a point of reference for the district, facilitating movement for different users and, through its organic form, organizing flows and creating connections within the heterogeneous landscape in which it is placed.
The station entrance is not merely an opening in the ground, but a fluid public space that redistributes movement and establishes a new point of orientation for the wider area.

Can a metro station transcend the conventional limits of a transit node and function as a landmark and connective element for a distinctive area at the city’s edge?

Speakers:
Tilemachos Andrianopoulos — Director, Tense Architecture Network
Panagiotis Tournikiotis — Professor Emeritus, NTUA · President, Hellenic Institute of Architecture
Efthymios Bakogiannis — Secretary General for Spatial Planning & Urban Environment, Ministry of the Environment and Energy · Assistant Professor, NTUA