Projects: 1995 to 1999

Keywords:  Capital Strategy, Sustainability, Conservation

Awards and Press: Winner of the European Business Awards.

National Investment Review Guidelines

Through funding from the World Bank and USAID, consultants from OHK were contracted as technical and sustainability advisors to the Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency for 24 months to select, screen, review, and approve capital investments totaling $5B. Our consultants developed and implemented sustainability assessment, screening, and approval procedures, as well as a national unit for project review, tracking, and monitoring. More than 2,000 project applications  in tourism, oil and gas, renewable energy, manufacturing, urban development, industrial estates, port developments, airports, and infrastructure were reviewed, with many subsequently adjusted to our recommendations and redesigned to deliver sustainable benefits.

These national guidelines were then formalized and disseminated to investors under a 9-month capacity building program. The guidelines included coastal tourism development guidance, project finance and feasibility modeling, new urban communities design requirements, and environmental impact assessments. More than 20 of these guidelines were published in manuals and ratified within legislation currently used by government agencies and investors alike. Egypt’s 6th of October industrial park, various new urban communities in New Cairo, and Cairo Airport’s new extension are some of the investments that were developed according to these guidelines.

Keywords: Sustainability, Economic Strategy

Awards and Press: Winner of the European Business Awards.

Sustainable Communities: Clean Energy Design and Management Guidelines  

Advisors from OHK provided technical advisory services to a program funded by the UK Department for International Development.supporting clean industry and energy in Egypt. The multi-year program was large in scope, extending across various industries and regions. The team was on the ground in the Middle East developing the region’s first clean energy and industry master plan, resource management systems, and capacity building frameworks at the local, regional, and national levels to support institutional strengthening. In addition, the team designed a framework for the use of market-based financial instruments in renewable energy infrastructure and environmental services.

OHK's consultants helped develop national and provincial action plans, built institutional capacity programs, and planned the decentralization of energy and environmental services’ management in regions like the Nile Delta, Luxor, and Alexandria. The team also took on the implementation of pilot projects in urban redesign, housing, clean energy, pollution prevention, energy efficiency, clean air, wastewater management, environmental management, coastal zone management, and solid waste. A set of green building and urban energy design guidelines were developed and became reference design requirements for several landmark projects such as the Bibliotheca Alexandria, Smart City (Egypt’s techno park), and many new urban developments and high-rises. More than $25M of investment was directed through public-private partnerships along with 200 SME grants and facilities. Our advisors also developed a series of national policies that remain central to several Egyptian authorities’ mandates and capabilities. 

Keyword: Kuwait, Waterfronts, Strategy, Sustainability

Vision Plan for the Future of Kuwait’s Waterfront

Consultants from OHK were hired to run a national re-visioning program for Kuwait’s 20 kilometer waterfront. Merging spatial design with urban economics, the team formulated a vision plan for the waterfront’s evolutoin towards better physical and economic integration with the city’s urban corridors. Public-private investments to produce high-value uses such as hospitality, housing, retail, and entertainment were introduced based on an economic and financial model that accounted for various market trends and characteristics. These models were further coupled with targeted infrastructure investments and inland interventions to enable improved network effects and economic linkages, transformation of idle land and non-productive land uses, and non-public finance and business incentives.

Today, the waterfront constitutes a considerable segment of the city’s economy and urban character, and is connected through various urban corridors and regeneration nodes. More than $15B in private investment has increased the waterfront’s economic activity exponentially, rationalized public funding into civic amenities, met the city’s growth needs (particularly for retail, real-estate, and hospitality), and facilitated landmark projects like Sharq Marina, Souq Sharq, the Salmiya Corniche real-estate corridor, and the newer Fahalel waterfront scheme. At present, the waterfront attracts more than 20 million visitors per year.

Keywords:  Sustainability, Economic Strategy, Conservation, Community Development, Spatial Strategy

Arabian Gulf National Program of Action for the Protection of the Marine Environment

Consultants from OHK provided technical support to countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council under the National Program of Action for the Protection of the Marine Environment from Land-Based Activities on the Arabian Gulf. For 12 months, we studied development trends including coastal populations’ conditions, industrial and coastal development, land use regulations, public investment schemes, and the planned project pipeline for coastal zones in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Bahrain, and Qatar.

An action plan was drafted to support resilient coastlines and sustainable development in the coastal zone. Under the plan, our consultants developed new land use and coastal zoning policies and proposed both regional and municipal regulations for land use management, investment planning and review, and impact assessment. In addition to delivering the program, the team kick-started implementation of many of the core recommendations, including a pro-community policy support program, an environmental monitoring information system, country-specific decision support tools, and a set of coastal community development schemes.

Keywords:  Economic Strategy, Capital Strategy

Awards and Press:  Recipient of the World Tourism Organization Award for Excellence. 

World Bank Tourism Investment Policy Reform: Tourism Privatization Scheme 

Experts from OHK were tasked with advising the World Bank on its Private Sector Development Strategy for financing tourism and infrastructure projects around the world. The experts developed several policy reforms that were supported by the Bank in places like Egypt, Indonesia, and Eastern Europe. Public-private partnership policies were drafted based on tourism assessments and sector diagnostics and subsequently formulated into laws and investment promotion schemes.

With the bank’s support, the team piloted an institutional support program for the tourism investment authority in Egypt (now known as the Tourism Development Authority) as a one-stop shop for engaging private investment. Our experts helped formulate the investment procedures and governing regulations under three presidential decrees and one prime ministerial degree in 2001/2002 to support the development of large integrated tourist towns as designated tourism development zones led by private investment. In parallel, the team provided capacity building interventions through technical assistance and active management of entire functions of the Authority, including innovation and entrepreneurship initiatives, technical and project ideation, investor relations, private sector partnership development, and land concession.

With these new frameworks governing investment in key tourism regions in the Red Sea, Sinai, the Nile Valley, Luxor, and the Mediterranean coast, investment in and growth of the tourism sector in Egypt has surged. More than $30B of private investment has been realized over 20 years, employing two million people and offering close to half a million hotel rooms to international tourist markets. This initiative was award winning and remains one of the definitive global case studies on tourism sector build up, breadth of reform, and scale of development.

Keywords:  Urban Design, Spatial Vision, Place Design

Dubai Urban Vision Plan

Before Dubai became a haven for ambitious urban architecture, a team of experts convened in the Emirates to develop a vision plan for Dubai upon which various mega-scale economic and land development initiatives would take shape. Members of OHK joined pioneers in New Urbanism and postmodern architects and, in partnership with Michael Graves and others, helped conduct analysis, interviews, meetings, and workshops designed to establish a vision plan for transforming the city into one of the world’s most important economic centers.

This effort gave birth to early blueprints for Downtown Dubai, Palm Island, Internet City, Health City, Dubai Marina, and other infrastructure schemes. This vision plan later became a cornerstone for the city’s ambition to be a global center for modern urbanism, infrastructure, trade, finance, and tourism. In 2001, one year after the completion of the effort, work began on Palm Island, and today the majority of the plan has been implemented in landmark undertakings. Many of the world’s top planning and design firms have taken on various parts of the plan and implemented iconic projects including the world’s tallest tower, the Burj Khalifa.

Keywords:  Conservation, Rehabilitation, Place Design, Experience Design, Community Development

Awards and Press:  Winner of Tourism for Tomorrow Award

Ecotourism Development and Design Guidelines

On behalf of Egypt’s Tourism Development Authority, OHK joined a multidisciplinary team of planners, architects, and environmentalists to develop a marketplace for ecotourism in urban and rural development. This included eco-lodge guidelines that assisted potential developers of ecotourism hospitality infrastructure. Several prescriptive sets of guidelines were issued for site planning, architectural design, infrastructure, construction, operations, financial planning and management, experience interpretation, and conservation. 

The work has innovated opportunities for sustainable environmental services in tourism. Several renowned and award-winning lodges such as Adrère Amellal, Shali, Tarfa, and Al-Maha have been developed using our guidelines. The work has won multiple awards for helping preserve the environment, benefit local economies, employ local community members, use local products and traditional skills, and transfer know-how and successful income generating economics to nature reserves, national parks, historic town centers, and rural villages.

Keywords:  Spatial Design, Urban Design, Economic Strategy, Sustainability, Capital Strategy

Best Practice Guidelines for Resort Planning and Design

As part of a $30M long-term assignment in Egypt funded jointly by the Government of Egypt, USAID, and the World Bank, OHK contributed team leaders to draft planning and design requirements for use by investors and their design consultants in the Red Sea and Sinai Governorates. This involved unique concepts for waterfront and resort towns development that revolutionized tourism offerings in Egypt and transformed the investment opportunities in the industry.

Consultants from OHK contributed to a comprehensive development handbook of best practices to help the development community accomplish sustainable tourism development goals. Since the first edition of the handbook was published in 1998, it has been updated several times to keep it up to date with evolving industry challenges. Over the past decade, both regulators and various international design firms have engaged the consulting team to provide technical assistance and guidance in the application of these guidelines to resort development and design proposals.

Keywords:   Capital Strategy, Rehabilitation, Community, Economic Strategy, Place Design

Awards and Press:   Winner of Global Vision Innovation Award.

Named among the "World’s 60 Greatest Public Places" by PPS.

Redevelopment Strategy for Al-Azhar Park

In partnership with CH2M Hill International, the Aga Khan Trust for Culture, USAID, and the Government of Egypt, consultants from OHK assumed a coordination and visioning role in the creation of Al-Azhar park in the Egyptian capital. This involved selecting and analyzing a central location of suitable scale on the derelict Darassa site, a 30-hectare (74-acre) mound of rubble adjacent to the historic Fatimid City. The site posed several technical challenges, and OHK’s Managing Partner Ahmed Hassan, together with a team of local and international experts, developed a vision that would transform a 500 year old land dump into both the largest underground water supply facility and the largest green public space in Cairo.

In addition to managing a complex construction program, the team focused on conducting a large stakeholder engagement process culminating in three concept designs that acknowledged architectural contexts, urban planning concerns, preservation imperatives, and social and political issues germane to the 32-hectare heart of the Old City. The winning spatial concept entailed a $300M investment strategy which was later executed by several leading design firms and is still being implemented today through an operational park that receives millions of Egyptian visitors, the ongoing restoration of a mile-long 12th-century Ayyubid wall, the restoration of key parts of the 14th-century Darb al-Ahmar neighborhood, and the implementation of various housing rehabilitation and improved health and basic service projects. The advisory services also included the drafting of deal points for a public-private partnership agreement for the continued management of the park that is in effect today.

Keywords: Place Design, Urban Design, Sustainability

Awards and Press: Resulting projects include a recipient of the AIA Silver Award for Excellence in Architecture.

Architectural Design Standards for the MENA Region

Consultants from OHK collaborated with several renowned international architects to develop design guidelines for excellence in architecture, planning, and landscape design. Using vernacular architecture of the Middle East and North Africa for historical grounding and style, and the work of Hassan Fathy as a source of inspiration, the team created a design lexicon for architects and landscape architects to incorporate into their designs.

With more than 200 illustrations, the guidelines are a unique reference for interpreting vernacular desert architecture and explaining the development of key design elements in hundreds of plan types whether hotels, housing, or public facilities and spaces. The first among many designers to employ these guidelines was Michael Graves in El Gouna and Taba resorts in Egypt. We estimate that more than 400 of the 1,000 hotels built under Egypt’s 30-year tourism master plan have made use of the guidelines in site planning, design vocabulary, and climatic considerations. Numerous projects applying the guidelines have subsequently received awards, the most prominent of which being the American Institute of Architects’ Silver Award for Michael Graves.

Keywords: Infrastructure, Information Technology 

Project Management Support to USAID's Cairo Air Improvement Project

OHK's experts provided project support services to the international technical team charged with implementing a $60M, USAID-funded program to address pollution in Cairo. The consultant team established a central project management unit to oversee collaboration among agencies, enabling administrative and operational efficiencies and implementation dependability. This involved creating an executive information system to provide information to decision-makers, procurement of back-office, operational, and IT systems, and system infrastructure support.

The program gave Egypt its first compressed natural gas transit bus fleet, a national vehicle emissions testing program, and $20M in environmental technology to manage a comprehensive air monitoring system for greater Cairo.