World Cup Shorts: No country for old men. Urban renewal in downtown Doha

6th Dec 2022 by Javier Guirado

The destruction of the urban fabric of downtown Doha is one of the side effects of the preparation for the World Cup. The event has bolstered a process of urban renewal that has made Qatar spend more than any other host country in previous editions of the World Cup. Most of the media outlets have focused on the newly developed stadiums, but the figure of 200-220 billion USD (depending on the source[1]) includes all sorts of infrastructure from new hotels and office buildings, to new roads or road improvement. In many cases, they have torn down whatever occupied those spaces before.

Figs. 1 and 2. Examples of pavement tiles in the Old Salatah quarter. They are being replaced by roads or new plain tiles made of concrete

Much of this has happened in the oldest districts of Doha like Musheireb or Old Salatah, and areas of downtown Doha where a sizable number of foreign workers, mostly from Southeast Asia, reside and work. There, commercial and residential units that showed the evolution of architectural styles in Doha are being torn down for glass towers. These buildings not only represent a loss in terms of heritage, but also economically. Many of these new developments are more costly for renters and buyers, and they also increase the prices in the properties nearby. Public spaces are being redesigned as well, with important losses like the tiles that have formed the pavements of the area since the mid twentieth century.

Fig 3. Old house in the Old Salatah quarter. Buildings like these are being replaced by new office towers and upscale apartments and hotels, erasing the existing urban landscape of downtown Doha

These new developments are erasing an already endangered built environment that speaks about the past of the country during the twentieth century. The livelihoods and social histories that it showcased are now curated in starchitectural projects like Jean Nouvel’s designed National Museum of Qatar or the I.M. Pei’s Museum of Islamic Art (MIA). Qatar has embraced a process of creative destruction instead of one that premiers preservation.

  The urban projects undertaken during the preparation for the World Cup show that the notion of heritage is the re-creation of an imaginary and commercialized past rather than actual preservation and repurposing. It shows an essentialized past that invisibilizes the different stages of social and urban development that the country has gone through in the past century

1. Philip Whiteside. “Qatar 2022: What has been built for the 2022 World Cup, what it has cost in lives, and how much was spent in construction,” Sky News. See online: ahttps://news.sky.com/story/qatar-2022-what-has-been-built-for-the-2022-world-cup-what-it-has-cost-in-lives-and-how-much-was-spent-on-construction-12496471