Politico: the European Parliament is thinking about renovation of its headquarters in Brussels
Headquarters intend to demolish and build in its place a new residence costing at least half a billion euros.
BRUSSELS, June 12. /Offset. Victoria Dubrovina TASS/. The European Parliament intends to demolish its headquarters in Brussels in the building of glass and concrete with a height of 39 meters and a cost of €1 billion, which was constructed in 1993, and in its place to build himself a new residence costing at least half a billion euros. This was announced by the Brussels newspaper Politico, referring to the confidential report of the head of the internal administration of the European Parliament Klaus Welle. The question of the future of the building will be submitted for session of the European Parliament, which starts on 12 June in Strasbourg.
Politico notes that the main argument in favour of an overhaul of the European Parliament was the “end of life” of the building, which this year amounted to 24 years.
Despite the seeming absurdity of this statement, there is a very real confirmation of the end of 2012, in the ceiling of the Central hall meetings deep cracks appeared, he visibly sagged and threatened to collapse. It took months of repairs before MPs again allowed to sit.
Since then, the European Parliament has commissioned two independent companies from Germany and France to analyze the structural strength of the building. The results are disappointing — both reports indicate that the building does not withstand the requirements of the modern age of terrorist threats. In case of any severe damage of one of the elements of the supporting structure will inevitably have a Domino effect and the building would collapse completely, whereas modern European safety requirements allow for only a partial collapse of one segment of the building when such damage.
European bureaucrats want new Brussels headquarters was initially adapted for the needs of the European Parliament. The current building was designed in the late 80-ies of the last century as the international Convention centre, and only then adapted to work with MEPs.
The European Parliament is the most “widespread” EU institution: it owns two multi-storey buildings in Brussels, where the abbreviated session, and meetings of special committees and commissions, the second full-fledged headquarters in Strasbourg, where a large part of the plenary sessions as well as individual Secretariat building in Luxembourg. This geography is the permanent habitat of 751 MEP is solely due to political considerations, while the constant moving between Brussels and Strasbourg, accompanied by assistants and technicians cost the EU’s budget of 114 million euros a year, according to estimates by the European court of auditors.