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Mega urban development in Uzbekistan envisions canals, giant towers, smart neighborhoods, and artificial intelligence monitoring to transform Tashkent’s expansion into a new metropolis planned for 2.5 million inhabitants, amidst challenges involving infrastructure, energy, population growth, and water scarcity.
The implementation of New Tashkent has begun in the east of the Uzbek capital, occupying an area of 25 thousand hectares between the Chirchiq and Karasu rivers, with a projected capacity to accommodate approximately 2.5 million residents over the coming decades of urban expansion.
Responsible for the master plan, the British company Cross Works developed a model based on mixed-use neighborhoods, integrated transport, artificial canals, green areas, and a digital platform capable of centralizing real-time monitoring of the new city.
Within this initial timeline, the so-called District 1 covers about 6 thousand hectares and has already entered the structural preparation phase, with road opening, earthworks, and the definition of the first areas reserved for public and residential infrastructure.
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Pressured by Tashkent’s population growth, whose urban structure began to face physical and operational limitations, the expansion emerges as a response to the growing need for housing, hospitals, schools, jobs, and large-scale distributed services.
Instead of repeating the traditional model of dormitory neighborhoods far from economic centers, the government intends to consolidate a new autonomous urban hub, bringing together administrative, cultural, commercial, and residential functions within the same integrated network.
New Tashkent bets on walkable neighborhoods and superblocks
Inspired by the traditional concept of mahalla, New Tashkent’s urban design adapts ancient forms of community living to a contemporary scale, reorganizing neighborhoods to bring housing, commerce, public services, and communal areas closer together within the same urban space.
With this configuration, the proposal reduces car dependency and shortens daily commutes, as schools, markets, public facilities, and commercial areas are distributed in walkable zones connected by corridors designated for pedestrians and cyclists.
In addition to the predominant orthogonal grid, the planning incorporates large diagonal thoroughfares to accelerate connections between different sectors of the city, avoiding excessively long routes and creating more efficient circulation between residential, commercial, and institutional areas.
While heavy vehicle traffic remains concentrated on the edges of the blocks, the internal cores feature tree-lined courtyards, communal spaces, bike paths, and shaded areas designed to reduce noise and enhance pedestrian circulation.
Canal system and artificial intelligence shape the new city
About 20% of the total area has been reserved for parks, green corridors, and an extensive network of canals fed by sources located in the mountains north of the capital, a structure planned to integrate landscaping, urban drainage, and climate control within the future metropolis.
At the same time, the canals are intended to function as environmental corridors connecting different neighborhoods of the expansion, creating cooler circulation areas and separating part of pedestrian routes from the main thoroughfares designated for motorized transport.
To coordinate all this infrastructure, the project administration began using a digital twin, a system that brings together three-dimensional models, georeferenced maps, operational data, schedules, and simulations aimed at permanent monitoring of the new city.
With the help of this technological platform, government, engineers, and urban planners can track potential structural failures, test operational scenarios, and plan interventions even before the physical completion of the works scheduled for the coming years.
575-meter skyscrapers are set to change the Central Asian skyline
Among the main architectural symbols planned for New Tashkent is the Tashkent Twin City Towers complex, announced at 575 meters tall and designed to dominate the skyline of the future Uzbek urban expansion.
According to Global Construction Review, the towers are expected to be part of one of Central Asia’s largest vertical complexes, occupying an area directly connected to public parks and the canal network planned to traverse different sectors of the city.
Another prominent development involves the Alisher Navoi International Scientific Research Centre, designed by Zaha Hadid Architects and conceived to bring together cultural, academic, and scientific functions within the new urban core.
In addition to a literature museum and an auditorium for 400 people, the complex will feature an international research center and a residential school for students, incorporating facades made of locally produced bricks and passive ventilation systems inspired by the region’s historical architecture.
Water Scarcity Threatens Billion-Dollar Urban Expansion
Despite the billion-dollar scale and urban ambition involved in the project, water scarcity remains one of the biggest obstacles to the consolidation of New Tashkent in the coming decades.
Dependent on transboundary rivers and pressured by increasing agricultural and urban consumption, Uzbekistan faces a scenario of growing water scarcity, observed with concern by international organizations and regional infrastructure specialists.
World Bank estimates indicate that the country’s annual water deficit could reach 7 billion cubic meters by 2030 and hit 15 billion cubic meters by 2050, a scenario that increases pressure on supply systems, irrigation, and urban expansion.
In this context, the construction of New Tashkent brings together economic interests, territorial reorganization, attraction of foreign capital, and large-scale environmental challenges, especially concerning the capacity to sustain millions of residents in a region marked by water limitations.
More than erecting towers, avenues, and smart neighborhoods, the success of the new metropolis will depend on the efficiency of the water, energy, transport, and job creation systems planned to transform the economic weight of the Uzbek capital in Central Asia.
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