Photo Courtesy of Wikimedia.

London-based global architecture and urbanism practice Broadway Malyan has been selected to deliver an urban growth plan for Angola’s capital, Luanda.

The company, which has operations in Asia, Europe and North America, won an international city-planning competition to accommodate, by 2030, a population of 13 million people in Luanda, which now has an estimated six million people.

Malyan said in a statement that it would work closely with the Luanda Institute of Planning and Urban Management and a team of consultants, including local partner Urbinveste (local planning and property market consultancy), Deloitte (strategy), Aurecon (infrastructure), Mobility-in-Chain (transportation) and the Universidade Nova de Lisboa (community, environment and heritage).

“Over the next 12 months, the practice’s multidisciplinary team will analyze the city’s geography, socioeconomic conditions, morphology, infrastructure and environmental context to prepare a sensitive and sustainable long-term urban renewal and growth plan,” says Chris White, spokesman for Malyan.

White says the final plan will be used to enact new land-use policies in Luanda and “help establish [the city] as a major economic force in Africa as well as one of its most livable cities” over the next 20 years. However, he would not confirm the value of the contract.

James Rayner, Malyan's director, said the company is looking forward to growing its portfolio in Africa “on the back of our track record for partnering with clients to deliver visions for entire new cities, strategic citywide development, city extensions and neighborhoods.”

The Luanda assignment comes barely months after Malyan was chosen to develop a master plan for the transformation of a 196-hectare site in Kuala Lumpur. Other Malyan projects include the 17-sq-kilometer extension of Sadr City, Baghdad, and the creation of New Sadr City in Iraq. The company also was involved in the transformation of 470 hectares of Convida Suape, Brazil, into a new city to accommodate 100,000 people.

Luanda, the largest city and administrative capital of Angola, is also the country’s main seaport. The city, with seven municipalities, has been ranked the third most populous Portuguese-speaking city after Brazil’s São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.