Built More Than They Demolished

In 2015, the first residential area of Kiruna, Northern Sweden, was demolished in the first stages of the moving of the city due to mining. Since then, the housing stock in the new Kiruna has increased. From 2012 to today, 966 homes have been built in Kiruna, while 730 have been demolished.

"In other words, more has been built than has been demolished. In 2023, LKAB (Swedish mining company, ed.note] will also free up a further 547 homes," says Linus Niva, head of department at the unit for urban change in Kiruna, in a press release.

"We wish to continue to maintain a high pace in housing construction. We and other actors have the capacity to build even more. But in order to succeed at this, it is important that the municipality's infrastructure work keeps up and that their process around access to land does not become a bottleneck," Niva points out.