Underground Park in Manhattan

Is this the beginning of underground cities?

SLEEK: Architect James Ramsey wants to build this underground park.

A design for a an underground park in Manhattan has been proposed by architect James Ramsey, Time has reported.

Ramsey's plan is to convert an abandoned trolley terminal in the Lower East Side into an underground park covering about one acre.

"Remote skylights" will be used to light the subterannean space which has been named Delancey Park.

COOL: This is the trolley terminal that could be turned into an underground park.

While humans have been known to build structures up towards the sky, some through out history have also been known to build down.

One of the oldest underground dwellings is the French city The Barry Troglodyte Village (below).

Archaelogical evidence shows the city built onto and inside a cliff was inhabited continuously for 1500 years.

CLIMBING: This French underground city was home for people once upon a time.

An even more curioser case comes in the form of Derinkuyu (below).

TUNNELS: An artist's interpretation of Derinkuyu.

This ancient underground city located in Turkey was five floors deep, extending 60m in width and could house more than 2000 people.

Scholars believe the city was built by Persians in the 8th or 7th century and used as a refugee settlement.

The complex had all its usual amnemities commonly found in Turkish underground dwellings such as stables, cellars, oil presses, storage rooms and chapels.

The city was connected to other underground cities through miles of underground tunnels.

Today about half the city is open to the public.

EERIE: Inside Derinkuyu.

Cooper Pedy, a small opal-mining town in South Australia, still has a large amount of houses based underground.

When opal was discovered at Cooper Pedy in the early 1900's, mining families built underground homes to escape the seering heat of the Australian summer.

Temperatures exceed 40 degrees Celsius during the Summer months and to survive above ground requires a good working air conditioner. The homes underground however stay at a cool 24 degrees.

HOME?: Cooper Pedy locals still live underground.

Ramsey is not the first modern architect to suggest an underground structure.

In 2008 Amsterdam architects suggested creating a giant underground city to fix the Dutch capital's parking and development problems.

If approved the plan would have seen the city's canals drained to build the underground labyrinth which would house parking, cinemas, sports stadiums cables, ducts and supply facilities.

While it wasn't approved, it's still a funny notion to dwell up isn't it? Maybe one day we will be living underground. It's either that or the moon.

HI-TECH: Amsterdam's underground city would have been cool.