Zaha Hadid Architects has unveiled photographs of the King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD) Metro Station, which is set to open on December 1 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Named King Abdullah Financial District Metro Station, with the opening of its Blue, Yellow, and Purple lines (Lines 1, 4, and 6), the Riyadh Metro network will begin passenger operations on Sunday, December 1st, 2024. 

This will reduce traffic, shorten travel times, and enhance the quality of life for the city's expanding population, according to Zaha Hadid Architects. 

The studio also added that with a daily passenger capacity of 3.6 million, Riyadh Metro will promote the use of sustainable transportation options and reduce the number of car trips made throughout the city.

The main interchange on the new network is the King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD) Metro Station, which was created by Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA). It connects the KAFD terminus and King Khalid International Airport and offers access to the skybridge for the local KAFD monorail.

In addition to creating new indoor and outdoor public plazas for the financial district, the station's six rail platforms spread across four levels connect to bus and park-and-ride services, making it a significant multimodal transportation hub for the city.

The KAFD Metro Station prioritizes connectivity

The project was developed using BIM standards and procedures to create an accurate engineering model during construction. The design of the KAFD Metro Station prioritizes connectivity, which helps to define the character of Riyadh's new metro system. 

To maximize internal circulation and prevent congestion, the station's anticipated rail, automobile, and pedestrian traffic has been modeled, mapped, and organized, as the studio explained. 

The result is a three-dimensional lattice that serves as the spine for the building's circulation and is defined by a series of opposing sinewaves that are produced by the station's daily traffic flows' repetition and frequency variation.

The exterior of the station, which is covered in ultra-high-performance concrete panels, is also affected by these sinewaves. As a modern take on traditional environmental sheltering within the area's vernacular architecture, the façade's geometric perforations reduce solar gain. 

Multiple frequencies and reverberation create the intricate repetition of patterns found in the natural world, and the station's façade composition echoes the patterns created by desert winds in sand.

The elements that make up the KAFD Metro Station are highly correlated through symmetry, scale, and repetition. Throughout its development, ZHA continuously improved the design to improve environmental performance and structural efficiency while streamlining construction without compromising spatial quality. 

This was accomplished by blending the station's internal structure, which supports the train platforms and viaducts, with the external envelope's self-supporting structure. 

The station combines efficient passive design elements with a high-efficiency cooling system that is powered by renewable energy sources and automatically adapts to varying passenger levels throughout the day to provide maximum comfort at the lowest possible energy consumption. 

Additionally, sliding door panels on each platform keep cool air inside the station. The US Green Building Council has certified the KAFD Metro Station as a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold facility.

Image courtesy of RDA

Zaha Hadid Architects' King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD) Metro Station in Riyadh was captured by Riyadh-based photographer Faisal Bin Zarah in 2019.

Recently, ZHA revealed design for its first project in Malaysia, the plans are developed in collaboration with JLand Group Sdn Bhd (JLG). In addition, the firm begun construction on the Ülemiste Passenger Terminal in Tallinn, Estonia. 

Project facts

Project name: King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD) Metro Station

Architect: Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA)

ZHA Design: Zaha Hadid with Patrik Schumacher

ZHA Project Principal: Gianluca Racana

ZHA Project Director: Filippo Innocenti

ZHA Project Architect: Gian Luca Barone

ZHA Project Associate: Fulvio Wirz

ZHA Construction Support Leads: Marco Amoroso, Domenico di Francesco

ZHA Construction Support Services: Vincenzo Caputo, Abdel Halim Chehab, Marko Gligorov, Stefano Iacopini

ZHA Project Team: Marco Amoroso, Vincenzo Caputo, Abdel Halim Chehab, Lee Cubeddu, Rawan Al-Derjem, Domenico Di Francesco, David Fogliano, Manuele Gaioni, Marko Gligorov, Subharthi Guha, Alexandros Kallegias, Lisa Kinnerud, Alexandre Kuroda, Stefano Iacopini, Carolina López-Blanco, Jamie Mann, Mohammadali Mirzaei, Arian Hakimi Nejad, David Wolthers, Nicola McConnell, Mario Mattia, Massimo Napoleoni, Niki Okala, Carlos Parraga- Botero, Sohith Perera, Izis Salvador Pinto, Carine Posner, Neil Rigden, Paola Salcedo, Nima Shoja, Thomas Sonder, Vincenzo Reale, Kate Revyakina, Roberto Vangeli, Seungho Yeo

ZHA Competition Team: Alexandre Kuroda, Fei Wang, Lisa Kinnerud, Jorge Mendez-Caceres.

Structural Engineer: BuroHappold

Building Services Engineer: BuroHappold

Transport & Civil Engineers: BuroHappold

Fire Protection & Life Safety Engineer: BuroHappold

People Flow: BuroHappold

Acoustic Consultant: BuroHappold

Sustainability Consultant: BuroHappold

Lighting Consultant: BuroHappold

Façade Engineering: Newtecnic

Design Management: AECOM

Specification Consultant: AECOM

Cost Consultant: AECOM

Signage & Way Finding: Transport Design Consultancy

Safety Assessment: BH with Transsol

Development Engineer: Riyadh Metro Transit Consultants (RMTC) Main Contractor: BACS Consortium

Independent Checking Engineer: Buro Veritas

Independant Safety Assessor: TÜV Rheinland / ISARail Group Transit Systems: Line 1 Siemens (BACS), Line 4&6 Alstom

(FAST)Viaducts: AECOM & TriPod-ssd (Line1), Atkins (Line 4&6) Automatic Fare Collection: Indra

Structure Contractor: Saudi Lebanese Tarouk Contracting

MEP Contractor: Zamil

Interiors Contractor: DEPA

Elevators and Escalators: ThyssenKrupp

Facade Contractor: Permasteelisa Gartner Saudi Arabia Landscape Contractor: DEPA

All images © Hufton + Crow unless otherwise stated. 

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