The Athens Metropolitan Area

Athens Today

The Greater Athens Area constitutes, today, a modern Metropolis with singular aesthetic and cultural assets which signify both its ancient and modern history. Simultaneously, the Metroplex is a large economic and buisiness centre undergoing a rapid pace of multi-level transformation in the spirit of sustainability, playing an indispensible rote in the country's development, proclaiming an international physiognomy and generally possessing all those characteristics which allow for its full integration ihre the network of the metropolitan regions of Europe and the world panorama of major urban centres.

The Greater Athens Area is a self-contained region of the country, the region of Attica. It is the largest region in the country in terms of population and density, as well as econonmic activity. lt contains 157 local government muninicipalities and 4 prefectures.

History

Modern Athens, a small town of 12.000 inhabitants at the time it became the capital of the newly founded Greek Nation (1834), grew to a city of 453.000 people in 1920, and 802.000 in 1928 after ihe massive immigration wave of refugees from Asia Minor. During the latter period, Athens experienced high rates of industrial development and transformation into a major urban und economic centre

On the eve of the second world-war, Athens was already a city of 1,140,000 inhabitants. The years following 1950 marked the period of total post-war restructuring of the Country. Athens developed even higher rates of economic and demographic increases propelled by a significant concentration of industrial activity in the area.

By 1981 Athens was a Metroplis of 3,400,000 inhabitants. Following 1981, the domographic rates were finally checked and the capital underwent a period of population stabilisation while at the same time it experienced the symptoms of the recent international economic crisis and industrial recession.