A Future City Anchored in Midocean
Fascinating Dream of the French Engineer Foenquinos to Float a New All-Steel Atlantis Midway Between Europe and America in the Gulf Stream — A Haven and Paradise to Be Eighth Wonder of the World.
The Marseilles engineer proposes to build his floating city on an immense steel ring, in the center of which will be an enclosed harbor that may be entered by passing under on of the four towers.
NEW Atlantis, a city anchored in the ocean between the Old and New Worlds —such is the daring proposal of Leon Foenquinos, a Marseille engineer. Briefly M. Foenquinos, who has some notable military and naval inventions to his credit, wants to build a circular steel ring large enough to contain a population of 200,000 that would be “the most majestic work of man.” It would be anchored at a shallow spot, less than 200 feet deep, that is located in the Gulf Stream about halfway between Paris and New York, namely, at 43 degrees longitude and 45 degrees north latitude.
The ring would be 659 feet high, its internal diameter 3282 feet and its external diameter 4,600 feet.
“I have arranged for a handsome outer boulevard and also an inner one, as well as an intermediate street,” M. Foenquinos explains in a memorandum he has sent to French capitalists seeking $4,000,000,000 for the project. “These circular boulevards will be cut by 86 radial streets. Four full-sized Eiffel Towers will be erected at the four cardinal points to serve as radio masts, lighthouses and landing stations for Zeppelins. Skyscrapers will raise their noble heads in the intervening spaces. A subway will make the circuit of the ocean city in the lower caissons. The three boulevards will be lined with gorgeous tropical plants, always in bloom.
“The central pool or basin, which will be entered through four broad passageways, will serve as a harbor for transatlantic liners and flying boats. The pool will have no bottom except the ocean.”
The principal purposes of this extraordinary project are as follows:
First. A health resort—eternal springtime.
Second. A temporary or permanent refuge for wet Americans.
Third. Landing place for transatlantic air services of the future.
Fourth. Meteorological station.
Fifth. Fuel and freight depot for shipping lines.
Sixth. A gambling resort, like Monte Carlo, outside all international laws.
Seventh. Base for life-saving services.
“I PARTICULARLY wish to explain that my steel island is not simply a landing place for air lines across the Atlantic,” M. Foenquinos declared energetically. “It will be an actual city established on a far more substantial basis and serving far broader interests. The world has a very urgent need for such a halfway station, with all that it implies for the safety of navigation. The population will be permanent and will find the life and the climate there extremely agreeable.
“It is hardly necessary to add that we shall have luxurious hotels for tourists who wish to take a health treatment or break their Journey for a few days; theaters, picture palaces, bathing beaches and every possible amusement, as well as a handsome casino.
“The principal shipping and commercial interests of all countries will have offices there. Ocean liners and air liners will be passing every day, every hour. Life-saving boats will be dashing out when appeals come. Mails, cables, radios,
bassadors will represent every nation. Bands will be playing in the parks. One will simply tingle with excitement there. The new Atlantis will be the eighth wonder of the world.”
Evening Star, Washington DC, July 06, 1930