Kingston Harbour Walk

CITYFORSTER + FELIXX + AQUA&TERRA win international tender to design Kingston's waterfront

The contract was signed at a ceremony in Kingston on 22 July, in the presence of Prime Minister Andrew Holness and Mayor of Kingston Andrew Swaby. Supported by IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, our consortium will deliver the feasibility studies and designs for the Kingston Harbour Walk between Rae Town and Harbour View, commissioned by Jamaica's Urban Development Corporation (UDC) and financed by the Government of Jamaica and the Caribbean Development Bank.

The Kingston Harbour Walk is Jamaica's flagship climate-adaptation initiative: a 25 km linear park and continuous public waterfront along the world's seventh-largest natural harbour, reconnecting downtown Kingston with historic Port Royal. Conceived in the UDC's Downtown Kingston & Port Royal Redevelopment Plan and delivering directly on Vision 2030, the Walk is both the coastal defence protecting downtown Kingston's regeneration behind it and a vast new public realm in a city where green space covers barely 11% of the urban area — for more than 600,000 people.

Our assignment forms the backbone of that development. The ~10 km between Rae Town and Harbour View is the central span. It ties separate waterfront projects into one continuous 25 km harbour edge, linking the downtown segment now being redesigned under the World Bank's KiWI programme with the future extension to historic Port Royal. Our feasibility studies and designs will set the coastal-defence and nature-based design logic the rest of the route can build on.

Kingston is one of the Caribbean's most hurricane-exposed capitals. We will pair nature-based solutions — mangrove and coastal habitat restoration — with resilient engineered defences, woven into a continuous waterfront embankment where Kingstonians can walk, meet, trade and play.

The assignment starts immediately with shoreline characterisation, hydrographic surveys and the climate risk & vulnerability assessment, moves on to feasibility studies and design options for the coastal defence and waterfront embankment, and concludes with final designs by end-2027 — setting the stage for construction of the Harbour Walk's central span.

We look forward to getting started, together with UDC and the people of Kingston!

The contract was signed at a ceremony in Kingston on 22 July, in the presence of Prime Minister Andrew Holness and Mayor of Kingston Andrew Swaby. Supported by IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, our consortium will deliver the feasibility studies and designs for the Kingston Harbour Walk between Rae Town and Harbour View, commissioned by Jamaica's Urban Development Corporation (UDC) and financed by the Government of Jamaica and the Caribbean Development Bank.The Kingston Harbour Walk is Jamaica's flagship climate-adaptation initiative: a 25 km linear park and continuous public waterfront along the world's seventh-largest natural harbour, reconnecting downtown Kingston with historic Port Royal. Conceived in the UDC's Downtown Kingston & Port Royal Redevelopment Plan and delivering directly on Vision 2030, the Walk is both the coastal defence protecting downtown Kingston's regeneration behind it and a vast new public realm in a city where green space covers barely 11% of the urban area — for more than 600,000 people.Our assignment forms the backbone of that development. The ~10 km between Rae Town and Harbour View is the central span. It ties separate waterfront projects into one continuous 25 km harbour edge, linking the downtown segment now being redesigned under the World Bank's KiWI programme with the future extension to historic Port Royal. Our feasibility studies and designs will set the coastal-defence and nature-based design logic the rest of the route can build on.Kingston is one of the Caribbean's most hurricane-exposed capitals. We will pair nature-based solutions — mangrove and coastal habitat restoration — with resilient engineered defences, woven into a continuous waterfront embankment where Kingstonians can walk, meet, trade and play.The assignment starts immediately with shoreline characterisation, hydrographic surveys and the climate risk & vulnerability assessment, moves on to feasibility studies and design options for the coastal defence and waterfront embankment, and concludes with final designs by end-2027 — setting the stage for construction of the Harbour Walk's central span.We look forward to getting started, together with UDC and the people of Kingston!