In the past decade, many master plans of cities across Israel have included various provisions encouraging the development of large-scale mixed-use projects. The promotion of these projects, known as Urban Mega Projects (UMPs), is not limited to major central cities such as Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. UMPs appear in various forms, but they share a common goal: to be part of a broader urban development strategy aimed at deep transformation of the urban environment.

This transformation intensifies land use and radically alters urban morphology by creating "vertical urbanism," characterized by dense, high-rise, and large-volume construction. As a result, UMPs contribute to the emergence of a new urban model referred to in the literature as "mega-urbanism."

Although such projects are now being developed in dozens of Israeli cities, local research on the phenomenon is still in its early stages. Thus, despite important studies on urban intensity, including phenomena such as "towerification" and the creation of vertical urbanism, the local body of knowledge on UMPs remains rather limited.

Cohen B., Cohen N., and Rotem-Mindali, O., (to be published 2025), Size Does Matter: Towards a Geography of Mega-Urban Areas in the Tel Aviv Metropolitan Area, in Beeri I. and Shlomo O. (Eds.), Urban Research in Israel/Palestine: Recent Trends, Lamda publisher, The Open University of Israel (to be published)