Modern Modi'in

What really makes Modi'in different from most other Israeli towns are the parks, luxurious long lawns running down the centre of the major boulevards, small neighbourhood parks, such as the one in the Malibu area or simply nature reserves on the edges of town. There also beautifully maintained small gardens around many apartment buildings.

My personal favourite is a little garden with banana trees in it, maybe it isn't the most beautiful garden in town but I love the banana flowers and watching the fruit develop. Many other buildings have lovely flower arrangements or huge brightly coloured, delicious smelling vines tumbling over the fence, such as jasmine, passionfruit, honey suckle or morning glory.

Modern Modi'in a new, planned, semi-suburban town. In harmony with local topography most of the main streets in Modi'in are in the valleys with residential areas along the hillsides.

Like many Israeli apartments in the hilly and mountainous parts of the country, many Modi'in apartment buildings are ‘graduated' or ‘terraced' along the hillsides, for example our flat is half a storey above the ground in the front and a full story above the ground at the back.

Hula Valley Street, Modi'in

From our flat we have a view of one of Modi'in's main streets, a wide date palm lined boulevard with lush parks down the centre interspersed with small shopping centres and schools. We overlook a local school and several parks planted with lawns, huge wonderfully scented rosemary bushes and ornamental grasses. On the other side of the boulevard are more residential neighbourhoods going up the hillsides, a mixture of angular stone and concrete graduated buildings.

This idea of building in harmony with the local topography also includes an emphasis on rounded shapes at junctions to flow with the contours of the hills. This works better in some places than others.

While rounded corner buildings and in some areas sloping tiled roofs do soften the harsh lines of modern Israeli architecture in some parts of town, in most neighbourhoods the dominant style is some variant of the plain, angular architecture typical of most urban areas in Israel. Some of the newer neighbourhoods are prettier, with single family homes, arches and softer lines.

Modi'in does have it's 'charming' areas too. There are some neighbourhoods with semi-pedestrianised brick paved streets (rehovot hollandiim - Dutch streets in Hebrew), for example the area with streets named after verses from Solomon's 'Song of Songs' near the Modi'in Centre shopping centre. This neighbourhood has large houses on narrow brick lanes leading off from a main park and parking area. The overall impression of this area is that the architect was trying to create a modern version of the traditional style old neighbourhoods in cities such as Jerusalem and Jaffa. I'm not sure how practical the layout is, but it is certainly prettier and and more private than many of the more modern looking neighbourhoods.

Modi'in in the rain

One of the nice features in many areas of Modi'in is the use of Jerusalem style stone facing on buildings. I believe that this is required by municipal regulations on all main roads, but it's a feature in other areas too. Unfortunately in many side streets the more usual painted concrete is common, and while for now this looks fresh, it generally doesn't age as well as stone facing, as a casual look at most typical Israeli cities proves. Concrete facing tends to age by crumbling and turning brown, while the buildings of Jerusalem just gain character as their rough stones age and show signs of weathering and urban grime. On a practical level the pale pink or yellow of stone buildings produces less glare in the bright summer sun than whitewashed concrete, and so is easier on the eye.

Luki Towers

One problem with the construction in some areas of Modi'in is that the buildings are often very close to each other. We look out into our neighbours' kitchens and living rooms, or down onto the ground floor flats' gardens. The south facing wall of our living room/dining room/kitchen (one big room) is almost entirely glass, making it very hot in summer unless we leave our heavy aluminium shades down all day. On the other hand for most of the year it's lovely to leave the shades up and have the room flooded with sunlight. The only problem with this is that then we also end up looking out into our neighbours' apartments, so we can't really just enjoy sitting on the balcony or by the window. Like many other Modi'in residents we've put up vines, flower pots and a cloth wall along the balcony railing to make it a bit more private. If you're planning to move to Modi'in, check how close you are to your neighbours before signing on a contract, it's awkward to have windows that look directly into your neighbours' homes...

While most of Modi'in consists of low to medium rise buildings, we do have exceptions, a few high rise apartment buildings, the most prominent of which are Luki Towers (yes, I have spelled that correctly, named after the Luki building company which built them). The towers are probably Modi'in's main landmark, other than the hilltop watertower, and continue to be the subject of strong feelings in the town. Many people consider them to be an eyesore, spoiling the more human scale of the rest of Modi'in. More towers are planned in some of the newer neighbourhoods, though residents are doing their best to block the plans. Personally I think the towers look like a pair of rocket ships but that's just my opinion.

Fog in Modi'in

The naming of streets is a difficult matter...

Most main streets have been named after major Israeli valleys, e.g Ayalon Valley Street, Hula Valley Street, Dotan Valley Street etc. This is especially confusing as Modi'in is located close to the real Ayalon Valley.

In keeping with the topographic theme many residential streets in eastern Modi'in have been named after Israeli streams and rivers, the idea being that all the streams on the hillsides 'flow' into the valleys. The result is very confusing with several neighbourhoods in which just about every street is named after a 'Nahal' (Hebrew for stream). Even though we now have street signs, there are a lot of visitors to Modi'in who get very lost in a sea of streams, and not realising that almost every street in this part of town is named 'Nahal something' end up cruising around a neighbourhood checking each Nahal for the right one. Rumour has it that some poor souls have spent days looking for the right 'nahal'...

Each neighbourhood has its own themed streets: trees, flowers, Solomon's Song of Songs, the Twelve Tribes of Israel and the prophets.

Links to my Modi'in nature pages

Return to home