Posted on May 01, 2025 at 19:44. / Modified May 01, 2025 at 20:39.
Where will we dance tomorrow in Geneva? Nothing certain for the moment.
The new PAV development project, for Praille-Acacias-Vernets, aims to create, among other things, 12,000 dwellings on 230 hectares. But this vast urban project also threatens an essential part of Geneva cultural and nightlife.
For more than a decade, clubs like La Gravière, the Motel Campo, Le Village du Soir, Audio or Rooftop 105 animate the Geneva nights in the areas concerned by the future PAV. But all share the same fragility: they are installed with temporary leases, sometimes renewed in the spot. Some, like the Motel Campo, may have to close in 2026.
The Grand Council of the Night requires recognition full of nightlife
Today, the actors of the Geneva night, grouped within the Grand Council of the Night, demand full recognition of their cultural role. For them, town planning and party are not incompatible. “We must anticipate, integrate nightlife into the development plans, instead of acting in reaction,” pleads Kate Reidy, coordinator of the collective.
The PAV Foundation claims to want to integrate culture into the city of tomorrow, via a strategy combining transitional and sustainability occupation. The Grand Central project, organized with the Antigel Festival and the Motel Campo in January 2025, is part of this logic. But in the field, uncertainty dominates. A motion filed with the Grand Council now requires that culture and night being not “the big forgotten of the future district”.
At stake: 500,000 annual visitors attracted by neighborhood clubs. A vibrant, but threatened nightlife, as elsewhere in Switzerland. In Zurich, the cult club Zukunft recently had to close, for lack of rehousing. The symbol of a gentrification which threatens the spaces of culture and celebration.
