The city of Athens is one of the oldest cities in the world with a recorded history dating from c. 1400 BC. The capital and largest city of Greece and the southernmost capital on the European mainland, Athens is located in the southern part of the region of Attica.
The Athens Larger Urban Zone (LUZ) is according to EUROSTAT the 7th most populous LUZ in the E.U. with nearly half of the Greek population living there (more than 4 millions), and one of the most densely populated areas in Europe (1.540 inhabitants/km2). The municipality of Athens is the central municipality of the Athens urban zone and the most populous in Greece, with approximately 750.000 inhabitants and a land area of 39 km2. It is one of the most built up areas in Europe, enlisted among the top-ten most densely populated cities of our continent (mean population density being nearly 20.000 people per km2).

Athens is a major regional transport hub for air traffic, rail, roads and boats. Athens is supported by Piraeus Port, an important centre of the merchant marine, industry, and transportation connecting cities across within the country and abroad.

It’s a city of numerous excellent institutions of higher education, a major centre of archaeological research, a world-renowned tourist centre of prime international significance for its wealth of culture including: ancient monuments, world-class museums, large contemporary exhibition spaces, art galleries, numerous cultural events.

Athens is a rather densely populated area with16,830.41 inhabitants per Km² (2011) with a constant increase in the past decades and a reversed outflow in the last 2-3 years with 17% of the population relocating particular to the suburbs or to eastern and southern rural areas of Attica. The percentage of greenery in the Municipality of Athens is 2.25m² per inhabitant which is a fourth of the average for European cities.

Greece experiences a severe economic crisis. The population suffers from austerity measures. In the Municipality of Athens average annual income per capita dropped from 24.048 € in 2008 to 18.600 € in 2011 and remains in constant decline.