In recent years, many world cities its activities directed to river developing the public spaces on its shores, and basing its identity on the line just a city - river. Transformation of the world economy, the crisis of traditional industries and the transition from industrial to the postindustrial stage of development of society, had resulted in the abandonment of traditional methods of production and storage of goods, ie. dislocation of industrial plants from the central coastal zones of the cities. Rehabilitation of industrial complexes in the world began a few decades ago. Abandoned warehouses and industrial buildings are the starting point of modern reconstructions of coastal zone cities. The text deals with the phenomenon of coastal zones and methods applied in the revitalization of the same, in the service of overall city development. Cities on rivers have natural wealth and the specific development potential that can be considered simultaneously as a generator of development and the urban fabric regenerator. Adequate solutions are not only in the macro and micro interventions, shaping and final character, in the authors defined vision. Any partial solution (detail by detail) is reduced to the consideration of only one, the present moment. Through the pursuit of new and adequate functions and coastal forms, we can provide a higher living quality of citizens, but also the affirmation of the city in the context of global competition.