On Thursday about the confusion of urban land on a location known as Lido.
The results of the meeting of the Bratislava City Council showed that MEPs approved point 2 and thus “Proposal for confusion as a case worthy of special consideration concerning land in Bratislava, k. Ú. Petržalka, Kočánková Street, with Popper Capital, SRO, based in Bratislava. ”
Urban planner Ivana Nemethová In the Podcaste of Ekocast, she told us more about how it is with the zoning planning in Slovakia and explained why the Lido project is problematic.
Listen to our podcast:
What do you consider to be the biggest systemic problems related to the city of creation in Slovakia?
There are several problems and the whole world is facing them. Cities are growing and we are assumed that in 2050 up to three quarters of people will live in cities, so we need to make them sustainable from all aspects. For me, the biggest challenge is the climate crisis, because in our organization we are dealing with the climate and we are trying to point out that city representatives really take this challenge responsibly to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases that cause climate crisis, it is called mitigation, and it is called mitigation, and At the same time, to adapt our urban environment to increasingly and worse impacts of climate change.
And these are the floods we have experienced in September or it is an increasing increase in heat and the number of hot days. It is also drought or various strong storms. These are all things that fall directly on the population and fall on our economy, so we have to deal with them.
In recent years there have been concerns about the development and pollution of the natural environment in urban areas. Can these problems be solved already in the creation of the city?
Yes, the problem of pollution is more complex. It is either soil, water or air pollution and more, so it’s a very complicated topic. But how the city works, how its individual parts work and how the population is treated, it can greatly influence the level of pollution.
Last year, together with the Organization of the Cyclo -Coalition, we had a project where we focused on air pollution in Bratislava’s streets. We measured carbon dioxide in 25 places and found that on many streets in Bratislava, pollution is much worse than measured at SHMI stations. And the streets were the most transported. They are in the city center, such as Mickewiczova, Staromestská, Šancová or Štefánikova Street. With this finding, we asked both the city management to take steps to calm down traffic and reduce traffic in these streets, and we also asked the Ministry of the Environment to access this topic in a comprehensive way. For example, Slovakia still has no strategy for air protection, which is very important. At the same time, the Directive has now changed in the EU and the limits for pollution will gradually decrease in the coming years, which is very good, because we need to reduce the pollution for people’s health. This is a real problem because, for example, more than 5,000 people die of air pollution in Slovakia. And this affects the most, for example, young children who breathe more often are closer to the ground. This pollution can endanger them and cause them health problems for life.
Did you get some feedback from organizations, institutions where you turned?
The Ministry of the Environment is now a very complicated situation. Minister Tomáš Taraba has been led by this department from the beginning very incompetent, released a lot of experts and the departments are now undersized. He even canceled the air pollution separation, which is total nonsense. So we didn’t go anywhere and asked the Minister to resign.
And as far as the city management is concerned, a few weeks ago we had a meeting with Mr. Deputy Primer Mrva and Mrs. Prime Minister Kratochvílová. We meet on various such occasions and discuss solutions. However, I was quite disappointed with this meeting. I see that there is great potential and Bratislava could approach these topics much bolder. We also have this in the strategic documents of the city and in our plans, but I do not really see the steps that would be directed.
If we look at the Lido site and construction problems – can you describe the main challenges that are associated with the planning and implementation of new buildings in this area?
We have now joined the initiative of various experts from various professional areas and wrote our opinion, which we addressed to the city management regarding these changes and accessories of the zoning plan. However, we feel that no comments have been accepted, our reservations about public involvement have also not been heard.
We think that the city must also be created in cooperation with the inhabitants. They should ask people what they need in the territory and it should not be just a memorandum with developers behind closed doors.
We appealed to three basic things. The first thing was rather economic. With this zoning plan, the city wants to increase construction in the territory, which will allow developers to build more apartments. From this increase, the city has made some small part of the apartments as compensation, but in our opinion the compensation is really only symbolic, because in the whole area there will be more than 5,000 apartments and only some 97 should get the city, so it is two percent of apartments. In other cities, in other countries, this form of compensation is about 20 percent. We think the city has a strong position to negotiate much more. And I think it is strategic for the city to develop rental housing, which is one huge problem.
Another topic we pointed out was the participation of the population. This process was really a legal minimum. Yes, there were some commenting and presentations, but we have never seen any more active effort to involve residents. And we see that some other projects can do this, such as the City for Children. And here as if he wasn’t interested. It’s a shame.
And another aspect is the environment aspect. This area is currently largely forest. There is a floodplain forest, various kinds of trees, older trees. At the same time, there is a biodiversity to be protected. But what I think is important not only for this forest itself, but also for the whole of Bratislava, is that now there is an island of cold. Natural vegetation is naturally cooler than the surrounding areas.
This was also investigated by experts from the climate and measured that there are about 4 ° C less in this area than in the built -up area. So we need to protect these areas, which are naturally cooler because we know that climate change is not going anywhere, will deteriorate and the tropical days will be more and more. Such a refuge and such cooling of other districts is very important.
Listen more in our podcast.
What else will you find out in the podcaste of ekocast?
- Slovak cities often struggle with a lack of high -quality public spaces and green areas, or that the properly rooted are exchanged for newer, more modern solutions… What steps would you recommend to improve the quality of public spaces and create urban oases in urbanized areas?
- For example, Košice went to people and talked to them when changing the zoning plan… Can this way be “better”?
- Slovak towns and municipalities face problems of unclear coordination between different levels of government, municipalities and experts and architects. How does it evaluate cooperation between these entities and what should be improved to simplify the planning and construction process?
All of our podcasts can be found on the page. You can log in to subscribe to all new parts via or. Follow us on the Facebook page.
