How to design a city for people not cars?

When I walk to the office, I think about cities having their own personalities. I see Batumi as male, smart, well-groomed, and laid-back as if the salt and holiday spirit of the Black Sea have sunk into his system. He appreciates the fusion of the jumble in the old city, the scent of magnolia and coffee around the small cafes, and the sparkling new buildings along the boulevard. He enjoys the buzz of tourists heading to the beach and bicycles riding along the sea-side promenade.

But when I turn away from the seaside towards the busy streets, I see the other side of this laid-back man. The mood of the city changes, becomes tense and anxious. The streets look grey and are full of cars and eccentric drivers.

Batumi has grown dramatically in recent years, from a relatively small city of 18 km2 in 1990 into a 65 km2 urban conglomerate. It is not only a leading sea resort of Georgia, but plays a critical role in the national economy as a sea and land gate for the country.

The price to pay for this rapid growth is one of the highest levels of car concentration in Georgia – around 136 per 1000 capita (on par with Istanbul at 139 per 1000). The city’s urban transport is congested and, sadly, inefficient. Public transport is quite basic, the parking policy has not progressed much, and people use motorized vehicles for one third of daily trips. Batumi has the potential to become a bicycle-friendly city, but a lack of extensive biking lanes means only 0.3 percent of city residents use bicycles for daily commuting.

When I talk to Batumiers about the future of our city, we agree that the city should be designed for people not cars. While they don’t say the phrase “sustainable urban development”, that is exactly what they describe as the idea of a great, liveable city: excellent public transport, pollution-free air, no traffic jams, and more places to walk, bike, and leisurely sip our famous coffee.

I tell them that Batumi will soon become the first green city in Georgia, once we introduce our own model of sustainable urban mobility. To prepare the ground for this reform, The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Global Environment Facility (GEF) have been working with the Batumi City Hall and the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources Protection of Georgia since 2016.

We have done a thorough research to collect the traffic data and study how people move about in Batumi and what type of transport they use. Based on this research, we have designed a virtual model which shows transport demand of the city and reflects daily choices and mobility behaviour of an average Batumian. This model laid the ground to the first ever Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan of Batumi, a guiding document which merges recommendations of the urban development professionals with the real needs of people. The solutions described in the plan include a new parking strategy, public transport scenarios, more attractive bicycle network and the electric city taxi.

The whole exercise is quite unique for Georgia and, once completed, will open a whole new prospect of urban transport development in the country.

After the local government in Batumi adopts the Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan in the coming months, we will start piloting it on several central streets of the city.

The first results of our work will already be visible in 2018. Then Batumi will tell his story to his friends in Ajara and then all around Georgia, giving them a reassuring smile and a helpful nudge in the right direction. 

Find out more about UNDP’s work in Georgia: www.ge.undp.org