a city at war

A square in old town

Tbilisi is a city at war. At war with pedestrians, at war with cars, at war with good sense. A walk down the side of the street is akin to an acrobatic obstacle course, where one must lunge past opposite walkers, over roots, under branches, around cars. A drive through Tbilisi must be accompanied by the sign of the cross, a blessing from a priest, for the dead die before they know it. It’s a demolition derby of Ladas, Mercedes, and Land Cruisers, where no one leaves alive but some just might enjoy going down and taking a few pedestrians along with them. 

I left Tbilisi a few years ago and moved to Prague. I come back to visit every now and then, and when I hear Georgians calling themselves “European”, I chuckle. It’s cute. But one only needs to look at their traffic, the way they drive and handle pedestrians on streets, to see that they’re no more European than Genghis Khan leading his Horde through the steppe, lobbing the heads of the Qara Khitai and piling them up outside of failing traffic lights, spinning dust clouds around badly implemented traffic circles. If you still don’t understand, if you’re some vajkaci here actually trying to make an honest argument, then read on.

Walking

I’ll start with some rants about walking on this blog, and onto driving on the next.

I’m in Prague now. Walking is nice. Pavements are nicely done, little stones placed together in sequence, creating a nice pattern throughout the city. In poorer parts there are consistently laid asphalt. The uniting theme though is this—people can walk. Two abreast, at the very least. People can push baby strollers, wheelchairs can navigate. Life, without a car, can exist rather calmly and nicely. This model is repeated ad nauseum throughout most of cosmopolitan cities of the world even, from Paris to Moscow to New York to Marrakesh to Bali. But curiously not so much in Tbilisi. 

Leselidze 2 years ago, now with another lane of parking

Walking up what should be the most tourist-ified street in the country, Leselidze, I came to the realization that perhaps Georgians just hate pedestrians. Perhaps they have some sort of passive aggressive rage built up towards ambulation and the usage of ones feet as a legitimate form of transportation. At some parts, one must squeeze between a parked car and a church wall, another part, jump over wildly sprawling roots, which lead from road to vendor, new street vendors are popping up and place themselves conspicuously in the way of flow, providing even less space for maneuvering. And don’t, by God, step into the street. You’re likely to get your arm broken by one of the speeding cars jetting by—on a good traffic day—but more likely your toe rolled over by a slow moving Niva whose engine stalls and then can’t roll off. 

Old Town

In every cosmopolitan city in the world, one thinks of their most romantic journeys strolling through the town. In Barcelona, there’s Las Ramblas, a 1.2 kilometer, low traffic stretch dividing two old town neighborhoods and connecting the main metro station to the sea. In Denver, 16th Street Mall, a 2-kilometer pedestrian only stretch of granite, coffee shops, and skyscrapers. In Paris, there’s Montmartre, winding streets and allies, filled with cheese smells and hipsters. Camden in London. Venice in California. All of Venice in Italy. Karlova Street and Staromestska in Prague. If you want a beautiful city that loves you, you need to feel that love, and the way you feel that love is by the street experience. Even if it’s just in the old town. There are a few streets that are nice, but that's the sum of it. It's a good start, but it's a long forgotten start, it seems.

There are a few nice streets. More of this and less of above=win

Really, Old Town Tbilisi—along with every other city center neighborhood—must be entirely re-imagined. It’s as though everyone in City Hall dozed off after eating one xatchapuri too many and never woke up again. Tbilisi needs a Prince Charming to kiss their zarmaci asses awake. Old Town must be closed down to traffic. I realize this goes against the grand scheme of some who must only move around the city by helicopter if they think they have a good dream of it. And the reality is that the city is being strangled and destroyed, ever so slowly; the long death is the most painful and shameful. The powers that be could at least have the grace of a matador and give it a quick death, if that’s their intention.

Main old town square. Zebras aren't only in Africa folks!

To the side streets and Leselidze, cars must be limited to residents and service vehicles only. All other cars—heading to Sovlolaki or beyond—should route to Pushkin or the embankments. Cross walks with lights must be installed at Meidan. It might be possible to still allow driving on Leselidze, but it should be entirely cut off on weekends, to allow for restaurants to spill out with chairs and tables, and musicians on the streets. Parking must be compensated, with a huge parking garage at Freedom Square and one at Abanotubani. Think big, guys. Go big.

Pollution

I’ve never seen smog until I went to Tbilisi. I mean, I’ve seen it in the sense that it taints a sunset, brings out the pinks and the purples, like in LA, or where there’s a vague blur on the horizon like I’m wearing someone else’s glasses. But in Tbilisi—and maybe this is used in tourism marketing for the city—you can really get to know smog. You can see it. You can breathe it. You can take it home and make a night out of it. 

When I came back, I was in shock. Before it was only in lower regions of the city, like that Satanic sigil of a traffic circle they call Hero’s Square. But it had crawled up, spread its Cthulu-like tentacles from Hero's Square up to Chavchavadze, along Rustaveli, strangling everyone in sight, confusing everyone’s doctors to think that they entire city must be smoking cigarettes. The next time I go, I’ll remember to bring a medical mask before daring to take a breath in the streets.

Walking the streets, it’s no wonder that heart disease is one of the main killers of Georgia. Because of the smog. Cars must be limited. Less cars: less smog. Emissions standards must be tightened. Higher standards: less smog. Less smog: greater health. Greater health: less strain on the health care system. Less strain: more room for year-end office supras. Everyone wins.

Parking

Walking perhaps wouldn't be so bad if parking weren't so bad. Where there are pavements, there are parked cars. Where there are no pavements, there are parked cars. There are some streets where the only option for walking even is to walk down the center of the street, and then drivers still honk at you as though you're crazy! If there's one thing Georgians are worse at than driving, its finding and creating parking spaces.

Parking on downtown streets needs to be heavily restricted, to residents only. Garages need to be built around transit hubs, new buildings should be required to have so many number of new parking spots depending upon their occupancy. Tourists will take metro and trams gladly, but the city obviously lacks tram access, so capitalize around metros. There’s no part of the city center outside of Vake that’s hard to get to by mass transit--except, curiously, Ortatchala, one of the main transit hubs to leave Tbilisi. 

Development around metros needs to be thought out. Tbilisi is on a mall-building craze, but why build malls where people can’t go? Instead of East-Point, the city should have engaged developers to redesign Samgori as a multi-transit shopping district, with metro, marshrutka/bus station, and many levels of shopping. Instead of Tbilisi Mall, Didube would have been a much better sight. But again, either Tbilisi urban planners are asleep and ignorant of opportunities, have never left Tbilisi, or when they do leave they only end up in strip tease shows and high dollar per diem drinking sprees.

Sidewalks only existing as parking places must end. They must be reclaimed. Police must ticket violators. Require each officer to make at least 10 traffic/parking tickets a month or dock their pay. In a city like Tbilisi, this really isn’t asking much and should be the easiest job in the world still and yet. For drivers, receiving 3 violations means your car is towed and fined, 7 means your license is suspended until you pass a driving test.

Streets are disasters to walk down, and they’ve only gotten worse since I returned for a short time. I left still loving Tbilisi three years ago, I left after a two-week jaunt regretting having returned, primarily because of the pedestrian and traffic experience. It aches my heart to feel that way.

Street Life

Street life is visceral. Mostly its gypsy kids blackmailing you for money, telling your girlfriend you have no heart, its beggars, its musicians pretending to be beggars, sometimes musicians being buskers, and mostly a lot of sad angry people. A lot of that is because of the above. Some of that is because of the poverty level and can't really be immediately helped. But a lot of this can be fixed. Give people places to go outside of birjas next to deteriorating block apartments, in parks with no lights, or collapsing walls.

In Prague, they have an amazing region on the river bank, Naplavka, which has very low rents to vendors, allowing for small time bars to run nearly non-stop. The place is packed with locals and tourists day and night, drawn by the beautiful views of the castle and river, staying for the cheap beer and drinks. Tbilisi also has an embankment park with a beautiful castle view, which sits empty at all times. There’s a high dollar bar that few can afford, and I think these days it has even shut down, I’m assuming because the rent was too high. Again, re-imagine. Follow the Prague model. Make it cheap and accessible for everyone. There’s already the Peace Bridge on one end, Metekhi Bridge on the other, the place is perfectly set up for a power house of amazing tourist and local activity.

With a view of the castle and the old town, why is this empty?

A long term vision would even be to see Rustaveli no longer a main traffic corridor, limiting all future constructions in Old Town to medium or low density, with lots of traffic lights on the route with cross walks, and further narrowing the street to allow for one lane going each way. Another lane would be for a tram, and the rest of the room for trees, walking, vendors, skate parks, busker stands, and restaurants. Then you’ll start to see a city that loves you.