Moving from the Charter to concrete problems

Small informal meeting, 22nd October 2004

A small meeting in a private apartment, organised by a friend with six students, was an opportunity to ask ourselves some questions about the development of the city of Tbilisi.

The city is becoming uglier and the air unbreathable due to all the old cars brought in from Western Europe. But everyone wants one and cars make it easier to get a job!

This example of the conflict between economics and ecology speaks for itself. The principle I had put forward of a “larger effort of active protection and careful management of the environment” also seems a bit feeble up against the breadth of the problems. We talked about cities that encourage “environment-friendly transport” and economically sustainable development projects like solar energy, to give one example.

The experience once again illustrated that as long as there’s plenty of room for debate, the Charter makes it possible to get to very concrete questions quickly.