BELGRADE 2041

We are in a very specific moment - the preparation of the General Urban Plan of Belgrade for the period from 2021 to 2041 is underway. This important and comprehensive plan is created every 20 years, and determines the guidelines of the entire development of the city, from traffic, through the layout of residential areas, the number and size of parks to the construction of new communal infrastructure and facilities.

Belgrade is a city of growing inequalities, unaffordable apartments, polluted air, traffic congestion and many other things that irritate and annoy us. Apart from occasional short-term and insufficient measures, there is no long-term plan in sight to really change any of this for the better.

Can we imagine what Belgrade will look like in 2041? Where will we live in twenty years, if only the desire for profit continues to shape our city, and not the wishes and needs of all those who live in it? What kind of air will we breathe at this rate of pollution? How much time will we spend in traffic jams with such a rapid increase in the number of motor vehicles? Where will we live if, in the next twenty years, mostly apartments are built that are unaffordable for the majority of the population, and the roof over their heads continues to be taken away from those who are unable to cover housing costs with their work compensation?

Solutions must be sought in strategic, long-term and systemic moves - in plans that decision-makers and institutions must adopt and implement.

How come we don't ask ourselves anything?

One such plan is the General Urban Plan, which is created every 20 years and sets strategic, urban development goals for the city for the next 20 years. Until this moment, GUP 2041 has not yet been adopted, nor has the Draft Plan been presented, although it was on early public inspection in 2022.

Can you imagine that none of us ask anything about such a document? We do not know at what stage the preparation of this important document is currently, and we have been waiting for the Elaborate for three years! Whose priorities does this plan follow, to which problems does it offer solutions? These are all unanswered questions, but one thing is clear - citizens are practically excluded from this process. 

The fact that no one asks us what kind of city we want to live in does not mean that we should be silent, because we have the right to say what kind of air we want, where we want to rest and play, where to work, how to live. We can join together to fight for our voice to be heard and for it to be recorded what kind of neighborhood and block we envisioned and how we would like them to develop.

Let's jointly bring back to the air the topics that were taken away from us and placed in some non-transparent and unknown procedures. Let's talk about them with each other, let's inform all those in charge about what we think, and whenever possible, loudly and clearly defend our right to the city and our neighbors. The question of what kind of city we want is inseparable from the question of what kind of people we want to be, what values ​​we cherish and what kind of social relations we seek. The right to be asked and to think about our cities is one of the most precious rights that we must win back. 

Where's the plan?

During 2021, we launched the campaign Where is the plan? waiting for GUP 2041 to appear on early public inspection, and believe it or not, a year later - it did. Notable was the planning of the city according to the interests of profit and investors, the expansion of the city in density and width, although this is contrary to the modern way of planning, which puts the reduction of the impact of climate change among its primary goals. 

On the other hand, there was no space planning for the construction of public housing stock, but there was a noticeable reduction of public green space and the occupation of public land by construction of commercial and residential purposes.

During 2020, we created a series of talks about GUP 2041, which is available on our Youtube channel. We have tried to include as many experts as possible who deal with urban planning, housing and climate change, in order to develop a discussion on these three topics and implement ideas and suggestions for the GUP as it should be. 

In addition, we also released a film called Belgrade 2041, which talks about the problems of organizing Belgrade, and how we could do it differently. 

We invited artists to present their vision of the city and how Belgrade could look like in 2041. https://ministarstvoprostora.org/beograd2041-2/ We received great creative solutions that show that there are many more possibilities and creativity than what Elaborat offered and that if someone asked us something, they would get a suggestion and a proposal that would make this city a better place to live.