What Is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan?
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What is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan? «The transport policy of the capital of Kazakhstan should be implemented and improved comprehensively, taking into account the environmental factor, reducing traffic congestion with a focus on the flow from the outskirts and nearby villages to Nur-Sultan», – says analyst Anuar Temirov in his article written specifically for CABAR.asia. Follow us on Facebook Impacts on the city’s transport network is increasing every year due to internal migration from other regions to Nur-Sultan. Photo: Sputnik / Bolat Shaikhinov The fast-growing city of Nur Sultan has achieved impressive success over the 22 years since the transfer of the capital from Almaty. According to a study by the International Strategy Partners Group, the capital of Kazakhstan took first place in the competitiveness rating among 40 cities in Central Asia and the Caucasus in 2018.[1] However, despite the fact that the young city is becoming more and more attractive to investors, for the capital’s residents themselves, the everyday situation, primarily related to movement within the city is complicated due to a busy transport system, as well as lagging behind the development of the city’s public transport system. Moreover, the factor of deteriorating ecology also plays a What is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan? key role in the life of a simple Astana citizen. It is worth asking a question: why is the youngest capital in the world facing the problems of the already formed large megacities in the field of transport policy? Is the architect to blame? Architect Kisho Kurokawa presented to the first president of the country, Nursultan Nazarbayev, a master plan for the new capital of Kazakhstan, which distinguished itself from other projects by an innovative approach in the field of building architecture. However, the famous architect in his economic calculations was based on the realities that took place in Kazakhstan in the 1990s. According to experts, Kurokawa made mistakes in predicting the Architect Kisho Kurokawa. Photo: informburo.kz demographic “boom” that swept the country after overcoming the Asian crisis, due to an increase in oil prices.[2] In this vein, Kisho Kurokawa predicted that by 2010 only 490 thousand inhabitants would live in capital city (Astana back then), and by 2030 this figure would double and reach 800 thousand.[3] This forecast had an impact on the design and construction of the streets of the capital, which turned out to be very narrow. For example, on the main avenue of Nur-Sultan – Mangilik El, sometimes the number of lanes on one side reaches only two, although the buildings of many ministries and departments of Kazakhstan are located on this street. The population itself, contrary to the forecasts of the Japanese architect, reached the mark of 500 thousand already in 2003, now the population is 1.1 million. A natural desire for an ordinary resident of Nur-Sultan is the purchase and further operation of a vehicle, due to the fact that the city is the second coldest capital in the world after Mongolian Ulaanbaatar.[4] In this regard, impacts on the city’s transport network is increasing every year due to internal migration from other regions to Nur-Sultan and high birth rates. In the city itself, the number of cars per 1000 inhabitants in 2016 amounted to 340 units, this figure was higher than in such cities as London and Baku.[5] According to official statistics, a total 261.1 thousand cars were registered in the capital during 2018. Is Dr. Kurokawa to blame for this all? The answer is clearly negative, because even despite the narrow streets of Astana, public transport has not gained popularity as the most convenient means of transportation around the city. Its popularization began relatively What is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan? recently and continues with the help of projects that are not quite right in terms of mass involvement and attractiveness for residents, which, moreover, were also economically disadvantageous for the capital. Overhead railway, at the cost of stratospheric rates During the Soviet period, a very developed network of tram tracks successfully functioned in several cities of Kazakhstan. First of all, the network connected the enterprises with the places of compact residence of workers for the smooth functioning of factories. However, after gaining independence in two large cities of the country – Karaganda and Almaty, the tram depots were closed, and the tracks were dismantled. Moreover, if in the first city this happened back in 1997 due to constant power outages,[6] then in Almaty the decision to eliminate trams in 2015, as President Kasym-Zhomart Tokaev commented on at a meeting on city development, was controversial.[7] It became logical that due to the widespread trend of abandonment of trams in the republic, despite the great demand for transport in European countries, the leadership of Nur-Sultan in 2014 identified the implementation of a more modern project – light rail transport (LRT) as their priority . Astana LRT: A Project or a Scam? The LRT system operates in many large cities of the world, which are “magnets of attraction” for tourists and migrants. In many countries, the implementation of the construction project costed foreign countries not cheap: for example, in Dubai, the final cost amounted to about $ 7.8 billion with a length of 74.6 kilometers and 49 stations.[8] The LRT project in Nur-Sultan is significantly inferior in length to Dubai – 22.5 kilometers (18 stations), and the final cost will be $ 1.5 billion.[9] The daily passenger flow of the overhead railway in Dubai today is about 600 thousand people,[10] in Nur Sultan, the mayor’s office forecasts daily 146 thousand passengers. President Tokayev criticized these forecasts, pointing out that only 2,000 people travel the LRT route daily.[11] This raises the question of the feasibility of such an expensive project and its payback not only in the near future, but also in the long-term perspective. What is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan? The initial amount of the project was $ 1.8 billion, however, after numerous scandals and facts of corruption, as a result of which the former head of Astana-LRT, which directly implemented the project, managed to leave the country and was put on the Interpol international wanted list.[12] Much of this money was taken from Chinese loaners, which added an additional burden to the Kazakh budget. Residents of the capital named the erected columns, on which transport routes will be held, as “a monument of Kazakhstan corruption”. What is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan? What is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan? What is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan? Project “Astana LRT”. Photo: clrt.kz Even despite the high cost of the project, the key problem is that it is unlikely to solve the transport problems of the capital of Kazakhstan, since it does not connect the main streets with the areas which have the largest population of residents, and also completely ignores many suburbs of the city and nearby satellite towns and villages, in which, with continuing growth in migration to Nur-Sultan, the majority of the population will live. For example, in Moscow, the future construction of LRT is precisely aimed at solving the transport problem of the cities of the Moscow Region, whose residents travel to the largest city in Russia for work. The length of light rail transport in the capital of Russia will be 246 km. Upon completion of the construction of 22 km of tracks, local authorities are unlikely to intend to continue laying LRT, for example, to the village of Kosshy (located 25 km from Nur-Sultan, the population is 50 thousand), although this will be crucial for unloading traffic. Expensive “bus breakthrough” of Nur-Sultan What is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan? Currently, the main means of public transport In Nur Sultan is the bus. Every day on weekdays this type of transport carries about 712 thousand passengers.[13] Since 2015, the city authorities began to actively introduce new solutions to increase the role of buses in the transport system: new buses were purchased, special Bus Lane lines were allocated, cameras were installed everywhere, warm bus stops, a mobile application for tracking buses was launched and many other things. All these solutions together have significantly improved the functioning of the system. However, quite a lot of budget money was spent, although there were opportunities to reduce cost of the projects. At the beginning of 2020, 15 electric buses entered the routes of the capital. Photo: Akimat of Nur-Sultan One of the latest controversial decisions was the purchase approval of 100 electric buses worth $ 38 million. As the akim (mayor) of the capital Altai Kulginov mentioned, the high price of buses is dictated by their environmental friendliness, however, even the Ministry of Ecology cannot give an accurate assessment on how 100 electric buses can help to improve the environmental situation in the city. In 2015, when the first warm bus stop worth $ 36 thousand appeared, at the same time in media there was information that similar bus stops What is Wrong with the Transport Policy of Nur-Sultan? in Russia costed almost 5 times cheaper.[14] The introduction of innovative ideas for buses continues. In October this year, in several metropolitan buses, the Face Pay system was introduced in pilot mode using cameras from the Chinese company Hikvision, which was charged by reading biometric data from a person.[15] Amid growing anti-Chinese sentiment in society, there is a risk that some residents will stop using public transport, fearing for the leak of their personal data.