EKIP– Expert Club for Economics and Politics A Different Opinion
Parks are an invention and a luxury of modern society. This is true for many things that we take for granted, but they are a direct result of the general enrichment in some parts of the world, a consequence of the division of labor, of scientific progress and in general - the opportunity to live without working every day, all day, for tomorrow's lunch. So are weekends, excursions to distant places, diverse cuisine. It does not require much knowledge to be aware that we can enjoy all this precisely thanks to global markets and scientific progress.
The emphasis here, however, will be on the urban environment. A topic that – like many others – we need to look at a little from a historical context to understand what is happening, how it is happening, and what we can think about the future.
Today, the topic of wide urban spaces (squares) or green spaces (parks) is one of the most frequently discussed. And not only their aesthetics, but also their existence in general – numbers, size, etc. Currently, in Bulgaria, the topic is viewed from the perspective of “development” – and attempts to solve this problem. Every city in the world, at any given time, has different problems, and solves them in different ways.
The libertarian perspective on the case can start from there – there can be no global solutions to local problems. Every place, every larger, smaller city, or village has its own problems, determined by its landscape, economy, history, culture of the population, etc. That is why it is much more logical for each place to define its own problems and accordingly seek solutions first at the local level, and then at the global level. Today, however, we are moving in the direction of more and more centralization, whether in a strict legal framework or in “soft” measures such as various conventions, recommendations, etc., determining exactly how good the population density should be, how much green space there should be, and so on.
This is probably an inevitable consequence of globalization – the modern global world has brought both global markets and global solutions. Therefore, a look at history would be useful to see how societies have found local solutions to their local problems – in our specific topic of urban planning problems.
Did people have squares and parks before? And were they state, municipal, or owned by various private institutions, unaffiliated with state power (or even hostile to it)?
Parks are a luxury for which we all pay in solidarity today
Today we imagine that if there were no strict bans or regulations on the percentage of green spaces, our entire cities would be built over. There would be no squares, playgrounds, dog parks, parks, sidewalks, streets left. The reality is that in a free market, people get what they want. If there is a great need for dog parks, then they will be built. If there is a great need for playgrounds, then someone will build them. In all likelihood, every dog owner or every parent will have to pay for them directly – but the difference with today is not great. We still pay for these spaces today, but “in solidarity”. When the municipality builds a dog park, everyone pays for it. Yes, in most cities there are pet fees, but these amounts very rarely (if ever, anywhere) fall into a separate fund from which to pay for the costs of dogs – for playgrounds, cleaning, dog litter boxes, and so on.
If, indeed, with a freer market in construction, parks are built, then we must understand that they are a luxury. This is an area of the city that many people want to be a housing cooperative, but it is a park. And if the people who want it to be a housing cooperative are willing to pay several hundred euros for each square meter (floor) of it, then the people who want it to be a park pay nothing - or pay nothing more than those, the others, because they probably pay identical taxes and fees.
In this situation, an argument can always be made about human greed – about the businessman who wants to build a taller apartment building, about the new resident of Sofia who wants to live as close to the center as possible, and so on. However, we must always admit that everyone is greedy in their own way and is drawn to their own personal greed in some way. It seems more moral and more pleasant for the electorate to defend the thesis that there should be parks, not apartment buildings, but perhaps increasing residential areas, that is, meeting the demand for housing, and therefore reducing their price, is not such a bad cause.
Aggregated statistics on mold for green spaces are meaningless
The other truth is that we need common spaces and green areas. Every city should have squares and parks. The debate, however, is “how many”. I will recall from a few paragraphs above that the global answer to this question – or at least the European one – is a norm for certain squares of green area per capita. Some-what percentage of the city, at a certain population density, should be green area. Does that make sense to you? Not to me.
Firstly, because this fact is too easily circumvented – for example, in Plovdiv in recent years there has been talk of expanding the park around the Rowing Base by dozens of acres. For those unfamiliar - the Rowing Base is located on the edge of the city, at a distance for most people, approximately as far as going to a deserted region in the Rhodope Mountains. The expansion of this park will increase the percentage of green spaces on paper and will raise us in the given rankings, but in no way will it actually improve the access of people from most of Plovdiv to green spaces. At the same time, cities like Gabrovo, Asenovgrad, Smolyan, Troyan or similar mountainous places may be densely built up in their centers and without many central, large “city parks” – but due to their location, residents there have access to peaceful green park spaces, literally curving along 3-4 streets on the sides of the city. The diversity of cities is so great that attempts to fit them into a mold according to these indicators are pointless.
The libertarian perspective – decentralization of problems and solutions – is supported by history
Thus we return to the libertarian perspective of decentralization – of problems and solutions, that is, each city should identify its own problems and seek their own solutions. Here we will also look at history – how Bulgarian cities solved their problems during the Revival. These were the years in which, in the words of the great Bulgarian historian Vera Mutafchieva, “any village that wanted to, built a community center, any village that wanted to – built a church. If it needed a road – it would build a road. It would bring water to the village from somewhere. The people did all this for themselves and no one interfered with them”.
This also applies to squares - an interesting space in settlements, which has changed its appearance quite a bit in different historical periods, but has always been a wide place where large groups of people - or animals - gather. And whenever people needed such a space, they found it or shaped it. Thus, in almost every village you will find, inherited from centuries, a "mere" - a wide empty space between the houses, where in the morning before and in the evening after grazing, the sheep, cows or the respective livestock that everyone owns gather. These "mere" are not made according to a standard, they are not exclusive state property, some are rectangular, others (more often) triangular, curved, etc., but all are in a convenient place in the center of the village, shaped with the understanding of the villagers, since they needed it.
In a similar way, squares were formed in cities – in many cities, they are still preserved as empty spaces. One of the main dividing lines between cities and villages during the Ottoman rule was the presence of a market. Usually, these markets were not permanent, but were held with some cyclicity – the names of the already permanent markets have been preserved to this day, such as the “Monday”, “Thursday” or “Saturday” market in Plovdiv. Some of these markets were formed later, but the cultural model is centuries-old.
The urbanistic conclusion we draw is that on the other days the spaces where the market was held were empty. They were squares. For a number of reasons, this urban feature has already been lost in our country, but we can see something similar in Italian towns – the neighborhood square is a large empty space surrounded by interesting activities. That's where the city clock is, there are probably the most cafes on the periphery of the square, etc. That's how it was in many places in our country centuries ago.
Private initiative as an alternative to a disinterested state
There is another, more interesting type of square space in cities. It (somewhat) comes from the need for segregation of society. To put it in an unpolitically correct way, Bulgarians needed a place where they could discuss their Bulgarian affairs without being disturbed by Turks, and from a certain point on – by Greeks. These are the empty spaces in front of churches.
There is a long history of the meaning of an empty space in front of the church facade – a place that has existed since the birth of Christian temple construction. From the first centuries of early Christianity to the Bulgarian 19th century, the function changes radically, but despite everything, they exist. By the way, we can again draw a parallel between the Bulgarian Revival and the Italian Renaissance (a completely formal parallel – the reasons, conditions and prehistory are infinitely different). In the center of Florence, for example, the large squares are in front of the four large churches – Santa Croce, Santa Maria del Fiore, Santa Maria Novella and San Lorenzo. The fifth square is around the municipality – which actually took shape because the city market was there.
All these spaces are designed and often maintained by the churches themselves and the respective Catholic order (and in the Bulgarian case – by the respective church community) with a specific purpose. The church needs a place where many people can gather – to communicate before and after the service, to be in an open space and to take advantage of all the amenities that the wide, informal, secular square gives them compared to the closed temple space. In this case, all this happened not with the support of the state, but on the contrary - in a power that was rather hostile to the idea of such a space. People needed and created the necessary public space.
Parks appear when society needs them.
If we discover city parks only after the Liberation, it is for the same reason – the need for such spaces before was small. And yet, there were parks. In settlements around rivers or mountains, Bulgarians – and other residents of Bulgarian cities – used this natural environment to relax. We recall again from the introduction that this great pleasure was reserved only for city dwellers who were engaged in trade or other types of crafts, in which they had free time. The villagers did not have the time and need and therefore – they did not have parks. But travelers who passed through the cities, as well as local documents, indicate the presence of suburban parks. It is reported that Sunday walks by the rivers, in certain places in the forest or in meadows near the mountain cities were common for citizens. Among the larger and wealthier cities, some houses also had large courtyards, which were particularly welcoming and served this role – in these entirely private spaces, the women and men of the neighborhood gathered to read newspapers, knit, sing or discuss politics. And in some cities there was even a “Bahçi” guild – that is, an association of professional gardeners.
Many of these spaces still exist today. A certain part of today's "gardens" and squares in older Bulgarian cities are inherited places from the markets of the Middle Ages or the Renaissance. The wide courtyards in the houses were not obtained from a regulation of the Land Use Plan, according to which a certain percentage of the property must be green space - they were obtained from the need of the respective owner to have a green space. When a city needed to have a square, it created a square. Bulgarians - and people in general - are not to be underestimated, if left alone, in peace to regulate their own lives and the life of the community in the immediate vicinity. And, in the words of Vera Mutafchieva, in these times of relative peace, whoever "needs a road - will build a road. Will bring water to the village from somewhere. People did all this for themselves and no one interfered with them".
