B.Baibek told about ecological development of Almaty

In his welcoming speech Mayor of Almaty Bauyrzhan Baibek noted that today the city has developed a comprehensive scheme for organizing traffic until 2023, which includes common vectors for the development of transport, some of which have already been implemented.

"Thus, the allocated lines for public transport with the length of 96 km were launched, which increased the average speed of rolling stock by 1.5 times, and passenger traffic by 30%. One-way traffic on the streets of Kurmangazy and Shevchenko is organized. The introduction of paid parking allowed to reduce the load on the street-road network and increase payments to the budget five times. A bicycle corridor from the "Orbit" microdistrict to the Green Bazaar was cfreated, the city has installed 200 bicycle stations for 1,730 bicycles. Owing to the establishment of market relations and the withdrawal from the shadow of income, the bus fleet of the city is being updated, at the expense of the budget and private carriers 675 new buses of different capacity have been purchased", the Mayor said.

He added that the BRT project is being implemented in the city, the preparation of the LRT project is underway, construction of the subway line is continuing.

The Mayor of Almaty noted that the reforms implemented in the city are implemented in accordance with the "Almaty-2020" program, adopted on the principle of crowdsourcing after open discussion with all population groups, experts, international institutions, business, public organizations, etc.

"The key issue and the main priority of the "Almaty-2020" program is ecology. All that we do is transport reform, the creation of pedestrian zones and bicycle infrastructure, the introduction of paid parking lots, the allocated lanes, the renewal of the bus fleet, the transfer of CHP to gas and the ban on the construction of skyscrapers to the south of Al-Farabi avenue, all this is aimed at improving the environment, Bauyrzhan Baybek said.

He assured that during the two-day conference with the participation of representatives of state bodies, international experts from Barcelona, Vienna, Batumi, the results achieved by the project will be presented and recommendations on further promotion of sustainable transport and urban mobility in the cities of Kazakhstan are made.

"Sustainable development of cities is impossible without the development of the transport system. Transport reform is considered one of the most difficult in any metropolis. An important achievement of the UNDP project "Sustainable Transport" was the development of the CSDD until 2023 - this document proposed an integrated approach to transport planning and now we see positive results in the transport sector of Almaty. In recent years, the intensity of the use of personal transport has decreased from 50% to 41% in favor of public transport, bicycles and foot traffic. I think that the experience of country's largest metropolis will catalyze changes throughout Kazakhstan", UNDP Deputy Resident Representative in Kazakhstan Munkhuya Altangerel said.

Foreign consultants of the project noted that a qualitative analysis of the Almaty transport system was conducted, the necessary experience was obtained by local executors, and a vector of further development was determined. For more successful development of the transport system in other cities, it is necessary to create a national strategy for improving public transport, improving legislation, training personnel, introducing new technologies, etc.