THE BUDA SIDE LOWER EMBANKMENT CASE

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THE BUDA SIDE LOWER EMBANKMENT CASEREGIONAL
GRASSROOT ACTIVITIES AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

• Tamás Fleischer
• MTA Világgazdasági Kutatóintézet
• lttfleisch_at_vki.hugt
• lthttp//www.vki.hu/tfleisch/gt

BGF KKFK Ritsumeikan University UNESCO
Partnership Program Budapest, 1st March, 2006
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The Buda-side lower embankment case

• End-of-pipe unsolvednesses and the century-old
  dream of the sewage collector and the central
  cleaning plant
• Changing role of the embankments in the life of
  the cities
• The planned four lane road to solve the traffic
  problem.
• The report of the mission of UNESCO and ICOMOS
  experts
• The interpretation of the Report of the mission
• Present perspectives
• Other questions, remarks

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End-of-pipe unsolvednesses

• End-of-pipe solution when dont think over the
  causes, see but the effects and we try to solve
  this latter
• End-of-pipe unsolvedness when dont think over
  the causes, see but the effects - and we dont
  even try to solve this latter

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End-of-pipe unsolvednesses

• An afternoon walk in Madras (Chennai)
• The river, as the brown zone of the city
• Where the residents turn their back to the river

• Fortunately we dont do such terrible things at
  home
• Or still?

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End-of-pipe unsolvednesses

• Or still? What about the Ördögárok (Devils
  ditch)?

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End-of-pipe unsolvednesses

• We do turn our back to it now

• The Devils ditch in the Városmajor (Town-park).
  Barabás Miklós 1854

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And what about the Danube? Do we turn our back
to it too?
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And what about the Danube? Do we turn our back
to it?
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And what about the Danube? Do we turn our back
to it?

• The Danube was a frequented trading corridor with
  a tracker-route and with ports along its
  embankment
• The direct trading role gradually decreased,
  Houses were built along the riverside, a the city
  began to turn toward the river. Swimming pools,
  boats, ships, promenade, urban life.
• Better water supply, more and more sewage water
  and all goes to the river. The mouth of the
  Devils ditch is now the end of the pipe.
• As a matter off fact we again turn now our back
  to the Danube, but this time with bad conscience.
  
• That is why we decided to extend the pipe and
  the sewage water of two-third Buda transport 8
  km-s to Csepel island. By that way we let the
  Danube being again clean and attractive.

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And what about the Danube? Do we turn our back
to it?

• I personally have doubts if it were an up-to-date
  solution to collect the sewage water of a half
  metropolis and transport it to great distances
  just for handling it together in a huge cleaning
  plant.
• The sewage system gradually should be changed
  from unified (sewage and rain water together)
  system to a separated system. The existing
  open-end sewage system would be good for the rain
  water, that keep on can directly be driven into
  the Danube while the household sewage water
  could be cleaned in small local cleaning plants,
  and from those it could also be gone to the
  Danube along the old sewage system.
• This is not happening, because the whole system
  has a huge inertia, (path-dependence). Even if it
  is known, that the direction we follow is not
  good, we are not able to change. We are not able
  to change our mind.

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And what about the Danube? Do we turn our back
to it?

• and joining to the sewage water system
  construction if the supporting wall is to be
  transposed anyway it seemed to be an excellent
  occasion to widen the road with two extra traffic
  lines.
• in order to let here go those traffic, that we
  decided to send here in a period, when we were
  just turning back to the river!
• That type of relative through traffic is
  normally sent to those parts of the town that can
  be easily sacrified in order to help the traffic
  flow.
• The inner Buda embankment is definitively not
  such a part of Budapest.

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And what about the Danube? Do we turn our back
to it?

• Otherwise we called the attention - the sewage
  collector could be constructed under the lower
  embankment, or under the upper embankment, or
  under the pavement in Fo utca, or in the river
  bed, or under the river bed - too.
• In such a case it could have been said if the
  pavement is to be changed anyway it would be
  possible to build a pedestrian pavement, an
  exclusive road for public transport, a calmed
  traffic street, an extended tram line that is
  investments for a better life in the district,
  rather than improve the circumstances of the
  transit road traffic..
• All these latter suggestions could be much more
  harmo-nised with the official targets to
  decrease the traffic load, the through traffic,
  the environmental pollution.

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And what about the Danube? Do we turn our back
to it?

• In an urban fabric, one can decrease the traffic
  load of a section, if I make the site less
  attractive for car traffic if it is net possible
  to drive along the whole section, if the road has
  no priority, if because of speed limits it is not
  worthy to choose that way, if one have to pay if
  want to use thet section etc.
• Just differently, the official plan wanted to
  make more attractive the lower embankment for the
  through traffic. It increased the car traffic, by
  that way perpendicularly also increasing the
  feeding traffic. The result is, that the traffic
  in the district - that was declared to be
  protected from the traffic - does not decrease,
  while the connection with the Danube changed
  definitely worse.

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Paris 2002Plage at the Seine
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Budapest 2004Plage at the Pest
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South-Korea Cheon
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South-Korea Cheon before and after
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Source P.-M. Tricaud. B. Maldoner. Evaluation of
Buda Embankment Wastewater
Collector and Road Project 20-22 March 2005.
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Source P.-M. Tricaud. B. Maldoner. Evaluation of
Buda Embankment Wastewater
Collector and Road Project 20-22 March 2005.
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Source P.-M. Tricaud. B. Maldoner. Evaluation of
Buda Embankment Wastewater
Collector and Road Project 20-22 March 2005.
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Source P.-M. Tricaud. B. Maldoner. Evaluation of
Buda Embankment Wastewater Collector and Road
Project 20-22 March 2005.
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Source P.-M. Tricaud. B. Maldoner. Evaluation of
Buda Embankment Wastewater Collector and Road
Project 20-22 March 2005.
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Interpretation of the Mission Evaluation

• I have never heard communicating, what really was
  the preferred alternative the two authors found
  best
• Namely removing the road and restoring the
  former aspect of the embankment
• It is true, that the authors correctly added that
  this solution was not acceptable by the current
  position of technicians with regards to
  functional issues
• But, when these technicians refer to the opinion
  of the foreign experts, it would have been right
  to quote similarly correctly their statement

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Present perspectives
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Present perspectives

• The good news that the four lanes widening of the
  embankment was abandoned.
• The bad news that the planners didnt want to
  understand the real message a more liveable
  environment needs calm, less traffic,
  pedestrianisation, more public space.
• What is planned now, formally follows the advises
  of the non-widening of the embankment, but want
  to send more lorry traffic to the areamaintains
  the place for a future tunnel under the lower
  embankment, that is still they want to press here
  through the north-south traffic of Buda.

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THE BUDA SIDE LOWER EMBANKMENT CASEREGIONAL
GRASSROOT ACTIVITIES AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

• Tamás Fleischer
• Institute for World Economics of the Hungarian
  Academy of Sciences
• lttfleisch_at_vki.hugt
• lthttp//www.vki.hu/tfleisch/gt

THANKS FOR YOUR ATTENTION !
BGF KKFK Ritsumeikan University UNESCO
Partnership Program Budapest, 1st March, 2006