Twenty-five years ago, we brought in Austrian experts to study Nicosia’s traffic problem and recommend ways to tackle it. By 2000, the study was ready and outlined numerous one-way systems, parking facilities and much more.
They were paid tens of thousands of euros, but they did a thorough job. With maps, concrete practical solutions and quick fixes—not theories about sustainable urban development and academic waffle about bicycles and walking. Do this, this and this, they said. Crystal clear.
Twenty-five years later, no one knows where this study is. Apparently, it didn’t appeal to some of the self-appointed best and brightest who make decisions, so they buried it deep in drawers. Meanwhile, the problem has worsened. Nicosia is now a city of traffic despair. And every Transport Minister trots out ideas to ease congestion.
Case in point, the previous minister: In 2022, seven months before the end of a ten-year government that did nothing, Yiannis Karousos announced he would tackle the capital’s traffic congestion with bus lanes, one-way systems and staggered hours for schools and public services. In this column, we asked whether we should bet for or against implementation of these plans. That’s gone too—dead and buried! Not even the staggered hours.
Today, ask any official and they’ll tell you privately: the traffic problem can’t be solved. Behind the scenes, that is. Because publicly, everyone continues to declare they have plans and will solve it. But the truth is experienced daily by those forced to travel around our European capital. Especially in the centre. Where covering distances of three or four kilometres can take 30 to 40 minutes. Sometimes longer, if you hit the (endless) roadworks. In a city that, compared to other European capitals, is nothing more than a small parish!
How can they tell us that the only way to solve the traffic problem is to learn to use buses and bicycles? At the very least, let some government and municipality take even temporary measures. Because every decision taken so far has simply made the problem worse. They close, for example, a section of central Makarios Avenue, make the remaining section one-way, and think they’re implementing green policy. But if a comprehensive plan isn’t applied that takes into account the consequences of every decision, then these are half-measures. Spasmodic actions with painful results—experienced by citizens, not by those making the decisions.
If one-way systems are to be implemented, for example, let them dig out the maps prepared by the Austrian experts 25 years ago (I repeat), update them and implement them.
There is, they say, a “Strategic Plan for Sustainable Urban Mobility in the Greater Urban Area of Nicosia”. I found it on the Department of Public Works website. Its introduction states that in Nicosia, use of public transport is low (around 2-4%), as is cycling and walking (around 4%), whilst car use currently exceeds 85% of journeys. How on earth will cycling and walking get from 4% to 85%?
The strategic plan reels off various ideas: “Discouraging private vehicle use. Substantial upgrading of the importance, role and effectiveness of Public Transport. Creating the necessary conditions and infrastructure to encourage the use of environmentally friendly means of transport (cycling, walking).” They have plenty to say about cycling specifically: “Improving cyclist safety. Establishing cycling as an independent and safe mode of mobility.”
What lovely plans! Pipe dreams, we’d call them. These can be achieved in two hundred years. Or in a hundred, at least. After first ensuring that if we cycle, we won’t get killed on the roads. But what about today? Don’t they feel sorry for us? There are quicker ways to make interventions that bring relief. Since roadworks are underway on Digenis Akritas and Evagorou, for example, open up Makarios Avenue. Or introduce timetables for when lorries, bin lorries, tractors and bulldozers can enter vital arteries of the city (all cities)—that’s what other countries do.
There are specialists who can provide solutions. Not yours truly, but neither the minister nor the mayor. Someone just needs to take responsibility. Is there anyone? Or shall we leave it to the next lot so we can keep our heads down!
