[YouTube]
The Achrafieh car-free day has turned out to be a very successful event and has been the talk of the town for few days now. I think it should become a monthly event in many cities around Lebanon.
Looking back few weeks back, no one would have thought we’d be able to have a long peaceful day in Beirut and in Lebanon as a whole. Habib from The Beirut Report called it a perfect day in Beirut.
Thumbs up to Achrafieh’s MP Nadim Gemayel for launching this apolitical environmental driven initiative and to everyone taking part in its success. [Achrafieh2020]
Here’s a [link] showing Discover Achrafieh’s mentions in the press.
As an Ashrafieh resident, Sassine Street, I couldn’t feel a real success.
Again he is an MP, he shld be launching draft laws protecting Achrafieh (management of Achrafieh’s urban area) and not only municipal level fairs. Maybe he shld run for Municipality and not for Parliament and then I would raise all my thumbs up for him. Achrafieh needs a lot of protection laws from the greedy real estate developers. What about incentives for those who develop projects with low environmental impact and a penalty on those who exceed certain environmental parameters.
No doubt the event was well covered by the medias (who were at the same time the sponsors), and this is the only success i have seen until now.
1- This project was launched by Nadim but he is not the one in charge. It’s a non political driven project which makes it great. As for managing Achrafieh’s urban areas, you forgot Achrafieh does not have its own municipality which is a big obstacle.
I see it as a fair (fete foraine) and not a serious initiative. the serious one would be a draft law protecting the area of Beirut (which includes Achrafieh) and for thi he doesn’t need the municipality he is an MP.
one more note, If you live in Achrafieh, you will know that in Summer on a Sunday day, the cars are very rare. I would like to see this initiative during the week days on rush hours, then we may say whther ppl liked it or not and whether tws a success or not and whether lebanese are ready to go green like in Amsterdam for example wher you go to your work on bicycle
This initiative is made for days like Sunday right now. Making it happen on week days takes years, hence the 2020 project 🙂
putting a remote date is like saying “nttor ya kdish ta yenbout el hashish”, especially that there are no milestones for this long term project. this whole initiative and the clowns running the executive committee is just like a circus committee to organize street festivals, promoting the real estate developers (and maybe some MPs and some legislative runners) without really adding any environmental value to the area. the real initiative would be a full fledged transparent project, recommending amendments to current laws, drafting new laws, voting in parliament and implementation.
I suggest Razor you ask Nabih to open the parliement so sheik Nadim can do his duties as an MP! Tu peus le aounism…..
There are parliamentary committees convening every day (you can follow them on newspapers, but not on french ones coz from your french spelling I doubt you might understand anything), the parliament is not closed.
as far as there are troll supporters like you talking farts on blogs, I am not optimistic about Sheik Nadim
More responsibly than that?!