Prime Minister Edi Rama has presented the new national program "Urban Renaissance 2.0", which provides for a fund of 1.5 billion euros for the transformation of cities and public spaces in Albania.
"An ambitious national program to move to "Urban Renaissance 2.0" by making available to this breakthrough a target of 1.5 billion euros. What I thought it was important to share with you today is related not simply to the difference between this new program and the first urban renaissance program, but to the reasons that led us to this program. The more conditions improve, the more what is missing becomes obvious as unacceptable," he said.
Prime Minister Edi Rama also made a comparison with the situation in the cities when he took office.
"If the main square is the face of a city, the main squares of our cities were the faces of degradation and surrender to the fate of every city, including the "Skënderbej" square of that time. The exit from degradation, the return of the city as a place where people have a possible social life and everything that summarizes the mosaic of urban renaissance with squares, streets, lighting, schools, kindergartens, water supply, sewage belonged to a phase when Albanian people began to believe in themselves, began to believe that Albania could be beautiful not just in the mountains and 100 meters from the coast when you swim, but could be beautiful and could be presented beautifully to anyone who lived there or who opened the door for visitors. Now we are not in the phase where we lack these. I remember when we planted trees in Tirana, it was like we were giving a show, people would stop and gather around the trees. When we planted red plums on Kavaja Street, traffic was blocked because people see. They had the feeling that the trees in the city were being returned because they had been mutilated and cut down from all sides. Today, those who were not born in 2001-2002-2003 have no idea that 90% of the trees on the streets of Tirana were planted at that stage. The problem is the quantity and quality of the thing. This is not ingratitude. This is not even an unjustifiable request, when we build schools, once in the first phase of urban renaissance it was a very big thing. It is a new standard where society is today thanks to all this work we have done, but in the meantime, being in this task, we must face this very big challenge. Once upon a time, a road was required", said Rama.