Legalization obligatory to cope with Tirana’s population booming

TIRANA, Sept. 27 – Shaban Memia, head of the government agency of the legalization process, said that a month and a half before the end of the time for the voluntary declaration of illegal properties they had some 200,000 statements. A considerable number of them is for sure in the Tirana district, or the Bathore quarter, just across the city, or in its outskirts close to Kamza. Thousands of newcomers established there after the fall of communism finding free land. But later it came out the land was owned by many old owners. Legalizing their property turned into a big challenge to any government, often into a political issue. It seems that the government of Prime Minister Sali Berisha of the Democratic Party has decided to resolve it. That is not easy. Tirana is a big challenge in the upcoming local elections. Winning the top post of the town hall remains a kind of key element to show who’s the country’s winner in the political life.
Tirana has significantly increased in the post-communist period with a population growth that has been experienced in no other city in Europe. That is very obvious. Until 1991, or let’s say 1993, there were more bicycles and horse carts than cars on Tirana streets. Cars were not allowed to be privately owned during communism. That all changed with dramatic suddenness. Nowadays the Albanian capital is often choked with motorized traffic.Horse carts are long gone and only the bravest dare navigate by bicycle. By the late 1990s Tirana’s population had tripled to at least 600,000 and its development was chaotic. There are estimates that Tirana’s population will reach one million within the next few years.Albanians continue to move to the capital, where wages are at least twice as high as in rural areas. Planners say growth is so rapid that soon Tirana and the port city of Durres, 33 kilometers away, will become a single urban area comprising about half of the country’s population.