Building a crossroad instead of the Opera and Ballet House (video)
Architect Gurgen Musheghyan said that the overloaded streets of Yerevan and the problem of traffic jams had deep roots. "During Tamanyan's period, the city was designed for 150,000 people. The entire street network is mostly made of by taking into account that number of the population, also the availability of public transport and Yerevan as a city-park. Washington D.C. and Yerevan were the only city-parks in the history. Washington D.C. has maintained the status of the city-park, meanwhile Yerevan has become a crossroad-city with the population of one million, and all ways lead to the center of Yerevan. That's why we are in such conditions." He said that traffic jams and overloads of streets also arose because the public transport seemed to be removed from the agenda. "Trolleybus almost does not work, the tram is completely removed, the subway is very limited. As a result, the organization of those minibuses seems to have one direction: starts from Komitas Street and goes to the South through Baghramyan. Bypassing roads were included in the plan which do not exist now. Streets are the vessels of the city that are responsible for blood circulation. But instead of cleaning the streets from blood clots we added new ones - car parking." Gurgen Musheghyan suggested to destroy the Opera and Ballet House and to build a crossroad, thus solving the transport problems. "Our approaches to the solution of problems are the case." The architect had the corresponding graph with him. To remind, the Prime Minister Karen Karapetyan also gave instructions on the elimination of traffic jams.
