Urbanism Reflections from Central Asia

Last month, Helen and I spent three weeks visiting Uzbekistan, Almaty (Kazakhstan), and Istanbul. During this time, I was able to make a fair number of urbanism observations. Let’s look at what Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan have to offer for all of you urbanists!

Tashkent Metro

When was the last time you were wowed by the appearance of subway stations? Many of the North American subway stations are merely functional in design with maybe some artistic elements added. However, Tashkent takes the beauty of subway stations to the next level. Some people even consider the Tashkent Metro – with four lines and 45 stations – as the world’s cheapest museum (or art gallery) with one fare costing 2000 Uzbek Som (or about 20¢ Canadian).

One station in particular which stands out is Kosmonavtlar; about one kilometre from the Art Hostel we stayed at. That station paid tribute to some of the former Soviet Union’s cosmonauts including Valentina Tereshkova pictured below who was the first woman in space.

While we did get to ride the old Soviet style trains, Tashkent Metro also has these newer trains which feel more open thanks to the larger windows.

The subway was reasonably frequent and easy to navigate. These wayfinding signs show you the stations on the specific line and direction of travel. If there’s one thing that Tashkent Metro lacks, it’s accessibility.

Here’s one more shot of Chorsu station located near the Chorsu Bazaar.

Streetscapes in Uzbekistan

One thing I like about the streets in Uzbekistan is how many of them were lined with trees and even had herbs such as basil growing along them. My favourite was University Boulevard in Samarkand which has a good-sized linear park in the median with a wide sidewalk. You could barely tell there were four traffic lanes on each side.

A fair number of streets in Uzbekistan also have combined foot and bike paths such as this one outside of Khiva’s Itchan Kala. However, I wished these were more consistent. I didn’t see any bike share programs, but you can rent e-scooters in some of the cities.

I did see some dedicated cycle tracks such as this one on Shakhrisabz Street in Tashkent, but I wouldn’t call Tashkent – or any city in Uzbekistan – a cycling city.

If you look at the cars in Tashkent, you would immediately notice most of them are white Chevrolets. I also noticed a lot of these Chevrolet Labo trucks which are far more human scale than the Ford F-150’s which dominate North America.

The Yandex app is a must in Uzbekistan. Think of it as Uber for the former Soviet Union which also has food delivery. The most expensive trip we did costed 70,000 Som (or about $7 Canadian) to get from Khiva to Urgench Airport, but may of our trips were in the 20,000 Som ($2) range or less.

Trains in Uzbekistan

Despite having a GDP per capita that’s only four percent of Canada’s, Uzbekistan managed to get a high-speed train called the Afrosiyob while Canada still doesn’t have one. It operates between Tashkent, Samarkand, and Bukhara with a maximum speed of 250 km/h, though the highest I observed was 230 km/h. In urban areas, the speed was closer to 160 km/h. They also serve you free tea and a pastry on board, while the fares were affordable at 245,000 Som (about $25) from Tashkent to Samarkand and 178,000 Som (about $18) from Samarkand to Bukhara.

Even the below sleeper train – which we used to get from Bukhara to Khiva – was punctual and comfortable to sleep in, though getting to the upper bunk was a bit tricky. It took six and a half hours between those two cities. If the Afrosiyob gets extended to Khiva, you can expect a lot more tourism that way.

One thing that’s unfortunate about Uzbekistan Railways is while you can book the Afrosiyob trains 45 days in advance, you can only book trips from Bukhara to Khiva about 15 days in advance. Even so, it’s yet another sign why VIA Rail Canada desperately needs to clean up their act and use their own tracks instead of being held to the whims of CN and CPKC.

Observations Around Almaty

Unlike in Tashkent, Almaty only has one subway line which opened in 2011 and 11 stations. The subway frequency is worse than Toronto’s TTC – every ten minutes – while there are really long escalators to get to some of the stations. Here is a picture of Auezov Theatre station.

Despite the lack of subways, buses are everywhere in Almaty including bus priority lanes. However, we had trouble paying our fare in cash when heading back to our hostel from Medeu despite having exact change, so you may want to get an Onay card to use the buses (and subway) or use Yandex.

Almaty also has a lot of bike paths with some bi-directional and some uni-directional.

However, their bike share program – Almaty Bike – seemed to be abandoned not having seen a single bike share bike docked, but there are a lot of scooters which can be rented using the Yandex app. The cost to rent them is 50 Kazakh Tenge (or 14¢) per minute. Almost par with Bike Share Toronto.

Last, but not least, Almaty has a decent park near the Ascension Cathedral below, while heading to Medeu is a must for some mountain hiking by the Shymbulak ski resort. Will save that for a future post.

Final Thoughts

No matter where we travel, there will always be some lessons we can bring back home. In this case, we have seen how subway stations can be beautifully designed such as in Tashkent, many lower income countries including Uzbekistan put Canada to shame with high-speed rail, more human scale trucks to transport goods, and the proliferation of cycling infrastructure in places you didn’t expect. Let’s keep travelling to new places and working to make our cities back home better.