Assessing the Sustainability Principles of Prishtina, Kosovo

Abstract

Prishtina is the capital city and at the same time the fastest-growing city of Kosovo, which is an eastern European country that is both a developing country and a post-conflict country dealing with poverty and underdevelopment. Kosovo separated from Yugoslavia in 1999, and since then it has experienced various development stages, transformations, and radical changes regarding urban planning, society, and the political system. Urban planning in combination with local politics that had no visionary urban strategies resulted in the failure of Prishtina’s planning to direct massive growth towards sustainable urban development. To confirm this hypothesis, Prishtina is studied using a set of fifteen principles of green urbanism, which serves as a tool to assess Prishtina’s sustainability principles. The results show that postwar urban development patterns have been unsustainable thus far. Prishtina lacks the majority of sustainable city principles, but there have also been positive aspects of city development. The question remains whether Kosovo as a developing country should follow the same unsustainable steps as developed countries to catch up with them, or whether it could use other means such as universities, which can act as think tanks for transforming cities. The findings of this study can be used as a reference for existing development patterns and can provide guidance for future sustainable urban planning and developments in Prishtina.