C I T I E S

It is likened, at times, to Vienna and Paris. Beauty is one thing. Sustainability is another. To decide on whether a city is sustainable or not requires a look beneath the surface, beneath all that beauty.

No doubt, the view of the UNESCO-protected panorama of Buda including the Danube River, the Chain Bridge and Castle Hill is breathtaking. Up on Castle Hill itself, the romantic medieval setting is as pretty as any other in Europe. The observant tourist on Castle Hill may, however, be curious about that large pit in the street. "It's a problem," says the taxi driver. "The whole street could fall in."

Caves lie beneath the Hill's surface. The ancient caves are wonderful Ñ for a major city centre, it's the largest cave system in the world. The real problem is getting the cars, which are doing the damage, off the streets.

The other side of town

Edit Toth is an inner-city pensioner living in downtown Pest, the city's flat and densely concentrated centre of governmental, commercial and office buildings, shopping areas, museums, nightlife and less affluent residential districts.

Every day, weather permitting, Edit gets about 10 minutes of sunshine through her window, which looks onto a dirty, concrete courtyard. She has tough houseplants.

Edit used to stroll the streets of her district. She stays inside most of the time now. The reason being that cars now own the streets. Cars park anywhere they can, preferring the tight sidewalks and grassy corners. That means a very tight fit for Edit, her poodle and her cane.

Budapest was not built for cars. It was built for horses and carriages. And in its haste to accommodate cars, the city failed to leave enough space for people and the things that they like to do.

Budapest does have some large parks, including forests in the Buda hills, Margaret Island on the Danube and the City Park in Pest. But unlike Vienna or Paris, Budapest was planned with few inner-city parks or pedestrian zones. There is the touristy Paris-like Vaci utca and the riverside Corzo. But pedestrian areas have not grown significantly in the past ten years, says Gyorgy Arato, Public Space Coordinator for the City of Budapest. Arato adds that Budapest will probably follow "international trends" in permitting trams and business vehicles into pedestrian areas, rather than reserving areas outright for pedestrians. And lands that becomes free as potential public space more often go for private profit.

One result is that Budapest's streetlife is almost non-existent. While city youth in Sarajevo, Belgrade, Prague or Sofia spend countless hours chatting away in outdoor cafes on car-free streets, most Budapest gathering spots are found in reconstructed, and unventilated, basement chambers Ñ coal-storage holds in days gone by.

Another result is terrible urban air pollution causing damage to structures and human health. A 1997 environment ministry report entitled The Quality of Budapest's Air states that concentrations of toxic materials at major urban crossings in Budapest are often above health limits.

Dogs also own the streets. 200,000 dogs produce some 30 tons of excrement daily. Local retreats exist, such as the fenced-off King's Garden in downtown Pest, similar to parkettes in Paris where dog areas are separated from playgrounds, benches and happy people. Unfortunately, a park near King's Garden, now nothing but dirt and excrement in front of a hospital, is more often the reality in Budapest.

Budapest's public transport system is good, the city being the first in continental Europe to build a subway system. Three major routes now cover large areas of the city but development of a fourth line was recently cancelled, (officially) due to costs. Budapest NGO, the Clean Air Action Group, supported the cancellation, arguing that using funds to revitalise the city's tram and bus system would be more sustainable for the city.

Pilgrimages of Europe's old and sick flock hundreds of miles to Buda's majestic Gellert Hotel for its therapeutic, life-restoring natural waters. A beautiful shelled waterworld of health, the Gellert rises in sharp contrast to the Danube outside Ñ the direct receptacle for 75 percent of the city's raw sewage. But water supply is the best in the CEE region, says Csaba Varszegi, service manager for Budapest Waterworks. He adds that drinking water quality (naturally filtered by the Danube and retrieved through 764 wells) meets both WHO and EU standards.

In the end, Edit doesn't mind the tap water. She also knows that Buda has more parks, trees and fresh air than her neighbourhood. Unfortunately, she just can't make it out there.