Strada Ocnei was a public street and must become a public street again, said mayor Astrid Fodor yesterday during the presentation of the future General Urban Plan (PUG) to interested citizens of Sibiu. She specified that the municipality granted a deadline to the management of Independenta, the former factory that “blocked” a portion of the street, with which it is in litigation.
“The extension of Ocnei Street is foreseen in the new PUG. Moreover, we are in a litigation phase with Independence. Last week I had a discussion with the director of Independence and a deadline was given: we agreed to give them a deadline in this process to reach an agreement on the opening of the street – not only for bicycles or pedestrians, but also for car transport. It was a public street and it must become a public street again,” said Astrid Fodor.
We remind you that in the fall of 2019 Sibiu City Hall started the proceedings to sue the commercial company Casa Albă Independenta SA for the almost 4,000 square meters of land that were part of Ocnei Street in the past. At that time, the leadership of the Sibiu administration said that the negotiations to hand over to the city the part of Ocnei street that was occupied by the Independenza factory during the communist regime failed and there was no other way than the court.
“We started discussions with those from Independence for a year, very polite, but they did not progress. Therefore, I sent them a summons before the proceedings. If we cannot come to an agreement, we will file an action in court because there is a public road that belonged to Sibiu. And we want to extend Ocnei street”, announced mayor Astrid Fodor. She hoped, however, that the representatives of the company that now occupies that land would finally accept Sibiu’s offer. “I hope they understand that a lawsuit is not useful. That street must return to the municipality of Sibiu”.
During the negotiations that preceded the trial, the representatives of the White House Independenta showed that they only agree with the sale of the land and not with its transfer to the benefit of the city.
The majority shareholder of this company is SIF Transilvania, with over 53% of the shares, the rest of the shares being divided between 3,000 other owners. And the representatives of the majority shareholder, members of the company’s board of directors, believe that the respective land is owned by the company in the most legal way possible. “When determining the value of the company’s social capital, the value of the land in question was also taken into account, for which a corresponding number of shares were issued, the company being listed on the stock exchange. The company has paid all the annual fees and taxes related to this property to the Sibiu local budget, including for the mentioned land”, it was stated in a reply sent to the Council Tower on behalf of the Board of Directors of the White House Independenta.
Read also: Process for a street. Sibiu is suing the former Independence
3 years followed in which the file was passed around three courts, without any of them judging the case for even a minute, on the merits: all the judges passed their jurisdiction to each other.
Meanwhile, the buildings generically known as “Rieger Halls” within the Independenza complex became the subject of a trial that ended only in December 2023, on the merits. The court in Bucharest decided to give, partially, justice to the owners of the halls and to downgrade 20 of the 32 buildings declared as historical monuments.
Recently, the City Hall launched in public consultation one of the most anticipated urban reconversion documents of Sibiu: it is about the platform attached to the historical center of the former Independenta enterprise. The urban planning documentation was developed at the request of the owner of the land and buildings, Casa Albă Independenta SA, being made by the designers from a.plan SRL, owned and coordinated by Alexandru Găvozdea (who in the meantime became an independent candidate for Sibiu City Hall) .
From the point of view of public circulation, the urban planning documentation proposes the (re)opening for public use of several alleys intended for pedestrians and cyclists, but also of the street closed during the communist regime between the current Ocna street and Cibinului street, next to the Stone Bridge . This street will have the role of “predominantly pedestrian link, with road access reserved exclusively for supply and interventions”.
Read also: “The center next to the center”: on the site of the Independenza factory, seven-storey blocks are proposed, no cars, park. “40% housing would be enough”
During yesterday’s debate, a resident of Sibiu referred to the respective PUZ, drawing attention to the congestion of the city: “There are hellish queues: from the former Libertatea to reach the Hospital on Coposu you need 50 minutes. I only make bike lanes for nothing, because not everyone can ride a bike… and today those who go to the industrial west use the highway. In vain, they widened the boulevards, which increased the concrete surface: there (on Calea Dumbrăvii – nn) the tram used to run, there were two lanes and parking spaces, now it was only solved with a line for 2-3 buses. There are many tracks, they are not connected to each other, it’s something else; but not everyone can use them and the interests of the other citizens of the city are obstructed”.
Read also: Sibiians came to the debate of the future PUG with specific problems. The expansion of inner-city areas interested him the most: between “don’t destroy!” and “why don’t you expand?”
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