Radu Mihaiu, the mayor of Sector 2: I am not the enemy of cars! – Video interview

Radu Mihaiu believes that he managed to change the face of Sector 2, starting from communication with the people and ending with an important project of asphalting and redevelopment of secondary streets.

How will working in local government affect family life?

In reality, before I was mayor I had much more time for my family.

Now, I have to plan the moments I spend with my family very carefully.

There are a lot of meetings that take place in the afternoon, in the evening, and all of these obviously take away from personal time. We try to connect in the remaining time, but the truth is that the whole family misses me and wants to spend more hours with me.

What are the achievements of this term that you are proud of?

There are many things that I am very proud of. I think the most important achievement is the Glazing Park. It’s a park I made out of a garbage dump. We returned it to the community and it is a very atypical place to relax for Bucharest. It’s unique. We don’t have asphalt, we only have gravel, we preserve biodiversity and it’s simply an oasis of nature in the middle of the city.

The second achievement that I am proud of is the completion of the passage from Doamna Ghica because there was an extraordinarily high chance that it would remain an unfinished, dilapidated construction site.

If I hadn’t intervened in 2021 and said that Sector 2 would help with money and let’s find, together with Mayor General Nicușor Dan, the solution to unblock that site, we would probably have entered a vicious circle in which the suppliers would have sued The Metropolitan Buildings Trust would have entered into litigation and we would have been left with the unfinished construction site.

The third achievement of which I am very proud is the fact that, in Sector 2, we have the best schools in Romania, an appreciation supported by studies carried out by independent organizations.

Can you tell which is the best school in Sector 2?

I wouldn’t want to create a competition. We have a few. The Ferdinand I School, for example, is highly regarded. School 49, too. School 10. But there is a price that comes with this appreciation, and the price is the “floating visa”.

There are a lot of parents who get their floating visas near these popular schools, and then there are a lot of children who are enrolled, and the schedule becomes very busy. Many times, these schools cannot benefit from the school after school program because they teach in several shifts.

At School 49, for example, we have three shifts, precisely because a lot of floating visas are issued.

From my point of view, this problem is extremely harmful because it affects the effective management of educational institutions.

I think the school allocation should be based on the address in the parents’ bulletin and not on the basis of floating visas. But no town hall can decide this, it can only be done in the Parliament.

Many residents of Sector 2 consider you the enemy of automobiles.

I want to disprove this label. I am not an enemy of the automobile. The car is an absolutely necessary and useful means of transport for a family.

What I am arguing is that in the city we should be able to move much more on foot, with public transport and alternative means.

The number of cars in Bucharest has grown in an unsustainable way. There are families that have 3, 4 cars each, and no matter how much goodwill we have, we cannot create subsidized parking spaces for such a large number of cars per family.

I had a house sitter in the audience who told me that I rebuilt the street, which is very good, but he no longer has a place to park his cars. And I asked, what do you mean cars? Well, how many cars do you have? Three, he answered: me, wife and daughter. Then, I say, but you stay at home? How many cars do you have parked in your yard? None, he replied. I’m doing something else in the yard, he told me.

I understand the whole discussion, but the state cannot create a parking space, possibly free, on the street for every car in the city.

I understand that a family needs a car, and I drive the car on vacation, so I understand that need. I’m just arguing that we should spend as much time as possible walking or taking public transportation. And for that we need a vision for the city that has already been tested in other European towns that have developed public transport, encouraged walking, encouraged urban planning that puts all the services he needs close to people.

You are a person who travels by electric scooter during the day. What do you think about the lack of infrastructure for bikes or scooters?

We have a feasibility study approved for cycle lanes. Those who can ride a bike or scooter should have adequate infrastructure for it.

Not everyone needs to ride a bike or scooter, but all people who can should be encouraged and given optimal conditions because that means fewer cars in traffic.

I also enjoy cycling with my daughters, but I have to admit that the infrastructure for bicycles is extremely poor.

If you move on the sidewalk you can hit pedestrians, if you go on the road there are potholes, bumps from canals and so on, plus aggressive drivers.

If there were dedicated roads for bicycles and scooters, which did not intersect with those of pedestrians and cars, I am convinced that many, many people would use this mode of travel.

In the case of bike paths, I have a significantly different opinion from that of Mayor General Nicușor Dan, who says that the infrastructure is expensive and the transition to this means of travel will be slow. I think it will be done quickly if there are tracks.

But be careful, we need a bicycle infrastructure that is not just for the weekend, but one that is useful for people who travel to work during the working days.

We need infrastructure for bikes, scooters and e-bikes. I am a person who often rides a scooter. It helps me a lot to get around and avoid traffic jams, and I sweat on the bike.

We need such infrastructure including to develop the courier business and home delivery of food and groceries, which are growing rapidly in the city.

In order for Bucharest to have such an infrastructure for bicycles, the administration must overcome the bureaucratic monster. It is a dragon with many heads.

The feasibility study carried out is based on analyzing the points of origin and linking them with those of destination. That is, where do people start and where do people cycle to get to work. That’s where we have to make the tracks. In vain you build them where no one uses them anymore.

At the moment I can say that such data exists and is being discussed with the Road Brigade and the Technical Traffic Commission. It is the institutions that matter and give the opinions.

Have you done anything to increase the opportunities for outdoor movement of children and young people in sector 2?

There are several steps we have taken in this direction. One of them was to stop the “don’t step on the grass” nonsense. Children can play with the ball on the grass.

Another step was that we opened the schoolyards and we try to keep them open even if some principals would like to close them in case a window is broken or I don’t know what.

In general, the safety of schoolyard activities involves guarding because if something happens there, someone has to answer and the question is, who is responsible? In Sector 2 we have security in the schools, but the principals would like that if a window is broken at the school or if the field, football goals or basketball boards are damaged, the repairs should not be made from the school budget.

I try to explain to them that the school is not theirs, but the community’s, and if a window is broken, if a basketball backboard or a football goal is damaged, it is also repaired with the money of the residents of Sector 2, that the principals do not come with the money from home .

Unfortunately, there is still a reluctance that I don’t quite understand.

Right now, we have 17 school yards open to everyone in the neighborhood out of 56.

Another step for children’s health and development is the program carried out with sports clubs.

The City Hall of Sector 2 offers vouchers of up to 250 lei per month to children who enroll in a sports club. This voucher is used to pay the costs of the sports base, equipment and coaches. This encourages participation and provides a fairly predictable source of funding for sports clubs in the sector as well.

How do you communicate with citizens?

I appreciate the diversity of opinions. In 2020 I started my mandate by launching an online discussion program with the mayor. It was a pandemic, and the way to keep in touch with people was through online meetings.

After the pandemic passed, I started seeing citizens regularly every Thursday in different parks. People scolded me that why we only see each other in parks. The truth is that it seemed simpler that way.

I also use the ad hoc meetings, let’s call them that, in which I go with the people from the town hall to different places, talk to the citizens and note the problems that arise.

People come to my meetings who are dissatisfied with something, who have a problem to solve. You don’t go see the mayor on Thursday night unless you have a problem. It’s a very good way of interaction because you get in direct contact with people’s real problems, problems that they must have taken out of their free time to come and communicate.

I can say that in these meetings there are several issues that frequently come up in discussions. One is the parking space, obviously, and we are trying to solve it as much as possible.