Beautiful Homes and Comfortable Cities
Back in his first term, in 2020, U.S. President Donald Trump signed a memorandum on Promoting Beautiful Federal Buildings. It can be assumed that in his current term, Trump will recall this initiative. We understand that a former developer's idea of beauty may differ significantly from ordinary people's expectations, but such a measure indicates that the beauty of cities and buildings is not least on the minds of authorities.
The development business evokes strong public reactions. Tycoon landlords are often portrayed as villains in film and literature. As early as 1954, American poet Woody Guthrie denounced in his poem the greedy father of the current U.S. president, in whose house the poet rented a room.
Part of the negativity towards developers is explained by envy: people think developers make money out of thin air, and their well-being is based on deception and corruption. Unfortunately, stereotypes are very persistent, and if you ask an ordinary person in Tashkent how much developers earn, you will hear in response that their income is from 50 to 100%.
Naturally, citizens blame developers for all urban problems: from air pollution to overpopulation and lack of parking, not to mention the demolition of historical buildings and the felling of parks.
In global practice, there is the concept of development risk. When implementing a project, a developer takes on extremely high risk. And the developer's qualification lies precisely in managing this risk. Banks finance development projects thanks to an experienced entrepreneur who knows how to manage risks.
We ourselves sometimes struggle to plan our vacation for the upcoming summer, while a developer must calculate a financial model for 10 years, consisting of variables. How much will cement cost, will urban planning regulations change, what will people need in three years, will they have enough money to buy apartments – these are just a few of the thousands of questions facing a developer.
However, as is known, in real life we encounter mistakes more often than malicious intent. And I want to dedicate this article to the difficult work of developers. Yes, as a consultant, I have many complaints about the development community, but for our city to be convenient and popular, it is important to understand how it works. Why parks actually disappear, why ugly buildings are constructed, and why traffic jams grow.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder
In 2024, Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson, and James Robinson received the Nobel Prize for answering the question of why some countries are rich and others are poor. But wealth can be measured, so how can beauty be measured? How to objectively assess comfort and happiness? Why, in the end, are there beautiful cities and unattractive ones? And why, even in the most beautiful city, are there ugly and inconvenient buildings? Is it malicious intent, poverty, or the notorious mentality that is to blame? Unfortunately, there are no generally accepted answers to these questions yet, and another "Nobel Prize" is still awaiting its laureates. Nevertheless, the expert community is trying to answer these questions by inventing happiness, comfort, and safety indices.
Each rating considers only one aspect of life, but helps little when choosing an apartment or a plot for development, yet these ratings significantly influence expectations. After all, it is no secret that people behave differently depending on these very expectations. Strolling along the Thames, a tourist looks around with admiration, without thinking about transport problems and safety at night, but returning home to Tashkent, he curses upon seeing dirt on the street.
The same person behaves differently in different roles. At every moment, we wear different "hats" – tourist, guest, citizen, worker. Our attitude depends on our mood, on troubles or successes at work, on personal experiences. And what is good for one may not be suitable for another.
For example, residents of Barcelona complained that it became impossible to live in the city due to tourists. Habidatum, a company specializing in big data analysis and providing predictive metrics for real estate investors and urban planners, used its Chronotope platform to analyze urban environment data and identify the best ways to use real estate. The study showed that in reality, tourists only massively interact with locals in a small number of locations and during limited periods. The solution to the problem was a project to "separate" flows by changing the operating hours of tourist facilities. This is an example of how a problem that seems global and unsolvable can often be easily resolved.
The Dutch city of Haarlem, located near Amsterdam, with a highly developed urban environment and street trade, suffered from the fact that in the evening, when shops closed, the city plunged into darkness and the streets filled with antisocial elements. The solution was to convert the floors above the shops, which were usually used as warehouses, into apartments. Given that the Dutch dislike curtains, preferring to show their lives to passers-by, the city completely changed, and the environment became safe. Now Haarlem is one of the most developed cities in terms of retail.
Cities are not born beautiful, popular, and attractive. They become so. Sometimes thanks to a popular historical figure, sometimes thanks to specific urban planning solutions, but maintaining this status is a daily job.
In modern mass consciousness, the principle described in ABBA's song "The Winner Takes It All" operates – the winner takes everything. We don't remember who took second or third place; only the leader remains in our memory. Tashkent is still searching for its place on the globe – its unique identity. Perhaps it will become famous as the safest city in the region, perhaps as the friendliest, or perhaps as the most beautiful. But for this, everyone will have to work hard.
Citizen School
Every day we make decisions that depend on or concern city life: where to live, where to work, where to invest, which school to send a child to, where to go on vacation, how to improve qualifications, how to acquire new and useful social connections. Naturally, we all want to live in beautiful and comfortable cities.
Life in the city offers a person immense opportunities but also imposes obligations that we, as citizens, often forget. Being a modern citizen means actively participating in the life of the city and society, recognizing one's role and responsibility. If I were involved in education, I would include a modern citizen course in the secondary school program, where students would learn how the city is structured, how to use its benefits, and how to help it develop. Such programs are already being implemented worldwide. The Urban Land Institute has developed such a program for European schools, which has been successfully implemented for several years. The UrbanPlan program is designed for high school students and aims to teach the basics of urban planning and land development through project-based learning.
Constructivists dreamed of ideal cities inhabited by ideal people living in complete harmony and accord. Totalitarian regimes sought to create "cities of the future" to which they tried to reshape citizens. Humanists, on the contrary, try to ensure that even "imperfect" residents are comfortable. The life of a modern person is a constant struggle and compromise: with neighbors, authorities, and businesses.
Why Ugly Buildings Are Built
Everyone wants to live in a beautiful city, and in the pictures in sales offices, we see ideal solutions, beautiful public spaces, and happy residents. In reality, however, ugly and unsuccessful buildings constantly appear in the city. This is a scourge not only of poor countries; affluent cities often face poor development. The average person, who habitually blames everything on corruption and theft, is only partially right. The problem is systemic.
Architecture
Paradoxically, the main critics of cities are architects – even though all buildings are designed by them. It seemed like everything was fine on paper, but in practice, something went wrong. As a result, architects blame city authorities, bloggers blame developers, citizens blame corruption, and everyone together is unhappy with another monstrosity.
Architects and consultants too often give in to the developer's desires instead of insisting on professional solutions. Foreign architects in developing markets are often more successful than local ones precisely because they know how to insist on their solutions and argue with the client. Most projects are financed through forward sales. In the early stages, the developer experiences severe financial hunger, as they had to buy the land. It would seem that design, concept development, and project preparation cost less than 5% of the total cost, and design errors can later turn into colossal expenses. The shortage of funds in the early stages forces savings in this area. Therefore, the developer often opts for a standard project, which the architect may have already offered to another client, and is ready to quickly and cheaply adapt it to their needs. As a result, the building may become morally obsolete even before construction begins, and the client lacks sufficient qualifications and experience to evaluate the project.
Developer Experience
The fact is that a large number of development projects are implemented by companies that have never built anything before. Few would think of creating a car manufacturing plant from scratch or piloting an airplane without proper training. But anyone can build. Despite the fact that a modern building is no less complex than a large enterprise, novice developers believe that their life experience allows them to implement complex projects. Moreover, the less experienced the developer, the more complex the project they conceive. European developers, after working for a decade, begin to build multifunctional projects that are very complex in both design and management. They start with simple office buildings, residential houses, and shopping centers. In Tashkent, even those with small plots and only 10,000 square meters try to pack the object with functions. As a result, the building does not perform any function well and does not generate the expected income.
Beginner developers believe the secret is to hire those who know how to design and build and squeeze them for the minimum price. But in a developing market, where there is no decades-long reputation, specialists, and experience, this approach does not work. Paradoxically, in a developing market, quality construction is more expensive than in a developed one, and a businessman who "rose" by squeezing suppliers will ultimately get an object full of compromises and shortcomings.
Successful development requires a very specific type of thinking that can only be acquired through experience. A good project always costs more, and a successful developer is someone who can sell these additional costs to the market, not someone who built cheaply and sold expensively. If we look at the best developers in the world, we see that they gradually increased their potential. Westfield, a recognized leader in shopping mall development, started with simple and utilitarian retail facilities before undertaking revolutionary projects like the £1.6 billion shopping center in London.
"My hotel will be better than Hilton because Hilton hires employees online, and I will manage the hotel myself with my loved ones" – this is a real quote that partially explains service problems in Uzbekistan.
Urban Planning Regulation and Property Rights Protection
The arbitrary handling of urban planning regulations also leads to a decrease in quality. If a building is constructed without adhering to all regulations and necessary permits, it is obvious that there is no point in investing in quality, as the risks of ownership are very high in any case. Therefore, it is the strictness of urban planning policy that forces developers to approach their work more responsibly.
The Life of Buildings
Many people think a project is completed when it receives a cadastral number and is sold. In reality, life only begins at that moment. Modern buildings are built to last 100 years, so the first years of a building's life determine its future fate. A building is like a child. If it is raised from childhood, taught to work, and nurtured with love and joy, it will become a worthy citizen in adulthood. If left to its own devices, its fate will be unenviable. For buildings, this function is performed by the maintenance service. If a building is well maintained, if the management company monitors the condition of common areas, controls interior finishing work in apartments, and prevents barbaric renovations that violate the integrity of the buildings, then the life of such a complex will be long and happy, and the value of apartments will grow regardless of the market. If, on the contrary, the property owners save on maintenance, and the management company steals, then the premises will depreciate, and the buildings will degrade.
What's Next
In 2024, a correction began in the real estate market. The rapid price growth has ended, and sales have slowed down. This is called a market correction. This word means a process of correcting the situation. For the city, this is a chance to move towards a more balanced approach, towards development without excessive haste and the desire to grab a piece while you can. For developers, this is an opportunity to focus on added value, on building structures that will be better than before and will become the city's calling card. For the banking system, this is an opportunity to create financing schemes that allow for the implementation of long-term projects.
Today, an "expertise core" has been formed in the market, allowing for a new level of development, and the emergence of specialized publications dedicated to this most interesting and important sector of the economy is a clear testament to this.
