The streets of Sarajevo

July 10, 2007
hosts and hills | Sarajevo | social housing

The first eight photographs on this page are of streets in eastern, older Sarajevo.

Larisa and Vedran were curious about my reaction to Sarajevo. Coming from Kabul, my impression is that it is definitely a European city, reminiscent of Austria and parts of Italy.

Of course, it does have many mosques, and their minarets are distinctly Ottoman style.

But increasingly, there are mosques across all of Europe, so even that difference is disappearing. And a street like this looks more European than anything else.

Old Sarajevo is quite dense, so there are some very tight alleys giving access to houses.

Note some interesting little features here: the red car on the left has a "disabled" sticker in the window, indicating special parking rights which were recently implemented in Sarajevo. On the right, small bags of trash ready for collection. I forgot to ask, but I think the blue box may be for recycling of bottles (Larisa, please verify this).

Here the municipality is repaving a street in the commercial district with stone. What we (tourists) think of as "historic" stone-paved streets are usually modern acts of urban design to make shopping districts more attractive. Note the new copper drainpipe from the shared eaves of several shops.

Another street repaved with beautiful white stone is now a pedestrian-only street.

These last three photographs are of the main boulevard that extends out into western, New Sarajevo. This boulevard is at least 60 meters wide, with a tram line down the middle. It works, but it is not beautiful. Not that it has wide sidewalks, but no one is walking on them except us, and we are only there for the specific purpose of taking these pictures.

Yes, it carries a lot of traffic.

One of the good things about this wide street is that it provides views of the valley beyond.

hosts and hills | Sarajevo | social housing