On September 3-4, at the invitation of the city hall of Mykolaiv (population 500 thousand people), the NGO "Vision Zero" visited the " Urban Development Forum ". Our representative Viktor Zagreba had the opportunity to give two speeches in the city on the Bug - as part of the main plenary program of the forum and at the "City Workshop" in the central squares. 

 Forum organizers and speakers (not all). Both reports were devoted, of course, to our favorite things: a scientific approach to assessing traffic safety; smart and unsmart decisions in street design; the impact of infrastructure on user behavior; practical experience of high-quality projects in Ukraine. In Mykolaiv, we liked: 

• 1) Mykolaiv itself. A well-planned, green, spacious city with an ideal square-nest grid - reminiscent of Chicago or New York, and not at all Vienna or Ivano-Frankivsk. The streets are very wide, you can easily develop them and make them safer, friendly to cyclists and pedestrians. There is one beautiful, wide, pedestrian street in Mykolaiv. True, its pedestrianity is far from perfect, since it is constantly crossed by non-pedestrian streets with car traffic. But it is there, and it is pleasant and popular. And Nikolaev also has a wide expanse of water and endless kilometers of coastline. In such a city, you can live and live! 

Planning of Mykolaiv. View from space

• 2) Mayor of Mykolaiv Oleksandr Senkevych. A modern leader and an educated, thoughtful person who came to local government from an honest IT business, and, having won the elections, fights every day for a better city and a better country. It feels like it's hard, but he already manages to show results! In the first few months, the mayor created a Development Agency with an excellent team of motivated educated people who are rocking the creative class, successfully (and honestly) cooperating with businesses, and attracting international technical assistance and intelligence. It feels like thanks to this mayor and the Development Agency, Mykolaiv is becoming more ambitious and visible every month. And that the team that works with the mayor gets pleasure from work and from the fact that with this leader many ideas get the green light and full support. For a small class of civic activists and urbanists in Ukraine, an adequate mayor is like winning a lottery you didn't even play, so it's self-evident that the local proactive class with Senkevych is simply happy and even risks falling into a personality cult (and you shouldn't!). But even the average, that is, generally passive and skeptical, residents of Mykolaiv, interviewed by us in several taxis, in a bar, and on the beach, all respect their mayor and even, as strange as it may be for them to admit it, trust him. Although the sample is not representative, it's still an indicator for us. Oleksandr, go ahead! You yourself created these high expectations, now you'll have to plow like Elon Musk! Just take care of your health.

Zagreba couldn't help but take a selfie with Senkevych. 

• 3) The reaction of listeners to our messages and our approaches. People of all ages, genders, and professions understand and feel that the old "DAI" approaches to road safety do not lead to anything meaningful, that they have exhausted their potential, if they ever had it at all. People understand that new results cannot be achieved without doing something new, and that the city's streets should not be like those in Mykolaiv. We explain what is specifically "wrong" with them and what our streets can and actually should be in terms of safety, logic, comfort, and aesthetics. We state in which direction our cities need to move in the field of traffic safety - towards zero mortality. And we are pleased that these new ideas and approaches for Ukraine are positively perceived by local leaders, planners, architects, activists, police officers, and ordinary citizens.

"City Workshop". In place of the green area with yellow flowers, a granite Lenin recently stood. It should be noted that we mostly did not like the organization of traffic on the streets of Mykolaiv. Wide lanes that encourage speed. Long zebra crossings. A strange pedestrian street, on which, if you are inattentive, you can get hit by a car traveling 60-80 km/h. Questionable conditions for cyclists, a barely functioning tram network. But all these shortcomings are far from unique - they are in all our cities, this is our Soviet heritage. And they did not outweigh our positive impressions of the visit. In addition, having felt the dynamics that the city is gaining, we believe that its street infrastructure will also begin to change for the better in the next year or two. Thank you to Mykolaiv for the invitation, high-quality organization of events, hospitable reception, energy and ambition! Personal thanks go to Roland, Daria and Vasyl! We wish your warm city sustainable development and safety on the streets, and are always open to cooperation and further professional exchange. 

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