Resource information
This report on Albania urban sector
review focuses on trends and issues that have come to the
fore with rapid urbanization and with the recent
decentralization of major responsibilities to local
governments. Continuing the achievements and addressing the
problems will require actions by local governments and, just
as importantly, by the central government, which sets the
legal and regulatory conditions for local governance and the
tone of political leadership. The major challenges facing
both levels of government include: 1) restoring a better
balance between public goods and private goods, and between
public interests and private interests, as demonstrated in
urban management and land use; 2) devising and implementing
a form of urban planning and regulation that serves the
urban economy and the demands for commercial and household
real estate, and can be enforced; 3) making local
governments more effective managers of cities, with
sustainable financing. This implies that the private sector
is enabled and not hampered by avoidable problems with local
infrastructure services, or by unnecessary regulations or
fiscal impositions; and 4) helping the citizens who remain
relatively disadvantaged to continue improving their
welfare, including their housing assets, in the urban
location. The study concludes that the dramatic
transformations Albania has experienced since the transition
have had very clear spatial dimensions. The increased
concentrations of population settlement and of economic
activity have brought about improvements in welfare for both
the urban residents and for the communities sending
migrants. The geographic pattern of Albania's economy
is strong and apparently becoming more established, as the
Tirana/Durres metropolitan region will likely remain the
economic center of gravity. Urban growth will continue but
at a measured pace, as Albania's urbanization rate
approaches levels seen elsewhere in Europe. National
development strategies and policies, including policies to
strengthen and improve the investment climate experienced by
firms in each city, should therefore acknowledge and work
with these spatial realities.
