By Daphi Ezrachi
Tensions raised in the hall of Minhal Ginot Hair, a Local Community Council (LCC) in West Jerusalem, when hundreds of residents gathered in late July 2016 to discuss the route of the Blue Line have yet to ease. Although months passed, there is still no consent regarding the segment of the Blue Line passing through Emek Refaim Street (ERS). After reading reports produced by the Jerusalem Transportation Planning Team (JTPT), Ginot Hair LCC, the opposition group and speaking to different stakeholders, I reached a new understanding of the issue. I no longer believe that the biggest issue is which solution will be chosen for the light rail, but rather the lack of agreement between the residents’ opposition group and the planners of the JTPT.
Earlier, the JRPC announced its approval of the Blue Line but also required the JTPT to rethink the ERS segment. This is a very new development and I am unsure how the planning team will go about doing this. My suggestion is to ask for assistance from a professional mediator who will spearhead a participatory negotiations process. I fear that if they do not get the needed support from the opposition group, the latter will continue fighting the JTPT and their solutions, possibly killing the plan.
A first draft of the project directed the Blue Line-Malcha segment to pass through HaRakevet Street, which abandoned train tracks and runs parallel to ERS. The Blue Line would connect some of the lower income, peripheral neighborhoods to the urban core of the city. While the team was working on this plan, a different plan for a public park on HaRakevet Street was well on its way. By the time the JTPT presented plans for the Blue Line, Park Hamesila was open and was, according to Dr. Elan Ezrachi of Ginot Hair LCC, “successful beyond belief and expectations”.
During 2012-2013 the JTPT presented the plan to members of three surrounding LLCs (Ginot Hair, Baqua and Gonnenim) and neighborhood residents. Residents feared that the plan would ruin the park and appealed directly to the mayor, who in April 2013 directed the JTPT to come up with an alternative plan (JTPT, 2017). During 2015 the ERS plan was presented again to LCC members, some residents, and a few local business owners. At this point, there did not seem to be opposition to the plan, and some members of Ginot Hair LCC voiced implicit support of the plan (Ezrachi, 2017; Piperno, 2017).
The atmosphere shifted in the spring of 2016. Although some had already known about the plan a different response started to surface. Residents felt the plan was imposed on them without consultation, and they were furious at the Ginot Hair LCC, which represents them at the city agencies, and at the agencies themselves. They demanded to hold community discussions.
As mentioned earlier, a heated community meeting took place in late July. This meeting made clear that more deliberations were needed. The mayor, Mr. Nir Barkat, gave Ginot Hair LCC and the JTPT a November deadline. In November 2016, both the JTPT and the LCC submitted reports examining four different plans: Placing the light rail on ERS, on Harakevet Street, in a tunnel underneath Harakevet Street, or eliminating the light rail from the neighborhood by having the blue line split further down the route.
During the remainder of 2016 and into the spring of 2017 the sporadic opposition turned into an organized group. They filed many complaints to the JRPC, signed over a thousand people on a petition, wrote op-eds in local papers and pressured local politicians. Not deterred from losing in court they continued submitting objections, attending hearings of the JRPC, and pressuring politicians, namely deputy mayor and head of the Jerusalem Planning Committee, Meir Turjeman.
Throughout these years, different narratives and perspectives developed on each side. The planners of the JTPT phrase their efforts as objective and professional. Their plans focus on solving transportation issues, fostering economic and sustainable development, and promoting transportation justice. I believe these efforts are genuine but they also limit the ability of the JTPT to find common ground with opposing residents, who have other reasons in addition to technical ones, to oppose the plans. Members of the opposition have a specific narrative and interpretation of the situation that feeds their perspectives. They perceive the plan as destroying one of Jerusalem’s heritage sights.
In this case, the process should be led by an external mediator or facilitator hired by the JRPC. Hiring a professional mediator or facilitator has the advantage of bringing in a professional who has vast experience in leading group discussion but not (necessarily) in urban planning. Essentially, she is more neutral than an urban planning consulting firm. Hiring a mediator is not very expensive and could start as low as 225$ an hour. The payment is usually split between the different parties. I suggest a four months process which will include: two weeks for scheduling interviews, two weeks for daily interviews, two months of learning, and lastly a month of actual plan making.
The facilitator should start by mapping out the stakeholders and inviting them to personal or small group interviews. This way she could bring more people into the conversation who are currently not given enough space: residents of Katamonim, the neighborhood right near ERS, community leaders from the Ginot Hait, Gonennim and Baqua LCCs, representatives from the schools and institutions surrounding ERS, and possibly representatives from the Ultra-Orthodox and Palestinian communities. All of these groups should be brought in in addition to the JTPT and the opposition group.
My ideal solution would include preserving Hamesila park and building a light rail on ERS as part of a bigger plan of transforming the German Colony into Jerusalem’s first “Ecodistrict.” This would broaden the scope of urban renewal that could take place in the area while taking sustainability, inclusion and economic development into consideration. Yet on a more practical level, a consensus agreement needs to be reached that honors the goals of the many stakeholders. An agreement is more important than any specific solution. Jerusalem desperately needs better transit and economic development. Hopefully, through mediated negotiations, a consensus will be reached and the Blue Line will be able to be a part of these efforts.
Bibliography
Photo Source The Times of Israel, Jerusalem Municipality
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