Prizren is one of the most interesting cities of Kosovo when it comes to cultural heritage.  Its protection is one of the key premises which led to the adoption of the conservation plan of the historic city centre in December 2008. Municipality and MUSPP team in Prizren are working together to identify potential capital investment projects which would not harm the existing heritage but would contribute to the city’s development.

On 15^th and 18^th of July 2009 municipality and MUSPP team organised the area audit walks within the historic zone of Prizren, as an initial step for identifying potential projects.

Representatives of the  Association of Craftsmen (women branch), business community, Council of Experts, local architects, representatives of people with mobility and vision impairments, NGOs dealing with cultural heritage, environment, arts and other groups of interest constituted the group of stakeholders that took part in this area audit.

During this walk many interesting ideas, proposals and recommendations were extracted based on a questionnaire which the participants had been requested to fill in.

The findings from the area audit will be presented to a wider group of stakeholders including those that were part of audit in September.

The results will be used by the technical group of the project in order to harmonise their proposals with those of the participants in the audit walk. This would help identifying the potential capital investment project which will be implemented jointly by the municipality and MuSPP.

There is a need to link the centre of Prizren (Shatervan) with the key mobility lines around the centre in order to improve the accessibility to other part s of the municipality, to upgrade the built-up environment, and create opportunities for economic development. The centre is also identified as part of the commercial area hence the added value of the project is encouraging small business and units.

The local authorities face a difficult task on balancing the protection of the cultural heritage and responding to the challenges of the present day and the future. These relate mainly to the improvement of the city urban infrastructure which affects the quality of life of its citizens.

Take a look on MuSPP 2 photo gallery: Area Audit