Prime Minister Edi Rama inspected the ongoing works to construct student dormitory buildings at the Civil Engineering Faculty in Tirana, as part of the latest government’s ongoing plans to expand and renovate on-campus student housing. As many as 1080 students will be housed at optimal accommodation conditions within next March thanks to an agreement with the German government to expand the on-campus student housing. The project on building the student housing facilities is based on the international energy efficiency building program that provides for the floor heating according to highest central heating standards and is designed to profoundly transform the living conditions in the student dormitories.
“The project is conceived in the form of a two-room unit that creates a mini-apartment. Each mini-apartment includes a bathroom and showers. The project is also designed to provide all necessary conditions for a student, including Wi-Fi coverage and kitchen in every floor. A modern laundry system will also be in place, including a tailoring. The building will also feature study halls,” the student campus director said.
A total of 570 students are currently accommodated in the two first completed buildings, whereas 8 other student housing facilities will be built.
“The transformation has really been like night and day,” said a student, who used to live in the old buildings.
“The living conditions are 1000% better than in the old buildings,” another student added.
In his remarks, Prime Minister Edi Rama noted that this is the transformation model to extend to other student housing facilities, which will provide contemporary standards.
“The facilities provide same living conditions and standards currently applied in Germany thanks to the investment program supported by the German government-owned Development Bank. This will herald entire transformation, while efforts are underway to speed up works to construct other buildings complex up to European standards,” Rama said.
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Prime Minister Rama also inspected the construction site in Tirana’s Student City, where nine new student housing facilities are being built from scratch too thanks to the agreement with the German Government. Meanwhile, three more new buildings will be constructed through the assistance of the Turkish government that will provide a second assistance program next year. The government head stated that student campuses in Tirana and elsewhere across the country will undergo entire transformation to provide optimal conditions for students within this term in office.
“Nine new buildings will be constructed under the KfW assistance. An assistance program will be supported by the Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TİKA) about which I talked with Turkish President in Istanbul. This is the initial program, while more assistance projects will ensue, but we have discussed the first program. Meanwhile, the government has adopted a normative act to transfer 300 million lek, or $3 million to Tirana Municipality and more funding will be provided to support student on-campus accommodation in the future. With the signing of the next phase of the assistance programme with Germany’s KfW another project on construction of other student dormitories will follow. Our ambition is to make sure that every dormitory in Tirana and all over Albania meet the optimal conditions during this term in office,” PM Rama said.
Work is also already underway to develop the new university campus project and identification of the illegal constructions in the territory of Student City is set to begin this week.
“Meanwhile, we will continue work in tandem with the Municipality of Tirana on the new University Campus project, which is however another problem of its own in terms of property and this is the reason the construction works haven’t been launched to date as we inherit a serious situation regarding the property restitution and compensation following the privatization processes with gambling shops and bars, etc., a catastrophe. It is important that we are very clear about what we have to do,” the Premier went on saying, adding that no illegal buildings in the territory of the Student Campus will be legalized.
This process – PM Rama went on to say – as the ongoing works in the construction site already show, has been launched prior to the current situation which is one more reason to move forward with these projects.
