Single-family homes, multifamily complexes, new schools and kindergarten, all being constructed from scratch. This is the post-earthquake rebirth panorama of Shijak Municipality, which is being completely redesigned through the new reconstruction projects.
Kindergarten No. in this is municipality is the newest educational facility being constructed from scratch and designed to deliver on an infrastructure that provides every facility and habitability comfort for children of various age groups and the educational staff.
“It is a new kindergarten designed also to serve meals for the preschool children, an infrastructure that this municipality has been lacking to date and the new facility has a capacity for 120 to 150 kids, with a floor area estimated at over 1 000 square meters. Offering kids meals provides comfort to parents and helps them get through their daily routines and work and the kindergarten will remain open until late afternoon,” Mayor of Shijak Elton Arbana said as he accompanied Prime Minister Edi Rama during a visit to the new kindergarten.
In addition to the kindergarten teachers’ staff, a doctor and a nurse have been also employed, along with a social worker and a psychologist, to provide health and social care for the preschool children.
“The number of new educational facilities built in one year in 11 municipalities only is higher than the number of schools constructed throughout Albania in the past 30 years combined,” the Minister of State for Reconstruction Arben Ahmetaj said.
In the meantime, work is also underway to construct the multifamily housing complexes in Shijak. Prime Minister Rama inspected the ongoing works on construction of the so-called “Lugina” residential neighbourhood, where continues around the clock to complete the construction project ahead of schedule.
“In parallel with the educational facilities, we have started the work to construct the residential buildings. This is one of the 9 buildings already under construction in the Municipality of Shijak, where building crews are working around the clock. The entire municipality of Shijak has been transformed into a huge reconstruction site. New water supply infrastructure is also being built in the town of Shijak. Work to build the urban infrastructure of new residential complex “Lugina” has completed and implementation project on construction of the first five apartment buildings will kick off in the next two days. A total of 21 residential buildings will be constructed in this new neighbourhood only to accommodate around 400 families in a floor space of around 25.000 square meters and the project is slated to complete by September,” Mayor Arbana said, adding that all citizens who have lost their homes in the devastating earthquake are being provided a rental bonus until the move into their new homes.
The Reconstruction Minister Ahmetaj noted that “Shijak and other quake-hit areas are not only being reconstructed, but also being redesigned. The concept behind the new ‘Lugina’ neighbourhood is designed to render a completely fresh physiognomy to the town and completely different from what it used to be in social, economic and urban terms.” According to Mayor Arbana, around 50% of the work to construct “Lugina” residential complex has already completed and construction of the multifamily housing units will complete within six months.
Work is also underway to build a large number of single family homes in the area. Construction of some 20 houses has already completed in the administrative unit of Gjepalaj.
“Intense work continues to construct the single-family homes too. Construction of 450 out of 567 new homes has already completed and the rest will complete within February,” Arbana said.
