Gyumri, a Foundation City. A Study-case as a Paradigm of Abandonment and Gentrification in the Historical Centres of the Republic of Armenia

Abstract

Gyumri is the second largest city for population in Armenia. It is located at 1550 metres above sea level on the bank of the Akhuryan river in the Shirak region, bordering Turkey on the west and Georgia on the north. Planned and built in its current structure since the 1930s, it has a "historical core" of 200 hectares that significantly retains its nineteenth-century conformation, despite the violent earthquake that struck and partly destroyed it in 1988. The disastrous earthquake and the consequent closure of the large established productive systems massively reduced the employment opportunities of the inhabitants, forcing them to move or to live at the limit of the poverty threshold. Independence, conflicts and the economic crisis further impoverished the city. Not infrequently, along the streets of the historical centre, some of which are still in clay, you can see the piles of tuff blocks, that testify the violence of the earthquake, abandoned buildings, or those with partially collapsed floors and missing doors and windows, even though, after years of neglect, the city is today the subject of renewed attention which, paradoxically, could lead to further losses in the urban tissue. The paper, starting from a reconstruction of the historical and constructive events of the city, analyzes the current conservation problems and projects in progress, taking a cue for some preliminary considerations about the general situation of the historical centres in Armenia.