Is Sofia becoming just another faceless city?

The signs of Bulgaria’s exodus are still visible. Since 1989, the country has struggled to curb rampant emigration. Bulgarians have left behind many empty homes, some of them abandoned overnight. Some villages have begun to feel like ghost towns. Bulgaria’s population now stands at just 6.4 million. This Balkan country is considered the poorest member of the European Union: the minimum wage is just €550. But the economic and demographic vitality of its capital, Sofia, stands in stark contrast to the rest of the country.

With its 1.5 million inhabitants, Sofia accounts for almost 40% of Bulgarian GDP. It has become an economic hub of the region, with annual growth of over 15%. The city’s low taxes and modest labour costs attract foreign investors looking to outsource a part of their business. Sofia’s IT sector is particularly buoyant. The city’s economic dynamism can be seen on its main boulevards, whose brand-new glass towers are home to offices known locally as “business centres”.

It’s a safe bet that most of the 528,000 foreign tourists who visited Sofia in 2023 stayed in the historic city centre, where most of the attractions listed in travel guides and trendy vlogs are concentrated. The tourist trail has hardly changed since the heyday of Balkantourist, the storied communist-era state-run travel agency. The central district, straddling the imposing Boulevard of the Tsar Liberator, is probably the only part of the city to have remained unchanged since those days.

Just a stone’s throw away, inquisitive tourists can discover the charm of central Sofia’s Viennese-style residential neighbourhoods, which are in the throes of major redevelopment and obvious gentrification. But the many building sites in this area are no match for the transformations going on in the rest of the city. Huge residential development is underway in Sofia’s more outlying districts, which include Studenski Grad, Orlandovtsi, Manastirski Livadi, Ovcha Kupel and the slopes of Mount Vitosha.

As well as the concreting over of many green spaces, it is Sofia’s blatant lack of proper planning that is most striking. The developments are often unmoored from infrastructure and lacking in any clear public purpose or even a coherent architectural vision. Yet it is hard for a Sofia resident to fully appreciate the extent of the damage that is being done or is yet to be done.

This has now been laid bare by a 3D map designed by Boyan Yurukov, an anti-corruption activist involved with the liberal Yes Bulgaria party (DB, centre-right). He has made a name for himself by creating online tools that make use of publicly available data.

Boyan Yurukov’s map illustrates the possible future of Sofia as things stand. He extracted data from various municipal departments to show the construction currently permitted by law. By modelling the potential developments, his map helps users to understand the impending changes in the city as a whole, but also in their own neighbourhoods and even right on their doorstep.

The map has gone viral in Bulgaria, both on social media and in the press. Boyan Yurukov himself has spoken out publicly to warn of its limitations. In particular, the map does not show construction sites in real time, nor building permits that have been approved. But, he says, “This is just the start of a dialogue. It gives a general idea of how Sofia is developing today. It also gives an idea of what the city will look like in a few years’ time, if nothing changes.”

The map was produced with the consent of the new mayoral administration, which likely sees it as an opportunity to account for the mistakes made by previous mayors. Much criticism has been levelled at Sofia’s opaque management of urban development, and there have inevitably been suspicions of corruption. Boyan Yurukov’s aim is clear: “To create a spatialised visualisation of this data – which is usually scattered in the archives of various administrations – and to make it publicly accessible, which should enable citizens to take control of the development of their city by making them aware of the projects that may arise in their neighbourhood.”

But what exactly does the map reveal? First, there is a massive amount of development authorised by law. The circumscribed areas are large and the buildings may be tall, including in the city centre. If construction were to proceed according to what is permitted, Sofia would be unrecognisable. And that’s on top of all the change that has already taken place since the end of communism. Since the 2000s, the city has been in constant metamorphosis as a result of chaotic construction projects with dubious oversight. According to the Bulgarian Institute of Statistics (INS), 4,008 projects have officially been launched since 2004. That year, there were just 13; in 2023, there were 522, an increase of 400%.

The new developments have risen on wasteland, on the edge of the Vitosha nature park, in the green spaces of the communist blocks, and in public parks. Some have even been on the sites of historic residential buildings in the city centre, many of which were surrounded by gardens. Further densification would pose numerous problems: insufficient transport, traffic congestion, and pollution.

In 2023, according to the INS, a total of 1,165,653 m2 was built, divided into 10,887 individual dwellings. During that same year the city’s population rose by just 6,631. Since 2013, a total of 9,372,359 m2 and 78,672 homes have been built. During the same period, the city lost 22,669 inhabitants. So who are these new homes being built for? Property prices in Sofia are soaring, and Bulgarians are wondering why. The increase was 15.1% in 2023, the second highest in the EU. Eurostat reports that Bulgaria as a whole has one of the highest such national figures for the period since 2015 (+113.4%).

One of the reasons seems to be the appeal of the Bulgarian property market for foreign investors. They are attracted by lower taxes, some of the cheapest prices in Europe, and a solid prospect of profit. According to Capital, a Bulgarian weekly, the largest property owner in Sofia is SEE Residential, a Danish investment fund. That company, which is looking to quadruple its assets by 2030, is building “Scandinavian-style” flats for long-term rental.

It all makes for something of a revolution in a country where, according to the INS, 85% of the population were homeowners in 2023. But this statistic masks another local peculiarity: more than 30% of homes in Sofia are officially unoccupied. Many Bulgarian homeowners prefer to keep them empty but available, often to encourage their emigrant offspring to return home. In the meantime the flats may be used occasionally by family members or acquaintances.

In recent years, investors and affluent locals have shown increasing interest in the residential area of Sofia city centre situated inside the boulevards Vassil Levski, Hristo Botev, Slivinitsa and Dondukov. In the past, this area comprised a maze of detached houses and small blocks of flats, often surrounded by large gardens and interconnected tree-lined backyards. A number of particularly remarkable buildings have been listed by the Bulgarian Heritage Institute. But many of the neighbourhood’s modest, poorly heated buildings have simply suffered the ravages of time and developers.

Numerous properties have been replaced by modern buildings several storeys higher than their predecessors and with no architectural connection to the area. Gardens have been completely concreted over. Initiatives by civil society to preserve heritage have tended to concentrate on the legacy of the communist era, or else have had the effect of accelerating gentrification. One example is the Kvartal arts festival, whose negative impacts have been documented by the anthropologist Nikola Venkov.

In Nikola Venkov’s estimation, the festival has mainly served to further commercialise this residential area while also distorting its original identity, which it was intended to revitalise. The researcher reports that “Sofia’s chief architect, Zdravko Zdravkov, even welcomed the fact that the festival would drive up property prices in the northern part of the city centre, urging the festival organisers to push into neighbouring districts where prices were still too low”.

To illustrate the mentality of the previous municipal government, Venkov quotes one of the most active councillors at the time, Vili Vilkov: “Our main task [was] to take measures [leading] to an increase in the price of your property. The more expensive your home, the richer you are and the more satisfied you are with the city government that made you rich.”

Out in Sofia’s suburbs, groups of determined residents have had some success in fighting back against greedy developers and lethargic bureaucrats. One example is the resistance of the small district of Musagenitsa against the destruction of a local green space. After several years of demonstrations and petitions, the organisers succeeded in halting the construction of a 35-metre-high building complex. Similar achievements have made the headlines in the districts of Studenski Grad, Zona B5 and Opalchenska.

These groups are all asking for the same things: greater transparency; the power to decide what is built close to their homes; and to preserve Sofia, starting with its green spaces. As Boyan Yurukov explains, his map enables them to do just that: “I have been able to identify plans for 15-storey buildings that have been declared suitable for construction on municipal land. I’ve asked the town hall about this, but I’ve had no answer. Are they planning to sell these plots? And why don’t they build a crèche or a school there instead?”