"The yard was a place for gatherings. Now there is no room for anyone." Three stories about how residents of the Loladzor neighborhood are fighting for their yards

“The courtyard was a place for gatherings. Now there is no place for anyone.” Three stories about how residents of the Lolakor neighborhood are fighting for their courtyards

The story of the construction of a business center in the courtyard in the Lolakor neighborhood, after public protests and the intervention of the authorities, was stopped and a criminal case was opened, has become one of the most discussed topics in Tashkent. But just a few minutes walk from here, there are two more courtyards, where similar disputes are ongoing. The newspaper correspondent visited each of them.

The Lolakor neighborhood of the Mirabad district came into the spotlight at the end of last week. After a series of media publications devoted to the struggle of residents against the construction of a five-story business center on the site of the former mahalla building, children's and sports grounds, and after widespread public protests, the head of the Presidential Administration, Saida Mirziyoyeva, arrived at the scene. He instructed the Prosecutor General’s Office to investigate the legality of housing estate construction projects throughout Tashkent. The construction itself was halted.

Last weekend, when a Gazeta correspondent was in the courtyard of the same neighborhood, surrounded by houses Nos. 27/5, 27/6, 27/7 and 27/8, the place was noisy, dusty and crowded with people.

An excavator was demolishing the remains of the former building, workers were clearing the area and collecting construction waste, and trucks were taking it away one by one. A few days ago, the metal fence that had been blocking the area had already been dismantled. Landscaping work was underway on the site where the business center was planned.

About 15 residents from the surrounding area had gathered a few meters from the area being cleared. Some were watching the equipment work, while others were discussing the latest news. There was a sense of relief in the conversations — the construction was stopped. However, there was no complete certainty that this incident was really over.

“We are not yet at peace. We will only be at peace when the children's and sports grounds are really restored here, trees are planted, and we are sure that in a few months there will not be another construction barrier here,” said resident Fatima Temirkhojyeva.

According to her, for many years no one had even imagined that the community area, where the mahalla committee building, children's and sports grounds were located, and trees grew, could disappear. This area was used not only by residents of nearby houses, but also by residents of neighboring yards.

“This was the heart of our yard. Neighbors would gather here, celebrate holidays, and have parties. Children would play in the playground, and young people would play sports,” says Alla Avanesova, a resident of the neighborhood.

In early May 2026, a four-meter metal fence was erected around the area. According to residents, at first, many thought the area was being prepared for reconstruction. In the following weeks, they tried to find out what was happening: they contacted the neighborhood chairman and representatives of the builder, asking to show them the permit documents and explain on what basis the work was being carried out. However, residents say that they did not receive a clear answer. While they were trying to understand the situation, work continued in the area.

“I asked to see the building permit, cadastral documents, and government decisions. They said, ‘Okay, okay, we’ll show you.’ In the end, they didn’t show anything. Then, without informing everyone, they demolished the neighborhood building, removed the playground, and cut down the oak, paulownia, and fruit trees that we had done ourselves, so they didn’t bother anyone. They just leveled the area for construction,” recalls Alla Avanesova.

It was only after the facility’s passport appeared that, according to residents, they first learned that the future building was a five-story business center with a usable roof and two levels of underground parking.

“We thought that the neighborhood building would be renovated and a maximum of a second floor would be built. No one expected such an impressive building to appear in the middle of the courtyard. All the houses around were built in 1956 in the Stalinist Empire style, which did not fit into the established architecture at all. The most incomprehensible thing for us is how such a decision could be made without the participation of the population. We were not invited to the meeting, they did not tell us about the project, they did not collect signatures,” said Fatima Temirkhojyeva.

“The building belonged to the neighborhood. If it needed repair, why didn’t the neighborhood itself or the management company repair it? Why were these tasks assigned to a complete stranger? The most painful thing is that no one stood up for the rights of the residents, our children. After all, it was the neighborhood committee that was supposed to protect the interests of the people living here first and foremost,” added Alla Avanesova.

By mid-summer, residents admitted that they had almost lost faith in the ability to stop the construction. Numerous appeals to the authorities, the prosecutor's office, the cadastral authorities, and other authorities received increasingly formal responses, and the applications themselves were redirected from one agency to another. The last attempt was a collective appeal to the Presidential Administration with a request to check the legality of the construction documents.

Residents did not expect their appeal to have such a wide resonance.

“This was a real miracle for us. We saw that they could hear even a small person fighting for his yard,” says Fatima Temirkhodjaeva.

After the visit of a delegation led by the head of the Presidential Administration, Saida Mirziyoyeva, residents began to receive dozens of messages of support from different districts of the capital.

"People wrote to congratulate us and say, 'We're so happy for you.'" Many said that this event gave them hope. "We really hope that our issue will be brought to the end and that there will be no more construction behind us," the woman adds.

Such caution is explained by the experience of recent years. According to residents, in recent years the area has already lost several public spaces. A hotel with a parking lot has appeared in place of the playground near house 27/5, and a business center has been built near house 27/8. Therefore, the square in front of the former Lolazor neighborhood building has become one of the last places where residents of several houses could gather together.

Until recently, there was a playground in the courtyard of house 27/3, where, according to residents, several generations of children grew up. Pine trees grew around it, which the residents themselves planted and nurtured in time, and the square was a place where families gathered with their children.

In the neighborhood Resident Elena Politayeva says that in April 2025, the area was surrounded by a high metal fence. No one explained to the residents what exactly was planned for this area. When they tried to get answers from the builder and local authorities, they only replied that “everything is going according to plan,” but did not provide any documents or specific explanations.

“Then one night they simply took out the entire playground. The swings, slides, turnstiles, the shed — everything was gone. By the morning, the playground was spotless. After that, construction sometimes stopped, sometimes started again,” she recalls.

After numerous complaints from residents, a new playground was built nearby. However, according to Elena Politayeva, it could not replace the old one.

“This playground is intended for very young children. "Older children are no longer interested here. In addition, the play elements are installed too close to each other - it is dangerous to play. Maybe the old playground was not very modern, but the children spent the whole day there. We even wanted to build a small football field next to it, but this area was later blocked by a construction fence," he said.

A few months ago, work resumed on the site. According to the information posted on the facility's passport, the project customer was "ARX STROY PROJECT" LLC. It was planned to build a five-story building on an area of 1,979 square meters. It was planned to allocate about 30 percent of the territory (593 square meters) for the needs of the neighborhood, and the remaining 70 percent (1,385 square meters) for the construction of an investor's residential complex.

"They cut down several large trees, surrounded the entire area with a metal fence. Previously, there was grass, trees, and shade here, but now there is concrete, asphalt, and iron. This is especially noticeable in the summer: the yard literally heats up, and the residents of nearby houses suffer first,” says Elena Politayeva.

After construction in the neighboring area of the Lolazor neighborhood caused widespread public objections and was stopped, changes have also occurred here.

When the Gazeta correspondent was in the yard last weekend, the construction fence had already been dismantled, and the object’s passport had been removed. The residents have not yet been informed about the further fate of this area.

If the conflict around the construction in the first two yards has only escalated in recent years, the residents of house 27/10 have been fighting for their public space since 2018. Once upon a time, there were utility sheds (pantries), a playground, and a green area where residents of several neighboring houses gathered. Now in their place — an empty area, scorched by the sun, with only one bench left.

“When we were children, we used to play football here with the children from the neighboring yard, we would organize tournaments. Neighbors would gather on the benches, discuss the news, and watch the children. Life was always bustling here. It’s not like that now. The yard was a place for gatherings. Now there’s no room for anyone here,” said Vladimir Davydov, a resident of this house.

According to residents, in February 2018, the 440 sq m utility sheds in the yard, which residents had been using for decades, were given to the Viva Victoria furniture company as compensation for real estate confiscated during the construction of Tashkent City. It was then, they say, that the initial plans for construction in the area emerged.

“The sheds have always been part of our yard. Once upon a time, coal was stored here for houses heated by stoves, and later the residents used them as utility rooms. We wanted to formalize them ourselves, pay the state and get a cadastre, but they didn’t let us. Then it turned out that the territory belonged to another owner,” said Ksenia Romashkina-Blyummer, who lives in a neighboring house.

For eight years, residents have seen several options for developing the territory. According to them, first a hotel was planned here, then a business center, and later a residential complex. At the same time, the territory began to be cleared and perennial trees were transplanted to another place, some of which later dried up.

“This green area grew with several generations of residents. We knew which tree was which and told our children about it. Today, only a dry area remains. "Over the past few years, we have been planting new seedlings, caring for them, and hoping to restore the yard to its former appearance," says another resident of the same house, Natalya Shishkina.

Over the past few years, residents have repeatedly appealed to state authorities, and in court, their interests have been defended by the prosecutor's office and the authorities. Despite this, the fate of the area still remains uncertain. The incident with the neighboring yard in the "Lolazor" neighborhood has given residents hope that they will be heard for the first time in a long time.

"We are not against the development of the city, but it should not be at the expense of the people. Today, the problem of such construction concerns all of Tashkent. Residents are losing their cherished yards, children's playgrounds, and entire districts are losing their green spaces. Is this development? Business can and must be social. "If an entrepreneur does not think about people, the environment and what will remain after construction, such a project is doomed to failure from the very beginning," concluded Ksenia Romashkina-Blyummer.

The incident in the Lolazor neighborhood is just one of the conflicts that are escalating in different districts of Tashkent according to a similar scenario. In recent weeks, the newspaper has reported on the protests of residents in the Okkurgan and Chulpon neighborhoods against point-based construction. A few months ago, the editorial staff wrote about the long-standing struggle of residents of the Yunus Rajabiy neighborhood to preserve the only sports facility in the district, a football field. All these incidents once again raise questions about how openly decisions are made regarding public spaces and how residents can participate in their discussion. So far, the answers are not in favor of the city and its residents.