The draft decision "On the need to declare the territories of the left-bank floodplain of the Dnipro River within the boundaries of Horbachykh tract in the Dnipro district of the city of Kyiv as a landscape reserve of local importance" was considered at the meeting of the ecological commission of the KMR. On the basis of the adopted decision, the Department of Ecology should work out the issue of bequeathing Gorbachykha, which is also called the "Kyiv Amazonia", on a territory with an area of about 100 hectares. The problem is that only part of this territory, which has ecological value, is in communal ownership, and part is under long-term lease to the company "Building Interindustry Alliance" and KAN Development.
Ksenia Semenova, a member of the Kyiv City Council, explains that the support of the public initiative by the environmental commission would allow activists to start negotiations with land users: "We have repeatedly raised the issue of buying up land for public needs at meetings of the KMR. In order to at least start a dialogue with the developer, owner, tenant of these plots, we need to make a decision. Otherwise, on the basis of what will we talk at all."
"All this territory was reserved as a nature reserve back in 1994, the only one with the island on which the Hydropark is located. The decision was made, but the Kyiv City Council did not take any actual action, and the City Hall gave the land for development," says Olena Fateeva, a Kyiv architect and activist.
The representatives of the land user (tenant) - the company KAN Development and the Directorate of construction of road and transport facilities of the city of Kyiv spoke against the adoption of the decision. Although the activists claim that the creation of the reserve does not contradict or interfere with the construction process of the Podolsko-Voskresensky bridge crossing, the directorate claims the opposite. After listening to the opinions of all parties, the deputies of the ecological commission of the KMR could not make a decision on the creation of a nature reserve - there were not enough votes.