Security measures must be taken immediately in the whole of Bit Pazar in Thessaloniki, where shops of health interest and second-hand shops operate, as there is a risk to public traffic, according to the Urban Planning report, after an autopsy of all areas.

It is noted that the market of Bit Pazar, which has been designated as a preserved building, is a private building complex and its square is the uncovered part of the surrounding buildings.

It is located north of Aristotelous Street in close proximity to the Roman Agora.

The exhibition of urban planning

The report was drawn up after a hole opened in a gallery in January 2024 where two people had fallen in and injured themselves.

Characteristic of the situation Bit Pazar has found itself in is that last Saturday afternoon plasters fell from the windowsill of a closed shop on Tositsa, without any injuries and the area was cordoned off.

In the report posted on June 17, 2024, the Town Planning officer ruled that there traffic safety hazard of the public in all the internal arcades, in the internal courtyard of the property and on the sidewalks on Tositsa streets, between numbers 3 and 9 and Olympos, between numbers 68 and 70.

It is mentioned that owners “must IMMEDIATELY take safety measures under the responsibility of a competent private engineer which will be set by them to prevent accidents, e.g. installation of a fixed barrier-fence for the complete blocking of access to the galleries with an entrance on Tositsa, Olympo and Eleftheriou Venizelou streets and preventing the approach of the buildings on Tositsa and Olympo streets at a distance of 2 meters from the buildings in the pedestrian area with a safe fence”.

In the Urban Planning risk report, the owners, estimated at 300, are called to repair the damage immediatelyto take safety measures under the responsibility of a competent private engineer, to install informational signs for pedestrians on the sidewalks around the complex but also on internal courtyard area pointing out the danger, to check all aspects of the complex and to issue an administrative act of restoration.

Regarding the control of Town Planning by static and structural view of Bit Pazar, it is requested to carry out a load-bearing capacity check of all basement ceilings in their entire extent for the entire building complex. Overall, the civil engineer of the Town Planning Department who performed the autopsy, concludes that the “building complex as a whole presents danger from a structural point of view and there is a risk further detachment and loss of materials around and inside Bit Pazar”.

As an appropriate solution for the investigation of the causes of the damage to the building complex, it is proposed to carry out a technical expertise by the competent Technical Chamber of Greece. It is clarified, however, that the taking of the safety measures contained in the report must be done within 20 days from the posting of the report (17/6/2024) while the work to restore the risk must be carried out within 120 days.

“We are monitoring the situation and checking if they will carry out work” says the responsible deputy mayor

The risk report was also communicated to the municipality of Thessaloniki – specifically to the vice-mayor of urban development and urban planning. As Deputy Mayor Dimitra Agathidou told APE-MEP, the private individuals and owners of the building complex must undertake the repair.

“However, they do not comply and do not respond to complaints about restoration work. The only person who can intervene to compel them, according to the law, is the prosecutor. However, according to the risk report, they have room for the work until the beginning of July. We are monitoring the situation and checking if they will carry out work” concluded Mrs. Agathidou.

The story of Beit Pazar

It started operating almost a century ago as the refugee market of Thessaloniki and got its name from the clothes that had lice (bit = louse in Turkish) and were sold by Asian Minors who were granted the building complex by the Thessaloniki Refugee Building Cooperative in order to sell used things. In the complex, two-story buildings were initially built, with the upper floors being residences and the ground floors commercial shops, and an enclosed square was created in the center with six arcades and ending on Tositsa, Venizelou and Olympos streets.

Main photo from thessalonikitourism.gr