Veszprém’s railway station today is an imposing building; its manicured facade and bright, well-tended flower beds welcome passengers, who access platforms via a subway flanked by large, colorful photos of performing artists and scenes of the city. Graffiti is noticeable by its absence.
It was not always so: Just 18 months ago, departing passengers approaching the station faced a scene reminiscent of the later communist years, with the shabby frontage a mosaic of grime-coated stone and peeling paint.
The dramatic metamorphosis (however last minute) has but one cause: in 2023, after six years of preparation, Veszprém, with a population of just 60,000, took its turn as a European City of Culture (ECoC).
In just 12 whirlwind months, the city (120 km southwest of Budapest by road) and surrounding country settlements hosted countless events, ranging from concerts by stars like Tom Jones and Joss Stone to local folk dance performances, a wine festival and joint Japanese-Hungarian sculpture sessions.
But in the aftermath, it seems fair to ask: what will remain? Will Veszprém find itself, like cities with poorly planned Olympic projects, lumbered with rotting, unused infrastructure that become local eyesores for decades?
“Not at all,” Alíz Markovits, chief executive of the ECoC, tells the Budapest Business Journal at a cafe in one of the city’s cool, green parks. “From the start, we wanted to create [positive] long-term effects in Veszprém and the region.”
She points to developments in Óváros, the old city center, which towards the end of the last decade was blighted by numerous empty and run-down shopping units.
“There was barely any life there! The challenge was to revitalize it,” she says. Under a Street Management Development Program, the city invited tenders to establish new businesses, offering subsidies to help start-ups past the initial need for capital.
“Of course, we couldn’t take responsibility for all the economic problems, but if you go round the old city square, there are surely at least 10 units that have been revitalized, with shops, a sushi bar, a vegan restaurant, a Hungarian restaurant and a breakfast cafe,” she says.
“Only yesterday [a Sunday] morning, I wanted to eat breakfast in Kunszt!, and I couldn’t even get a seat,” she recalls, speaking of what has already become an iconic bisztro-cum-community space in the city.
Indeed, Kunszt!, like the railway station, is symbolic of the transformation stimulated by the ECoC project within Veszprém.
As Andrej Tóth, the artist-designer behind the operation, boasts: “A few years ago, I entered […] a bad-smelling Albanian bakery [….] Kunszt! has since become Veszprém’s number one brunch venue, a place for local-regional fine arts, theater performances, book launches and exhibitions.”
Zoltán Mészáros, a hotelier, concert promoter and predecessor to Markovits as chief executive of ECoC, also stressed his efforts to put investment into infrastructure from the very beginning.
Having “squeezed out some money” from ECoC to enlarge some of the existing hotels (he managed to get HUF 1 billion for the sector, which increased the number of four-star rooms in Veszprem from 160 to 240), he lobbied for investment into the expansion of facilities such as the Gyárkert (the conversion of a former furniture factory into a concert venue and community center) and CodeLab, a center for arts and digital experts to combine their skills in creativity, scheduled to open later this year.
“Cultural investment is really worthwhile because it doesn’t disappear; it stands here for decades and serves the needs of the local community, and if it’s built correctly, for longer,” Mészáros argues. Furthermore, this adds to the overall attraction of the city as an investment location.
“If you talk to any international company manager, they survey the town [before investing]. They want to know the livability factors, like how strong is education? How is the safety? What’s the vibe like in the town?” he says.
But what do the locals think? Approached at random, Péter Szűcs, a mechanical engineer and native to the city, admitted he failed to participate in any ECoC events.
“That was our fault, but my daughter, Judit, and her family were active at concerts and events, which they all enjoyed,” he told the BBJ.
“I think it was perfect organization, I mean like VeszprémFest, Utcazene, and [the] Rosé, Rizling and Jazz Days, which helped Europeans get to know our city better. And there was investment around the city, highway development, into religious [buildings], and the city center. We are happy about that,” he said.
Neither the city nor ECoC are devoid of criticism, however. One Budapest resident, who asked to remain anonymous, attended the Nora Jones and Josh Stone concerts last July. While raving about the shows, she was less than flattering about prices at a local spa hotel.
“By the time we got around to it, everything was pretty much fully booked. We paid the exorbitant fee [of EUR 340 per night for two] because it was my birthday treat. The town is really too small to hold such a festival, and with limited accommodation, hoteliers could gouge clients,” she said.
And despite the back-slapping celebrations, service standards could still improve in the city. Sandor Nemeth, a foreign language examiner, found the staff at a national bakery outlet in the city less than welcoming when he arrived five minutes before closing one Saturday in April.
“The staff were cleaning up and made it obvious they didn’t appreciate my custom. But I only wanted a sandwich; it would have taken only two minutes. I walked out,” he says.
Anecdotal, true, but if the city wants to improve its tourism potential, there is work to be done. Yet, Bernadett Grászli, the public culture specialist in charge of the traditional weaving and joint Japanese-Hungarian sculpture exhibition (scheduled to move to Japan later this year), was enthusiastic.
“Here in Veszprém, we’re continuing to build and expand our contacts after ECoC, and that’s good.”
While the ECoC events and projects certainly had, and will have, economic repercussions on Veszprém and its surrounds for years to come, Alíz Markovits, chief executive of ECoC, says some of the most important results of the entire project are less tangible, but potentially equally, if not more important for the general well-being of the population.
“ECoC has effected behavioral changes in the local people. Restaurants began to open terraces, and people have become much more social, more open. It’s not only the direct economic effects, but there’s growing cooperation here and between villages,” she says.
Quite how these trends can be evaluated is a difficult question, but a comprehensive survey of attitudes currently underway could be one indicator of improvements in the mental and psychological health of the population as a result of ECoC.
This article was first published in the Budapest Business Journal print issue of June 28, 2024.
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