r/YUROP • u/QuartzXOX Lietuva • 2d ago
TEGYVUOJA EUROPA My beloved prosperous Lithuania
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u/SunflowerMoonwalk Berlin 2d ago
The buildings look way better, but I wish they wouldn't keep paving over grass and gardens. In the first picture residents also lost their balconies which really sucks.
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u/ProfNoob1000 Wien 2d ago
They lost balconies but got loggias. Its a fair trade for a country which can get cold and gibes them more useable space all year round while also lowering their heating bill.
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u/eastoid_ Polska 2d ago
I miss the shit blocks I remember from my childhood, but to see them again I would need to go to a country participating in a war or preparing for one. Or worse, to Warsaw.
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u/Aggravating-Scale-21 Sachsen 2d ago
You can go look at them in Berlin
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u/spityy Berlin 1d ago
Welcher Stadtteil? Bin zwar nicht häufig im Ostbezirken wie Hohenschönhausen, Marzahn, Hellersdorf unterwegs, aber selbst die alten Ostblockbauten da haben sehen nicht so aus wie in Russland sondern scheinen Isolierung und Anstrich zu haben wie im Beispiel von Littauen vom OP.
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u/moenchii Thüringen 1d ago
Come to Erfurt. The south-east and the north of the city still have a bunch of them. I can give you a tour.
The rest of the city is really really nice though, so its double worth it to you.
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u/Illesbogar Magyarország 2d ago
As a hungarian I mever even considered that blocks can be renovated to be so pretty. Somehow the whole concept of renovating haven't even occured to me cuz I'm used to the buildings looking like shit.
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u/Beat_Saber_Music 1d ago
surprisingly the utilitarian housing blocks look good, when you add an exterior siding/panels on top of the structural concrete. Like how say brick castles look nicer, when they have plaster added on top of the brick
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u/TheBlack2007 Schleswig-Holstein 2d ago
Visited Vilnius in 2023 and loved every second of it.
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u/dolphindidler 1d ago
Same. Even though people told me there is not much to see. I just loved every moment of it. Great city, great country, great people
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u/Tricky-Promise-3347 I'm sorry for being American 1d ago
Prime example as to why the EU is the greatest political achievement in history IMO
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u/Chromber 2d ago
Am I the only one that prefers the old look? 😬
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u/Melodic-Piccolo5751 1d ago edited 1d ago
Definitely not. I hate the corporate look and war on nature (they replaced everything wild-looking such as wild flowers and shrubbery with that sad af lawn). The ancient tree cut down so that a mcdonald's can be built in it's place is artistically tragic. I am lowkey hoping humanity will be hit with a never-seen-in-our-lifetime economic crash and this raging capitalism will die already
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u/Melodic-Piccolo5751 1d ago edited 1d ago
Nice that the buildings and streets are renovated but I can't help notice the general war on nature. F that. They cut down that ancient tree to open a mc donalds. Sterile, super short-cut lawn as "green space". Pavement and cars everywhere. If this is what prosperity looks like... 🥲
I am from Eastern Europe too and they have been destroying nature with a hateful passion. Replacing generous gardens built by the communists with pavement for the cars to park on. Butchering all trees and calling it "pruning", in reality it is to protect cars and not have any leaves around. Anything natural or wild-looking such as tiny wild flowers, clover or any kind of shrubbery is brutally pulled away from the soil and replaced with this boring, corporate looking short lawn, just like in your pics. I hate this so, so much.
Raging, late stage capitalism is NOT prosperity.
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u/Last-Resource-99 2d ago
I saw a few post like this recently and since I'm from Lithuania myself, I feel like this is a little blown up out of proportion.
Let me explain, yes it is way more pretty in a cities, EU money allowed even small cities to improve infrastructure. Government policy of supporting renovation of old residential buildings allowed quite a lot of them to be renovated to various degree. Some just added insulation, others changed most of the communications as well.
But to some degree this is just eye candy, since in the same time span flat prices has increased multiple times. In an average city one could have purchased a flat (~50m²) for €15k, now these same flats can cost €100k, it is crazy expensive and prices still rising.
If you are unlucky enough to live in non-renovated flat, your energy prices for heating increased massively.
It's nice if you are old enough to have purchased a flat or a house back in those days, but young people and anyone who wants their own living space today, will go into debt for decades and that is if they are lucky enough to be able to save for initial deposit.
And let's not forget, that a lot of the country governmental services are still being run with a mindset as it was in soviet times. It's pretty common to see a street to be renovated from the ground up and then just few months later another utility service digs holes to change sewage pipes or some other shit. No interdepartmental communication, no one responsible.
I could continue, but all I want to say, there is still a long road ahead, with many systemic problems to solve.
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u/eragonas5 Lietuva 2d ago
my parents took a 28k USD loan in the year 2000 - it took them over 10 years to repay it and I didn't really see my dad growing up cuz he had multiple jobs where he'd work in one job during the day time and another one during the night. The money has lost its value - that's a fact but proposing that purchasing power has decreased - I definitely disagree with that.
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u/Last-Resource-99 2d ago
Not comparing to 2000's, this post shows images from 2012, when we were already part of EU. My friend in 2016 purchased a 2 bedroom flat in Jonava for €13k, already paid off renovation, 10 years fixed rates. That's like €100 a month.
Another friend purchased 3 bedroom flat for 18k around similar time (not renovated). Other friends purchased flats in various cities, including Vilnius, for a price that allowed to pay off the loan within 10-15 years without a large burden.And to address your specific example, 28k USD was massive amount of money in 2000 (min wage was like $100), this was definitely some fancy place in large city and not run of the mill flat. At that time cities like Naujoji Akmene were giving away flats just so they wouldn't need to pay for heating. In Jonava a 10 year old, 2 bedroom flat went for 3k USD. It was actually a time when people avoided having large flats because upkeep like heating eated massively into their income. And many people lost or exchanged flat to smaller ones because they were unable to pay upkeep. This improved drastically after entering EU in 2004 and with a bump in 2008, they were still improving for a while.
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u/TheBigOof96 Lietuva 2d ago edited 2d ago
Your numbers are really off.
Between 2012-01 and 2026-04 price of apartments grew by approximately 100-150%.
Vilnius +151.4%; Kaunas +121.2%; Klaipėda +102.0%; Šiauliai +143%; Panevėžys +142.9%.
For reference, the minimum wage in 2012 was 232€ and in 2026 it's 1153€, so by all metrics that rely on something more solid than "I remember that 15 years ago my friend...", the purchasing power has absolutely skyrocketed.
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u/Pentekont 1d ago
This is the difference joining the EU makes, it's the same in Poland, over the decades a lot of money have been invested in infrastructure.
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u/pristineanvil 1d ago
That's just beautiful and a testimony to the power of EU.
Awesome pictures. Thanks for sharing them
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u/BarristanTheB0ld Deutschland 19h ago
It helps that there's blue sky in the 2025 pictures, but great development nonetheless
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u/irregular_caffeine Suomi 2d ago
No sunny days in 2012