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This article examines the ten-line cable car network of Tbilisi, Georgia, constructed by the Soviet government between 1953 to 1988, then decommissioned in the 1990s after independence and partially reactivated since 2012. During the Soviet era, Tbilisi's cable cars played an important role in the city's mass mobility, particularly in areas of steep geography. They also functioned ideologically, supporting Soviet ambitions toward public transportation and access to recreational space for the working proletariat. We argue that today's aerial network reflects new state ideological goals where cable cars lure global capital and facilitate the tourism commodification of Tbilisi's historic Old City. Tbilisi's cable car network can, therefore, be understood as embodying changes in government stances toward labor, leisure, and the direction of future development, while further reflecting the mobility politics of the city. The article describes the various ideological shifts that took place, exploring how Tbilisi's cable car network now links to contemporary changes in government urban development priorities and tourism promotion. The findings are based on interviews, document analysis, transit ridership/City Hall data, as well as field observations that collectively provide an overview of Tbilisi's cable car network as it has transformed since the 1950s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 1960s, both mega-events and special economic zones have gained global prominence as agents of urban development. Often relying on extra-legal measures for their realization, these two initiatives further create areas of spatial exclusion in cities. This paper examines their coming together in Tbilisi, Georgia, where costs for the city's hosting of the 2015 European Youth Olympic Festival were defrayed by the company Hualing Group in exchange for government approval of a 420-hectare special economic zone. Using a qualitative mixed-methods approach, the research shows that combining mega-events with special economic zones poses significant threats to the democratic processes tied to urban planning at both the local and national level. It further demonstrates how the coinciding of such projects promotes sprawl and privately-enclaved urban development patterns. In relation to urban theory, the paper contributes to a growing body of literature examining exceptionality in cities, and looking at how mega-events serve as legitimizing devices for even wider practices of long-term spatial and legal exception, such as special economic zones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]