Arbat Almaty: the pedestrian stretch of Zhibek Zholy Street

Arbat Almaty is what locals call the car-free part of Zhibek Zholy, a central street with shops and benches. The Almaty Metro operator marks the zone as Zhibek Zholy between Abylai Khan Avenue and Kunaev Street. Ride to Zhibek Zholy station and you are close. Treat it as a stroll to pair with Panfilov Park or the Green Bazaar, and check the bridge repair below.

Search for Zhibek Zholy, because Arbat Street is not on the map

Arbat is a spoken nickname. Russian Wikipedia describes the pedestrian section as “known in everyday speech” by that name, and street signs use Zhibek Zholy, which means Silk Road in Kazakh.

The whole street is 4,200 m long, according to a 1983 city encyclopedia quoted by Wikipedia. Only part of it is car-free, and that part is what visitors mean by arbat street Almaty. Traffic was stopped between Abylai Khan and Kunaev in the late 1980s.

Older books use earlier names. The street began as Torgovaya (Trade Street), became Gorky Street in 1936 and took its current name in the 1990s.

A second trap is Ainabulak, a microdistrict in Zhetysu district, which has its own pedestrian zone called Arbat along Makataev Street. If you ask a driver for “Arbat”, add “Zhibek Zholy, Abylai Khan”.

What you pass on the way

The table runs from the western end. It lists only what we could tie to a source, and it is not a full shop directory.

Read that as a short walking plan: metro, Arbat, then a side trip. The metro operator also lists Panfilov Park and the Ascension Cathedral near the same station, and the street continues towards the Green Bazaar. Our metro guide shows which station serves what.

The repairs: what was promised and what happened

The short version: the new street is not finished, and work comes in patches. The dates below come from the press, because we found no single city page that tracks them.

The bridge job is planned to take five months from registration of the contract. Kursiv says a closure of Nazarbayev Avenue is possible and notes that people walk underneath. The source does not say whether the passage below will shut.

So what should you do? Before a planned walk from winter into spring 2027, look at a recent map or news report for the Nazarbayev crossing. If it is fenced off, you can still walk the western half from Abylai Khan to Panfilov and use Zhibek Zholy metro.

What to do on Arbat Almaty in an hour

There are no tickets or entry points, because this is a public street. Plan a walk with a stop or two.

• Walk it end to end. Go between Abylai Khan and Kunaev and turn down Panfilov Street if you want more distance.
• Look at the older buildings. Wikipedia names the Kyzyl-Tan building, formerly a trading house and a protected example of wooden architecture.
• Look for artists and musicians. The 2017 works promised space for them, and Wikivoyage calls the street an artists’ row. There is no programme, so it comes down to luck.
• Browse the shops. The street has been a commercial and business district since the 19th century.

For the wider day, our Almaty guide has a one-day plan without a car.

When to walk here

Any month works, since it is a city street at about 800 m. Spring brings the most rain, and midwinter days barely reach freezing.

These are computed normals for a grid point near the city centre at 814 m, not weather station records. July averages 29 °C by day and 17 °C at night, and January about 0 °C by day and −8 °C at night. April is the wettest month at about 146 mm, so May, September and early October suit a slow walk.

What we could not confirm