Cardboard city (Serbian: Картон сити, Karton siti) was an informal settlement, or locally classified as unhygienic settlement, basically a slum in the capital of Serbia. It was located in Belgrade's municipality of Novi Beograd. The settlement was completely evicted and cleared in 2009.
Most of the houses in the Cardboard city were built, as its name suggests, from cardboard or other non-building materials, like plywood or nylon bags. The settlement had no communal infrastructure (roads, running water, sewage, electricity).
The settlement was located beneath the bridges Gazela and Stari železnički. The settlement was just a few kilometers away from the downtown Belgrade, close to the Block 19 and Block 20, and in contrast to five-star hotels Hyatt Regency Belgrade and Continental Hotel Belgrade.
There were 986 people living in the Cardboard city (501 men; 485 women) of whom 278 were children living in 237 "households" according to the census taken by the city authorities in August 2007.
The Cardboard city was depopulated on August 31, 2009, following 4 years of unsuccessful attempts.
The City Government announced in 2005 that it will evict the population from the settlement into a new one, made of the temporary container houses in the area around the neighborhoods of Dr Ivan Ribar and Blokovi. This decision was not received with approval of the local population. They demanded that the city government should disperse the population on the territory of the entire city, especially in Dedinje, the most affluent neighborhood of Belgrade and that simply moving the population without giving them any jobs or education would not make the difference. They claimed that the action was caused by desire of the city government to free the land for construction. Some NGOs supported the city government, also labeling the protesters being racist, but some pointed out that the solution proposed by the city was not good, economically and socially. After months of verbal clashes and protests, city halted the eviction.