Below: another view, looking south-east. Now, this is going to be a huge project. The website of BGK Nieruchomości (the property arm of state-owned bank BGK), says the site's size is 148,260 square metres - up to those trees along the far horizon.
Below: I plot that onto a local satellite map using Google Earth Pro, which lets you measure area as well as distance (and now it's free!). I marked a 148,260 m2 polygon on it, outlined in red. Now, to measure out that area, the golf course will have to go, along with the scrap-metal yard. Click to enlarge.
Last week, BGK Nieruchomości announced an architectural competition to find the best project. The task: to fit 8,000 people into 148,260m2 (works out at 18m2 per person, which suggests blocks several stories high) and to do so in a sustainable, low impact way. Below: from Warsaw city hall's official website showing plots and ownership. Grey = private, yellow = city, pink = state treasury. The guidelines for the competition state that car space provision should be no more than one for every two flats. The idea is that everything that's needed for bringing up young families is to be found within the boundaries marked in yellow, the plot itself marked with a red border.
The terms of the competition (click on link above) give the clearest indication of what the authorities are aiming for. Low-cost social housing, for young families as well as old people, using public transport to get to work, with nearby nurseries for small children.
It will be a crush to put 8,000 people into this space. That is more than the entire populations of poviat towns in Mazowsze such as Białobrzegi (pop. 7,056), Zwoleń (7,940) or Lipsko (5,678). Warsaw's longest block of flats, ul. Kijowska 11 (one building, one address, over half a kilometre long) is home to just 1,200 people. So this will be high-density housing. It will triple the population of Jeziorki Południowe, placing a huge burden on public transport and on the roads, in particular on ul. Karczunkowska, which feeds into the already-choked ul. Puławska.
The architectural competition sets out that there should be a maximum of 138,000m2 of housing space (on a 148,000m2 plot, remember, of which only 35% can be used for housing), with 45% of the flats being one-bedroom, 40% two-bedroom and the remaining 15% three-bedroom. And the buildings should average 20m in height (seven floors), being lower when built adjacent to agricultural land.
Quick calculation then. One third of 148,000 is 50,000m2. To get 138,000m2 of housing on to that footprint means an average of three floors. One car per five (on average) inhabitants still means 1,600 cars; end-to-end with a metre between each one, this is the equivalent of a traffic jam eight kilometres long, should everyone choose to drive out onto Karczunkowska at the same time. This (and not the number of inhabitants) is unsustainable.
Entries must be submitted by the end of November. It will be interesting to see the results - they will have a huge impact on the neighbourhood.
This time last year:
Autumn in Warsaw
This time two years ago:
Inside the Norblin factory
This time four years ago:
Sadness at the death of Tadeusz Mazowiecki
This time six years ago:
More hipster mounts (Warsaw fixieism)
This time seven years ago:
Welcome to Warsaw
This time eight years ago:
Just like the old days
The funniest part is (one car space per two flats). Giving up on vehicles as sign of social status has gotten under way with better-off families (who often have one car used in mostly during weekends and for longer trips), but not among the lower class, who still claim (multiple) vehicle ownership is the best way to show off their social status. Just note how bringing in 500+ allowance boosted imports of rickety cars from the Western EU. Besides, lower rent under Mieszkanie Plus will also boost disposale income of dwellers, so I expect serious problems with parking (those blocks will lack underground garages which on many new estates are insufficient anyway) and that new inhabitants will clog up local roads.
ReplyDeletePlus high-rise building will be an awful blot on the semi-rural landscape of Jeziorki ;-(
Sounds like a nightmare. Does a "competition" in this case mean a tender?
ReplyDeleteSounds like a nightmare. Does a "competition" in this case mean a tender?
ReplyDeleteNot just the roads that will struggle but schools, medicine and other infrastructure is really going to be hard hit. IS there anything about building new education/medical facilities to support this influx of people?
ReplyDelete@student SGH:
ReplyDeleteWhat is the point of OWNING a large family car just for the occasional weekend jaunt? Surely hiring one when it's needed makes better economic sense? The whole car ownership model is outdated. I need a car twice/three times a year and hire it - so much cheaper.
@ Bozena:
Not an official tender. More like a request for ideas...
@ Ian Wilcock
...ideas to fit the whole thing together - the flats, the nursery schools, the clinics, the cycle paths etc.
Ah, I see. Free labour in other words.
ReplyDeleteIt is a big ask to fit all that plus the dwellings into that space. I would hazard a guess that the cars will arrive before they finish extending the expressway to Lesznowola. Are there plans to expand the number of trains and carriages per train to absorb the jump in travellers?
ReplyDelete@ Bozena Masters
ReplyDeleteNot free labour, if your idea comes first, second or third. Given the scope of the competition, I doubt if there will be more than three entrants.
@ Ian Wilcock
By 2020 (we hope) money will have been found to buy new trains for SKM to run down to Piaseczno. Then we can expect four/five trains an hour at peak times, two an hour (one to 'Seczno and one to Radom) off-peak. Expressway to Lesznowola - once built, I guess most of the new estate's inhabitants will rather use than to get into town than Puławska with its myriad traffic lights...