Pavement comes to Jakubowizna (...but not to Jeziorki)

It was back in May that pallets of paving stones and kerbstones were left along the side of the main street running through Jakubowizna. I wondered when work would start to actually lay them. It was to be nearly four months on. Such is the rate of inflation in building materials that had the contractor who won the tender to lay Jakubowizna's pavement not bought the stones when he did, their new price would have bankrupted him. After four months, some of the pallets had been unwrapped and some paving stones stolen; other pallets had been hit by passing traffic. A propos of building materials inflation, a neighbour told me that he had to put the re-roofing of his house on hold after the price of the roof tiles he had chosen had gone up from 80 to 130zł a square metre.

Anyway, at last they're getting on with it. Below: from outside the Jakubowizna entrance to Chynów station, looking east along the road to Machcin and Rososz. The crew has knocked off for the evening, parking diggers and dumpers in the courtyards of farmhouses happy for the extra revenue.

This EU-funded project will make walking through Jakubowizna safer and more comfortable. It is ironic that here, where traffic is sparse and locals take care not to mow down their neighbours in acts of mindless piracy there is a pavement, whilst in Jeziorki - part of the capital city of Warsaw - a main road along which strangers race their cars and vans with scant regard for speed limits still has no pavement.

Below: farther on up the road. The work is being undertaken thoroughly, with due care taken to health & safety of pedestrians. The total length of pavement is nearly 1.4km. Note the brick shrine to the Blessed Virgin Mary on the right-hand side of the road.

As of today, about one third of the length of the village has been paved. Below: beyond this point, the kerb has been laid, but the pavement is still to come. There will be still be plenty of tidying up to do. An interesting fact about Jakubowizna is that it lacks a single shop, a single café or bar, despite its length. Widok, the next village south to Jakubowizna has two shops, yet there's no direct road or even official footpath between the two. Note the drainage ditch running along the south side of the road.

UPDATE: 27 September - since these pictures were taken two weeks ago - exactly nothing more has happened. The crew, the plant, has all gone. I wonder how long it will be before they're back?

This time last year:

My local craft brewery

This time 11 years ago:
Time to change gear.

This time 12 years ago:

Spidery autumn

This time 13 years ago:
Early, cold start to autumn