No longer the place to live

Twenty years ago, life in Jeziorki was sweet - an ideal place to live, close enough to travel to work in central Warsaw every day, to be in the office by nine am, yet a quiet, green area. Quite the place to raise children. Since then, 'Zielony Ursynów' ('Green Ursynów' - the part of the Warsaw district of Ursynów lying to the west of ulica Puławska and the Las Kabacki forest) had been developing slowly, but that pace has accelerated rapidly in recent years.

The opening of the S7 extension (to Lesznowola last August, and all the way to Grójec last month, thus linking the northern and southern bits of the S7) has vastly increased the amount of traffic pouring through Jeziorki. 

Below: ulica Karczunkowska, peak morning rush hour. See where that tanker is in the middle of the photo - on either side of the road, you will see... no pavement. Traffic is up maybe tenfold, maybe more, but there is still no f*cking pavement. This road is not scheduled for an upgrade until 2026. Meanwhile, there is a vastly greater risk of pedestrians or cyclists being killed or injured along this stretch, not to mention the extra noise and pollution. Just behind that tanker is the junction with ul. Nawłocka (to the left), and access to the Biedronka supermarket and W-wa Jeziorki Park+Ride (to the right). Trying to turn into Karczunkowska is a nightmare, so the local residents have petitioned for a roundabout to be placed here - I hope it happens, as it will have the additional benefit of slowing down traffic as it comes charging down from the viaduct. Reminder - the speed limit here is 50km/h.

That's just the through traffic. Jeziorki is also growing organically, with developers moving in to build new estates. A new house generates one and half new cars for the neighbourhood. Below: land for sale, Jeziorki - 2.1 hectares, enough to build 24 to 30 terraced houses; once sold and developed, another 36 to 45 new cars for ul. Trombity. They paved paradise, put up a parking lot.

Below: one of four new estates on ul. Trombity, this one of ten houses, just completed, and up for sale. 

Talking of through traffic - I feel very sorry for the residents of ul. Pozytywki and ul. Cymbalistów; these two roads are used as rat-runs by motorists wanting to avoid the traffic lights at the end of ul. Karczunkowska to turn right towards Mysiadło, Nowa Iwiczna, Piaseczno and all points south. Despite the 30km/h speed limit, there's a constant stream of cars charging down these streets, heedless of the speed-bumps, tearing past the kindergarten and the new housing estate on Cymbalistów. The answer here is to create a Woonerf - the Dutch solution to the problem of through traffic tearing through quiet residential areas. My solution - the działka, 26km to the south, 24 minutes by train from W-wa Jeziorki to Chynów. From Chynów station I can walk to the działka without fear, often without being passed by a single car. And above all, peace, quiet, clean country air*.

Below: elegy for a lost suburb - Karczunkowska in 2007, five years after we moved to Jeziorki, 12 years before the viaduct crossed the tracks, 16 years before the S7 extension was completed. This is the reverse angle of the shot in the top photo. As busy as it got back then, I had to wait a bit to get the cars into the composition.

The inexorable lava flow of development will take time to reach Jakubowizna; it is happening. Three new houses have appeared on my street since I bought the działka in 2017, but each one is detached, and two of them are bungalows. I cannot see the same kind of development that blights Jeziorki - or worse, Zgorzała, Zamienie and Nowa Wola on the other side of Warsaw's city limits - whole fields being turned into row after row of terraced houses with no asphalt or amenities.

* Country air pollutants: diesel fumes from tractors, chemicals used to spray orchards, and smoke from wood- or coal-fired domestic heating. But at least there's a thousand times less traffic on the roads.

This time last year:
Textures of Childhood

This time two years ago:
Stupendous sunset, Sułkowice

This time seven years ago:
Politics - the importance of fact.

This time eight years ago:
Rural Mazovian toponyms

This time nine years ago:
Carrying the weight on both shoulders

This time ten years ago:
Railway history - the big picture

This time 12 years ago:
A new lick of paint for W-wa Powiśle

This time 13 years ago:
The ingredients of success