Rapid development in the wetlands

It's all happening very quickly. The construction plant parked up on ul. Kórnicka and halfway down Trombity is hard at work. As I related last week, ul. Dumki (below) has been made passable to tracked diggers, hardened and widened.

Below: between ul. Trombity and ul. Dumki one can see the biggest changes. Here, hectares of scrub and reed have been removed; the boggy parts deepened and turned into proper ponds.

Below: view from a four-metre high mound of earth before it's removed. From here I can take in a wide-angle shot of the terrain between the backs of gardens coming off houses on ul. Trombity looking towards Dumki in the distance. Retention ponds have been created and walled in by earthworks.

Below: A similar story off ul. Kórnicka - a deep pond has been dug, hundreds of trees and bushes cut down and a deep pond has been dug. Beyond it, ul. Dumki and in the far distance, ul. Baletowa.

How this will all look once completed is still unclear; there's still much wetland untouched, and this is where most of the wildlife congregates. I trust this will remain as it is. Below: the latest satellite image from Google Earth, from May this year (click to enlarge). Google Earth's imagery of this part of Warsaw goes back in yearly intervals to 2002 (with a few years missing ).



The map has been tilted to fit on the page, north lies to the left. Most of the work so far has been taking place at the northern and southern ends of the wetlands.

This time last year:
Sun shines down Al. Jerozolimskie

This time two years ago:
Warsaw Metro vignette

This time three years ago:
The most dangerous word in the English language

This time four years ago:
What a difference a day makes

More autumnal gorgeousness from Warsaw

On a day like today, one should be snap-snap-snapping away, to capture Warsaw in its autumnal finery.
Below: Ujazdowski castle, and the Piaseczyński canal in the foreground. Trees blaze with colour.

Below: coming out of the Metro station at Politechnika, ul. Nowowiejska. Oily effect on plexiglass caused by polarising filter, not visible with naked eye.

Below: Pl. Zbawiciela, the church of the Holiest Saviour (Najświętszego Zbawiciela), late afternoon. 

Below: ul. Marszałkowska between Pl. Unii Lubelskiej and Pl. Zbawiciela, over the Trasa Łazienkowska. A new-style Swing tram departs towards Wyścigi.

Below: Trasa Łazienkowska towards the end of the working week. Completely solid. At least the bus lanes keep public transport moving efficiently along this major east-west thoroughfare.

Look at all those short-distance one-per-car commuters going nowhere fast - they should give up their cars, take to public transport and leave the road space for those really need it.

This time last year:
The genius of Donald Tusk

This time two years ago:
Tragic road accident kills 18: Has Poland learnt anything from it?

Warsaw, early autumn, photo miscellany

Here is a selection of photos taken of central Warsaw yesterday and today - I hope you enjoy them.

Al. Jerozolimskie, looking west. Above: a bus, headed for Awaria (this side of Trasa Zmieniona). Giant billboards promote men's fashion rather than financial pyramids. Below: another view, later the same day.

Below: outside the Institute of Applied Social Sciences. It's nearly two weeks since the academic year began, and still the University of Warsaw is recruiting students (a result of the deepening demographic dip).

Below: a classic view of Warsaw's ever-changing skyline with two skyscrapers - Zlota 44 (left) and the Cosmopolitan building on ul. Twarda 2/4 (right). The new architecture makes the Palace of Culture look dreadfully dated and threatening.

Below: ul. Chmielna, by Nowy Świat. Lovely pastel hues around sunset. Plenty of shopping, plenty of restaurants and bars, the clientèle a mix of tourists, students and office workers.

Left: work continues at a noticeable pace on the Cosmopolitan building. I counted up to 38 floors, and it's on its way up to 44. Once again I manage to snap it from midway up the Warsaw Financial Center building just across ul. Świętokrzyska.

I like the way these new skyscrapers are modernising Warsaw. I believe cities should grow upwards rather than outwards. In years to come, the skyscraper centre of gravity will move towards Wola, with several developments coming into fruition.

Above: another unattended suitcase brings the city centre to a halt. Police close off ul. Emilii Plater around the Lumen building and the Złote Tarasy shopping mall.The all-clear was given minutes after I took this snap.

Above: a recent mixed residential/retail development on the corner of ul. Franciszkańska and Bonifraterska. Glass windows, floor to ceiling, glass balconies, reflect off the late-afternoon sunlight.

Above: Al. Jana Pawła II, by Dw. Centralny. A Konstal 105Na tram waits, doors open, for the signal to proceed across the busy junction with Al. Jerozolimskie. Note Złota 44 in the background. Right: the Palace of Culture, its upper floors illuminated by a low, early-evening autumn sun, the Sala Kongresowa (Congress Hall) below already in shadow.

Above: Al. Jerozolimskie; trams outside Dworzec Centralny, Warsaw's central railway station.

Left: wooden steps from the fountain terrace by Wisłostrada leading up the Vistula escarpment, at the top of which lies Warsaw's New Town. The brick tower of a Gothic church of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Below: waiting for the neon to be lit - sign at Warszawa Śródmieście commuter railway station.

So there we have it, Dear Reader - Warsaw, my kind of town.

This time last year:
Moaning about the trains again

This time two years ago:
Warsaw streets - Dolna, Polna, Rolna, Smolna, Wolna. Lost?

This time four years ago:
Ditches, landscapes, autumn

This time five years ago:
Golden autumn, Łazienki Park

The pros and cons of acoustic screens

A bitter, and rather one-sided debate has sprung up in the pages of Gazeta Wyborcza criticising the ubiquitous acoustic screens that routinely line the side of any new road as it is opened. These screens are a relative novelty in Poland, and have started appearing as EU funds came on stream. Designed to protect nearby houses from traffic noise, for drivers, they give the impression that you are in a never-ended gully. No scenery to gaze at.

Above: acoustic screens line the A2 around the Grodzisk Mazowiecki turn-off. Driving through built-up areas, one cannot get one's bearings, spot landmarks or notice geographical differences.

While I sympathise with people who wake up to find a motorway at the end of their garden, it would be nice to get some kind of changing visual stimulus when driving.

There are different types of screens - the transparent ones (with black bird-of-prey silhouettes applied thoughtfully to them to stop birds from flying into them), green ones (a favourite of graffiti daubers and the odd true artist), natural ones (which employ climbing plants to make them look like a wall of plant life). And there are the concrete pots, filled with earth, stacked in a triangular profile, with trees growing out of them. These I object to the least; after some years, they will look like regular earthworks, greened over with shrubbery and plants. 

Now, as I recall, the M6 runs through the very heart of Birmingham without screens. Maybe Poland has made a civilisational leapfrog in this respect; by taking away some of the fun of driving, maybe people will drive less. On the other hand, acoustic screens are starting to appear on the side of existing railway tracks. Such is the nature of progress. I'll poll this one, see what my readers think.

This time last year:
Hope in heaven

This time two years ago:
Touched by greatness

This time three years ago:
Fixed wheeling around Jeziorki

This time four years ago:
One day, this will all be asphalt

This time five years ago:
Ireland

Tatra time II

Once again thanks to Kuba from Tychy for this excellent set of photos taken recently in the Tatra museum in Kopřivnice in the Czech Republic.

My first remembered encounter with the aerodynamic Tatra was when driving through Czechoslovakia in July 1966. Czech roads were lightly trafficked in those days; there were humbler Skodas, but these were seen (rarely) on British roads. The Tatra was something else. Its form was quite unlike the Austins, Hillmans, Vauxhalls, Fords or Jaguars that I grew up with.

In those grim industrial Moravian towns of cobble and brick, where a red star on the front of a tram was the only colourful decoration, the sinister shape of a black Tatra, looking like a giant trilobite scuttling about, added to the country's visual uniqueness.

Below: the pre-war shapes of the T77a (right), T87 (centre) and T97 (left) were still to be seen in Czechoslovakia in the mid-1960s. The cars were usually painted black, the occupants either senior party members, factory officials or StB officers. But just look at these shapes. Rear-mounted air-cooled engines, bodies with extremely low drag coefficients even by today's standards.

Right: back of the T97, pre-war car that influenced Hitler's KdF Wagen, the direct antecedent of the Volkswagen Beetle. Rear-mounted air cooled flat-4, like the Beetle; but a more slippery shape.

Below: imagine lifting the back to get to the engine! I have childhood memories of driving behind one of these and wondering how the passengers could see out of the back (unlike the Beetle, the rear window was not in the passenger compartment, but in the engine bay).

Below: a post-war Tatra T600 Tatraplan. Again, rear-engined, though only four cylinders. Note its similarity with the Swedish Saab 92, which was designed around the same time.

Below: the rear of a post-war T600 Tatraplan Monte Carlo two-door coupe. Note split rear windscreen, still separated by a fin, and engine grille. It looks from this view like a puffed-up Porsche 356 coupe.

Left and below: the T603, the last Tatra streamliner, (though not the last rear-engined V8 from Kopřivnice - that was the T613, an angular beast with Italian design that no longer had the Tatra character.

This is a late production version; in yesterday's post we saw an mid-series T603. The T603 was in production from 1956 to 1975. A wonderful beast, proving to the world what Czech engineering could achieve even under the heel of communism.

This post and yesterday's one fill me with a great desire to visit our south-western neighbour; I've only been there for three very short visits in recent years (last one recorded here).

This time last year:
Donald Tusk and Co. get re-elected (yes! it was only 12 months ago!)

This time two years ago:
Poland's wonderful bread

This time three years ago:
An October Friday in Warsaw

Tatra time

A huge 'thank you' to Kuba from Tychy, who forwarded this magnificent link to me - a little film I watched over and over for the last five days. Here is that epitome of post-war Czechoslovakian technical thought, the glorious Tatra 603, in action. It is a film to savour and enjoy. The freedom of the road - when only a high-ranking communist party official could have the use of such a vehicle, and roads were mostly empty.

What really made this film, Stastnou cestu, made 50 years ago, a real hit with me, was the amazingly climatic Czechoslovakian landscapes that brought back precious memories of driving through the country en route to Poland in the 1960s. In particular, the town that appears from 05:15 through to 06:50; dark, drab, grey, cobbled, narrow, mediaeval; looking like a set from an Expressionist film.

And the catchy tune; whistled intro, jazz, eerie early-electric organ, a tune that stays with you.

I wanted to find the town, and did so by googling "Czech town gate" and found almost immediately that this was Cesky Krumlov, inconveniently situated right down in the south of the country by the Austrian border.

Using Google Maps Street View, one can see that Cesky Krumlov today looks entirely different to the way it looked in Stastnou cestu, thanks to a lick of paint and... advertising. Signs for everything, everywhere. And sunshine. Still, it looks like a place well worth visiting. 

Note for English readers: the Czech language appears humorous, comical almost to the Polish ear, especially when you can almost work out the meaning; ("motor dobrze pracuje w najróżniejszych klimatycznych podminkach".

More on the Tatra, a car that has fascinated me since those drives through Czechoslovakia, in a future post, once Poczta Polska delivers me a CD that Kuba sent to me some time last week...

This time last year:
The passing of Old Poland

This time two years ago:
A glorious week

This time three years ago:
Trampled underfoot: Sobieski and the Turks at Vienna

This time four years ago:
The first, spontaneous signs, of a Park + Ride at Jeziorki

This time five years ago:
Early autumn atmospheres, Jeziorki

More serious problems on the new Metro line

On Friday morning, the radio was warning commuters that less than three months after it was re-opened to traffic, ul. Marszałkowska was one more closed. The reason - a collapse in the pavement and roadway around Świętokrzyska station on the Second Line of the Warsaw Metro, currently under construction. I travelled one stop beyond Centrum to have a look.

Below: the Straż Miejska (lit. 'Urban Watch' or city guard) has cordoned off the junction of Marszałkowska and Świętokrzyska. Marszałkowska has been closed to traffic from Al. Jerozolimskie all the way to the junction with ul. Królewska and Grzybowska. Huge traffic jams coinciding with a mass protest from public sector healthcare workers.

Below: the red arrow marks the building under which the subsidence occurred. Eighty residents had to be evacuated from this block. Much of the city centre was without hot water, there was no drinking water for 13 blocks in the immediate vicinity of the subsidence.

This is the second station on the Metro's second line to have its construction seriously affected by underground water, which also caused damage to nearby objects; Powiśle station flooded in August, also closing the Wisłostrada tunnel.

This looks like a set of tough geological challenges; water-bearing soils, the Vistula escarpment, the vulnerability of adjacent buildings. I can see construction deadlines moving backwards and the whole Second Line project looking likely to drag on for years and years.



Below:  It's just gone ten, and ul. Marszałkowska, Warsaw's main north-south thoroughfare is deserted. Have the Martians landed?

By lunchtime road traffic returned to Marszałkowska, the trams returned by the evening as one of the underground cables providing power to the overhead wires had been washed away.

I hope the civil engineers and geologists can sort this one out and move on with building work on the Second Line without any further mishaps on the scale of this one and the Powiśle station flood.

This time two years ago:
Leonard Cohen in Katowice

This time four years ago:
The short-term future of suburban development (How right I was!)

In which I turn 55

Or not, depending whether you use the Polish or British way of counting. Poles would say I turned 55 on 1 January 2012, as the year of my birth, 1957, is the key to the question of how old am I. In Polish, today I have 'finished 55' (zakończyłem 55, i.e. the 55th year of my life has reached an end). Poles put far less store on birthdays anyway, tending to remember names-days (imieniny) as the big, age-independent, celebration for friends and family. St. Michael's Day (Michaelmass as in 'Michaelmass term', which traditional English schools use to name the first trimester of the academic year) falls on 29 September; so, close to my birthday. (St. Edmund's Day is in late November).

Grammatically, Poles 'have' their years, while English speakers 'are' their years. "Mam 55 lat" (I have 55 years - or indeed 55 summers), rather than "I am 55". I wonder whether that's telling.

I must say I do feel in fineft fettle (that Polish word samopoczucie being rather inelegantly translated as '(general) physical and mental state' - Wielki słownik polsko-angielski PWN-Oxford). Better than at 50; more relaxes, more (ahem) distinguished, more of an (ahem-hem) authority (was on telly today and the radio yesterday) and as a result more self-confident and comfortable within myself as a person.

Much, much, happier. My mother was absolutely right when she told me before I turned 50 that 'the best is yet to come'. (It's great reaching 55 and still having two parents in good physical and mental health.)

Since my 50th, for the first time ever, the US and then the UK elected leaders who had the bare-faced cheek to be younger than me. (I was rooting for John McCain for this very reason in 2008 - the guy was 72 then!). 

As I approached the Dread Milestone, I asked my good friend and fellow-blogger Krzysztof (Toyah), what it was like being 52. He said "Still a long way to 60". Another memorable - and true - statement.

And if someone asks you "how old do I look", the correct (politically and otherwise) answer is: "too young to have complexes about your age".

For the record, the day was sunny and warm (21C daytime high), as happens often in early October in Warsaw; I can't remember a sunny birthday in my Grey English Childhood.

A big dziękuję to friends and family for SMSs, chocolates, a throughlion*, birthday cards, e-mails- and imagine my delight when I returned to the car at P+R Ursynów this evening to find the message (above) on the windscreen - many thanks to 'Student SGH', the author of the Politics, Economy, Society blog, (who for professional reasons must remain anonymous!) for surprising me in this pleasant way!

What lies ahead? I still want to know more about why it is I get these flashbacks (just got one to summer holiday in France in 1967, a Panhard 17L car... quite unbidden) and in particular those anomalous familiarity events which I get as often today as I ever did, back to the USA or Scandinavia in the late 1940s/early 50s. There are so many mysteries of the universe yet to unravel... This and the art of the Sublime Aesthetic, linked inextricably to our human sensibilities, to that which drives our spirits, to the intangible - the Great Unknowable, that which no scientific experiment can ever touch. I would like to have got much closer to it by the time my body gives in to the ravages of Time.

(*przelew)

Turning 54

Turning 53


Turning 50