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The
legendary
"New
City,"
promised
by Tishman
Speyer
Properties
(TSP),
is to
cost
700
million
dollars,
but
it still
continues
to exist
on the
paper
only.
The
size
of the
largest
projects
currently
in progress
in Kraków,
that
is a
business
park,
a multi-cinema
and
a shopping
and
entertainment
mall,
is tens
of dollars
only.
The
"New
City"
is so
old
that
it will
soon
be out
in the
treasury
of the
Kraków
legend.
All
that
started
like
in the
legend
of Princess
Wanda
who
did
not
want
a German.
When
municipal
authorities
announced
in 1998
a competition
for
investors
to develop
the
areas
close
to the
main
railway
station,
the
German
company
ECE
lost
with
the
American
TSP.
Also
local
traders
and
the
Polish
capital
have
lost.
It could
not
be the
other
way
round,
since
the
Americans
put
700
million
dollars
on the
table.
No one
has
actually
seen
those
monies,
but
an inflated
balloon
has
streaked
across
the
media,
with
the
vision
of the
new
city:
a whole
development
district
filled
with
shops,
banks,
hotels,
offices,
bowling
alleys,
cinemas,
etc.
Right
now,
in 2003,
the
whole
project
was
to be
completed.
A
Shop
Behind
the
Prison
Walls
In
2003,
it turned
out
that
the
shopping
centre,
would
be constructed
by …
ECE,
on 5
of 12
ha of
land
owned
by TSP.
The
Germans
are
not
susceptible
to any
extravagance.
They
are
offering
in the
city
centre
(at
300
million
dollars)
a big,
four-storey
concrete
box,
with
a windowless
wall
in Pawia
Street,
almost
one-kilometre
long,
with
parking
yards,
though
not
underground,
but
the
top-floor
ones.
All
that
remains
to the
residents
of Kraków
is only
to defend
what
is most
precious
to them,
also
from
the
marketing
viewpoint,
namely
the
urban
landscape.
"An
investor
cannot
be denied
the
issuance
of the
building
permit,
if the
valid
statement
of land
development
conditions
has
already
been
issued
to it.
Although
the
statement
includes
directions
as to
the
architectural
form,
they
are
difficult
to enforce.
The
more
so that,
actually,
we still
do not
know,
what
the
investor
wants
to construct
on its
land
plot,
as there
is a
certain
mystery
about
it.
I think
it will
not
be easy
to reach
a compromise,"
says
Prof.
Andrzej
Wyżykowski,
the
Chief
Architect
of Kraków,
who
presided
over
the
meeting
of Municipal
Urban
and
Architectural
Committee
that
was
reviewing
the
ECE
design
in respect
of public
space
requirements.
One
can
only
prompt
that
the
statement
of land
improvement
conditions
is a
local
law.
When
the
Berlin
Senate
did
not
like
the
design
for
the
Polish
embassy
building,
and
considered
it not
to match
the
surrounding
buildings,
the
municipal
authorities
of Berlin
did
not
agree
to the
project
implementation.
Does
the
City
Council
of the
Capital
and
Royal
City
of Kraków
have
to accept
a nightmare
prison
wall
in the
centre
of the
city,
which
surely
is nicer
than
the
German
capital?
In the
whole
TSP
history,
the
most
interesting
part
is the
Company’s
balance
sheet,
showing
92 million
zlotys
(2nd
quarter
2003)
spent
on the
"New
City."
It is
only
slightly
less
than
the
scheduled
cost
of another
Kraków-based
project,
which
is real,
and
not
virtual.
Without
Waiting
for
Miracles
It
is without
any
media
campaign
and
without
the
participation
of newspaper
headline
politicians,
that
the
construction
of a
business
park
has
been
taking
place
in Wadowicka
Street
since
last
year.
The
project
cost
will
be about
22 million
euros.
Buma
Square
will
be constructed
on a
3.5
ha land
plot.
As late
as by
2000,
the
area
was
occupied
by buildings
of the
Anczyc
Printing
House
that
dated
back
to the
turn
of the
1960s.
"We
restructured
the
printing
house
and
then
sold
it.
It was
moved
into
another
place,
it still
operates
and
yields
profits,"
says
Mr.
Piotr
Michalski,
the
Buma
Square
project
executive.
The
project
investor
is a
house
building
company
Buma
System
that
has
constructed
1.5
thousands
of flats
and
250
single-family
houses.
"We
are
developing
a new
business,
based
on the
Company’s
structure.
We did
not
intend
to become
involved
in trade,
but
in tenant-friendly
office
spaces,"
assures
Mr.
Michalski.
Tenants
and
their
clients
have
already
at their
disposal
a friendly
cuisine
–
a lunch
bar
of a
fashionable
Italian
"Cherubino"
restaurant.
In future,
there
will
be a
recreational
and
fitness
centre,
with
a swimming
pool.
The
whole
complex
is composed
of several
buildings,
including
a seven-storey
building
in the
front,
with
an inside,
12-metre
high
atrium
and
a large
congress
hall.
In the
part
that
has
already
been
transferred
for
use,
more
than
13,000
sq.m.
of office
space
has
already
been
leased.
In addition
to shops
and
salons
of renowned
brands,
there
are
companies
of the
high-tech
sector,
telecommunications
providers
and
software
producers.
Following
the
project
completion,
scheduled
to take
place
in the
second
quarter
of 2005,
Buma
Square
will
be able
to offer
31,000
sq.m.
of air-conditioned
and
ventilated
office
space,
furnished
with
the
most
up-to-date
IT and
telecommunications
systems.
A business
park
instead
of a
depreciated,
industrial
plant
is an
excellent
example
of revitalisation,
conducted
by a
private
company
and
without
the
public
sector’s
share.
Competitors
Don’t
Sleep
Several
hundred
metres
from
the
Main
Market
Square,
in Karmelicka
Street,
a multi-function
complex
is being
constructed:
an eight-screen
cinema,
a hotel
with
190
rooms
and
congress
part,
as well
as a
multi-level
parking
lot.
Such
a large
land
plot
in the
very
centre
of the
city
could
be left
intact
only
because,
still
in the
1990s,
it was
a military
training
yard
for
soldiers
living
in the
vast,
barrack
buildings
that
dated
back
to the
19th
century.
Today
the
former
barrack
buildings
house
a library,
while
the
yard
revealing
the
gable
walls
of the
adjacent
residential
buildings
will
at last
be developed.
"This
is going
to be
one
of the
most
modern
facilities
in Kraków,
and,
at the
same
time,
the
one
that
shows
best
the
co-existence
of old
and
new
architecture,"
declares
Mr.
Romuald
Loegler,
the
designer
of the
whole
complex.
Warsaw-based
company,
with
the
name
of Portico-Galicja,
is the
project
investor.
The
name
of the
company
demonstrates
that
the
fashion
for
the
Austrian-Hungarian
Empire
has
even
reached
Warsaw.
The
completion
of that
new
project,
valued
at 30
million
dollars,
is scheduled
for
the
second
half
of 2004.
The
new
Kazimierz
Shopping
Mall
was
described
by us
not
so long
ago,
on the
occasion
of its
corner-stone
ceremony.
It can
only
be added
that
the
functional
programme
of that
GTC
project
(the
project
value
is 70
million
euros)
is diversified
and
varied,
and
provides
for,
in addition
to different
size
shops,
bars
and
cafeterias,
also
for
a ten-screen
cinema.
It is
most
clear
that
the
investors,
taking
into
account
the
virtual
character
of the
"new
city"
decided
to enter
that
place
on the
market
that
was
supposed
to be
occupied
by the
Americans.
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