Pre-fab and groovy?
Architecture
Foreign models
Examples of similar enterprises can be found in many countries, including Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, and France. “It is a question of reintroducing beauty and community life through architecture and urban planning,” declares Roland Castro, the founder of the Castro Denissof architectural studio, which is one of the key players in this kind of development in France. Its flagship projects include the revitalisation of one of Europe’s largest social housing schemes with 1,700 housing units located in Villeneuve-la-Garenne near Paris. The transformation was done over a period of ten years. It included reshaping many buildings, the restructuring of the public space, and reconnecting the neighbourhood to the city centre. Diversity was one of the key concepts applied in this process. In one of the housing blocks that comprised only three types of apartments, the architects created more than forty new types, thus giving the units their own identity. Now Castro Denissof is turning its attention to Poland, seeing it as a market with great potential in terms of the possible revitalisation of blocks of flats. “Not many architects specialise in this type of development. The main difficulty is that you work on occupied sites, you work on the building while most of the people are still living there,” comments Max Castro, the international development director of the company. There are also economic issues involved. Revitalisation can cost approximately the same as demolishing a building and constructing a new one from scratch. The French experience shows, however, that people become proud of the place they live in. It is not uncommon to hear people say: you should have seen what it looked like before the modernisation. And it always generates a nicer feeling around the estate. “It is quite different when you knock buildings down and replace them – demolition is always a depressing experience,” claims Roland Castro.
Money the main obstacle
The remodelling of bleak housing estates in Poland has been under discussion for some time. It is estimated that 12 mln Poles live in such blocks. However, no project has been implemented on the scale of an entire housing estate so far. The reason is, as usual, mundane – it’s about the money. “There is actually no idea how to finance these enterprises, apart from one, which has been repeatedly mooted for the last ten years and involves the use of European Union funds,’ claims Dagmara Mliczyńska-Hajda, an urbanologist. Some people who could get involved in similar projects give up when they hear that no funds have been allocated so far. The authorities of Kraków, however, are counting on EU money and national funds becoming available and they are also hoping for the allocation of municipal funds. Despite this, no definite funding has been secured. Nor does the team of the Kraków University of Technology seem to care much about where the money is coming from at this time. “So far we are doing everything as part of our scientific research. We are showing what solutions are technically possible on these estates, what materials and structures could be used. We want to have a finished concept by the end of the year. We will think about the financing of the project in subsequent stages,” says Jacek Dębowski.
End of the era of free distribution
The main mistake made in the revitalisation of grim post-GDR (German Democratic Republic) estates was the fact that they did not foresee people’s migration to western areas of the country. Many blocks in eastern Germany became derelict and were subsequently demolished. However, substantial funds were later pumped in from western Germany allocated to redevelopment – but we cannot expect something similar to happen in Poland. Besides, these were tenement buildings, which the state could easily remove residents from during the reconstruction work and then commercialise the housing units in order to regain some of the funds invested. “Such an enterprise is always simpler because it concerns state property. In Poland the issue is the revitalisation of private property and in the case of the Ruczaj-Zaborze estate this is a property which is varied in terms of the legal issues. It is clear that the state will not finance such a redevelopment because the era of free distribution is already behind us,” explains Jacek Dębowski. What is the solution, then? Perhaps preferential loans as in the case of new apartments? Or cooperation with developers based on mutual benefits? “A developer might be interested in adding two floors to a building. Thanks to the profit from the sales they could improve the appearance of the building and maybe add an elevator,” believes Jacek Dębowski. Do such programmes have a chance of becoming commonplace? The experts are rather cautious on this point and emphasise the differences between Poland and countries where the remodelling of bleak estates is now large scale. For instance, the French government has prepared and implemented a substantial programme for financing the improvement of residents’ standard of living. “We should not expect a crop of such programmes in the next decade. Only growing apartment prices could increase the interest in pre-fab estates, and this might provide some kind of impulse for initiating such schemes,” remarks Dagmara Mliczyńska-Hajda.
