Praga: a second life or a slow death?

Aleksander Bucholski, 2016 Ideas Incubator Fellow, Poland

Mariia Veselovska, 2016 Ideas Incubator Fellow, Ukraine

Who does the city belong to? Whose needs should urban policies serve? Or should there be any urban policies at all apart from day-to-day management? Those were the questions crossing my mind as we were walking down Brzeska Street, described to us as notoriously dangerous to the point of becoming a tourist attraction. Five minute walk from a shopping mall and glamorous new metro station, five minute tram ride from meticulously reconstructed Old Town, we found ourselves in what had been presented to us as a dodgy armpit of the world, or at least of Warsaw.

It didn’t take for the legend of Brzeska Street to unfold: the sidewalk had been blocked by two big police vehicles, around which some dozen locals gathered to watch another episode of a well-known drama. One of the thugs noticed us filming the happening and started approaching us, demanding us to put down our cameras; the police remained indifferent. Hadn’t it been for the fact we were an organised group, some of us would not have got away safely.

But then, I was thinking walking through another courtyard accompanied by locals trying to draw our attention producing inarticulate noises, maybe their aggression is justified? Haven’t we basically treated them as a living exhibit, next to the Museum of Warsaw Praga or the former vodka factory at Ząbkowska Street?

Ironically enough, it was not until recently Praga was missing completely from all but alternative tourist routes, despite its fascinating, sometimes tragic history. Officially a part of the city of Warsaw since 1791, in 17^th, 18^th and 19^th centuries Praga was plundered, destroyed and burned to the ground many times, i.a. during the Swedish invasion of 1655-1660, in the massacre of Praga on November 4, 1794 during the Kościuszko Uprising, during Napoleonic wars or during the November Uprising of 1830-31.

The birth of Praga as we know it started in the mid-19^th century with the construction of the Petersburg and Brest Train Stations and the Kierbedzia Bridge – the first steel bridge over the Vistula River in Warsaw, along with a horse-drawn tram connecting Praga with the centre of Warsaw. Praga had become a major transportation and industrial hub. What is more, the district survived the Second World War relatively intact. On September 13, 1944 Soviet Army reached the right bank of the Vistula River in Warsaw and saved Praga from planned destruction of the city conducted by the Nazis after they had suppressed the Warsaw Uprising. Thus Praga has become an open-air museum of pre-war architecture and urban planning in the capital, which allowed e.g. for Ząbkowska Street to feature in the Academy Award-winning movie ‘The Pianist’ by Roman Polanski.

However, an open-air museum that haven’t been refurbished for decades is dangerously close to a slum. And once Praga was labelled as such, it has been more or less invisible to other inhabitants, city authorities, tourists and business ever since. Many old buildings in the district lack basic utilities: central heating system, gas or even running water. In 2011 a thorough medical survey revealed that the difference in life expectancy between Praga and the most affluent districts of Wilanów and Ursynów is 15 years[1]. Absence of basic living conditions caused a set of problems: higher unemployment rate, higher poverty rate, crime, domestic violence.

Then, since the mid-2000s, things have started to change significantly. At first, some independent galleries and concert venues, like the legendary Fabryka Trzciny, appeared. Then Ząbkowska, Okrzei and 11 Listopada Streets were slowly conquered by a number of cafes, restaurants, and clubs. In 2007 the vodka factory at Ząbkowska Street shut down and turned into a cultural hub.

In an article from 2010 title Creeping gentrification Jan Śpiewak, one of the HIA Senior Fellows, remarks ironically that The changes resemble an invasion of newcomers from a faraway country. They have set up their settlements and introduced their bizarre customs – like drinking a 10 zł coffee. They dress differently and, seemingly, speak different language. And they only interact with the „indigenous people” when they need to do some basic trade, like buying some bread or flour. They enjoy discovering local culture, which brings out a genuine pioneer in them. Looking at a Catholic shrine they feel as emotional as Howard Carter did the moment he discovered the grave of Tutankhamun. And the autochthones are happy too, as finally somebody has discovered them; they have become an object of someone’s interest.[2]

The most probable turning point and a major boost were the preparations for the UEFA Euro 2012 football championship. Polish National Stadium was built with the aim to develop the image of the district and bring tourist to it. And it has. The right bank has been reclaimed by the mainstream society. In 2014, after many years of the Museum of Warsaw Praga was opened, not far from the legendary Różyckiego Market and since then the history of Praga has been included in the official tourist narrative.

However at the same time more and more inhabitants of Praga have been ousted from their houses. Today Brzeska Street looks morbid not because of thugs but because of endless rows of dead empty windows. The former vodka factory now belongs to a developer, and even though there are plans to set up a museum of vodka there, next to a Google-founded Campus Warsaw, the main objective is to adapt the site for office spaces. After a brief period of artistic freedom, the factory premises have become a closed enclave once again. Only this time there will be no jobs for the locals there.

Is then that creeping gentrification something new or previously unknown? Surprising? Given the history of Williamsburg in New York, Notting Hill in London or Prenzlauer Berg in Berlin, to just name a few, Warsaw should have been prepared for that. Yet what mayor, especially of an aspiring metropolis, would be willing to stop a steady flow of capital? After all, it’s not that former inhabitants of Praga have been left sleeping rough. Many of them have been resettled further uptown, some decided to move out on their own. If they have a place to live, it shouldn’t be a problem, right?

But it is a problem. A problem of eradicating a decades-old communities, depriving them of their identity, the last frame of reference that helped their members navigate through more and more complicated modern life. Just like Europeans almost wiped out indigenous nations in Americas or Australia, yuppies and developers have been killing the city, not in its physical form, as it sometimes gets improved, but in its very essence, which is the society.

And suddenly it struck me: aren’t we the part of the problem? Aren’t we, a group of young international human rights activists marching right through somebody’s courtyard, one of those invisible forces of gentrification that sooner or later going to ousts current inhabitants from their little homeland to make more space for those who will be able to afford it? Have we forgotten that social and cultural rights are human rights too? Let’s hope that our visit to Praga opens our eyes to the complexity of all the issues we will deal with in the future. As sometimes the roots of the problem might look perfectly innocent, simply because there are not enough people who see it as a problem. Gentrification will continue all over the world as long as we allow it.

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[1] http://warszawa.wyborcza.pl/warszawa/1,34889,9051951,Na_Pradze_Polnoc_zyje_sie_15_lat_krocej__Dlaczego_.html

[2] http://kulturaliberalna.pl/2010/10/05/spiewak-gentryfikacja-pragi/ [Translated from original Polish by AB]