Prague has been a city for 50 years
The capital of the republic. Perhaps everyone can imagine the majestic Hradčany, Charles Bridge and in the background the Church of St. Nicholas in Mala Strana. But it is only a small part of the historic city and only a fraction of today’s city, which has an area of almost 500 square kilometers and over 1.2 million inhabitants. Prague achieved this state by gradual expansion, the most extensive of which was from 1922, 1960, 1968 and 1974.
The expansion, just 50 years ago yesterday, is significant, among other things, in the connection of the village of Ruzyně, which has an international airport, and parts of the villages of Ďáblice, Háje, Kunratice and Petrovice, where large housing estates later grew. As a result of this expansion, Prague formally became a city with more than a million inhabitants – according to the 1961 census, 1005,823 people could be considered Praguers at that time.
An even larger and more significant expansion of Prague took place on July 1, 1974. At that time, Prague grew by 30 municipalities with a total area of almost 200 square km and reached its current size – 496 square km. Prague is so – at least one of the capitals. For comparison – Berlin with 3.5 million inhabitants has an area of barely 900 square kilometers, Moscow with more than ten million inhabitants just over 1000 sq. Km. “The expansion of Prague in 1974, although sometimes described as exaggerated, was actually very predictable and created a lot of reserve areas not only for housing estates and mass development, but also for individual construction of family houses,” says architect Alois Hála, who worked at the planning office at the time. . . According to him, large-scale individual development near the center is typical for Prague. Other big cities have such buildings rather on the outskirts or in the suburbs.
For some citizens, the expansion of Prague meant problems with the post office. The municipalities suddenly ceased to be part of the districts of Prague-West and East, and at that time people were not yet used to postal codes. “The postal code was introduced in 1973 and did not meet with great understanding at the beginning,” says Marta Post spokeswoman Marta Selicharová. According to her, people thought that they had to learn something that belonged to someone else and who was paid for it. However, it was the postal code that helped the connected municipalities to eliminate problems with new addresses and also with duplicate street names within Prague. However, this was quickly removed.
Satisfied in Prague, to be…
“With the connection to Prague at that time, citizens shared hopes for a faster construction of sewers, gas pipelines and other engineering networks. But not much has been done in the first 15 years. The gasification, as well as the more extensive construction of the sewerage system, did not begin until 1990. While the gasification system is complete, the sewerage system is still non-existent, ”says Ivan Liška, Mayor of Horní Počernice, who took office in March 1990 and continues to do so today. However, it firmly rejects the centrifugal tendencies of some municipalities, and on the contrary, I believe that municipalities should operate within larger units from an administrative point of view. However, he considers the current state of the division into a city district to be unfortunate.
Through the eyes of a chronicler
In 1974, when Horní Počernice was annexed to Prague, Hubert Antes was a member of the municipal council for 14 years. However, he did not start writing the local chronicle until 1985, after the death of the current chronicler. “It simply came to our notice then. The current chronicler died in 1985, and as a longtime representative, I was asked to keep the chronicle going. But it turned out that her predecessor – apparently due to poor health – had not written it since 1979.
Originally an agricultural engineer, he worked at the municipal office for over forty years. “I’ve always been interested in chronicles. Horní (originally Hořejší) Počernice consists of four municipalities – Čertous, Chval, Svépravice and Počernice itself. The first written record of Horní Počernice dates from 1357, but part of Chvala was written as early as 1088, ”says engineer Antes. When discussing the site, one cannot fail to notice its neat writing, arranged tables – not only about the number of inhabitants, but also dogs and farm animals. Even the turning point of 1974 is correctly captured – unfortunately the events of that time are described somewhat dryly.
“You know that we like to be part of Prague, but we have actually been a city since 1969 and a city since 1936. People on the way to Prague mainly gained better transport options: first ČSAD used more often – and for the city tariff, then I started driving Prague lines. Today, the inhabitants of the westernmost part of the metro have less than a quarter of an hour’s walk. We also got a water supply system, we have good water from Káraný, but it was not free, “says the 70-year-old chronicler.
Jan Horák