Three large shopping malls in Warsaw, which were built in the 1990s as Poland emerged from communism, have been slated for demolition. The city says they are “relics of another time”.
The properties in question are the Atrium Reduta, Atrium Targówek and King Cross malls owned by Atrium, which is seeking to replace them with modern residential and retail spaces, reports Gazeta Wyborcza.
The condition of the malls has become “deplorable”, said Marcin Olech, a representative of the company, at an open meeting with Warsaw authorities. The shopping centres had been designed in the 1990s as “monofunctional”, but the firm now wants to turn them into “multifunctional” spaces.
“These three facilities are undoubtedly a relic of another time,” said Marlena Happach, head of the city’s architectural and spatial planning office. “I have the impression that the boom for large-scale strictly commercial facilities is over.”
The redeveloped sites will include apartments for rent on the upper floors, above retail and service spaces at lower levels. There will also be hotels and offices in locations closest to the city’s key communication routes.
Atrium is already building new apartments for rent next to another of its shopping centres, Promenada on Ostrobramska Street. There, however, the mall itself will not be demolished.
“The pandemic accelerated the decision to modernise,” said Olech. During lockdown the government ordered malls to close and suspended rental agreements, meaning that shops would not need to pay rent or service charges, leaving mall owners to shoulder the costs.
The company said that it had been in talks with the capital’s authorities for two years, but that these had recently stalled. This prompted Atrium to unveil its project to the public.
The delay has been caused by the fact that municipal spatial development plans assume that where the current malls are located there will be large retail spaces. Since the planned buildings will no longer serve only as malls, the city needs time to approve new plans.
The new developments come amid a housing boom in Poland, where the number of new homes being built is at its highest point in four decades.
According to official data from Statistics Poland (GUS), a state agency, 221,978 homes were put into service in 2020. That is the highest number since the late 1970s, when the communist-era government led a construction boom to house a growing population.
This has largely been driven by a booming demand for real estate as an investment., as Poland faces record-low interest rates and the highest rate of inflation in two decades.
Main image credit: Atrium Reduta/Facebook
Maria Wilczek is deputy editor of Notes from Poland. She is a regular writer for The Times, The Economist and Al Jazeera English, and has also featured in Foreign Policy, Politico Europe, The Spectator and Gazeta Wyborcza.
