Update - Riverworks

My last but one post dealt with the changes that have taken place whilst I was away, however one thing remains as it was - the state of the riverworks. This is probably for the good. Just before I left Cesky Krumlov, I met with an excited friend of mine, the owner of a restaurant on the river below the castle. “I heard it on the radio,” he said, “UNESCO are coming for a visit. Because they have had letters from people about the island and the river. Bloody marvellous!” And he shook my hand.

This coincided with a rise in the river levels due to summer storms. The unstoppable riverworks stopped. And they have not started again, even though the levels are down again. The town is agog, what has happened? What has UNESCO done and said? No one knows.

On Friday I met my restaurant friend again, “What has happened? You heard what happened in Dresden.” I had heard that the UNESCO world heritage status had been removed from the Elbe landscape as a result of a bridge being built there. However I explained UNESCO have a sort of football referee system, yellow card first and if you don't mend your ways you get the red, quite a lot of places have yellow cards and very few are taken off the pitch (like Dresden/Elbe). If the UNESCO visit found, as we all believe there to be, failures and irregularities in developments in Cesky Krumlov, then the town would probably go on the at risk list, the yellow card. We must wait and see.

Meanwhile the diggers lie idle on the banks, a temporary throroughfare of smashed rocks and rubble is still in the centre of the river waiting their return. And life goes on, the island is turned a canoe park and even as in this photo a beach for bathers. The ducks are back.

PS Readers of my previous posts on the subject might be interested to know I never did get a reply to my letter to the Mayor, even though he was obliged to give me one within so many days. No surprise there then.

UNESCO Acts, Let Us Hope In Time

We have heard that UNESCO has asked Cesky Krumlov Town Council a series of questions about the riverworks , to which it requires answers by Monday. All of us who have been expressing our fears about the environmental and heritage impact of the works are incredibly grateful to UNESCO for this. Only UNESCO has the power to (at least temporarily) halt the damage and only then I believe if there have been procedural faults in the approval process. We need UNESCO to ensure that the response it receives is full and verifiable - we have been unable to do so ourselves. And we need UNESCO if it finds faults to act on them. Our main desire is to stop and repair (where possible) the damage. We certainly do not want the World Heritage Site status removed, it is our main hope of protecting this precious town.

To elaborate:

a) there is a need for speed in any action that is taken, given the rate with which the damage is being done and continues to be done. Is there any way UNESCO could ask for the works to be paused while they consider the report?



The authorities have only been working on the area under Cesky Krumlov Castle for a week but look what has happened in that time. A temporary island has been formed consisting of material which has been dredged up from the riverbed by the diggers. The transformation can be seen by comparing my photos above with the panorama show on the Council's own website

http://www.fotogalerie.ckrumlov.cz/php/fotogalerie/panorama/index.php?lang=cz&vr=9

I was able to identify within the rubble a number of stones which appear to have been elements of man-made structures. A number more are lying on the shore (see photos below), including a date stone showing MDCXXV.



b) The second issue is this: inside the Town Hall UNESCO's request will have been met with alarm, especially as the Town Hall (unlike with UNESCO's previous report) has so little time to respond. If the Town Hall has the answers to UNESCO's questions then they should have no problem. But given their inability to answer the questions of objectors, including requests for detailed plans, one suspects that this is not the case. The onerous task of responding will have fallen on the local Branch of The National Institute for th Protection and Conservation Of Monuments and Sites. The officers involved are employed by the Town Council.

There appear to have been several procedural faults. It appears there are no minutes of any committee that approved this project. It is my understanding that, in order for the outline permission to be given, the conservation officers' agreement would be needed, but that for the later detailed plans and changes to the outline that officers 'views might not have been sought. Clearly some permission was given but on the basis of what? What important changes and additions were there in the final plans (if they exist)? Did they for example include the removal of the island? What permission was given at this stage and again on the basis of what?

The officers involved are dedicated professionals, who are between a rock and a hard place. I know from personal experience the pressure that one comes under from politicians and other officers in such circumstances, and that was in the UK where there is a long tradition of an independent civil service which exists to serve the people not its political masters. Any report written in such circumstances needs to be considered very carefully, in the end it's only verifiable evidence that can be believed.

Obviously I have no knowledge of the content of the report, nor do I have access to it. But then nobody else has either.

Mixed Blessings

I start with the riverworks. No photos this time, I can hardly bear to bring myself to watch, but then I don't have to - I can hear them from my desk. Huge diggers are ripping up the riverbed and banks, in their scoops are mixture of historic evidence and young fish and eels - heritage and ecology destroyed. The island had almost disappeared when last I looked, the safe haven for local wildlife destroyed in a few gulps by the monster diggers. The haven gone, the young birds will have fallen prey to the local cats.

The good news is that there is an archaeological symposium in town, let's hope they are able to say something and even be listened to. After that UNESCO arrives, but I fear it will all be too late. By the way I sent a letter to the Mayor of Cesky Krumlov, I shall be interested to see if he replies. It was a very nice letter - offering my assistance. If there is a development I will let you know.

On a brighter note I saw my first stork yesterday, carrying a branch (yes a branch not a stick) in its beak and flying towards Kajov. Let us hope it brings good fortune, we need it.

UNESCO or not

Those of you who have read my other posts will know my love of Cesky Krumlov. It is a wonderful Czech town in South Bohemia. As you arrive from Prague you come down the hill and in front of you you see a Renaissance castle, set on cliffs, almost Gormenghast-like in its proportions and aspect. It takes your breath away and you realise you are arriving somewhere very special. And you are - the heart of the Cesky Krumlov is a perfectly preserved medieval/renaissance town. In recognition of this the town was made a UNESCO world heritage site. The UNESCO status is meant to help protect its wonderful and unique collection of buildings and in some ways it does. But UNESCO status is a double-edged sword, it brings with it other dangers.

Being a UNESCO World Heritage site means that inevitably the town gets on to the tourism map. There is nothing wrong with that if the tourism is managed in an appropriate sustainable way, but it isn't. It would appear that those who "manage" tourism in Cesky Krumlov and too many that invest in it worship at the shrine of the filthy lucre, of the god of the fast buck. The tourists that are coming tend to be day-trippers, often on a day-trip from Prague. Now it takes about 3 hours to get from Prague to Cesky Krumlov , so as you can see a day-trip to Cesky Krumlov actually means that the visitors have only 2 - 3 hours in the town, not long enough to spend enough money to justify the damage they are doing to the town.

In the 1970's under the Communists there were a small band of people in the Krumlov, who set about saving the town and its heritage from the ravages of communist planning. They went in and saved old medieval doors and other features when the houses were being "improved". Over the decades these same people have faithfully restored frescos, chimneys and other features. If you want to understand more of this, visit the small museum of architecture (you can bet the day-trippers won't). This museum is an example of the sort of visitor offering that the town should have been providing, one in keeping with the setting and which enables the visitor to understand the heritage of Cesky Krumlov. Of course the town did not provide it, it was the initiative of one dedicated individual. The town didn't even provide the building in which this remarkable collection is housed.

The band rejoiced when the town got UNESCO status, now they feel that the status has done harm. It would seem that the greed of capitalism has combined with the centralist legacy of communism to exploit the status for financial benefit, not of the people of Krumlov nor of the fabric of the town, but of a few individuals and often external companies. Historic houses held in trust by the local historical fund have been sold off for inappropriate use. Restaurants, hotels and the like may keep the facades, but inside these uses inevitably result in major changes in the fabric of the houses - visitors expect ensuite bathrooms, these in turn need pipes to be punched through medieval walls. The so-called "protectors" of Cesky Krumlov are creating a disney-world, a facade beautifully restored but a facade nonetheless. A year ago I laughed when my friend told me that some of the Japanese visitors thought that the town was folded up and put away for winter. It is too near the truth now for me to laugh.

Action is needed. Action from UNESCO and the Czech government to stop this. To stop this now before it is too late.

For an update on this post visit my September post