Ostrava has cancelled the architectural competition for the veterans' memorial

Ostrava – Ostrava has canceled the architectural competition for the design of the Veterans Memorial, which is to be located in the Čs. letců park in the central city district of Moravská Ostrava and Přívoz. Although the city received 27 proposals, they did not meet its expectations and did not fulfill the jury's expectations either. This was stated by Deputy Mayor Zuzana Bajgarová (ANO) at today's council meeting. A new competition should be announced within a few weeks.

"A significant number of proposals were submitted; however, after discussion, the jury concluded that they did not actually meet the expectations that the client, and thus the jury of this competition, had," said Bajgarová.

According to her, the main problem was that the proposals for the memorial's design were not timeless. Bajgarová indicated that many authors likely misunderstood the assignment conditions. The city did not want the memorial to commemorate only veterans of the First and Second World Wars, but also modern and living veterans.

"After a long discussion among the jurors, we concluded that we would announce this competition again," the deputy stated.

The city council therefore decided to cancel the original competition. In accordance with the competition conditions, the city will financially settle with the proposal authors for their work. A total of 240,000 koruna is to be distributed among the individual participants. "At the same time, as a jury, we concluded that we would not pair individual bids with the names (of the authors) so that we would allow some entities to apply for the next competition as well," Bajgarová added.

The new competition is expected to be announced in a few weeks. In it, the city plans to directly invite some participants to join, but it will also be open for additional interested parties to apply. The city wants to better specify the requirements for the design of the memorial. Originally, it was expected that the winner could be known by the end of the year, but that was contingent on the winner emerging from the now-canceled competition.