Today, the A pavilion in the UJEP campus in Ústí began to be demolished

photo: usti-aussig.net

Ústí nad Labem - The demolition of the former hospital pavilion A began today on the campus of the University of Jan Evangelista Purkyně (UJEP) in Ústí nad Labem. The spokesperson for UJEP, Jana Šiková, informed ČTK about this. Demolition work related to the building started in July and is expected to be completed by October 7. So far, operating rooms and buildings near Klíšská street have been removed, for example. The campus is being created in the former hospital area.
    A group of historians and architects from Ústí who unsuccessfully sought its inscription on the list of cultural monuments led a dispute with the university's management over the preservation of pavilion A. It is to be replaced by a new building that will function as a center for natural sciences and technical fields. It is expected to be completed by 2016.
    Shortly before the demolition, workers from the Ústí museum inspected and documented the building. The house is already in very poor condition, having deteriorated since 2004 when the doctors left the entire area. Nevertheless, the museum staff managed to find several elements here that they disassembled and will enrich the museum's collections with. These include, for example, a window grille, a part of an originally designed railing from the balcony, a historical light fixture, and samples of original ceramic tiles. "At the same time, the museum photographer documented architecturally interesting details as well as the current deplorable state of the building. At the end of the demolition, the museum staff would still like to attempt to retrieve the cornerstone with an inscription, which was laid here by city officials in 1931," is stated on the website of the Ústí city museum.
    The demolition is being carried out by the company AWT Rekultivace, a. s. for 16.8 million crowns.
    For the removal of the old building and the construction of the new one, the university has approved financial resources of 590 million crowns from the government, but it must spend them by 2015. The university criticized efforts to declare the building a cultural monument, among other reasons, because they threatened the timeline of the work. If it were to lose this funding, it would not be able to finance the project from its own resources.
    The preservation and reconstruction of the building built in 1937 was not considered feasible by the school, partly due to financial demands, and it assessed its spaces as "completely unsuitable for teaching needs and the development of science and research."