Ostrava is preparing to announce two architectural competitions

Ostrava - The Ostrava city council approved the intention to announce two architectural competitions. They are to resolve the future shape of the square Msgre Šrámka near the renovated Cathedral of the Divine Redeemer in the city center, as well as the Art Street located close to the Gallery of Fine Arts. The announcement of the competitions will still need to be discussed by the councilors next week, Mayor Tomáš Macura (ANO) told reporters today.

"We have declared the city's interest in improving the quality of public space. It will take the form of an open architectural competition, following the rules of the Czech Chamber of Architects. The costs for the competitions themselves will be in the hundreds of thousands of crowns. For the preparation of the projects, it will be roughly around eight million crowns,” said Macura.

According to him, the city does not want to present the participants in the competition with its own vision of the space's appearance. "We wanted them to approach it as an unwritten book, to go there themselves and understand what functions the space can fulfill," explained Macura.

Personally, he would prefer the places to be transformed into quiet zones. "For example, I am bothered by the parking lot in front of the Cathedral of the Divine Redeemer; this is a place where people naturally gather, tourists go there, and they have nowhere to sit. The space simply does not invite spending time," explained Macura.

According to him, the city wants to temporally link the modification of the space with the upcoming reconstruction of the Jiří Myron Theatre across from the cathedral. "We also want to open the theater more to the public; a café that opens up to the square is to be created there. In short, we want it to start pulsing with normal life," explained Macura.

The parking spaces that the location would lose due to the transformation could, according to the mayor, be replaced by an underground parking lot, which the city is considering building.

In the future, the city leadership would like to announce an architectural competition for the reconstruction of the House of Culture of the City of Ostrava with the addition of a concert hall, which the city is missing. The proposals that will emerge from the upcoming architectural competitions will be judged by a jury, which will include both representatives of the city and experts. The competitions themselves could be announced within a few weeks.