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Posts by PhilipC  

Joined: 3 Oct 2010 / Male ♂
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From: Przemyśl
Speaks Polish?: Speak fairly fluently, not so good at writing
Interests: History, travel, languages

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PhilipC   
3 Oct 2010
History / Give back Lwow to Poland and Kaliningrad to Germany - is it possible? [198]

I registered just to add my 2c to this discussion. I live in Przemyśl so Lviv's the nearest big city from here and I've been there many times. During the last few years the amount of renovation work there is unbelievable. Compared to how it was in 2005 it's a different city. Yes, under the Soviets the place was allowed to deteriorate, but so were other many other cities. Never forget that the city is near the border and after World War two the authorities were loathe to invest in potential regional hotspot - that Lviv is also the centre of the Ukrainian nationalist movement was another incentive for the Soviets to avoid any investment.

Sometimes the Poles view the situation with blinkers. Przemyśl, which is architecturally and culturally very similar to Lviv, was also allowed to rot for the best part of seventy years while all investment was funnelled into Rzeszów. Much of Przemyśl is still ruinous, there's an enormous gap in the old town where the Jewish Ghetto stood that has yet to be rebuilt, many of the streets are potholed and lacking cobbles or asphalt and unemployment is still sky high. The city is only now slowly returning life, as will Lviv eventually. It's a large city and those old buildings require a lot of time and money to restore - we're not talking about glueing Styrofoam cladding onto a few commie blocks here, you needed skilled labourers and plenty of cash and Ukraine doesn't have the advantage of sucking hundreds of millions of euros out of the EU kitty.

And Lviv is not a Polish city, hasn't been for a long time - Is New York still Dutch? Is Sydney still British? Times change, borders change and we have to live with it whether we like it or not.