So where are Warsaw's slums?

I recently walked down Targowa -- the heart of Warsaw's 'bad' neighbourhood and was quite surprised. The place seems to be undergoing gentrificaton -- new façades, things being spruced up like some deslummificaiton project. So where are Warsaw's dangerous neighbourhoods nowadays, where you dont' feel safe without a spluwa or Alsatian at your side?

some parts of Praga are pretty grim. There are also some parts of Wola that I would be nervous about too.

Like where?

No such place. Poland doesn't really have slums in any conventional sense.

What about the familoki of Śląsk? Or the derelict, crumbling but still inhabited PGRs? They may nto look exactly like our American skidrow or a Latin America favela but they are slumsy all the same. Most every city in the world has such areas.

Ząbkowska Street used to be pretty bad, esp. the tunnel-like doorways leading to the court yard. There used to be a distillery there. Is it sitll there?

Soho-like revitilisation spreads all over the world.

When was that?

Nothing dangerous at all. The worst thing about the PGR's is seeing how people are ruining their lives with alcohol and the general lack of opportunities there for them. I've wandered around a couple before - no-one was even remotely interested in me or what I was doing there.

Last week, when Kaczyński was unveiling his allegedly unrealistic (according to Rostowski) economic plan.

You mean the plan which would cost the country 52 billion (milliard) PLN?

I'm not na economist, but I can see that everybody produces and bandies about figures the suit their preconceived views orn genda.
Luxury-loving and high-living Rostowski is so detached from the common man, that everything he says is automatically suspect.

Unlike a certain Polish politician who has never in his life paid rent or mortgage for any place where lived, doesn't know where ordinary Poles do their shopping and until very recently didn't even have a bank account.

Zabkowska has been cleaned up at great cost, but the warrens of dodgy courtyards still exist in that area (and by the way, the distillery is still there). One thing that's happening is that district hot water is being rolled out round there, paid for by the EU.

If you want slums, you'll often find them cheek by jowl with posher apartments dotted around Srodmiescie. Communal flats that people aren't paying for and in buildings that aren't looked after.

Someone mentioned Wola. There are some dodgy bits between Mlynarska and Wolska however I wouldn't call them slums - the housing stock is actually quite good.

There are some twentieth century housing estates dotted round town that are pretty bad - again, very scruffy communal tenants and shared bathrooms. There are some buildings like that even at the bottom of Zoliborz Oficerskie that resist gentrification because of the neighbours.

Exactly: there are buildings even on some of the most expensive streets (Mokotowska springs immediately to mind) where there are buildings that wouldn't look too out of place in any slum worldwide one cares to mention. And then there are the individual flats in buildings which have been beautifully restored where the window frame hasn't been painted for decades or the window cleaned for years (e.g. one of the top floor flats in Chlodna 20).

Especially in the second (or even third) line of building, courtyards behind courtyards. There's even one like that in Mariensztat, just a stone's throw from the presidential palace. There's also one near the Chopin Museum where many of the flats haven't been decorated since they were patched up at the end of the war.

The city is trying to get communal tenants out of places like that sothey can realise some of the value and provide more modern social housing. Unfortunately there's quite a lot of resistance.

And because some streets are gentrified, it does not mean they are safe.
Here in Bielany Przy Agorze is a good example. Even if the area in general looks OK. Some of the back streets are notoriously unsafe at night. Next to the Start Meta library are tower blocks (Wrzeciono) which come close the "slum" level.

What is your take on what makes slumdwellers tick? Anyhwere in the world. Slum clearnace projects are known in the US but these are municipal undertakings in which the actual slumdwellers do not take part. They seem happy to live in deterioratiung, rat-infested buildings and ctash-strewn surroundings. Or if not happy, at least it doesn't bother them that much. I don't mean pumping millions into a vast beautificaton project. A few people can get together and clear away trash, tidy things up, cut down weeds, rake up leaves, etc. and make the place more livable. Also crack down on crackhouses and low-life squats, But insetad of reporting such places to the authorites, they prefer to cower behind locked doors in fear of the riffraff. It's not all a financial issue (no money), but lagrely a mental and attitudinal one. Do any school programmes try to enlightened and alrert school children to such problems?

According to the police the most dangerous area's in Warsaw are as follows Srodmiescie, Praga pln (north) then Wola and Ochota.

According to the internet survey below Praga pln leads the pack.

I'm guessing he meant slum in a broader sense, a ghetto. Parts of Praga are labeled as that but that's mostly due to higher crime rates and poverty. I have never seen a neighborhood in Poland with ghettos as the ones here in the US.

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no- there really isn't anything like that here. There are loads of rotting old buildings but nothing like the American version of an inner city ghetto or the projects.

It is one of the very rare few positive things that came out of communism:no real ghettos in the western (esp US) sense, a real mixity where you could find ordinary workers and people having high social positions living in similar flats in the same buldings.

Also the lack of minority groups clustering together in a given neighbourhood, as we have in (Hispanic) East Los Angeles, or Afro-American and Puerto Rican niiehgbourhoods in Chicago, NYC and elsewhere. Some ethnics have turned their districts into tourist attractions to mention only various Chinatowns, Pennsylvania Dutch (German) communties and such places as Holland and Frankenmuth, Michigan.

Maybe Wólka Kosowska on the outskirts of Warsaw will eventually evolve into an Oriental ghetto?!

Is there a section of Warsaw, Poland called Wona? If yes, where is it? Is it a safe, good area? Are the cost of apartments high there? Where can I find more information on this area?

Valpomike

no - perhaps you mena WOLA?

Could be, can you tell me more on this area?

Valpomike

Some parts of Wola are historical, its mainly apartments and flats in the area. I would say the more interesting parts are closer to Śródmieście. I am only guessing as I don't know Harry, although I believe from his posts Wola is part of his stomping ground, so maybe he can provide better feet on the ground feedback.

Wola, before war, was an industrial working class area. There were loads of repair shops and work shop/mini factories here. There were also some Jews mixed here but mostly slavic.

Wola massacre took place during the war-you can google that one.

now it is kind of mixed. Old run down blocks but also new trendy buildings.

Mike, you can see parts of Wola in this video, when the camera is facing the Palace of culture it is about 2-3 blocks back and it goes up to the right, mostly everything beyond ul Jana Pawla 2.

Enjoy.

Thank you, do you think it is a place I would like, and be able to afford?

Valpomike

I think that is a question only you can answer.