Travel /
Just visited Poland - here is my random rant [154]
3. Many of the Polish villages and small towns..
Give me a break! You are talking about the cultural heritage of the country. Do you know how cities without these buildings, but with "something modern and efficient" look? Look at the cities built after WW2, both in Western and Eastern Europe. Or the crap that was built since the 1990s. No "average tourist" wants to see this, and no one with a choice wants to live there. Strangely, if people have a choice, they always want to live in historical buildings (if upgraded to modern standards).
But I agree that especially the smaller towns often look horrible. There are several reasons for this:
1) Neither the people nor the communities in the smaller towns have money.
2) No organization and controls. The cultural heritage management in Poland is a mess. The monument protection service is underfunded, has no influence in public policy and cares mostly about churches, and not much else. And the communities don't have basic rules like land utilisation plans or building regulations. Everyone can do whatever he likes.
3) Poles don't have a sense for architecture. For many centuries Poland was a land of a small urban middle class and a big rural lower class, unlike countries like Italy or Germany, which had a big urban middle class already during the Renaissance era. Urban development has a much bigger importance in such societies, that's why they developed the regulations and sensitivity Poland lacks. Just have a look at this thread: skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=967926&page=356
Turrets, battlements, huge portal on tiny buildings, defense walls, ugly colors etc.. The only place where I've seen similar tacky buildings was in Romania, built by Gypsy barons.
4) No emotional connections to the cultural heritage in the so called "recovered territories".
