Prague 7 City Hall to buy building and land on Orten Square from private owner

The Prague 7 town hall will buy a building and land on Ortenovo náměstí in Holešovice from a private owner. It will pay CZK 64 million for the building and will thus become the owner of all the properties on the square, announced Martin Vokuš, spokesman for the company. In the first half of the 20th century, the land was used as a school playground and in the 1950s a so-called nursery school was built there. To this day, the property is located in the area of public facilities in terms of the zoning plan. There are 17 municipal kindergartens and primary schools in the borough.

"Ortenovo Square is the main public space of Lower Holešovice. There is a school, a kindergarten, a park, a playground and a sports ground. In the 1990s, however, one of the buildings, where the kindergarten used to be, was privatised by the state and became privately owned, used as offices and for other private purposes, among other things it used to be a playroom," said Jan Čižinský, the mayor of Prague 7 (Prague 7 Sobě).

The project of the nursery was created on the basis of the post-war two-year economic plan from 1947 to 1948 in the Prague Study and Typization Institute under the guidance of architect Lubor Marek. Brick two-room schoolhouses were built all over Czechoslovakia at that time. They were usually designed as modules, sometimes also as double or triple solitary buildings. In Prague 7 there are other such buildings in the park in Tusarova Street or in Na Výšinách Street. Both buildings are kindergartens.

According to Čižinský, the land on Ortenovo náměstí is the second most important plot of land in which Prague 7 City Hall is interested. "The first one is the land under Billa on Letenské náměstí," he added. In Bubenec, however, there is no agreement between the town hall and the owner.

SourceL Prague 7 and CTK