- Major Pulsar Events in Cracow    23 kb by    Vargas Przerwa-Tetmajer, Aldo | fedeyogin@hotmail.com    Short Outline Major pulsar events in Cracow as data source for creating a time oriented approach to urban regeneration. An approach to reconciliation of peak and post peak demands. Abstract Major pulsar events in Cracow Cracow, one of the most important cities in Poland, possess a specific character due to its historical and cultural heritage and educational basis. It is also an important economical centre being among others the seat of the Sendzimir steel plant one of the largest in Europe. Its creation by itself has provoked a sort of pulsar effect due to the massive building effort, the major pollution threats to the city and the region resulting from the scale and time of exploitation and its socially threatening process of job loss following actual economical decrease. Although Cracow has never been the host of major international events such as Olympic Games or International Expos, during the past several years it has been the scene of a few pulse events: Cultural events One of the major events that strongly influences the city structure is the “Wianki” (Wreaths) event. It takes place around the 22 of June on the river side, at the foot of the Wawel Castle, as a remain of a pre – Christian fertility holiday. Although short in duration, it causes every year severe communication problems due to its localisation in a relatively limited area with restricted parking surface, between two of the six bridges, important crossroads connecting both sides of the city. This event causes important post – peak traumas of different kind. The Cracow 2000 - City of Culture festival was another major event. The statistical data indicates that it has had an important influence on the economical development of Cracow and the promotion of the city, demonstrating its capability to host important cultural events. However, despite its four years duration and the important number of events within its frames and its increasing budget (1996 – 3033000 zlotys, 2000 – 21620094 zlotys), it has not been able to create a more important development, such as new cultural supply. There are other recurrent big cultural events such as the ‘Juvenalia’ students week by mid May, or events organised by commercial companies (private radio stations) which procure occasionally important pulsar effect on the city infrastructure. Religious events Another major event is the All Saints holiday at the beginning of October. During a period of two or three days it provokes, more than any other holiday, major disturbances in the city functioning : the temporary change of the course of communication and mass transportation systems in large parts of the city, the closing of streets, etc. in order to ease cemeteries access. The visits of the Pope John Paul II to Cracow have also been very specific events changing the habitual functioning patterns. Those visits have gathered crowds of pilgrims willing to assist to those major religious events. Tourism and development During the summer season Cracow is host of a huge number of tourist. The city responds to it by a constantly growing number of hotels and other supplies, which however occur to be under-exploited in the post season period. On a different level there are big city investments, provided by the municipality or by private investors, like Tischmann – Speyer New City development planned close to the city centre. This however should not threaten the city structure and functioning since it takes into account future needs. Although recurrent pulsar events are not foreign to Cracow, none specific record of their influence on the city infrastructure has been done so forth. Some of those events still have a distorting influence on its functioning. There is always a certain time of recovering which length depends on the scale of the event and of the way the situation is treated. This length has not been determined yet as a specific data in the planning process, showing that the time factor is still a rather weak element of the planners instrumentary. It seems however possible to facilitate future attendance of recurrent large scale events. Considering the post - event weaknesses and needs under the perspective of its appeasing, it appears important to treat the post – event situation as a separate one and deal with it separately in the frame of a larger multi- aspect ‘event / post – event’ project. Elements forming part of such an approach are, among others : calculation of the range of fluctuation between the “event “ and “post event” stages and planning post-event adjustments according to that; including the peak season temporary resources on the planned post – peak project; assuring a ‘post event’ life that would avoid the creation of “isles” of seasonal utility; co-operation with local communities and organisations that deal with social development and environmental issues which, included in the post – event project, would be able to deal with the waste and outcomes: water, noise, pollution, waste, greenery, social and economical strength, spatial integrity and mixity, etc. The Cracow Institute of Physical Planning and municipal Economy – Cracow Branch forms part of a consortium of contractor partners participating in a project leaded by the North Milan Development Agency. The overall object of it is, by the way of creating an innovative time oriented approach to urban regeneration, focusing on mobility, safety and improvement of the quality of urban life. The direct objectives of the project are : to develop a new approach to Urban regeneration through a process of integration of spatial and time – related aspects, develop new forms of urban governance, disseminate best practices, favour citizen involvement, etc. Although this is not a direct objective of the project, the reconciliation of peak and post peak demands or the achievement of efficient and profitable year-round use of big and costly infrastructure does perfectly fit to the possible applying of the outcomes of the project. This will be one of the focus of the project. Keywords Case Study presented on the ISOCARP Congress 2002: The Pulsar Effect   Click to open the full paper as pdf document   Click to send an email to the author(s) of this paper