Ladies and Gentlemen, here is Frombork. The city that still cannot recover from the shock since the death of Copernicus. This town, where the great thinker spent the lion's share of his life and made some of his most famous discoveries, in which fortunately the local landscape had no way to distract and disturb him, has today decided that after five hundred years, thanks to EU funding, it's time for its new Hey Day.
So now please put yourself into the skin of the proverbial Frombork and let's collectively consider what the city, which consists of a few houses and the world's most important Copernicus museum, is missing. That's right. Exactly as you probably thought of it, Frombork lacks Copernican accents, so the remedy is to create here and now a square with an astronomical theme, without which a self-respecting municipality with such excellent historical roots and values obviously cannot do without.
Well, what do municipalities historically focused on the single last resort of marketing do? Well, what do they do? I will answer for you, so as not to artificially prolong this dramatic tension. The matter is very simple. They concrete a market square or other central square like in Kutno 's "City of Roses," or some other ditty from the catalog of marketing slush for municipalities that want to stand out from the crowd in order to attract those millions of tourists, who admittedly weren't interested in the place before, well... but now, thanks to a few acres of new concrete, they'll change their minds.
Well, and in this case a surprise, because Frombork has already, unfortunately, managed to concretize the market square and "gaddammit" for itself for the EU, or in other words a klop, because the astronomical idea has already been consumed once on this altar of public spaces in the form of a concrete and empty as interplanetary space astrolabe inhabited only by lonely benches of uninhabited planets. So it would seem that perhaps it would be time for something different? Maybe the city, which has eight hundred years of tradition and rich history, would like to tell us this time about something other than the already swaggering and tired Copernicus?
No. Nothing of the sort. It is necessary to roll out the same theme about the rotation of the heavenly bodies over and over again. What is needed in Frombork is an "astronomical catch-up square" fifty meters away, which in its well thought-out architectural idea, with meticulousness worthy of ancient Egyptian priests, astrologers and, unfortunately, also architects, will reflect this idea, because nothing better comes to mind. Therefore, in front of you the one and only and, hoho, the first astronomical square this week, in which nine trees artificially magnified on visualization, in nine pots artificially magnified on visualization, symbolizing the nine planets, are arranged in their great conjunction towards the bench of the sun. And all this enveloped by fields of concrete in a ratio of four to one, like dark energy relative to the visible universe, symbolizing the immensity of the emptiness of the cosmos and the dilution of the whole idea in a ratio of one molecule per billion cubic meters.
Revitalization of the Old Town area in Frombork - Miners' Square
© press materials of Frombork City and Municipality Office
Ok. Enough of this nonsense. This is exactly the same circus as always, which tells us, first of all, that no municipality in Poland ever learns from the mistakes of other municipalities, and even more, it does not learn from its own, and there is no flow of knowledge and information between them. So why the similarity in the scenario of the events of this tragedy to dozens of others in this country? Well, I am afraid that brought unfortunately on the shoulders of the architects. In this case, they are responding to a political order, which reads, yes:
- The previous square didn't play, people on concrete don't want to crowd. What to do, what to do?
<the grumbling of the mustachioed mayor, who angrily fumbles his tie while hurling lightning bolts from his eyes at his shuddering subordinates>.
- We need to be rescued. Summon the architect.
- So here I am, coming to the rescue.
<voice from behind the curtain, a gentleman in round glasses with a laptop under his arm enters the stage>.
- Let's give the square an idea and call it a square, I advise you to do. Where am I? A Frombork, Copernicus. Ok, so here's the concept. Nine trees in pots like planets, and here... oh... it's such a round accent, a bench with grass, because it's the sun, Copernicus blah blah blah, and the important thing is that everything turns. Thank you.
<Thunderous applause and enthusiastic roars in the office>.
- Bravo, bravo, imminent "siws" I punish the scribe to write. We're going with this coke, because it's brilliant. We must succeed this time.
- Stop, stop!
<from the dresser's box grambles onto the stage the director of the show blushing on his face, grunting and panic-stricken gesturing with his hands>.
Please forgive me if I offended anyone. Normally I wouldn't be so critical, because what we are seeing here is really just plain "old-fashioned nothing of the sort," but having had the experience of the Hundred Years of Planning profile I run on Facebook, I see the same scenario of an unconsulted diligent, imminent flop, and I see it for the nth time in my life. Please do not focus on the fact that these visuals are of such despicable quality. Presumably, if you are a long-time reader of A&B, your trained eye is not used to the coarse carnage of daily life in this country simply. However, I encourage you to dig in, to look for all the comforting tidbits we're dealing with here. Please dwell with it a bit in your conscience. Please, let's dress up a little intellectually. delving into this absolutely ordinary and typical project for our country and profession. Ladies and gentlemen, it may be nothing, but it is appropriate to rejoice, as the funds will be used.
