Urszula Nowacka-Rejzner

Berlin is an example of a city in which the principle of sustainable development has been consistently carried out for many years. The result of implementation of this principle is, among others, the rebuilding of the city’s central parts and creating public spaces of a high standard. In the following article I present the newest example of a implementation of urban open space in the city-Park am Gleisdreieck. The park was created on the grounds of revitalized post-rail areas which lie on the border of two districts of Berlin: Kreuzberg and Schöneberg. It occupies an exceptional place in the system of the city’s public spaces. This is because it constitutes a green continuation of the central areas of Berlin – it is an extension of Tilla Durieux Park in the Potsdamer Platz complex and at the same time it is a part of one of city’s two main green axes. The park is distinctive because of the high quality of applied spatial solutions and extraordinary care to retain the elements that constitute the place’s identity. It is also an example of effective cooperation of designers, city governors and inhabitants.

The aim of this article is to present, on a selected example, the problems pertaining to the areas of valuable natural and cultural assets which are being absorbed by the ever-growing urban fabric. Prądnik Czerwony – a district of Kraków, has been selected as an example for the above presentation. The boundaries of this district encompass the areas that in the past used to be parts of three historic villages – Prądnik Czerwony, Olsza and Rakowice, and they still have some preserved facilities of considerable natural and cultural value. The article discusses the spatial transformations of these areas. Special emphasis has been put on the monuments of technological culture that have been preserved in the area of the district and on the principles of their conservation in the urban planning documents valid for this area.

The case study selected to illustrate the author’s considerations is the area in the northern part of London – the site of the next stage of the King’s Cross Central revitalisation project. The site has been selected mostly because of its location in the close vicinity of the historic centre of the city and because of its valuable cultural and natural assets. The author discusses the spatial transformations of the area focusing primarily on various options of using the qualities and properties of water and its relations with elements of built environment and greenery in shaping urban spaces of a new quality, yet preserving their identity.