Katowice Old Train Station (Poland)

On July 25, 2019, the Railway Heritage World Blog went to Katowice, Poland. The history of this country presents a high degree of complexity; thus, when we started to search about its railway heritage, and face the presence of Germany, Prussia, Austria and Russia, we could realize that the railway history presents the same complicated net of deeds. Anyway, just to bring back a bit of Katowice railway heritage, we tried to summarize its history.

The History

The first railway branch of Poland was built by the Germans, and inaugurated in 1842; it linked Wrocław to Oława; some years later, in 1846, this line was extended to Katowice and the old railway station was inaugurated. Nevertheless, this city makes part of the Upper Silesia, a Poland region on the upper and middle of the Oder River basin, where a Prussia company, the Upper Silesian Railway Company (TKG), had interests, so in 1852, it connected Katowice Ligota to Murcki.

The Neoclassic railway station gave importance to the city, which became the capital of the region. To follow the city grown, the railway station was extended several times; a part of it was constructed making use of modern architectural features. Anyway, after the World War II, this railway station was considered obsolete. In the 1950s, the current railway station started to be built.

The Building

The railway station was sold to a private company around 2007; since then, it is under a big renovation process. As we could see, the future of this building is to become a multifunctional center. A part of the building is already being used by different services like a bank, a restaurant and a coffee shop; another part seems to be waiting for its new owner, while the part right beside it, just started to receive some renovation work.

Waking around the city, we reached two huge railway buildings totally neglected. We tried to take a picture of one of them. They must have sheltered many locomotives in their past!

Final Considerations

Katowice is under a huge reurbanization process. The old railway station is just following the new estate speculation for tourism projects. Even being the renovation of the station building a big achievement, lets hope for the emergency of some railway heritage preservation policy.