Arrabona - Múzeumi közlemények 13. (Győr, 1971)

Vörös K.: City-planning at Győr in the period of dualism

already, and the secular suburb situated, on the other bank of the Little Danube, Révfalu. Thereby he area of the city grew by about 9,5 km

2 and circa 9500 souls; the case of Győrsziget meant the annexion of a rather urbanized population, occupied in industry and traffic, the case of Révfalu represented the linking of a functionally and technically rural society with the town. 2. The city has outgrown its medieval bastions as early as in the first quarter of the nineteenth century and began a rapid territorial development after their demolition, structurally on the medieval ground-plan yet; it did not possess a modern lay-out plan sooner than the end of the century. The plan partly defined the main trends of the development of the outskirts, partly initiated the loosening of the traditional town structure of the City according to the demands of modern traffic. The lay-out plan, worked out and accepted at the turn of the century, made a later organic amalgamation of Győrfalu and Győrsziget with the structure of the town possible. At the same time, not with-out drawn-out legal altercations, suitable new building regulations were established to supplant the old ones, dating from the early nineteenth century. 3. This procedure was greatly influenced by the huge work, made necessary by the regulation of the Rába and Rábca rivers flowing into the Danube in city territory, executed with great state subsidy at the end of the century. In course of the regulation new banks were constructed, the Rábca river got a new bed and orifice, the old wooden bridges were supplanted by modern iron ones, and at some places embankments were constructed with railway connections. This work took a considerable time but it secured Győr against the danger of inundation and it enabled the town to extend further at some parts of its territory. 4. Parallel with the industrial development of the city, the desire to build was enhanced from the 1880s, starting to construct new parts of Győr with a special function. On the southern edge of the medieval city the ancient market place lost ground gradually and became supplanted by a new representative quarter, with the town hall, the large city park, the seats of public institutions, schools etc. in the center. In the eastern part the new industrial town has grown in a rapid pace from the 1890s, though the building of factories did not cease on the western edge either. The southern part of the city, a long-lasting rural territory, became interspersed by typical city houses with gardens and public institutions (e. g. hospitals), wanting such surroundings. The economic growth and the enhancement of the regional administrative centralization in the city gave an impetus to the building of flats as well. New blocks of flats grew out of the earth, though the city, at variance with several other towns of Hungary, luckily preserved its monuments of art (with minor losses), the medieval structure of its City and its ancient outlook. However, the results of this building of flats benefited almost entirely the comfort of the well-to-do; at the outskirts of the city many houses were wet, unhealthy, at places terribly crowded and disproportionately expensive. Therefore the industrial development induced the large factories to build workers' hostels, even workers' colonies. Owing to the building disposition gaining ground in all respects, the townscape has considerably changed; beside the archaic City the neighbourhood of the town hall developed in the architectural forms of the turn of the century; some suburbs became interspersed with family homes having gardens; the industrial quarters bore the imprint of industrial architecture. Both as to the building material, the height of the houses and the cityscape Győr occupied one of the first places among the most urbanized Hungarian cities by the time of World War I. 5. The most important elements of modern urbanization, following the economic development, are the public utilities. Among them canalization has a secular past in the town, extending nevertheless to a small area. Modern, coherent drainage began at the end of the 1880s, embracing all the growing territory of the city already; in 1908 the conduit was 28 km long, i. e. practically all the interior and the manufacturing area were canalized. In 1883 the first waterworks of Győr same intobeing and they underwent several extensions later. By 1908 a main line of 8 km and a distributing network of 87 km length supplied water to 7070 rooms of flats and 22 factories. However, the enlargement became only possible after the buying off the watermorks into city property and the discovery of new areas giving water; by 1908 the waterworks gave 1 million cubic meter per year already. Even so, water remained very expensive up to World War I. 390