Mezei István: Urban development in Slovakia (Pécs-Somorja, 2010)
3. The settlement structure of Slovakia
Town planning in (Czecho)Slovakia the development of services was planned according to the type, rather than with regard to the needs of the population in the vicinity. The directive provided that the three Slovak district centres should distinguish themselves from the six towns belonging to the first category and develop into metropolises with over 300,000 inhabitants. Besides Bratislava and Košice, Banská Bystrica was to have played such a role. In fact, it is only since the 1960s that Košice has been regarded as a town for which Slovak national politics has had long-range plans. Before that it was one of the neglected Eastern Slovak towns. Its development declined in the 19,h century when, as a result of competition between the two towns, Miskolc took over the central role Košice had played in economy, trade and transport. Due to its geographical location, Košice was able to keep its regional importance for centuries because it can be found in the meeting point of different geographical units. This is where the flat Hornád Valley with its wheat fields changes over to the northern wooded areas. This was where the roads from the north, from Šariš and Spiš and from Poland met and led to the Great Plain. At the time of the Turkish occupation of Hungary, Košice, which could be found at the crossing point of strategic roads of Transylvania and Felvidék, played an important military and diplomatic role. Lying in the meeting point of areas of agriculture and forestry, the economic prosperity of Košice started to decline at the time of the railway construction (Bulla-Mendöl 1999, p. 260). When the decision was made that, in accordance with the general objectives of industrialization, an iron works was to be built in Košice, decision-makers considered several aspects, one of them being the question of raw material. With metallurgy developing rapidly, one aspect to be considered became the mining of high heat-value coking coal and of the crude iron layer. Košice, however, did not have deposits of either and nor did Slovakia. In the planned economy system, they disregarded the traditionally accepted criterion in metallurgy that the country should have at least one of the most important raw materials. They decided to disregard costs and have coke supplied from the Czech Ostrava and iron ore from the Soviet Union. The latter source was the most decisive one for Košice in becoming the new metallurgical centre. With regard to other factors, the indicators of Košice and its vicinity were much better. Of auxiliary materials, both limestone and magnesite were available in sufficient quantities in the vicinity; besides, it had abundant labourers on hand. The metallurgical works were meant to improve the backward situation of the eastern part of the country. Construction was begun in 79
