Szablyár Péter: Step by step - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2010)

Steps udbounded - the Budapest embankments

Between 1871 and 1875 another impetus was given to the construction of the two- tier retaining walls. That was when the builders completed the section between Margaret Bridge—Pálffy (today's Bem Józsefi tér and Vitéz utca-Fátyol utca on the Buda side and another one between Margaret Bridge-Zoltán utca and Petőfi tér— Fővám tér on the Pest side at a combined length of three kilometres. It was also at that time that Pálffy tér—Vitéz utca, the Fátyol utca-Rudas Baths and the Pest-side Balaton utca—Parliament sections were provided with the perpendicular upper walls and lower stairways on the riverbank. Meant to service the Public Warehouses, high perpendicular walls were built in the period from 1879 to 1881 between Fővám tér and Boráros tér, which were then extended to the South Railway Bridge. By 1899 both the riverside steps and the perpendicular embankment between Rudas Baths and Francis Joseph (Szabadság) Bridge had been completed. The construction of embankments along the riverside continued after World War II in the areas around the South Railway Bridge on the one hand and in the vicinity of Árpád Bridge, Dráva utca and the Rákos Brook on the other.

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