Szablyár Péter: Sky-high - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2007)
Telecommunications and Data-transmission Towers
The tower is surrounded by six operation units which are serviced by three stairwells. The structure is currently operated by Hungarian Telekom Public Limited Company. In the wake of the revolutionary changes in Hungary’s telephone networks, the number of fixtures on the tower has quintupled. Located at the juncture of Üllői út and Határ út, this structure is the first to be seen by motorists driving towards Budapest on the Ferihegy freeway. "Space Base" on Sun Hill the News Agency wing of the MTI headquarters No. 8 Naphegy tér, District 1 Established in 1880 by parliamentary stenographers Géza Egyesy and Hugó Maszák, MTI, the Hungarian News Agency, was the sixth wire service in the world and became an internationally acknowledged organization during the interwar period. It was moved into its "Socialist Realist" headquarters on Nap-hegy (Sun Hill) in 1953. Since then, the agency had outgrown this (there are 12.7 million negatives, 5 million prints, and 600,000 digitalised pictures in its archives, a unique and officially protected collection). In 1985 a tender was announced for a telecommunications plant. It was stipulated that the building fit into the triangular site, the built environment of the existing unit and the natural surroundings of the hill. The competition was won by Csaba Virág of Lakóterv, with his design for a flat-roofed glass cylinder like a "landed space base”. This he topped with a 22.55 metre-high aerial mast. The balcony supporting the large parabolic aerials is 30.05 metres, while the tip of the mast is 68.97 rnetres above ground level. Four steel pillars support the construction with its 1121 square metre floor space on each storey, which provides for great freedom in the interior layout. This unique building was built in 1987—90. Met with controversial criticism before it was finished, the building was taken over by MTI in 1990—91, at a time when the agency’s functions and organisation were undergoing radical changes. The public and the professional community were slowly getting used to the sight of the Sun-Hill space base even as Csaba Virág's latest designs in Budapest, the glass-fronted office blocks in Kálvin tér emerged as the newest objects of architectural controversy. 54
