The functionalist building at the Žižkov freight railway station in Prague 3 is poised to be refurbished into a large cultural center.
The Czech culture minister, Daniel Herman, signed a memorandum to cooperate with the state-run rail operator, České dráhy, and the developer Sekyra Group. The building, which has been designated as cultural monument by the Culture Ministry, will be transformed into space for the National Film Archive as well as exhibition space for a few museums, including the Museum of Decorative Arts and the National Technical Museum.
The building, a topic of heated debate over the past few years, could become a cultural center for a new neighborhood that Sekyra Group plans to develop instead of an unused freight railway station. But it is still unclear who will foot the bill for the reconstruction. “Our effort is to integrate the heritage into the commercial part of the project,” Luděk Sekyra, owner of Sekyra Group, told ČTK. The head of České dráhy, Daniel Kurucz, said he would like the building to be owned by the Culture Ministry or some of its institutions.
