In Machoň's Passage, the demolition is coming to an end, and the restoration of the monument is beginning

Pardubice - The reconstruction of Machoň's passage in Pardubice has moved on to the next phase. The construction company is completing demolition work and will begin restoring the cultural monument. This was stated today by site manager Lubomír Jakl to journalists. Due to the reconstruction, the passage has been closed since January and will likely remain so until the end of the construction work.
     "Most of the demolition work is behind us; we have three facades left to do, and the internal staircase is being worked on. Otherwise, everything else is finished; the ceilings and trusses have been removed," Jakl said.
     The passage was created according to the design of architect Ladislav Machoň in the 1920s. Since the 1960s, the city commissioned several architectural studies, but none of them were implemented. In 1995, Pardubice announced a new competition, and only at the beginning of this year did the repairs begin. The two construction phases are expected to cost approximately 150 million crowns excluding VAT.
     "We have a loan for the entire construction that we will be repaying until 2023. We will do everything to stay within the planned budget," said Jiří Komárek, the chairman of the board of the Pardubice City Development Fund.
     The project has gradually changed since 1995 because new retail spaces, the Grand and Afi Palace shopping centers, emerged in the center of Pardubice. Shops will be located on the ground floor of the passage, and offices will be on the upper floors. The new wing will offer apartments, and a restaurant that once existed there will return to the basement of the passage, which had later been replaced by a civil defense storage. The fund is considering making part of the basement accessible as a gallery.
     "Originally, there was to be 12,000 square meters of non-residential space; from the original concept, only the passage and the extension of the eastern wing with apartments remain. The second phase will involve an underground and above-ground parking lot and park landscaping," said architect Miroslav Petráň.
     Chairman Komárek hopes that all spaces will be successfully rented, even though they will be much more expensive than before the reconstruction. Non-residential spaces in the passage itself will cost 3,000 crowns per square meter annually, while previously it was about half that. An apartment will come to about 4,000 crowns per square meter annually.
     The first phase is expected to be completed in March next year, though it is not yet clear how long the second phase will take. The client still needs to announce a competition. The winning company that is doing the repairs to the passage has a contractual agreement that allows it to participate in the second tender as well, and the fund is waiting for them to submit a price offer.