Nearly a thousand visitors came to see the building of the Ministry of Transport

Nearly a thousand visitors came to see the building of the Ministry of Transport
20/5/2023Press releases

Almost 1 000 visitors came to see the headquarters of the Ministry of Transport today as part of the Open House Prague festival. The participants of the open day were guided through some of the premises by the transport minister Martin Kupka.
 

Nearly a thousand visitors came to see the building of the Ministry of Transport
Visitors were fascinated by Antonín Engel's architecture, the sensitive reconstruction of the office rooms and some of the original furnishings as well as the shelter built before World War II. Children had the opportunity to try out safe driving with BESIP at the ministry's traffic playground.

Those interested could visit the meeting rooms of the ministry, the entrance hall, the office and meeting rooms, the so-called “Husák's apartment” and the shelter under the building. They learnt things not only about the turbulent past of the original Ministry of Railways but also the current use of the building and the current work of the ministry. 

Visitors also took the opportunity to meet directly with transport minister Martin Kupka and ask him questions. They could discuss with him various reconstruction projects near their homes, those that can help them in their daily travels or simply other hot topics. 

"Transportation affects all of us every day, so I am happy that we can, thanks to Open House Prague 2023, show not only an interesting building on the Vltava riverbank but also the headquarters of a transport institution that is at the beginning of what is emerging in the field of transport," says Martin Kupka.

With the founding of Czechoslovakia, it was necessary to build many new buildings to house important state institutions. One of them is the neo-classical building of the Ministry of Transport, formerly the Ministry of Railways, on the Vltava river bank.

The monumental building was the centre of the totalitarian regime from 1960 until the break in 1989: it was right from here that the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia was running the country. Its highest representatives even had their apartments here and at one time even the communist president Gustáv Husák stayed here. 

Today, the building serves its original purpose again, i.e. it is the headquarters of the Ministry of Transport. Správa železnic, employees of the Government Office or the Waterways Directorate are using roughly the same part of the offices.
In addition to the Ministry itself and BESIP, today's programme was attended by Czech Railways and the biggest investors in transport construction: Ředitelství silnic a dálnic (Motorways and Roads Authority), Správa železnic (the Czech railway infrastructure manager) and Ředitelství vodních cest ČR (Waterways Directorate of the Czech Republic). This is the first time that the Ministry of Transport has participated in the Open House Prague event. 
 
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