Geografie 1964, 69, 187-199
The Diagram of Housing Centres Network - Housing Centres Selected for the Concentration of Housing in Next Years
In recent years a considerable attention has been drawn to the prospective development of country housing in Czechoslovakia. It is especially the work on the conception of how to gradually concentrate the population from the present, large number of settlements of village character to a smaller number of settlements of central character in which the inhabitants could be provided with a higher standard of living including both necessary services and other technical establishments only. It is, above all, a gradual concentration of the village population of non-agricultural character which is concerned. (The Czechoslovak communities are of a mixed character mostly - of the total number of their population only 32,6 per cent occupy themselves with agriculture and forestry.) The gradual concentration of the population is meant to be achieved by concentrating new housing and the construction of services for the population always to a smaller number of housing centres of development, selected in advance. The respective problems have so far been worked out by scientific research mainly. The first, concrete step towards the realization was, however, carried out in the form of a diagram of housing centres network worked out by the State Institute for District Planning for all regions of Czechoslovakia in 1963. The individual diagrams show the classification of all housing centres, such as follows: (a) towns, (b) country housing centres of central character with more than 1,500 inhabitants, (c) country housing centres of central character with less than 1,500 inhabitants (in rarely populated areas mainly), (d) the so-called housing centres of independent function (housing centres of a specific character lacking gradient areas, recreation centres, as a rule, and housing centres as part and parcel of agglomerations), (e) other housing centres lacking a prospective larger development (see the graphs - diagrams of housing centres network of individual regions. On the basis of diagrams the district national committees of individual regions carried out in 1963 a selections of housing centres in which not only the housing but also the construction of public and technical establishments will be concentrated in years to come. The selection of such housing centres is obligatory for all authorities controlling the housing, and will, further on, be detailed succesively. Apart from the housing centres thus determined, the construction of dwellings will, in principle, be granted only to agricultural workers and the workers of local services, and only, of course, on places chosen for the purpose from the standpoint of districts and production-minded socialist agricultural enterprises on a large scale (the economy of state farms, and Unified Agricultural Cooperatives).
