Starting in the 1930s, there was this idea that the city needs to be divided into work, housing and recreational zones, with inhabitants making their way between them via complementary transport zones. Soon, however, these original four functions were no longer fit for purpose, and the zones began to fragment into smaller and smaller areas in the land-use plans. We had reached the stage where there were over ninety different types of areas in the current plan. The upcoming Metropolitan Plan is an attempt at steering the ship around, at returning to traditional urban planning where the city is structured primarily according to a set plan. The second problem with the existing plan is its instability: between 2000 and 2012 alone, 2,060 amendments to the land-use plan were discussed. The sheer scale of these changes has made the plan looser and less respected. To address this, there are plans to establish regulations narrowing down the number of possible alterations.

The Geoportal is a basic web portal for viewing maps and looking up information about the territory of Prague. The Geoportal offers a great many maps, ranging in scope from the current zoning plan to the city’s cycle paths. With apps such as “Prague Maps” and “Online Map”, anyone can run searches on topics as diverse as population, air quality and price mapping.

The core mandate of the Centre for Architecture and Metropolitan Planning (CAMP) is to improve the current public debate on Prague’s development, and to inform and educate the public about architecture and city planning.