Nothing can be compared to the consequences of the crime in Novi Sad – fifteen lives lost and two more in critical condition – yet the current demolition of Hotel Yugoslavia represents a collective & personal tragedy and is a traumatic event for many.
Buildings do not merely serve utilitarian purposes. If properly planned, well laid out and maintained, they can become new urban nuclei around which people gather and which are preserved and developed for the benefit of all who gravitate towards a specific area. Hotel Yugoslavia is far more than that; for many people in Zemun and Belgrade it represents a different time. A time of quays and life perspectives as wide as the Danube, of youth and hope. All of it is being destroyed for the sake of making a private profit.
There were demolitions, changes and replacements across Zemun during the sixties in the last century as well. It was precisely from where Hotel Yugoslavia is (still) found that the railway station & railway junction were moved. The latter was one of the most extensive urban planning projects of that time, led by the mayor of Belgrade, Branko Pešić and the president of the municipality of Zemun, Radojko Filipović.
The entire industry that was located in this part of the city was also relocated. Galenika, Zmaj, Ikarus, Nada Stark and Iskra are just some of the companies that flourished only after moving to the newly formed industrial zones.
The central areas of Zemun were thereby freed from industrial pollution and traffic. Conditions for the protection of the “Old Core of Zemun” cultural complex were created, new residential areas emerged. The necessary conditions for the final opening of Hotel Yugoslavia were also created, as well as the arrangement of a unique green area such as was (and will no longer be) the quay located around the hotel building which is connected to the old part of the Zemun quay. All of this was done for the public’s good and it proved beneficial for both the citizens and the economy.
This urban development enabled the continuation of the development of New Belgrade, and Hotel Yugoslavia is the most famous point where the two municipalities meet. Modernist and “New Belgradesque” in its appearance, and Zemun-like and by-the-river in its location.
It should also be mentioned that Hotel Yugoslavia together with the SIV Palace (Federal Executive Council, now the Palace of Serbia) and the CK (Central Committee) building in the original plans and ideas of New Belgrade represented the axis and symbol of the new socialist state. Those three bulky modernist structures were symbols of the political, economic and cultural development of a new society.
A society which cared more about providing people with open spaces and open air, with somewhere to walk, with ensuring children had grass to play on and tress to climb. A society that did destroy the old order, but that also built a new and better one for the many and not the few.
Hotel Yugoslavia, one of the marks of a society that looked after people’s wellbeing, is being demolished these days. Not because everyone will be better off this way, but only so that a few, selected people may make a profit by building countless square metres of residential and commercial space that they will later sink for even more money.
Maybe the politicians who used their institutional powers to impose the decision to demolish the hotel and build a new complex will gain something, but there is only shame for those who just threw their hands in the air during assemblies. The new project for the construction of two towers and additional buildings will create congestion in this part of the city, because it will never be as “wide” and beautiful as it was.
Where we could once breathe, we will suffocate and be piled up on one another. This plan, which has not resulted in human casualties yet, manifests itself as a crime. It is an appropriation of public space, an active threat to the environment and the erasure of marks and ideas for a different and better life.
Translation from Serbian by M.J.
