Petrohrad

The trail passes through the originally working-class district of Petrohrad, which is delimited by the railway and station on the north-west side, by the former railway workshops from the north-east, by Slovanská Avenue and the premises of ​​the former paper mill in the south-west, and Táborská Street in the south-east. The origin and development of the district is closely connected with the construction of the Pilsen railway junction, as well as with a number of industrial companies established in reaction to the new transport options near the station. The specific character of Petrohrad was co-formed by the railway workshops, the Piette brothers’ paper mill, the Bartelmus enamel works, the Schwarz & Beck rolling and wire factory, Cingroš stonework and a number of smaller companies that employed local residents. Dozens of apartment buildings were built on the chessboard-pattern of city blocks for them.

Thus, apart from the industrial heritage, the trail primarily represents a number of examples of interwar residential houses. Besides the city and several construction cooperatives, state railways were also involved in the new development, which also included municipal emergency housing with small flats. The path also presents the most important civic buildings – the former 2nd Czech Technical Secondary School in Mikulášské Square, which became a key public space in the district, or the significantly rebuilt building of the defunct cinema Invalid (Eden) – the no longer existing Railway Consumer Cooperative complex, the modernist administrative building of the West Bohemian Power Plant or the functionalist villa of the Chvojka brothers, owners of the nearby sand quarries.