YIMBY Poland

You simply have no idea what an actual YIMBY experiment would look like. San Francisco approved 30,548 housing units in the last decade. Krakow, Poland, which has the same population, approved 91,480. SF was more on par with Katowice, a city of merely 272k people.

Left map is incomes by place of residence. Right map is incomes by place of work.

Median monthly income in June in Poland. Sure, Warsaw is the wealthiest but take a look at Silesia (that big area of high incomes in the southwest). Not only is it rich, it’s also most economically equal. What a powerhouse.

Bo ornamentacja jest kosztowna

Freshly completed public housing in Katowice. 521 units varying in size. Bonus: there’s an art deco water tower right next door

Probably a big reason why small spaces don’t work in the U.S.!

For comparison, 1 sq m larger condo in Katowice. Polish people are used to small spaces so a few design tricks that make it more workable:
1. Smaller bathroom, no space for a tub
2. L-shaped kitchen (frees 90 cm towards the living room)

339 sqft is equal to 31 sqm. In Poland that’s 1 sqm too small to be a 1-bedroom but studios this size sell very well as investments (to rent out to students or young professionals).

Some crazy stat about construction in Poland and Czechia.

Katowice and Ostrava are cities of the same size 1h away from each other. In the 2016-21 period, Ostrava completed 1083 new housing units. In Katowice, more is built every 6 months.

Before and after in Bytom. Train station got renovated as part of the larger project that completely rebuilds the railway system in the Katowice metro area.

An afternoon in Upper Silesia: traditional lunch in a 200-year-old tavern where they display a German map of Silesia ;)

Good morning from Katowice. Today on the agenda: regional heritage market, pride parade, city’s birthday with free concerts and much more!

Poznań is really limited geographically. While Wroclaw and Krakow have plenty of areas suitable for single family development, in Poznan all of that happens right outside the border of the city. Plus in Poznan, rich people have their own businesses

Gender pay gap is 6.1% in Poland. It’s the largest in the 35-44 age group — clearly a „maternity penalty” effect. But among older workers, it gets reversed! Women over 55 earn more than men in Poland. 2/2

Some really interesting data about earnings in Poland. Warsaw is the best-paying metro by far, followed by Wroclaw, Krakow, Poznan and Tricity. Copper mining region in Silesia stands out too. Katowice metro is above average but visibly poorer than the former ones. 1/

Dzień dobry, ja akurat siedzę sobie w Kato :)

Błędów Desert indeed but its creation is not related to mining afaik

An under-appreciated aspect of living in Katowice metro area is that no other metro area in Poland compares when it comes to nearby attractions. Like, I woke up with 3h to spare and I managed to visit a desert, a beautiful countryside and a castle that looks like taken straight from Game of Thrones