Bata Motorway Chřiby
The Bata brothers didn't just dream of a perfect factory or one city. Their plans included building a state for 40 million people, a perfectly interconnected infrastructure of Europe and the whole world, ideal housing and life in developed countries. One of the projects they embarked on was a motorway linking Prague with Subcarpathian Russia. However, the project was never completed and all that remains are concrete ruins hidden in the middle of the Chřiby hills.
A motorway linking Prague with Subcarpathian Russia has been talked about ever since Czechoslovakia appeared on the world map. The road was to help develop motoring, which was still in its infancy at the time. The idea of a motorway through Bohemia, Moravia, Slovakia and the Subcarpathians was supported not only by statesmen but also by businessmen. And Jan Antonín Bata was among them.
There were several plans for the possible route of the motorway, but in 1939–1943 the one crossing the Chřiby mountains finally won out. In 1938, the government released 150 million for design work of the project that consisted of three stages: Prague - Jihlava, Jihlava – Zástřizly (Chřiby), Zástřizly – Lužná. It is evident from this division that the small Chřiby mountain range was a major obstacle to smooth construction and it was necessary to pay increased attention to it.
The construction of the Chřiby part of the motorway started on 24 January 1939, when the working battalion 304 arrived in Zástřizly and started to cut down the forest along the route of the planned motorway. The workers were accommodated at Bunč, along the Kudlovská road and in Žlutava. Construction continued rapidly until the occupation and the establishment of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. With the secession of Slovakia and Subcarpathian Rus, the importance of the motorway connecting all the territories lost all meaning. Instead, the motorway was to be integrated into the German transport network and adapted to its guidelines.
However, the whole construction was interrupted by the war shortage. In 1941, soldiers and workers left the mountains, leaving behind only the scattered torso of hundreds of thousands litres of concrete. You can see it on the way from Bunč to the Brdo lookout tower.
