The long-awaited engineering report on the condition of the building housing Univerzitni Kino Scala on Moravske namesti has finally been released. As well as a detailed assessment of the building, the authors of the report also provided a number of proposals for how to resolve the situation.
According to estimates, ensuring the static safety of the building will cost CZK 30-40 million, though the total costs of the reconstruction will depend on the character and scope of interior modifications, which could run into the hundreds of millions. The city is conducting negotiations with the parties involved about whether they will take over responsibility for the building and the cost of its repairs, so that cultural activities can be resumed here in the future.
In the report, which was reviewed by officials from the City of Brno during the summer, the experts considered possible options for the repair of the building, following on from previous static and laboratory assessments that the existing reinforced concrete structure is insufficient, and does not meet the standards to fulfil the function of the supporting structure.
Usually, in such cases, the most effective solution is to close and demolish the building in question, and replace it with a new one. In this case, however, that option is practically impossible from a technical point of view; the cinema and theatre spaces are in the inner block, and it is not possible to reach them with construction machinery. The city has also declared its long-term interest in preserving the building, which is protected as a historical monument, including the cultural operation and specifically the cinema.
“With the specific conclusions and proposals in the detailed static and technical survey of the building, we can now conduct concrete negotiations about the future of the building, both at the city level and with potential new owners,” said Brno Mayor Markéta Vaňková. “The offer we made to Masaryk University is still valid, to buy the building for one symbolic crown and then modify it under their own direction for the purposes for which the university has used it until now. We had a meeting with Rector Martin Bareš on this topic last week, at the same time we are also in contact with the company Dům Scala, which is a partial owner of the building and has a reserved right of pre-emption, and with the other tenant, the Bolek Polívka Theatre.”
“According to the aforementioned assessment, the cost of the necessary provision of statics has climbed to CZK 30-40 million,” added Karin Podivinská, Brno city councillor for property management. ”However, this will bring us only to the state of ‘rough construction’; probably another hundreds of millions will need to be invested in the necessary renovations and modifications in the interiors, so that the building can once again be used for cultural activities after the renovation. And it will always be an exhibition or social space, not a commercial property. This also means that its economic profitability cannot be expected. I would note that even until now it was rented at a reduced price due to the cultural operation.”
“We are negotiating with the city about the possibilities of saving the building and the cinema itself, and we are ready to continue negotiating, as we are aware of the uniqueness of this space,” said Masaryk University Rector Martin Bareš. He noted that, considering the complexity of the decision to be made, and the possible modifications themselves, the university must first consult with building authorities, the fire brigade, and property preservationists.
“According to our estimates of investment costs, the complete repair of the entire building while preserving the cinema hall and the next floor would require an amount of over CZK 330 million,” continued Bareš, for which he said the university would have to seek extra sources of funding. “I would like it if we could come to a conclusion this autumn, while the Rector’s College with the deans of individual faculties and decision-making bodies such as the Board of Directors of Masaryk University and the Academic Senate of Masaryk University must also express their opinion on the issue of a possible purchase of Scala within the university.”
The possible options for the reconstruction of the building are primarily based on the idea of preserving the shape and functionality of the Kino Scala hall without significant interventions that might affect the acoustics, projection possibilities, capacity, and so on. However, this means that the hall of the Bolek Polívka Theatre must be sacrificed for this purpose, in that its current two-floor space will be reduced to a height of one floor. The freed space would then be used for a new steel structure, and the hall of the Bolek Polívka Theater would thus disappear, with the newly created lower space to be used for community activities or as a gallery. There is also an opportunity to restore the space under the roof of the hall together with the skylights that were there at the time of its creation in the late 1920s, when the hall was used not as a theatre, but as a dance hall.
Three variants of the solution are proposed: two envisage the creation of a new steel structure, which will take over the load-bearing function, in the place of today’s theatre hall; the third proposes the complete demolition of the hall and subsequent roofing of the cinema.
The complete reports can be viewed here and here.
