Integration of “Made Cities” to Their Physical Environment

Abstract

The position of each settlement is determined by mostly unconscious, less typically conscious location decisions. During their lives, settlements change and transform their environment. In the case of an average settlement that has existed for centuries, the slow change of the environment is hardly recognisable. The environmental change may bring positive and negative results, and may modify the position of the given settlement in the hierarchy of the settlements. A specific group of towns in East and Central Europe, however, had a completely different development path. These twentieth century towns did not organically develop into towns, they were made towns right from the beginning, they were established as industrial towns. During their short existence—of 85–90 years—they went through very much different development paths; their interesting common feature is that their birth is due to dictatorships. The question is then how their fate has changed in the new historical situation, after the fall of the dictatorships.