while not null: A trip to spend a bit of time with mama

I'm a Varsovian. I lived there during my high school and uni years. I worked there afterwards. My family lives there. Warszawa (Var-sha-va) will always be close to my heart.

Warsaw is making progress towards being the most livable city possible. There are new separated bike paths, footpaths are everywhere, lots of zebra crossings in convenient places, usually little waiting to cross the street, pedestrianized places - like plac Pięciu Rogów. A half kilometre long pedestrian and bike bridge over the Vistula river is being built. Public transport is cheap, safe, clean, mostly modern and frequent. Compared to where I live in Australia, it's a pleasure to walk, bike, ride public transport, shop and visit places.

Unfortunately, there is still too much investment in car infrastructure, like the underground car parking under Plac Powstańców Warszawy, too wide new streets, sometimes having 4 or more lanes for cars in one direction, missing 3rd zebra crossing in 4 way crossings - I hate this design practice, it forces pedestrians and bike riders to wait for lights 3 times when they only should wait once.

Warsaw, population 1,862k, is the biggest city in Poland.

Warsaw has 133 km of tram tracks (system length) and 543 stops.

A tree-lined side street in Śródmieście.

Old tanks and troop carriers in Muzeum Wojska Polskiego.

Old rocket launchers - this exhibits need to be housed indoors, the climate in Warsaw is unforgiving to things left outdoors: wind, sun, rain, snow, daily transits through 0 Celsius in Winter.

A Polish Air Force Mig-29.

A passenger train crossing the Vistula river.

Sandy beach on the right (east) bank of the Vistula river. The whole right-bank Warsaw can be called Praga. It had its own dialect and culture.

Palace of Culture and a red and yellow tram. The flag of Warsaw is yellow-red.

The Palace used to be visible from other suburbs, now it is often hidden by other high-rise building.

I like trams.

Currently, the highest building in the EU, and a tram.

Plac Szembeka.

An elementary school with lots of parked bikes. I love it.

The structure on the left is a pedestrian overpass over a road - a relic of car-focused city planning. I know they are being removed in the Ursynów district. This one is in Praga Południe.

A yellow and red city bus, small shops, apartments near Wiatraczna.

An empty can of Tyskie beer, thoughtfully left standing upright by some @#%! in Grochów.

An actual dog shit, cigarette packaging, piss stains and a rusting methane ("natural" gas) box. Come on Warsaw, you can do better.

Street art or graffiti?

A famous balcony with an LGBT flag on the route of the annual Independence March. It's famous, because the "patriot" vandals threw a flare there and caused the apartment to catch fire.

Definitely graffiti.

One of the few remaining old Praga buildings.

"F*ck Putin" written on a wall near the balcony. That's the Praga spirit.

New apartments in Grochów.

Hopefully, soon to be replaced by a new 4 story apartment building.

CNG (methane) powered bus. The EU treats these as ecological, hopefully not much longer.

Flying the Pride flag.

4-5 story apartment buildings.

The human scale. 4 families live in this 2 story building.

New developments, in a quiet spot, 30 km/h speed limit and "sleeping policemen".

Old and new. Warsaw is full of contrasts like these.

A mural in Wiatraczna by Tytus Brzozowski, showing the Poniatowski bridge, the National Stadium, the Szembeka church, the number 24 tram, and Marshal Piłsudski (the guy with the mustache).

Old car garages.

Renovated apartments, bike and scooter station, post office van.

A tiny flower garden.

This flower garden is probably maintained by the residents of the adjacent building.

Modern office buildings, and an LNG (methane) powered bus.

A dedicated bike path becoming a shared path.

A Gothic church in Ochota.

Parcel lockers (paczkomat) of Allegro's "one box" in one location and three different companies (Orlen, dpd, DHL) in another. Poland is more advanced than Australia in the e-commerce area.

This building in Praga Płd bears the scars of WW2. One apartment is boarded up, but two (or three?) are lived in.

Plants taking over.

The National Stadium - mainly for football matches.

Bullet holes from WW2.

A lovely one way street.

High rise apartments, medical services, trees.

Grochów - one of the Praga Południe suburbs, on a red-white-green background - the colors of the biggest Warsaw football club - Legia.

Another (L) - Legia football fans mural.

A lovely, quiet tree-lined Grochów street.

A bike shed and a bench.

A street, a fence, a bike path, a pedestrian path.

Westfield shopping centres, very popular in Australia, are present in Poland too.

E. Wedel chocolate mural near the chocolate factory.

Sedum (green) tram track bed.

A smiling Hyundai Rotem tram in Wiatraczna.

St. Florian Cathedral - I've passed this church hundreds of times, but never been inside.

The Royal Castle.

The Old Town Square.

An aerial photo of the Old Town and the Royal Castle in 1945.

The Warsaw Barbican (semicircular fortified outpost).

The Mermaid of Warsaw - half woman, half fish, with a sword and shield, is an official symbol of the city.

Ukrainian, Belarusian, LGBT, Polish and Warsaw flags.

Polish and Ukrainian flags on Warsaw University gate.

Warsaw Metro trains come every 2-3 minutes in peak.

The yellow and red M arrow logo of the Warsaw Metro.

The frequency of the trams.

One of many reminders of what happened in Warsaw in WW2.

A plaque remembering 102 Warsaw civilians shot on that spot by Germans.

A Legia mural in the Ochota suburb.

Beautiful vines.

Veturilo - city bike share station.

A pedestrian overpass in Praga Południe over Trasa Łazienkowska - an 8 km long urban motorway designed in the late 1960s. Both need to go.

An Ukrainian flag flying at the museum of the history of Polish Jews (Polin).

Aleje Jerozolimskie (Jerusalem Avenue) is scheduled for an update that will reduce the number of car lanes to one in each direction, widen footpaths, add bus lanes, bike paths, level pedestrian crossings, and trees. This should be a standard for high throughput streets.

A bus shelter with plants on the roof.

Ugly Grochów houses

Pretty Grochów houses

Warsaw pigeon.

Warszawa Zachodnia - Warsaw West, the busiest train station in Poland (one thousand trains per day in 2017) is being completely rebuilt while operational. This is something unique I think. The old platforms, tracks, switches, etc are being demolished gradually and new platforms, tracks, etc are being built and opened.