Park at Fort Borek
Explorer of Kraków's Parks · no. 37
Park type: historic. In this park you can collect a stamp in the "Explorer of Kraków's Parks" campaign run by Kraków's Municipal Greenery Authority (ZZM). Where to find the stamp: on the left as you face the main entrance.
History
The 4.7 ha park surrounds the artillery Fort 52 Borek, one of the forts of the Kraków Fortress, built in 1885-1886. During the Second World War Russian and French prisoners of war were held there. On 26 December 1944 an American Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bomber, damaged during a raid on the refinery at Blechhammer, made an emergency landing in front of the fort. In June 2022 the grounds around the fort were landscaped and opened to residents as a park. New paths were laid, some of them made of steel grating that echoes the military character of the site. The landing is commemorated by an installation with the steel skeleton of the aircraft's fuselage, while plantings trace the outline of the wings.
Did you know?
For many years people believed the bomber was Canadian, because witnesses read the name "Candie" on the fuselage as "Canada". Four steel "pigtails", parts of old anti-personnel barbed-wire entanglements, have also survived in the park.