There are some situations that even authors or comedies or cabarets would never think up. Building a huge wall of sound barriers next to every new road became already a Polish tradition. Next to new Nowolazurowa street (later this unofficial name was changed into 4th of June 1989 Avenue) it really went beyond the limits of absurd: in a few places the sound barriers protect for example a cemetery, a meadow or some undeveloped areas next to the railway bridge. But the biggest absurd appeared next to the train station of Ursus Północny: the sound barriers were constructed just next to the wall of new-build housing estate.
The first question is: why actually this housing estate is hidden behind the wall ? It is rather not a case of defence reasons, it is connected rather with the difference of terrain level, behind the wall there are car parks, which are under the ground level of the housing estate. So the new blocks of flats itself are a bit higher than the street.
So why sound barriers are needed then ? The designers of the street claimed that the design was made a few years ago, when there was no building permit for the housing estate yet. It seems that later, when the blocks of flats were already under construction also nobody noticed them.In such way a corridor was formed in few places, on one side the wall, on the other one sound barriers, and the sidewalk in the middle. Or in some other configuration: the wall, the barriers and a half-metre-wide useless space between them. On the widest fragment there are both a sidewalk and the bike road between the two walls (on other fragments the bike road is situated outside the sound barriers, next to the roadway).
There are really many advantages of such solution:
- when we walk through this ‘exercise yard’ we can feel for a while like prisoners in jail and, thanks to it, to appreciate more the freedom we have, normally we do not bother about such obviousness,
- if we would like to organise an ambush for somebody - this is a perfect place for it,
- exercise yard is also a perfect place for a walk with dogs - they can run here without leash, there is no fear that they will run to the street,
- and - what is the most important - this is a perfect place for hiding a cache, first - because barely no-one walks here (so probably you will not need to use a camouflage) and also the sound barriers itself protect from the rest of the world; but do not be afraid - you will not need to walk to the most claustrophobic place, but at least from few sides you will be hidden behind sound barriers.