Mayor's Foreword
Prague’s constantly changing beauty never stops enchanting me: the splendour of a city of sophisticated and diversified architecture, a city of Czech and European history, a city rich in cultural traditions, a city of prestigious academic past and present; a metropolis of mysterious corners, niches and lanes, of hundreds of little pubs bustling with life, a Babel of the world’s languages.
According to foreign media Prague ranks among the Top Ten – the top ten of world-class cities on our planet and belongs to six most visited European metropolises. This view is fully justified. Prague is proving its membership of this elite group to its visitors and citizens every day. For more than a thousand years Prague has been able to preserve its unique genius loci and breath-taking appearance despite some difficult periods in the Czech nation’s history. This is one of the reasons why thirteen years ago its cultural heritage was granted protection as the world’s unique monument.
Today, I do not perceive Prague of the hundred spires only as a bewitchingly beautiful city of my youth but rather as a complex urban organism. As the Mayor, I do my best to make Prague even safer, with a better working transport system and infrastructure, a city with a healthier environment, and with an open and outgoing administration. A city for both work and rest, for the young generation as well as for the senior citizens, a city for serious business and lively tourism.