PUBLIC SPACE:
CONTINUITIES AND DISCONTINUITIES
The concentration of the country's heaviest industry in Elefsina altered both the inland and the coastal landscape of the city.
The initial phase of Elefsina’s industrialization saw a peculiar landscape, in which agricultural economy coexisted with industry. Farmers sheared their sheep by the sea, right next the smokestacks of TITAN; large vegetable gardens in central points around the city supplied the central farmers’ market at Rentis.
Such contradictory images spanned the history of Elefsina’s public space well until the 1960s, before gradually fading from view in the late 1970s, when industrial and port facilities began taking over larger tracts of land.
Elefsina was turned into a coastal city without a beach. Support for public spaces became part of municipal initiatives only from the late 1970s onwards.
It used to be great back in those days; it saddens me that my children never got to know Elefsina as it used to be. Elefsina was done after 1970; I’m talking about the beach and its surrounding areas.
MICHALIS MITROMELETIS
EXPROPRIATIONS
Elefsina meets industry as quarries gradually devour the mountain at Vrachakia, lands and houses are expropriated along the sea, and the coast itself is backfilled with soil. The landscape of the city is altered, and the vital space of its residents decreases as factories surround Elefsina and, in a way, delineate its boundaries.
The first attempt to establish an urban plan for Elefsina was made in 1877. The plan itself demonstrates the intention of the Greek state to separate the land from the sea by creating an artificial beachfront whose purpose was to lay the groundwork for the installation of large industries in the area.
It wasn’t by chance that the TITAN factory was constructed between the sea and the hills. The quarries bore tunnels in the hills, extracted raw materials and converted them into cement. Afterwards, the products were loaded on ships through the private seaport built as an annex to the factory.
The use of tons of dynamite catapulted rocks, soil, and fragments of ancient pottery and buildings into the sky on a daily basis, as local residents scurried inside their homes when a voice cried: “Varda fournelo!” (Fire in the hole!).
There was a crystal clear sea below us; it died along with our childhood when we reached adolescence and we saw the mountain disappearing every day to become, as our neighborhood idiot used to say, cement and money. They were setting off blasts in the mountain, and this happened in regular intervals: everyday at 12:00 at noon and 17:00 in the evening. A siren would wail before the explosions, because afterwards, old man Markos, also known as “Vardafournelo”–because he would scream “Varda! Fournelo!”–would warn us, and our mothers would pick us up from wherever we were and take us inside the house, because rocks would often land beside us or on the roofs–of course, nobody ever got hurt. The siren would wail again after the explosions ended, which meant that “the blasts are over, you can come out again”. And when the dust cloud settled, we would go to an area that was forbidden to us–but we would go anyway–and check what had fallen off the mountain besides rocks. Still, many times, amidst these rocks, we would find bits of baked clay, which, in fact, had colors, lines or faces on them, or even whole jars, and we would think about what we could do with them; the most natural thing would be to use them to feed our dolls. Their colors and textures were amazing. They left a deep impression in my memory and I rediscovered that when I touched the black-figured potteries.
ARGIRO ORFANOUDAKI | EXCERPT FROM “DEMECHANIZED INDUSTRY”
THE FRANKISH TOWER STOOD ON THE HILL OF ELEFSINA UNTIL THE EARLY 1950s, WHEN IT WAS DESTROYED BY THE TITAN QUARRY
VIEW OF ELEFSINA: THE HILL WITH THE FRANKISH TOWER, THE MILL OF TSANA AND SAINT NIKOLAOS BEFORE ITS TRANSFER TO THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE | 1932
REMAINS OF THE HILL | 2023
Next to the facilities of TITAN, children played war among ancient tombs. The game stopped when the quarries destroyed their hiding places and their toys were broken by the explosions.
Many tombs were destroyed along with the quarry. We used to climb down the tombs and play war; they were open holes in the ground. Great years… Sometimes, you talk about them and people think it’s all a load of crap. I used to climb down the tomb to hide when playing war. […] One time, we left behind my kite and it was smashed by a rock. My kite, I had crafted it myself, and a rock dropped down and smashed it. [...] I knew it was an explosive, but I never expected a rock to fall and strike my kite.
THODORIS KOUNELES
VIEW FROM THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE | 1941
AERIAL VIEW OF TITAN, ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITE
One time, we left behind my kite and it was smashed by a rock. My kite, I had crafted it myself, and a rock dropped down and smashed it. [...] I knew it was an explosive, but I never expected a rock to fall and strike my kite.
THODORIS KOUNELES
One of the Symiots’ neighborhoods was developed at Vrachakia and accommodated families that worked at the factory of TITAN. Many houses were built on the hillside, which served as a passage to the sea for the residents of Upper Elefsina.
When the quarry began to "eat up" the hill, besides the Symiots who lost their homes, many inland residents of Elefsina also lost their access to the sea.
People crossed the mountain through a footpath to go swimming, because there was no other way to get here. There was a road at PYRKAL, but it was too far.
THODORIS KOUNELES
Mining activity and explosions grew in intensity and frequency, and the living space of the neighborhood shrunk significantly. TITAN expropriated the homes of Symiots during the period of the military junta (1967-1974), forcing them to leave. The dictatorship was not a good period for protesting or pursuing legal actions before the courts.