Jastarnia railway station

Jastarnia station operates seasonally and is classed by PKP as a tourist station. For a seaside resort, it is a building that matters a great deal to the town's image. Before the redevelopment, it housed ticket offices open during the summer season and rooms for PKP Polskie Linie Kolejowe (PKP PLK), the railway infrastructure manager, including the signal box controlling train traffic, while the rest of the building stood unused.

PKP S.A. wanted to fit a comfortable waiting room, accessible toilets and a commercial unit into the same small building without disturbing the working train control infrastructure. The north-west part with the PKP PLK rooms was to be refurbished in its existing use, and the whole building was to regain its historic character. The station's surroundings also needed tidying up: a public toilet block in poor condition stood on the station plot.

The station is entered as no. 819 in the register of historic monuments kept by the Pomeranian Voivodeship Heritage Conservation Officer, so the redevelopment design required heritage approvals. The documentation for Jastarnia station also had to meet EU funding requirements, as the redevelopment was co-financed by the Infrastructure and Environment Operational Programme.

PAKA.archi began the redevelopment design for Jastarnia station by dividing the building between its users so that each part could operate independently. The PKP PLK rooms in the north-west part were refurbished in their existing use, the waiting room with accessible toilets was designed from scratch, and a commercial unit with its own entrance from the south was planned in the western part. The public toilet block, in poor condition and of no aesthetic value, was scheduled for demolition.

PAKA.archi prepared all the documentation, from the concept through the building permit and technical designs to the detailed design, in 2019–2020, together with the structural, plumbing and drainage, electrical and roads designs, and ran the coordination between disciplines and the approvals in-house.

The historic details of Jastarnia station were recreated from archive photographs. The brick façade was restored to its original appearance using contemporary materials, with subtle articulation of the walls, and the timber windows were designed with glazing bars true to the original. The beam details supporting the roof over the lower part of the station were reinstated, along with the copper gutters and sills and the boarded dormer gables, and the chimney brickwork was drawn up together with the contractor so that the chimneys, too, gained an architectural form. Air-conditioning units on the façade were enclosed in open-work screens in the façade colours.

The most visible design decision was the canopy over the entrance. PKP S.A. was modernising several stations on the Hel line at the same time, and each received a new entrance canopy. At the neighbouring station in Kuźnica, built in 1927, a traditional solution was chosen: a canopy clad in dark grey sheet metal, like the lower part of the building, so that it blends into the massing. For Jastarnia, PAKA.archi proposed the canopy as a clearly contemporary element, with a steel structure painted graphite, a glazed roof and an aluminium soffit in a golden oak finish. Its light, transparent form does not compete with the brick façade or hide the historic building, and the illuminated station name on the glass roof has become the station's new calling card.

The modernised Jastarnia station opened to passengers on 17 May 2024, ahead of the summer season. Construction began in October 2022 and took 19 months, one month less than PKP S.A. had planned. The building regained its historic brick appearance through a façade of handmade clinker brick slips in a natural brick colour, brown joinery, ceramic roof tiles and copper flashings.

The roughly 200 m² of usable floor area at Jastarnia station now houses a waiting room, toilets, a retail and service unit and the PKP PLK rooms, and the whole of the building is in use. The station is fully accessible to people with disabilities, with a dedicated toilet, a wheelchair ramp, tactile maps, Braille signage and tactile guidance paths for blind passengers.

Running costs at Jastarnia station are kept down by LED lighting, a rainwater retention tank and a smart building management system that optimises energy and water use and monitors the building's security. After the opening, the regional daily Dziennik Bałtycki wrote that the neglected station had finally stopped spoiling the image of Jastarnia as a holiday resort.