Industrial Monuments Route of Silesia

A UNESCO-listed silver mine, underground adits in Zabrze, brewery museums in Tychy and Żywiec, the Gliwice radio station and workers' estates where people still live. The Industrial Monuments Route of the Silesian Voivodeship (Szlak Zabytków Techniki) is a driving route linking about 40 sites of industrial heritage – in the words of its creators, the most interesting industrial tourism route in Poland.

History of the route

Work on the route began in 2004, and it officially opened on 19 October 2006. It is about 470 km long, starting in Częstochowa, running through Katowice and Bielsko-Biała and ending in Żywiec. The sites are linked to coal and metal mining, steelmaking, energy, railways, communications, textiles, water supply and food production; they include museums, inhabited workers' estates and working factories. In 2008 the route received the Polish Tourist Organisation's Gold Certificate, in January 2010 it joined the European Route of Industrial Heritage (ERIH) – the only route from Central and Eastern Europe to do so – and since February 2020 it has been run by the Coal Mining Museum in Zabrze.

Stars of Technology

The most important sites are called the Stars of Technology. They include:

• the Historic Silver Mine in Tarnowskie Góry – together with the Black Trout Adit, part of the site inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List on 9 July 2017,
• the Guido Mine, the Queen Louise Adit and the Maciej Shaft in Zabrze,
• the Tychy Brewery Museum and the Żywiec Brewery Museum.

Other highlights include the Nikiszowiec and Giszowiec estates in Katowice, the Gliwice Radio Tower, the Museum of Metallurgy in Chorzów, the Upper Silesian Narrow-Gauge Railway in Bytom and the Bread Museum in Radzionków. The two Katowice estates are still lived-in workers' colonies, not open-air museums.

Did you know?

Every year since 2010, on a chosen Saturday in June, the route holds Industriada, its own festival, with events in more than 40 heritage sites in nearly 30 towns. The organisers describe it as the only festival of its kind in Central and Eastern Europe and the second-largest industrial heritage festival in Europe. Many machines along the route still work: you can hear engines humming and machinery clattering, and feel the chill of the underground.

Tripto tip

You cannot cover the route in one day – pick a theme. For a weekend underground, combine Tarnowskie Góry with Zabrze (the Silver Mine, the Black Trout Adit, Guido and Queen Louise). For architecture and the atmosphere of the mining estates, half a day in Nikiszowiec and Giszowiec is enough, and beer lovers can follow the Tychy – Żywiec stretch. Each site has its own opening hours, tickets and rules, so check them separately on the sites' own websites or on the route's portal. The most popular every year are the Guido and Silver mines, the Bread Museum in Radzionków, the Tradition Park in Siemianowice Śląskie and the brewery museums – in high season it is worth booking ahead.