NOWA HUTA was the first town in Poland to be built from scratch after the second world war. In 1947, the Polish government decided that Poland needed a very large steel plant if its economy was to expand. In February 1949 the decision was taken to site the steel plant to the east of Kraków in the region of the Pleszów-Mogiła villages. In March 1949, work started on the construction of the town, and plans for the steel plant were drawn up in January 1950. At the beginning, Nowa Huta was situated in the middle of open country, with any way of getting from there to Kraków, but on December 1st, 1949, a main road was opened which linked Kraków to the new town. In 1951 Nowa Huta merged with Kraków, to form one of its six constitutive districts at the time.
