A long interview of mine—very much a programmatic statement—given to Maxim Trudolyubov for his project Home: Private Housing and Private Life in Contemporary Russia.
I regret that this did not make it into my election platform. In fact, I think about this a great deal, and I am absolutely convinced that one of the most important changes our country needs is a change in its urban planning paradigm.
We live in the largest country in the world. We have land in abundance. And what is Russia today? Emptiness, with tiny pockets scattered across it, densely packed with apartment blocks. Hideous five-story buildings in small towns. Hideous nine-story buildings in medium-sized ones. And super-hideous 22-story towers in large cities.
Disgusting little hovels where normal life is impossible. And even what is called “elite housing” is the same kind of hovel.
Your child has nowhere to play. You have nowhere to keep a bicycle, and parking a car is a huge problem. You have no workshop, no basement. You have nowhere to keep a pet—a cute raccoon named Nikolai that you have dreamed of all your life. There are no “garage bands” or “garage businesses” in Russia, because people do not have garages—those convenient utility spaces right next to the home.
Your high-rise apartment building is a quiet horror in terms of maintenance and коммунальные services (housing and public utilities). It is overcrowding. It is depression. It is a garbage chute full of cockroaches.
Of course, we have villages—though not many—and the “private sector” in cities, meaning areas of detached houses. But in 95% of cases, all of this is dilapidated housing, completely unsuited to the life of a modern urban resident.
Dachas (country houses) and modern “cottage settlements” in the Moscow suburbs are also more like “additional housing,” something you have on top of your main apartment.
Russia’s cities should develop through modern, comfortable, and low-rise construction. In that kind of environment, you can enjoy all the advantages of urban life without suffering the downsides of today’s overcrowding and those sinister ghetto-like human anthills.
In short, give it a read. There are several very interesting pieces there, and this discussion itself matters for the country’s future.
Instead, when we talk about the “image of the future,” we discuss all sorts of nonsense. And yet this is exactly the most important part of that future.