The builders of Tabakov’s school are boarding up the walls of neighboring residential buildings with railroad ties. ?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /** The project for an underground complex beneath Pushkin Square has been rejected by the expert council under the city’s chief architect. And what sometimes lies behind a showy love of children and animals. <**/o:p></span> It so happens that on our program we very often talk about construction scandals involving projects lobbied by theater figures. Unfortunately, in the view of these figures—a view apparently fully shared by the Moscow city government—if construction is being carried out in the interests of a famous director, then all laws and regulations cease to apply. And the residents of neighboring buildings are automatically stripped of all their rights. Today’s case is exactly that. We have already told you about the construction of Oleg Tabakov’s boarding school, which residents of Chistye Prudy strongly opposed. That school is being built by the Baltic Construction Company. Built, as the company itself claims, free of charge. In reality, to compensate it for the cost of building the school, the city allocated the company two more nearby sites for residential development—without a tender and without payment. One of them is at 8 Furmanny Lane. Also in Chistye Prudy. A prime piece of real estate: apartments here could easily sell for no less than $10,000 per square meter. And apparently, anticipating handsome profits and feeling backed by cultural heavyweights, these St. Petersburg builders have unleashed genuine construction lawlessness on the streets of Moscow. Let’s hear from attorney Tatyana Yushina, who lives and works in the neighboring building: Be*tween our buildings, according to the plan, there was supposed to be a small public garden for many years. Nothing was built for a long time, but then, as we learned, an order was issued to build the Tabakov Theater. But the Tabakov Theater is not being built on this site—a commercial project is. Our building historically consists of several sections. One half dates from the 19th century, the other from the 20th. The building stood just fine until now. Yes, it hadn’t been renovated in a long time, but it was solid nevertheless: we have walls a meter thick, our pipes had never burst, everything was normal. After the Baltic Construction Company started digging the foundation pit last year, cracks began appearing in the walls in the stairwells and in the apartments. Our foundation on one side of the building has been completely dug out. The building has started to tilt. Apparently afraid that the house would collapse and our wall would come down, they strapped the building at several levels with railroad ties. They installed a kind of brace around the house. Even after that, the building continues to lean. We’ve had another emergency. Today they opened the basement on the side facing the construction site, and there’s an open stream flowing there, undermining and simply washing away everything in its path. When the district administration head went down into the basement, everyone’s faces turned white. There’s literally a river pouring through under pressure. Our fire exit has also been completely blocked, and the building’s access to sunlight has been fully compromised. *The fears of the residents of this building are entirely understandable. Residents of practically all low-rise, older buildings in the city center live in a constant paranoid fear that their building will be declared unsafe. And in that case, the rule requiring that they be rehoused within the city center would no longer apply to them. And then—toot-tooooot—straight off to rebellious Yuzhnoye Butovo (a Moscow district that became a symbol of forced evictions and redevelopment conflicts). By then, they’ll have built nice new apartment blocks there. And just imagine: at the district administration office—the very body that should have taken the first steps to protect residents’ rights—they were told that if they didn’t leave the construction company alone and stop making trouble, they would quickly be brought to heel by being offered apartments beyond the Moscow Ring Road. As for the Baltic Construction Company itself, of course these people—fortunate enough to have been born in the same city as the president—are perfectly calm and do not understand what all the fuss is about. All the problems come from Muscovites’ impatience, the builders say. They just need to wait a little, and then things will get easier. Here is how Irina Zhubryakova, генеральный director of the Baltic Investment Company, described the situation: I *want to assure all the residents of this building that everything will be fine, that everything is under control. I would like, on the one hand, to address the residents and calm them down, and on the other hand to ask for their understanding: the faster our building is constructed, the less and less and less danger there will be to their homes. Presumably the residents should be interested in our finishing construction as quickly as possible and restoring their homes to proper condition. So that they are even better than they were before construction began. We’ll repair the facades—replaster them. Seal the cracks that exist today. Perhaps update the water supply and sewer systems in some places. If we are talking about the sewer break, the commission established that it was a sewer rupture caused by a blockage. We have undertaken, using our own resources, to eliminate this emergency situation and restore the building to normal life. To its normal condition. We will monitor these issues daily. All the permits exist; they have been submitted to the district administration and the prefecture. You know, there is a general approval procedure. The point is that any documentation is a bilateral document signed both by us and by the city. Therefore, we do not have the right to make a unilateral decision on this matter. *Let us note that Madame Zhubryakova herself admitted a violation in her interview with our program. She said they are not giving residents the documents because they concern bilateral relations between the company and the city. Perhaps she forgot that the city means its residents, not just City Hall officials. And under current regulations, not a single document related to construction may be classified or withheld from anyone who requests it. But most likely she knows the law perfectly well and is refusing to provide the necessary papers either because they do not exist, or because they were drawn up improperly. The residents, for their part, have appealed to Vladimir Resin, head of the city’s construction complex, demanding a comprehensive inspection of all BSK facilities in Moscow. We will certainly tell you about the results of that inspection. The heavily publicized project to reconstruct Pushkin Square and develop its underground space has run into its first difficulties. When it was reviewed by the joint working group of the expert council under the city’s chief architect, it emerged that the promised parking facilities—where everyone coming to Pushkin Square would supposedly be able to park—were not included. The only parking provided is what is needed for those coming to the underground shopping center. In other words, de facto, the whole thing is being undertaken not to solve the traffic situation, but specifically for the sake of a large underground mall. Surprised by such a striking discrepancy between practice and declarations, the members of the working group refused to approve the proposed project. Representatives of the Durov Theater had long complained to the city authorities that they had nowhere to keep their animals and asked for permission to build over part of the adjacent park. The authorities decided to accommodate them and asked them to submit their proposals. And just the other day, those proposals were presented to the public urban planning council under the mayor. It is a development at 3 Durov Street, with the tear-jerkingly sentimental name “Temple of Childhood.” The distinctive feature of this temple is that it is, quote, a “multifunctional office and business center with retail premises.” So that’s how the animals are to be housed. Clearly, the management of the Durov Theater understands business no worse than it understands animal training. Echo of Moscow. Urban Planning Chronicles. July 1, 2006.