Not only Moscow: why the largest country in the world is being built up with "human ant-hills"

Recently, Novye Izvestia has already devoted a lot of material to this problem, in which they compared the situation with housing construction in small Lithuania and in huge Russia. It is clearly not in favor of our country, which, as you know, is the largest state in the world in area, comparable to a continent like Australia or Antarctica. It would seem that under these conditions there are no obstacles to building houses and quarters suitable for a normal life. However, the passion for profit from the developers and the officials who give them permission is such that the so-called "human ant-hills" like mushrooms grow not only in the capital, where land is expensive by default, but also in the provinces. Blogger Maxim Slepov arrived in Stavropol and was amazed by what he saw:

“It really does exist... The famous Perspektivny residential area in Stavropol.

This is probably the worst thing that I have seen with my own eyes in terms of humanism. For example, in St. Petersburg there are houses and higher, but there the distance between them is still greater. Or here in Pushkino we have a very cramped district of O'Pushkino, but it is small itself, and on the plan of an intricate form.

But in order to do so, straight lines hundreds of meters ... This is really a prison for the population. Brick walls to the horizon, asphalt and carts. And nothing more. There are stunted playgrounds here and there, that's all. There are no people with dogs. No kids on bicycles. There are no old ladies. Stone and walls. At some point, it reminded me of Dudinka, a city on Taimyr, the beginning of the tundra: I lived there as a child. There are also yards without trees, only stones, but the houses, of course, are not so close to each other. But there it is because of nature. And now we are about a city in the very south of Russia! Around there is a resounding echo and squares of private apartments where convicts to live in Russia are accommodated.

The contrast with the old buildings in Stavropol is even more striking. It is a green city in itself, quite cozy. Low high-rise buildings are half-hidden behind the sprawling greenery of May, behind the paws of southern trees. A network of not very wide avenues and streets. Parks, squares, squares.

And there is an Industrial District, which is being built up with this kind of residential complex. At the entrance on the right hand there is a very monstrous residential complex South Fortress. And then a different kind of remake, higher and higher. The last (but, apparently, not the last) residential complex under construction is called the Russian one. There, on one patch, against the background of a monstrous shitty building, there is a fountain Russia, an exhibition "My History - Russia", a monument to Prince Vladimir and the Patriot Park. Concentration of everything Russian!

It seems that businessmen and officials are seriously trying to make fun of people as perversely as possible:

- Let's make the hulls 400 meters long!

- Come on!

- Let's make them so close to each other that you can throw a box of matches to a neighbor!

- Well, let's have fun!

- Hey, let's put up a barrier and start taking money just for the entrance!

- Aahahaa, let's do it next time!

- Come on!

And every time at the sight of something like that, exclamations are heard: they themselves buy! All by yourself!

One can only say that, apparently, this is the life of those people who buy. Probably, the savings of a conventional million rubles for a new building in such complexes outweighs all the obvious disadvantages. Probably, they do not expect a better life, one must somehow live the one that is..."

Slepov rightly assumed that this kind of construction once again testifies to the continuously growing social stratification of Russian society: in Stavropol, for example, the contrast between the normal development in which the so-called "elite" lives and the districts for everyone else is simply blatant:

“This is the historical part of the city - it is beautiful! Low-rise, often stone buildings, buried in chestnuts. Very high quality tiles, benches, ladders. Everything is pure, everything is done with the soul, with the mind. Karl Marx, Dzerzhinsky, Lenin, Central Department Store, administration, theater, square. It is not for nothing that the city won several times in the competition for the most comfortable cities in Russia.

That's the truth - a city for life, a city for a person! There are no too dense buildings, there are no wide screaming avenues, the grid of streets is made in such a way that cars spread evenly over it. Plenty of parking lots, all free. Fountains, greenery, cleanliness.

And what is it, comrades, turn out to be? The city is actually gen-tri-fi-ca-ted. No, not yet completely, as in Brazil or South Africa, but in fact it is like this: a wonderful, almost ideal noble part and a terrible, monstrously crowded area "for the simple", which I talked about yesterday. Just two different poles of attitude towards urban development!

Of course, there is still a large Soviet legacy - normally designed blocks of 3, 5 and 9 floors, in the main part of the city there are still many of them. But here and there ridiculous high-rise buildings are already growing and closer to the center.

Like this. Both fun and sad. An example of how it could be done normally for everyone. An example of how you should never do for anyone. And to our common misfortune, there is not only the first, but also the second..."

Slepov's readers added their comments:

- Here is the division according to property: to whom - the sun, air and greenery, hectares for golf courses, with rivers and ponds, and to whom - a concrete ghetto on a patch.

Abolished all Soviet standards that are not godly, hindering business. I here once compared the distance from the facades of houses in the late Soviet people and the people of the 2010s. In late Soviet times, it is at least 100 meters, and in the 2010s it became 60 meters in a regular class residential complex, and 90 meters in a business class residential complex.

- In Moscow, on Dmitrovskoe highway, a district of 40 floors was built, houses at a distance of 30 meters from each other. It’s wonderful!