The updated master plan for the development of Moscow until 2025, which shortly before the new year was considered crude and sent for unhurried revision over the next two years, unexpectedly again found itself in the center of attention of the Moscow City Duma deputies and was adopted in the second reading. The first to report this was the Vremya novostei newspaper. The reason for such a sudden activity was the appeal of the chief architect of Moscow, Alexander Kuzmin, not to delay the approval of the document, because of which many important objects are idle. Kuzmin stressed that all the necessary preparatory work on the draft general plan has already been done and the overwhelming majority of the residents' wishes to change the purpose of territories from "reorganization zones" to "stabilization zones" and vice versa have been taken into account. According to the chief architect of Moscow, now nothing prevents the city from finally adopting its master plan no later than April of this year.
The rush by officials has sparked strong protests among heritage defenders. “There are 1,500 monuments not yet registered in Moscow, but their registration is already underway,” Konstantin Mikhailov, a member of the Arkhnadzor public movement, told the Kommersant newspaper. - If we approve the general plan now, then we put at risk future monuments that may be in the construction zones. A year would be enough to solve the problem, but one or two months will not be enough. The Public Chamber of the Russian Federation also made an official statement on the need to postpone the adoption of the general plan, as reported by Vremya novostei.
In early March, the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation also opposed the construction of a shopping center near Pushkinskaya Square, according to Gazeta. Alexander Kuzmin, in response to this, did not hesitate to declare that in the new version of the project, which will soon be presented at ECOS and public hearings, there is no question of a shopping center. In an interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, the chief architect of Moscow said that the changes in the project two years ago affected, first of all, the first underground level, which will connect three metro stations.
By the way, in the same interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Kuzmin reported new facts about two other high-profile Moscow projects. In particular, in Zaryadye, where Mosproject-2 came instead of the eminent Lord Foster in February, according to the chief architect, “there will certainly be a flow from culture to hotels”. Apparently, this project will reduce not only the percentage of cultural institutions, but also the idea of a two-level solution for the entire territory of Zaryadye, which was supposed to preserve the historic streets. There are no happy prospects for the Central House of Artists, which has been living out on the Crimean embankment for the last months. In its place, according to Alexander Kuzmin, “something else will definitely be built”, and in order to find this “something else”, most likely, an architectural competition will be announced. This was reported to RIA Novosti.
Another blow to the legacy was dealt by the "profile" organization. The Moscow Heritage Committee presented a draft of the capital's law “On cultural heritage sites (historical and cultural monuments) in the city of Moscow” and a new version of the federal law “On cultural heritage sites”. Officials suggest introducing tax breaks for owners and tenants of monumental buildings, increasing sanctions for "intentional damage to a monument", up to confiscation of land plots; and also - they propose to allow the development of underground space under the monuments for the construction of parking lots. Kommersant and Gazeta write more about this.
The sweeping pre-crisis "style" of Moscow's urban planning policy is everywhere being replaced by a more economical one. So, the improvement of the capital's Arbat has been postponed until better times, Gazeta.ru writes. The reconstruction, the project of which cost the Moscow budget 18 million rubles, has so far limited itself to overhaul of the road surface. Let us remind that not long ago the city authorities planned to turn the Arbat into a “street of books” with the help of additional landscaping and 40 bronze statues of literary characters, poets and musicians.
But the Olympic construction in Sochi is unlikely to be able to stop the crisis. The problem of lack of time is much more serious - today experts have serious doubts that all the facilities necessary for the 2014 Winter Games will be completed on time. In particular, "Gazeta" writes that Sochi may well be left without several key facilities - a bobsleigh track and a complex of trampolines.
An architectural scandal threatens to erupt in another region of Russia: the Perm branch of the CAP prepared an open letter in which it severely criticized the Dutch company KCAP, which has been developing a new master plan for this city since 2007. At first, news of this leaked to blogs, and soon it was covered by the magazine "Expert". Perm architects, in particular, accuse the Dutch of abandoning the microdistrict principle of development in favor of the quarterly principle, as well as of the intention to make Perm a "compact city", i.e. build high-rise buildings only in the center and adjacent areas. Nevertheless, Perm will hardly be able to avoid the arrival of the "Varangians": on March 10, the victory of the British David Chipperfield ended the international architectural competition for the building of a new stage of the opera and ballet theater. The results of the competition and the projects presented can be found in our news feed, as well as in Kommersant.
The development of the theme of opposition to church restitution, which the prime minister suddenly “accelerated” at the beginning of the year, was an open letter from prominent figures of science and art to Patriarch Kirill, urging the head of the Russian Orthodox Church not to appropriate museum funds. The letter was posted by Nezavisimaya Gazeta, and Gazeta.ru presented a detailed analysis of the text. Earlier, employees of leading Russian museums sent a similar letter to the president. The ROC called both letters "a provocation by the bureaucrats."
Finally, the March press was not without articles about threats to the architectural heritage. Rustam Rakhmatullin's article in the "Caution Moscow" section in the Izvestia newspaper warns of another possible loss - the apartment building of Count Orlov-Davydov on the corner of Lubyanskaya Square is being rebuilt into a hotel.
Another reason, but not for concern, but only for sighs of regret, is the final demolition of the burnt ruins of the so-called. Muromtsev's dachas in Tsaritsyn. The remains of the house were demolished before the holiday: on March 7, bulldozers completed what the firefighters did not manage, and the activists who were trying to protect the house were taken to the police. Several articles are devoted to this at once - on the website of "Arkhnadzor", in "Gazeta" and other media.
Unfortunately, circumstances suggest that after the adoption of the main urban planning document of Moscow and the bill prepared by the Moscow Heritage Committee, it will become even easier to "clean up" the historical territories. And, perhaps, the main paradox of March (and, most likely, of this year as a whole) is that the economic crisis, having significantly reduced the volume of new high-quality architecture, simultaneously creates conditions for the massive destruction of the already existing high-quality environment.
