In Moscow, on the territory of the Winzavod Center for Contemporary Art, within the framework of the Design Territory project, an all-Russian competition for new type of kindergarten projects has started. Professional architects and designers are invited to participate in the competition, as well as students of specialized universities, - this was reported by "Moscow News". In a conversation with Sofia Trotsenko, President of the Winzavod Foundation for the Support of Contemporary Art, the publication found out that the main criteria in the selection of winning projects will be the innovativeness of visual solutions and the cost of project implementation (within 1 million rubles per child). Submission of projects will last until September 1.
The Petersburg press continues to pay attention to the appearance of the second stage of the Mariinsky Theater. According to Karpovka, the St. Petersburg architect Sergei Politin published on his website a concept for the reconstruction of the facades of the Mariinsky-2, in which the building takes on classical forms. Technically, the reconstruction is not very difficult, since “the outer shell does not depend on the bearing supports, it is actually a cladding. This means that the facade can be reconstructed painlessly for the interior,”writes the architect. In an interview with Moy District, Politin also expressed the opinion that “the fear of some architects about building in neoclassicism is completely inappropriate in St. Petersburg. There is no need to be afraid to continue building in this style, then a new architecture will appear in St. Petersburg."
Meanwhile, another interesting initiative was noticed in St. Petersburg. Taking advantage of the summer renovation of Nevsky Prospekt, which is closed for vehicles on weekends, the volunteers of the "Beautiful Petersburg" movement once again counted the number of pedestrians on it. As Fontanka wrote, the purpose of the study is to prepare proposals for improving the quality of the city's pedestrian infrastructure. By the way, The Village found out last week that regional officials supported the idea of creating a pedestrian zone on a part of Bolshaya Morskaya Street.
Continuing the topic, the observer of the Promin.ru portal pondered the prospect of creating a pedestrian zone in Novosibirsk. In her opinion, an active discussion of this issue will soon be followed by real actions on the arrangement of pedestrian spaces. The journalist also cited expert opinions. Most of them consider the creation of a pedestrian zone to be timely, but note that points of attraction for citizens should be created on it. In addition, it is important to correctly regulate traffic flows. But if the idea of creating a pedestrian street is still in the air, then the concept of a network of bike paths will be developed in Novosibirsk by October 1 of this year, Novosibirsk News was informed.
Active work on the improvement of the urban environment continues in the capital. Moskovskiye Novosti reported that Strelka Institute, together with the Moscow Urban Forum, launched an Internet project. On the website "What Moscow Wants", citizens are invited to express their ideas for the development of the surrounding space, which will serve as a basis for the projects of designers and architects. The main goal of the initiative is to establish interaction between citizens, architects, officials and businessmen. Projects of designers and architects will be presented in December 2013 at the Moscow Urban Forum, where experts will choose worthy ones for implementation.
Continuing the urban theme, we note the publication that appeared on the pages of the Internet newspaper NewsKo. The author of the article shared his vision of the situation around the former head of the Perm Bureau of Urban Projects Andrei Golovin: "Golovin is an executor, his role is purely professional and technical, but it was on him that the power of the groups waging the war for urban planning resources of Perm was concentrated." The observer comes to the disappointing conclusion that the “Golovin case” is a deliberate destruction of meanings. The risks of doing any business in Russia are outrageous. Moving innovation is even more risky. What will the city and citizens get? The logic of war and destruction of meanings does not provide an answer to this question”.
Meanwhile, NewsKo also published Andrey Golovin's opinion regarding the upcoming development of the Bakharevka district. The expert believes that due to the historically formed isolation, planned low prices for future housing and objective difficulties in creating a high-quality urban infrastructure, Bakharevka risks becoming a place with a homogeneous social structure of the population. Which, in turn, will provoke serious social problems. Golovin is also confident that such urban planning decisions "make any municipal planning meaningless and completely discredit urban planning regulation."
In Volgograd, meanwhile, public hearings were held on the draft planning of the city's central embankment, which is a monument of history and architecture. On the eve of the hearing, Vysota 102.0 news agency recalled the history of the issue. There are still no approved protection zones for the embankment, moreover, at the end of last year, the territory of the monument "The Volga River Embankment" was reduced by the Ministry of Culture of the Volgograd Region by 3 times. Before the hearings, the Volgograd public expressed fears that they could be falsified, - wrote the portal V1.ru. As a result, Interfax reported, the embankment development project was supported by a majority of votes, but public organizations demanded that the results be declared invalid.
Continuing the topic of heritage preservation, Vedomosti talked with the architect, historian and expert in heritage preservation Natalia Dushkina about the situation with the protection of monuments in Moscow. According to the expert, the general trend is that the capital is likely to return to the catastrophic situation characteristic of the times of Luzhkov. In particular, Dushkina negatively assessed the draft law on new urban regulation in protected zones, recently submitted to the City Duma on behalf of the mayor: “Sergei Semenovich proposes to exclude the Moscow City Heritage Site from the process of approving new construction in protected zones. It will only be able to work with monuments, that is, individual objects. And that space, which is infinitely valuable, it falls out of sight of an organization designed to take care of the heritage in one of the world's largest capitals. It amazes me."
The fears of another expert - about the future fate of "Red October" - were published by the Internet newspaper Cityboom. Marina Khrustaleva noted that the May approval of the project for the planning of the territory of the Krasny Oktyabr quarters went unnoticed by the press and the public, although the project involves the demolition of almost all buildings, with the exception of three buildings.
In St. Petersburg, unfortunately, the situation with the preservation of heritage is no less alarming than in Moscow. This week, "My District" talked with Pyotr Sorokin, the leader of the expedition that was engaged in excavations at Cape Okhtinsky. The expert told how invaluable are the finds of archaeologists who discovered the remains of the fortresses of Landskrona (XIV century) and Nyenskans (XVII century). Meanwhile, as you know, on June 17, the KGIOP issued an order allowing the development of 90% of the territory of the cape and thus sentencing historical and cultural monuments to destruction. However, at the end of the week, IA Regnum announced that Governor Georgy Poltavchenko would meet with archaeologists and city rights activists to discuss the fate of the Okhtinsky Cape.
