- How would you briefly describe the essence of the bureau's project proposal for the Moskva River?
- Our project is called "Future Ports" (English - ports of the future). We wanted to present a type of urban space, quite new and at the same time traditional, like St. Mark's Square. This is a space that is directly connected to the river just like this the Venetian square interacts with the lagoon. It turns out new urban centers - 11 urban and 28 regional. We called these ports “The place where the city meets the river.” We believe that there are linear objects, embankments along which you move, and there are special places where you can be on the river In addition to “Future Ports” there are other small objects in our project, but 39 ports are in fact the main elements of the structure.
In the context of your drawing parallels with Venice, I have a reasonable question: do you plan to launch any regular transport according to your project? Maybe there will be systems like vaporetto and traghetto?
- Yes of course! We understand that there are things that everyone should do in this competition: water transport, embankment improvement, and so on. We have taken into account all these necessary points. Therefore, of course, there will be water transport. For example, in the port of City, which we conventionally call "Banana Port" or "Orange Port", orange boats will appear and they will be recognizable throughout the city. These are the details. Basically, we focused on how to find places for these new centers, why they should be in exactly these places, how they will correspond to the population density, how they will solve the transport problem … That is, we wanted to figure out how to open with the help these acupuncture interventions, interventions, the entire length of the river and tie it into a single structure, into a "spine", which would become one of the urban centers.
In our proposal, the river becomes the physical linear center of the city, because all the districts and everything around it are attached to it with the help of their local centers. In such a situation, water transport should be mandatory. I even think that it should be without any competition anyway! However, it has its own peculiarity - the river is cut with the help of locks, so all these boats will be introduced in certain creeks. The city should launch transport at least where possible. For example, one of the centers we have planned - the Ukraine hotel, which we call "District Port", could easily serve this function. We know that they have their own boats, recognizable shuttles. It seems to me that it would be great if each such center has its own boat design, and then you immediately see where it comes from and where it should go.
One of the areas of detailed study was the right side of the ZIL peninsula, and this is half of the territory that you developed in 2012. What is the difference between your current approach to reorganizing this part of the city from the one taken two years earlier?
- We came to the form of the general plan even then. The first change concerns our "Planet ZIL" complex. We pushed it more out into the water and remade it for a different composition. It seemed to us that it works better this way. Today Planet ZIL is one of 11 city ports. In addition, we have comprehensively solved the entire harbor. Previously, it split into two parts, but now we have deliberately placed the buildings on both sides. The analogue is "Halfen City" (port in Hamburg - AL). We also think that there should remain a workshop in which a lot of money has been invested for innovative production. But, in addition to R&D (Research and Development - A. L.), for which not much space is currently allocated, we proposed to make a large exhibition complex. Expo, where automobile or other exhibitions can be held, while maintaining the research function. In fact, the concept has not changed much, we just, figuratively speaking, sharpened it. Of course, when you go deeper into any territory, you begin to see something that was previously unnoticed. It seems to us that now this section is forming a very clear composition, where there are three channels that converge to the "Planet ZIL". The three main streets are the red ZIL boulevard vector, the green Exhibition Boulevard and the blue one, this is the Harbor. These three stories meet in Planet ZIL, where colors are mixed.
The ZIL Peninsula was named one of the sections of the first stage of implementation … It is assumed that the entire concept of the winning project will be carried out in three stages - work until 2017, 2025 and 2035. What other short-term measures do you propose in your project?
- There are not so much short-term events as there are things that should be done, again, and without any competition - the necessary measures. First, you need to cleanse the river. To do this, you need to stop throwing everything that gets into it. We have found sources of pollution and we believe that this is a rather serious issue. It is not clear why this destructive process is still going on, and the river is constantly changing its color. We proposed the necessary measures aimed at restoring the ecosystem, so that at last there would be clean water and plants. Secondly, on the outskirts, one should still try to avoid highways along the banks of the river, not to cut it off by transport from the districts. At least where it can be avoided. Finally, thirdly, we came up with a holiday called "Celebrating the River". We decided that someday in summer there could be River Day, along with City Day. It can be a big rafting on the Moscow River, when everyone is sailing on anything: ships, boats, catamarans or refrigerator covers. The river festival, this sailing through the whole city, can be easily realized. But then, perhaps, people will understand why it needs to be cleaned.
What place does this project take in the work of the bureau? This is probably one of the most ambitious projects that you have been involved in …
- The fact is that since 2006 we have been, in one way or another, constantly involved in fairly large-scale projects dedicated to Moscow. They themselves were involved in them. These are Green River and Inventory, and participation in some similar competitions, for example, in the Big Moscow. Therefore, for us this is a completely understandable thing, although, of course, the competition for the Moscow River now occupies a worthy place among all our projects for the city. We cannot but do these projects. Despite the fact that everyone is very busy, we realized that we could not help but apply for the competition, because we saw an element of disrespect in this. Of course, we didn't think that we would make it to the final and win, we never hope for that.
In the project, we tried to be as respectful as possible to those who chose us, that is, to really do something that in any case, regardless of the results of the competition, will be included in the collection of urban planning ideas for the city and will be useful. In this sense, we are very pleased with the result, because now we know for sure that in Moscow we need to create places where the city meets the river.
You mentioned several of your major projects, including the competition for Greater Moscow … Now it seems that each of the Moscow competitions is larger than the previous one, nevertheless, to date, no such major changes have taken place in these territories. In your opinion, will the competition for the development of the coastal areas of the Moscow River be an exception?
- I would immediately separate some types of contests from others. For example, there is a competition for Zaryadye. This is a completely applied competition that just needs to be carried out. Such contests as "Big Moscow" and "Moskva River" are consultative contests, as the organizers themselves call them. They don't require implementation. This is done then in order to create a certain bank of ideas, which rather clarifies the picture of what is happening, forms the vectors along which it is necessary to develop and in the direction of which it is necessary to think. These are navigational experiments that are important for urban planning, which then only direct the movement of urban planning thought. In fact, now we are already seeing tremendous progress in reality after the competition for Greater Moscow. Although it was not an applied competition, but such a huge educational seminar! By the way, the competition for the Moskva River itself was manifested in the third seminar of "Big Moscow", when, unexpectedly for everyone, several teams found a river in the city. Although the Berlage Institute discovered it back in 2006, it did a very high-quality work led by Aurelli ("Strategic Dialectical Plan for Moscow" - AL), which, I am sure, many participants in this competition have studied. This is a student's work, but very important. I would even say that this is a landmark study that few people knew about.
Returning to the main question, feasibility is not a direct criterion for assessing what is happening. Although, without a doubt, author contests, like Zaryadye, should be implemented with full respect for the architects and with their involvement in the work. Otherwise, we get extremely shameful examples like the Mariinsky … In this sense, the competition for the Moscow River is doomed to success as the creation of a new history. It is intended to draw attention to the river, and maybe now it will become clean, accessible and active! This is the purpose of the competition.
It seems to me that its result could be the "mapping" of all concepts - that is, overlapping them one on top of the other, in order to thus create a single solution (which was promised to be done when the results were announced on December 11 - ed.). It would be nice if the Research and Development Institute of the General Plan could do such a job. Even if this does not happen, the very conduct of this competition was certainly very important.
