In the city of Pushkin, not far from the Tsarskoye Selo Museum-Reserve, it was planned to build a new residential area. A closed competition was held for the development project with the involvement of twelve architectural firms, and in an extremely short time - in just a month and a half. The concept, developed by the "Archstroydesign" workshop under the leadership of Alexey Ivanov, was included in the top three finalists.
An area of irregular elongated shape, which resembles an inverted women's boot, is located near the Alexander Park with the Catherine Palace and the Tsarskoye Selo complex. On the south side, the site adjoins the Kuzminskoye highway. The Kuzminka River flows slightly away from its northern border. The old buildings of the former station have been preserved on the territory given over for new development. At the end of the 19th century, the first Imperial Pavilion was built here to receive trains arriving at Tsarskoe Selo. After a fire in 1911, a new building was built on the site of the burnt pavilion, designed by the architect Vladimir Alexandrovich Pokrovsky. Gradually, it was overgrown with production facilities, which were used for the repair and maintenance of the imperial staff. In Soviet times, the station was renamed into the Uritsky pavilion, and since 1930, the Pushkin Track Repair and Mechanical Plant has been operating here.
Most of the surviving factory buildings, according to the competition assignment, have been designated for demolition. A part is supposed to be reconstructed for a new function. In the project of Aleksey Ivanov, the existing buildings occupying the entire southern side of the site are included in the complex, adapted for administrative and office buildings, and the large "Imperial steam locomotive shed" - for a public complex.
Most of the territory is occupied by residential areas that form semi-enclosed green courtyards, which are deployed towards the central park, which crosses the entire site from north to south. The living environment is completely free of traffic. The road for him is organized along the perimeter of the site. The author of the project, Aleksey Ivanov, compares this ring road with an earthen rampart, which was used for medieval towns. Parking spaces are also located on the periphery. Thus, the most comfortable and safe space is formed inside. Aleksey Ivanov admits that such a fashionable, but already slightly annoying topic of neighborhoods, turned out to be the most suitable for this site and the historical environment. “All master plans, developed at different times for Tsarskoye Selo, supported the hippodam mesh, preserving the historical structure,” explains Ivanov. - We also took this path, but penetrated into the environment from a slightly different angle, which was dictated by the boundaries of the site and the system of streets. The difference was no more than 18 °. And this fully corresponds to the St. Petersburg building grid. It turned out to be a kind of metropolitan penetration into the outskirts."
Special attention is paid to orientation and interaction with the environment in the project. So, the main park axis of the district coincides with the direction of the St. Petersburg - Moscow highways and opens, on the one hand, to Aleksandrovsky Park and the Imperial Railway Station, on the other, to the Kuzminka River floodplain, towards which the development of a recreational zone is possible.
Slender rows of residential buildings with a decrease from the periphery to the center from six to four floors are cut by a water channel. The canal with landscaped and landscaped banks, humpbacked pedestrian bridges, rows of street lamps and graceful benches in the St. Petersburg style originates from the walls of the reconstructed "Locomotive Barn", and ends almost at the northern border of the site. This solution was proposed by the authors as an alternative to the usual pedestrian boulevard. Now on the site of the proposed canal there are dead-end and very long unused railway tracks. They are planned to be dismantled, the soil will be reclaimed, and the canal, repeating the rectilinear trajectory of their movement, will be made a landscape monument of the history of the place. For the same purpose, it is proposed to install on the rails raised above the water a restored repair track machine assembled at the Pushkin plant in Soviet times.
The concrete channel of the canal is surrounded on both sides by a green park, thematically divided into several parts: a children's area with play areas, a sports area, as well as exotic and regular parks. The pedestrian embankments of the canal lead to a semicircular central square located in the wider northern part of the site. On the square, covered by a half-ring of bushes and trees, there are fair tents, a children's center, and recreation areas. Further north-west, beyond the residential area, there is a place for a school with an attached kindergarten. They have their own closed area and a sports complex. The school serves as a kind of buffer zone between residential buildings and the warehouse area adjacent to the site from the west. At the same time, the school playgrounds and sports grounds face the river and the forest, providing schoolchildren with a good view.
The main public space is organized on the side of the Kuzminskoye Highway near the walls of the "Locomotive Barn". In addition to the reconstructed historical buildings, it is proposed to place a small chapel in the pseudo-Russian style characteristic of the early 20th century on the wide Cathedral Square. Behind it is a site for the construction of residential buildings with loft-style apartments. This fragment of modern building responds to the existing industrial environment, trying to enter into dialogue with it. But, exploiting its scale and shape, instead of the traditional brown brick, the designers suggested using a more neutral gray-green hand-molded brick.
Quite different - residential areas in the depths of the site. There is nothing of the industrial past in them. At the same time, modern motives coexist with the so-called "historicism". The competition task required the stylistic correspondence of the new district to the historical architecture of St. Petersburg, which on the whole did not contradict the quarter master plan developed by Alexey Ivanov. However, “historicism” appears in the project only along the perimeter of the site. Here, on the street facades of houses, one can see characteristic classical divisions, horizontal cornices, pitched roofs, and an authentic three-color palette. The dry historical facades are contrasted with modern courtyards - with large window openings, glazing to the floor, deep loggias and extended balcony railing, offset piers and lintels, ledges of the upper floors. Each separate block is solved individually with small but noticeable accents.
The combination of seemingly incongruous styles forms a diverse typing environment. According to the author, the rationality of the approach, the sequence of construction (four stages of development are proposed) and typification are the benefits that make this project quite feasible. However, Aleksey Ivanov admits that he does not really count on implementation. The project froze. As usual, the matter has not gone beyond the competition.
