Moscow of improved quality

Harmonization should become a strategic direction for the development of the Russian capital in the coming years

Yuri Luzhkov was recently confirmed as mayor of Moscow for another term . During his reign, the Russian capital became a center of entrepreneurship and energy. The number of cars, including the most expensive brands, is constantly growing. Magnificent multi-storey buildings, offices, underground garages and transport interchanges are being built in all areas of Moscow. Luxury stores, five-star hotels, banks and representative offices of major Western firms are rapidly springing up. The size and equipment of the supermarkets located along the perimeter of the city are not inferior to any European capital. Financial flows passing through the city are comparable to the largest megacities on the planet. Theater life is richer than anywhere else in the world.

At the same time, not everything is safe and harmonious in the Russian capital, which is completely natural for any rapidly growing and rapidly changing organism. As a result of rapid transformations, trends towards disharmony have emerged, making life in the city not as comfortable as it could and should have been. Let us note several phenomena that appeared in the city during the period of rapid growth and cause the greatest concern.

The Garden Ring has become so expensive not only for visitors, but also for ordinary Muscovites that many city residents, including scientists, teachers, professors and doctors, have stopped (or almost stopped) going to the central areas altogether.

In the city center you can only stay in ultra-expensive, four- and five-star hotels, the prices of which are several times higher than in similar hotels in America and Europe. This scares off not only tourists, but also business representatives who prefer to open offices and representative offices in other places.

Pensioners living without the support of younger, wealthy relatives exist in the city on the brink of survival, something that has not happened for at least half a century. The quality of life of scientists, teachers, doctors, ordinary employees and pensioners is incomparably worse than, for example, in the last years of Soviet power.

Rising housing prices make it impossible for those who do not have it, particularly young people, to buy it in the foreseeable future.

The lack of hotels for visiting young people (so-called hostels) makes it impossible for hundreds of thousands of students from all over the world to come to Moscow, which, in theory, should be a completely natural and normal process that takes place in all other European capitals. Moscow also lacks cheap cafeterias, canteens, and the infrastructure that would allow incoming creative youth, as well as the middle class of engineers, scientists, and businessmen who open small companies, to join Moscow life. This makes Moscow a separate island in Russia and in the world. Which is extremely dangerous in the long term.

If you look at the situation strategically, all of the above abnormalities are completely normal. Moreover, during a period of rapid growth, it is generally impossible to avoid imbalances and dissonances. However, this should not and cannot continue.

The rapid growth of the Russian capital has ceased to be accompanied by a proportional improvement in the quality of life. This is clearly manifested, for example, in housing prices, which, on the one hand, are a sign of a sharp increase in the well-being of some segments of the population, but on the other hand, making their purchase impossible for the majority of Muscovites. (According to the calculations of the remarkable physicist, Professor Sergei Kapitsa, at current salaries and prices, the average Muscovite can raise money at best for one square meter per year. As a result, a two-room apartment in a “Khrushchev” in Moscow, a young family without housing, will be able to purchase pensions - and then only if prices do not continue to rise.) This situation will inevitably further increase the outflow of young professionals - the future of any city and country - abroad, despite the increase in salaries in the field of science and technology carried out by the government .

The rise in prices in Moscow far outstrips the increase in wages in the most essential expenditure components of life. The powerful increase in cash flows coming into the city is not accompanied by an increase in the standard of living of the population, and this applies to all classes of society - from pensioners to businessmen. All the great cities of the world have faced and are facing similar situations, and they can be resolved, but only if the problem of harmonization is solved in its entirety.

Harmonization, generally speaking, is incomparably easier and cheaper than rebuilding or creating something new. It takes a genius to create a Stradivarius violin, but an ordinary musician can tune this violin before a concert. However, we should not oversimplify the problem. Harmonization of the existing is not at all a simple matter.

It is up to the council of strategists under the patronage of the mayor of Moscow to decide what exactly and how to harmonize, carefully weighing proposals and programs. I will venture to make some of the most obvious proposals.

It is absolutely necessary to launch even more large-scale construction of municipal houses with inexpensive apartments, as is the case in all the largest metropolises of the world. The same applies to departmental buildings belonging to the Academy of Sciences, universities, large firms and, of course, the mayor's office. Qualified specialists - Russians or residents of other countries - should have the opportunity to settle in Moscow both permanently and for certain periods at a reasonable price. The payback of such a system will be quick. The rent-controlled system for paying for an apartment, which operates in New York, London, and Berlin, is a dynamic structure: people with low incomes settle in such apartments, and, having increased their income, pay in accordance with the city average or buy other housing.

It is necessary to create a system of hostels (cheap hotels) and dermatoria (dormitories with acceptable living conditions in them, by Western standards), so that not only Russian students study in the West, but also Western students in Russia. At the same time, a system of cheap food establishments and interest clubs should be created in the city center. An international multilingual “cauldron” of creative youth should emerge in the capital of Russia.

Today in Moscow, a city with a great intellectual tradition, it is difficult to obtain a harmonious education that includes ideas about Russian and world history, the history of art, the history of symphonic music and opera, architecture—in general, the history of culture. Although the number of specialists in each of these areas is extremely large. It is necessary to restore the tradition of free education in this area, which is key to Russia’s return to world civilization and culture after seven decades of Bolshevik rule.

Such a program, in our opinion, should be financed and coordinated by the city administration. Classes should take place in halls and university classrooms in all districts of Moscow, primarily in its center. At the same time, entry to universities for such classes should be absolutely free.

There has never been real freedom of speech in Russia, but there has always been extraordinary freedom of thought. Many issues - strange as it may seem - are impossible to discuss due to so-called political correctness in the West. Moscow should become a source of new ideas, technologies, and structures.

The effect of the city's harmonization may be no less than its rapid growth. Moreover, the possibilities for extensive expansion of the Russian capital have largely been exhausted.

In the harmonization program, the choice of those who make decisions and highlight priorities is important. Who will be the “harmonizer” will greatly determine how harmoniously millions of ordinary Muscovites will live and work there. In no case should the “Council of Strategists” consist only of heads of departments and city services, presidents of banks and firms. Along with them, it should include people who are not interested in distributing money to certain structures who care about the harmonization of the city as such. Those who with their lives have proven their devotion to Russian culture and science, Moscow and Russia. Those who will not think about personal gain, but only about the result.

As the first and completely obvious candidates, I would name director Mark Zakharov, physicist, professor Sergei Kapitsa, philosopher, academician Vyacheslav Stepin. People of such caliber and authority in Russia and the world, together with the Moscow mayor's office, must determine priorities in the harmonization of the city in accordance with the strategic importance of the task for current and future generations.

Once started, the capital harmonization program should become permanent. Only with a harmonious combination of what is being created and what already exists, Moscow can become not only one of the largest industrialized cities in Europe and not only the intellectual capital of the world, but also a city in which living is pleasant and comfortable for the vast majority of the population.

Russia needs harmonization. The whole world needs harmonization. Today, both the United States and Europe, according to the general feeling - for a variety of reasons - are not moving closer to harmony in their cities, countries and regions, but are moving away from it. And if Moscow is a leader in reorienting modern civilization towards its harmonization, the transition from extensive development to harmonization of the existing, everyone will benefit: Muscovites, Russians, and (given the scale of the Russian capital) residents of the entire planet.

Yuri MAGARSHAK