How to move “Corn”

Smolny is ready to discuss the transfer of the "gas scraper"

St. Petersburg Governor Valentina Matvienko said she was ready to consider "other options" for a location for the Okhta Center. Earlier, the St. Petersburg authorities refused to discuss the issue of moving the 400-meter tower from the Okhta Cape. Declaring that there are no...

St. Petersburg Governor Valentina Matvienko said she was ready to consider "other options" for a location for the Okhta Center. Earlier, the St. Petersburg authorities refused to discuss the issue of moving the 400-meter tower from the Okhta Cape.

Stating that no official decisions have been made by the city to start construction of the Okhta Center, Matvienko expressed confidence that “the vast majority of citizens understand that the city needs new projects that will attract investors,” and that “there are no hot disputes here.” ". The dispute is only around the place - whether to build a tower behind the Bolsheokhtinsky bridge?

“We are not going to break anyone over the knee,” Matvienko said, “and we are not going to push through this topic, we are studying public opinion. And I believe that a scenario is possible when we offer Gazprom other options that are possible for the construction of such major investment project.

In December, the governor will meet again with city defenders and is waiting for proposals for this meeting on where the tower could be built.

The search for a solution to this issue has been going on for a long time - however, it was exclusively one-sided. And city defenders, and cultural figures, and opposition politicians, and ordinary citizens who love their city, urged them to choose another place for a skyscraper - if Gazprom really wants to build it. The list included a site near the cable-stayed (Obukhov) bridge, Pulkovskoye highway near the airport, a site near the Varshavsky railway station, the Kolpino area and other sites.

The UNESCO World Heritage Committee demanded “to refrain from the implementation of the Okhta Center project with the declared high-altitude dominant at the chosen place” ... The answer was invariably that the place was chosen and there would be no other.

Finally, Dmitry Medvedev said that he could "offhand" suggest "a dozen other places that this tower would decorate." To which Vice-Governor Mikhail Oseevsky reminded the President that the issue of building the Okhta Center is the prerogative of the authorities of St. Okhtinsky cape. The executive director of the Okhta Center, Alexander Bobkov, answered Medvedev directly: “It is impossible to transfer the construction site.” (Characteristically, the press service of the Okhta Center responded almost exactly the same, if only in a milder form, to Matvienko's current statement.)

And here is an unexpected twist. However, now the city defenders are waiting for concrete steps from the governor. For example, the cancellation of last year's resolution of the city government on the high-altitude "deviation" for the Okhta Center. And appeals to professionals who would offer and calculate several options for placing a skyscraper - so that these options can then be discussed with the interested public.

If these steps are taken, then Smolny really wants to solve one of the most acute problems in St. Petersburg. If everything is limited to words, it means that we are talking only about an advertising break in the construction process.