Officials - to the Kremlin, students - beyond the Moscow Ring Road

A new quarter could be built for federal officials next to the Kremlin, Vladimir Kozhin, head of the Presidential Administration, said in an interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta . The current president is obviously in no hurry to support and continue Dmitry Medvedev’s recent initiative to move the main ministries and departments beyond the Moscow Ring Road. Moreover, he gives instructions that directly contradict not only the tasks of the former head of state, but also his election promises: experts assure that if they build a quarter for officials near the Kremlin, it will most likely be in Zaryadye, on the site of a dismantled hotel "Russia". But it was there that, before his next re-election, Vladimir Putin promised Muscovites to build a new park .

Projects of the Moscow Architecture Committee competition to develop a concept for the development of public space in Zaryadye. "Flower Glade"

Photo: mka.mos.ru

New buildings could be built for the five largest Moscow universities, but outside the Moscow Ring Road. It is planned to allocate 2 hectares to the Moscow State Industrial University (MGIU), 10 hectares to the National Research Nuclear University MEPhI, 5 hectares to the Moscow State Technical University of Radio Engineering, Electronics and Automation (MIREA), 5 hectares to the Russian Economic University. G.V. Plekhanov will receive 20 hectares. The National Research Technological University "MISiS" will also receive land, but how much is still unknown. Izvestia reported this with reference to a letter from the head of the department, Dmitry Livanov, to the Russian government. However, the Ministry of Education itself refused to clarify whether we are talking about relocation of universities or their expansion and made it clear that the issue is still at the discussion stage. “If the decision is made, it will be published,” replied the representative of the Ministry of Education and Science.

"The Hanging Gardens of Babylon"

Photo: mka.mos.ru

“There is no talk of any move from the historical buildings of the G.V. Plekhanov Russian University of Economics in the center of Moscow,” assured Vice-Rector for Administrative Affairs of the University Anatoly Govorin. “On the contrary, due to the expansion of the university’s activities and the urgent need for additional premises for educational, scientific and educational work, the possibility of constructing new facilities at two sites is being considered: in Shchelkovo (student campus with educational, residential and sports areas) and in the Domodedovo urban district (educational building, congress center, residential building for professors and teachers and dormitory for students with a capacity of up to 3 thousand people).”

MIREA, which, like MGIU, does not have a single building in the center of Moscow, reported that they want to build a dormitory for students and housing for young scientists. “We are not going to move anywhere. We are located in the South-West of Moscow. We have plenty of teaching space, but we don’t have and never have had a dormitory,” the university administration told PublicPost and clarified that so far they have not been allocated any land.

In the center is a map of Russia

Photo: mka.mos.ru

“They rushed to transport us outside of Moscow. Yes, we do have a campus project prepared by the Mecanoo architectural bureau. The project documentation for it is now being approved by Mosoblekspertiza, - Oleg Abrosimov, vice-rector of MISIS, commented on the university’s plans for the development of the property complex. - However, it is still too early to talk about moving. No one has made such a decision yet. Moreover, the scientific and technical base of the university is developing so dynamically that we will probably not even have enough space that we have planned.”

The need for any movement - both to and from the Kremlin - is traditionally explained by the government as a solution to transport problems.

The officials’ plans were commented on by scientific director of the Research Institute of Transport Mikhail Blinkin, architectural critic Grigory Revzin and coordinator of the Arkhnadzor movement Natalya Samover.

Mikhail Blinkin, scientific director of the Research Institute of Transport

When there was a competition for a project for the development of Moscow, the majority of participants (both Russian and foreign), formally fulfilling the terms of reference of the competition, indicated in the descriptive part of the project that although they undertook to design a government quarter in the Kommunarka area, they really did not like this idea . In general, many ideas were expressed, and if we talk about the location of the government quarter near the Kremlin, this could most likely be done on the site of the Rossiya Hotel or where the Military Academy is now, surrounded by a fence along Moskvoretskaya Embankment. In my opinion, there are no fundamental complaints about such plans.

But there is no need to create any illusions that Moscow’s roads will become less congested because of this. Moscow with its dense buildings (according to the international classification - Transit-oriented development, or rather Soviet type transit-oriented development) is focused on public transport. Car-oriented development type buildings are multi-storey, with a large number of local passages and luxury highways. Moscow is structured completely differently, but we want the entire prosperous part of its population to use cars - this is technically impossible. And widening the roads won't help. I hope this awareness will come over the years. But moving federal departments to any new location will, by and large, change nothing. This will make Moscow neither better nor worse.

Grigory Revzin, architectural critic

I suspect the fact is that they somehow want to get rid of the promised park on the territory of the former Rossiya Hotel. I hope that this is not the case, because such a decision directly contradicts the objectives of the city.

In a royal, imperial city, everything is in the center: the king and the boyars in the neighboring village. With such a transfer, Moscow will become hierarchized, like the Forbidden City in China. Moreover, if a government quarter appears in the center, transit through it will be impossible. And the main problem of our city is centripetal, in the radial-ring system: all flows go through the center, and that is where the busiest traffic is. If you make a restricted passage in the center, then everything is simply blocked to hell.

As for the transfer of universities, initially it was those who were governed who were going to be transferred, that is, public sector employees - the government and students. It was very predictable that the government decided not to move. If officials don't go, students will go. The program is federal; doing nothing at all will not work.

Natalya Samover, coordinator of the public movement "Arkhnadzor"

The idea of ​​building a large government quarter in close proximity to the Kremlin has been discussed many times. It can, of course, be discussed again, and the result will be the same as all previous discussions: it is impossible.

The problem is that the government quarter is a huge number of cars. Officials, visitors to departments - everyone arrives in this quarter by personal transport, a significant number of category "A" officials drive with flashing lights - this involves blocking the streets. The center of Moscow has a very inconvenient narrow road network.

Zaryadye has long been considered for the location of such a block - any Muscovite knows that access to this territory is now through narrow streets, which are already extremely congested. The appearance of a government quarter there will ensure a 100% transport collapse for the entire center of Moscow, including the government quarter itself. This is a completely meaningless idea, the repeated discussion of which will still lead to the decision that it is meaningless. The realization of the impossibility, by the way, gave rise to the idea of ​​moving such a block outside the historical part of the city. Not to mention the fact that such a concentration of officials in one place opens up an excellent opportunity for carrying out terrorist actions. Security problems are also very serious. Let me remind you that when the Presidential Administration moved to Ilyinka for the duration of the renovation, an attempt was made to close access to the historical part of Kitay-Gorod - this happened last fall and caused great protests.

So it is almost impossible to implement all this in the center of Moscow. There is another site on Sofiyskaya Embankment directly opposite the Kremlin, but there are still the same problems: transport, security and preservation of the urban environment of the center of Moscow - the government simply will not be able to build a large volume of office buildings there. There are no other large venues in the center of Moscow.

Of course, it is very easy to throw those defenseless and without lobbying resources outside the Moscow Ring Road - it may very well be students. There are campuses all over the world, and students study where they live. There are a lot of Muscovites in Moscow universities. It turns out that if you move the educational buildings outside the Moscow Ring Road, you will have to provide students with housing there. Such decisions should under no circumstances be hasty; everything needs to be carefully thought out.