st. petersburg, russian federation

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City profile St. Petersburg, Russian Federation Nathaniel S. Trumbull Department of Geography, University of Connecticut, USA article info Article history: Received 27 December 2010 Received in revised form 4 May 2011 Accepted 5 May 2011 Available online 12 June 2011 Keywords: Post-socialist city Architectural heritage Transportation Environment abstract St. Petersburg is the Russian Federation’s second major city and arguably its cultural capital. Western influ- ences have shaped St. Petersburg’s origins and cultural life, including its architectural style and built fabric, more than any other Russian city, yet its full transition to a globalized and modern European city remains in question. St. Petersburg’s transition from Soviet central planning to market economy during the last two decades has been accompanied by dramatic economic and social upheaval, and spatial change and disrup- tion in its built environment. This profile focuses on the city’s architectural inheritance, built fabric and the rapid transformation and impending loss of the ensemble of the city’s historical center as one of the most critical issues of public discussion and heightened concern among city residents today. Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Introduction After 70 years of isolation behind the Iron Curtain, St. Peters- burg (formerly Leningrad and Petrograd) would appear to be well placed to benefit from its highly educated population, improved access to the international tourist industry, and to global capital markets. St. Petersburg’s cultural gems are world renowned and include the Hermitage Museum, Russian Museum, Mariinsky Theater (formerly Kirov), and St. Petersburg State Philharmonic. It is a city of more than one hundred other theaters and museums. The tsarist palaces of Tsarskoe Tselo, Pavlovsk and Petergof draw tourists from across the globe. The city’s research institutes were once the crown jewels of the Soviet military-industrial complex and have led in aviation, space, and shipbuilding technologies. St. Petersburg is second only to Moscow among Russian cities in receiving foreign visitors. Constantine Palace outside of the city, fully restored in 2003, frequently hosts high-level diplomatic summits and other meetings such as the St. Petersburg Interna- tional Economic Forum. The G8 Meeting was held at the palace in 2006. St. Petersburg will be a site of Russia’s winning 2018 FIFA World Cup bid. Russia’s current president and prime minister both hail from St. Petersburg, as do a disproportionately large number of Kremlin officials. Yet a city of contrasts and contradictions has emerged over the last two decades as the city’s leaders have aspired to modern urban amenities and a European standard of living. While the city’s Strategic Plan for 2004–2014 proclaims tourism to be the city’s number one financial asset, 1 15 European cities (46 worldwide) had more visitors than St. Petersburg in 2007. 2 Western visitors to the city are taken back by the immense size of the historical city and its countless palaces, carefully planned squares, and architec- tural grandeur, covering several square kilometers. They are also stunned by its crumbling infrastructure, absence of English signs (Latin spelling was added to the metropolitan signage only in early 2010), and low value in the service sector. High prices of natural re- sources have kept the exchange rate of the Russian ruble high against world currencies in the last decade, making St. Petersburg an expensive city to visit or in which to do business. St. Petersburg, together with Moscow, regularly appears in the very top tier of rank- ings of the world’s most unaffordable cities. One response to these costs is a thriving underground economy. The Western press as re- cently as the 1990s had labeled the city as the center of the Russian mafia. Petersburgers continue to appear in the world press for their engagement in piracy, computer crimes, and illegal financial machi- nations. 3 City officials’ efforts to cooperate with contemporary Wes- tern cultural institutions have not always proceeded smoothly. Such 0264-2751/$ - see front matter Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.cities.2011.05.003 Address: Department of Geography, CLAS Building, Rm 422, 215 Glenbrook Road, U-4148 University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT 06269-4148, USA. Tel.: +1 860 405 9272; fax: +1 860 486 1348. E-mail address: [email protected] 1 The city’s Strategic Plan for 2004–2014 can be viewed in Russian at www.stratplan.leontief.ru. 2 European tourist rankings are based on data compiled at www.euromonitor.com/ Top_150_City_Destinations_London_Leads_the_Way (accessed on May 2, 2011). One of the obvious obstacles for future growth of international tourism in St. Petersburg is the red tape and expense of travel visas required for most foreign passport holders to visit the Russian Federation. 3 St. Petersburg’s development cannot be separated from Russia-large tendencies. Russia’s ranking in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions index in 2010 fell to 154th place, down from its 146th place in 2009, and by far the lowest rated European country. As an example, IKEA, self-proclaimed to be one of the world’s most socially progressive companies, recently admitted that one of its own managers had paid bribes in the operation of one of its two stores in St. Petersburg. Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Cities journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/cities

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Page 1: St. Petersburg, Russian Federation

Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Cities

journal homepage: www.elsevier .com/locate /c i t ies

City profile

St. Petersburg, Russian Federation

Nathaniel S. Trumbull ⇑Department of Geography, University of Connecticut, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history:Received 27 December 2010Received in revised form 4 May 2011Accepted 5 May 2011Available online 12 June 2011

Keywords:Post-socialist cityArchitectural heritageTransportationEnvironment

0264-2751/$ - see front matter � 2011 Elsevier Ltd. Adoi:10.1016/j.cities.2011.05.003

⇑ Address: Department of Geography, CLAS BuildiRoad, U-4148 University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT 06405 9272; fax: +1 860 486 1348.

E-mail address: [email protected]

St. Petersburg is the Russian Federation’s second major city and arguably its cultural capital. Western influ-ences have shaped St. Petersburg’s origins and cultural life, including its architectural style and built fabric,more than any other Russian city, yet its full transition to a globalized and modern European city remains inquestion. St. Petersburg’s transition from Soviet central planning to market economy during the last twodecades has been accompanied by dramatic economic and social upheaval, and spatial change and disrup-tion in its built environment. This profile focuses on the city’s architectural inheritance, built fabric and therapid transformation and impending loss of the ensemble of the city’s historical center as one of the mostcritical issues of public discussion and heightened concern among city residents today.

� 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1

1 The city’s Strategic Plan for 2004–2014 can be viewed in Russian atwww.stratplan.leontief.ru.

2 European tourist rankings are based on data compiled at www.euromonitor.com/Top_150_City_Destinations_London_Leads_the_Way (accessed on May 2, 2011). Oneof the obvious obstacles for future growth of international tourism in St. Petersburg isthe red tape and expense of travel visas required for most foreign passport holders tovisit the Russian Federation.

Introduction

After 70 years of isolation behind the Iron Curtain, St. Peters-burg (formerly Leningrad and Petrograd) would appear to be wellplaced to benefit from its highly educated population, improvedaccess to the international tourist industry, and to global capitalmarkets. St. Petersburg’s cultural gems are world renowned andinclude the Hermitage Museum, Russian Museum, MariinskyTheater (formerly Kirov), and St. Petersburg State Philharmonic.It is a city of more than one hundred other theaters and museums.The tsarist palaces of Tsarskoe Tselo, Pavlovsk and Petergof drawtourists from across the globe. The city’s research institutes wereonce the crown jewels of the Soviet military-industrial complexand have led in aviation, space, and shipbuilding technologies.St. Petersburg is second only to Moscow among Russian cities inreceiving foreign visitors. Constantine Palace outside of the city,fully restored in 2003, frequently hosts high-level diplomaticsummits and other meetings such as the St. Petersburg Interna-tional Economic Forum. The G8 Meeting was held at the palacein 2006. St. Petersburg will be a site of Russia’s winning 2018 FIFAWorld Cup bid. Russia’s current president and prime ministerboth hail from St. Petersburg, as do a disproportionately largenumber of Kremlin officials.

Yet a city of contrasts and contradictions has emerged over thelast two decades as the city’s leaders have aspired to modern urbanamenities and a European standard of living. While the city’sStrategic Plan for 2004–2014 proclaims tourism to be the city’s

ll rights reserved.

ng, Rm 422, 215 Glenbrook269-4148, USA. Tel.: +1 860

number one financial asset, 15 European cities (46 worldwide)had more visitors than St. Petersburg in 2007.2 Western visitors tothe city are taken back by the immense size of the historical cityand its countless palaces, carefully planned squares, and architec-tural grandeur, covering several square kilometers. They are alsostunned by its crumbling infrastructure, absence of English signs(Latin spelling was added to the metropolitan signage only in early2010), and low value in the service sector. High prices of natural re-sources have kept the exchange rate of the Russian ruble highagainst world currencies in the last decade, making St. Petersburgan expensive city to visit or in which to do business. St. Petersburg,together with Moscow, regularly appears in the very top tier of rank-ings of the world’s most unaffordable cities. One response to thesecosts is a thriving underground economy. The Western press as re-cently as the 1990s had labeled the city as the center of the Russianmafia. Petersburgers continue to appear in the world press for theirengagement in piracy, computer crimes, and illegal financial machi-nations.3 City officials’ efforts to cooperate with contemporary Wes-tern cultural institutions have not always proceeded smoothly. Such

3 St. Petersburg’s development cannot be separated from Russia-large tendencies.Russia’s ranking in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions index in 2010fell to 154th place, down from its 146th place in 2009, and by far the lowest ratedEuropean country. As an example, IKEA, self-proclaimed to be one of the world’s mostsocially progressive companies, recently admitted that one of its own managers hadpaid bribes in the operation of one of its two stores in St. Petersburg.

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470 N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

top name Western architects such as Perrault, Foster, and Kurokawaall won international architectural competitions in the city in thepast decade, but due to a combination of shifting preferences by cityand national leaders, cost overruns, red tape, and unfulfilled contrac-tor agreements, not a single one of those projects will be completedin their original architectural design (Trumbull, 2010).

This article traces the salient features of St. Petersburg’s tsaristand Soviet legacies, and especially the two decades of its post-socialist period, with an emphasis on the city’s built fabric and afocus on ‘‘urban policy and planning’’ as in other City Profiles(Kirby, 2011). The rapid and continuing transformation of the city’shistorical center mirrors closely similar changes in the built envi-ronment of other post-socialist cities (see Alden, Beigulenko, &Crow, 1998; Golubchikov & Badyina, 2006; Hirt, 2009; Nae &Turnock, 2011; Niemczyk, 1998; Rudolph & Brade, 2005; Staddon& Mollov, 2000). Russian institutional and political realities alsoprovide a much different context for urban policy and planningas the case of St. Petersburg reveals. Much of the city’s currentplanning system endures from the Soviet period, especially thenear absence of public participation in the planning process(Golubchikov, 2004). Globalization and market pressures in thepost-socialist context itself may show similar patterns of citydevelopment among post-socialist large cities; however, place-bound specificities, such as the vertical power hierarchy createdby President Putin (now Prime Minister) have provided the frame-work for corruption to flourish at the municipal level in Russia (seeKramnik, 2005). City planners and managers in St. Petersburg as aresult have also left themselves open to much criticism in the eyes

Fig. 1. Zoning map of St. Petersburg. Source: NIPT

of city residents concerning the planning, financing, and manage-ment of the city’s physical infrastructure and built fabric. As a re-sult, the quality of life in the city has not significantly improvedfor the majority of its inhabitants; residents feel threatened thatthey are losing the city’s (and their own) identity, as local issuesare overshadowed and undermined by lofty goals of joining theglobal market and seeking world city status. In order to pursuethe latter, city government has opened the city’s doors to largeinvestment projects and a series of megaprojects in order to bringeconomic revitalization to the city (Golubchikov, 2010).

Setting and historical background

St. Petersburg is located in the northwestern region of the Rus-sian Federation and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. It isthe second largest city in Russia and the fourth in Europe, behindLondon, Paris and Moscow. With a population of 4.6 million it isthe most northerly million-resident city in the world. Situated onthe delta of the Neva River, which flows into the Gulf of Finland,St. Petersburg is considered to have a moderate climate by Russianstandards. The city’s proximity to Western Europe has had a signif-icant impact on its cultural development and its economic activi-ties, including maritime trade, with Western Europe. The cityextends over 1.4 thousand square km, spreading out from the NevaRiver and its 42 delta islands. The Neva flows 74 km from LakeLadoga (Europe’s largest lake) through the city and there are 66other rivers, 38 canals, and 10 lakes associated with the delta;

s General’nogo plana Sankt-Peterburga, 2010.

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Fig. 2. Map of 18 administrative regions (rayony) of St. Petersburg.

Fig. 3. Palace square and hermitage museum (former winter palace).

N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 471

water represents more than 10% of the city’s footprint (Petrostat,2008, p. 13; see Fig. 1).

St. Petersburg and Moscow share the status of being the onlyurban federal subjects in Russia. The city is also an autonomous lo-cal authority administrative unit (munitsipal’noe obrazovanie),which gives its leaders relative independence and flexibility in itsallocation of finances. The administration’s head, the governor,has been appointed by the Russian president since 2005. The cityis divided into 18 administrative districts (see Fig. 2). Within those

districts, there are also 111 small municipalities (munitsipalitety ororgany mestnogo samoupravlenia), though their function is unclear.Leaders of the municipalities are elected, but they depend finan-cially on city officials who are appointed by the governor, and asa rule, the municipalities do not have an impact on urbandevelopment.

No other city in Russia has experienced so many name changes,first as St. Petersburg (1703–1914), Petrograd (1914–1924), Lenin-grad (1924–1991) and then again as St. Petersburg (widely known

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Fig. 4. UNESCO World Heritage Site map of protected sites in St. Petersburg application, accepted by UNESCO in 1990.

Fig. 5. Photos of the historical center and the Neva River. St. Isaac’s Cathedral, statue to Peter the Great by sculptor E. Falconet, with Neva River in foreground.

472 N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

as Piter by Russians) in September 1991. The city has acquiredmany images through the years. Peter the Great called it the ‘‘win-

dow on West,’’ Lenin called it ‘‘cradle to the Revolution’’ (‘‘kolybel’Revolutsii’’), and after the 900-day siege of WWII it was called the

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Fig. 6. Water bodies (including rivers and canals) of St. Petersburg. The city’s center is based on an extensive network of canals which lead to the Neva River. The city has atotal of 580 bridges.

Fig. 7. Moika River in city center.

N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 473

hero city (‘‘Leningrad – gorod-geroi’’). In the chaotic and tumultuous1990s it was often referred to as ‘‘bandit’s Petersburg’’ (‘‘banditskyPeterburg’’). One image that has endured through all the social andeconomic changes is St. Petersburg as the ‘‘northern’’ cultural cap-ital of Russia and as its ‘‘open air museum’’ (Goscilo & Norris, 2008;Strel’nikova, 2003). Its historical center and outlying palaces werelisted as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1990 and the city con-tains one of the largest World Heritage urban sites (see Fig. 3and Fig. 4). At the same time, drastic changes taking place inpost-socialist St. Petersburg in the 21st century are beginning tochallenge that designation.

Evolution of the city’s social and built fabricA relatively young European city, St. Petersburg was founded in

May 1703 by Peter the Great, the tsar reformer, who was deter-mined to reform, that is Europeanize, Russia (Kliuchevsky, 1993).Through his reforms Peter sought to establish Russia as an equalpartner among European countries. One of the key aspects of hisreform policy was to provide Russia with year-round access tothe sea through a major port city. To gain access to the BalticSea, however, Peter the Great had to declare war on Sweden whichcontrolled the territory at that time. After Sweden’s retreat, Peterbuilt his new city on the banks of the Neva River (Avseenko,

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Fig. 8. Peter and Paul Fortress with Never River in foreground and recent high-rise construction visible in background.

474 N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

1993). While abroad in England and Holland, Peter also recruitedmany skilled specialists, among some of Europe’s best architecturaltalents – Leblond, Trezzini, Rastrelli, Quarenghi, Mattarnovi, Schlu-eter, Fontana, Schaedel, Gerbel, Michetti, Feldten – to return withhim to Russia. Peter sought for St. Petersburg to be a planned city,‘‘one embodying all that was new in architecture and design’’ (Ba-ter, 1976, p. 2).

Dutch planning, especially the example of Amsterdam, servedas the model for St. Petersburg. The planned urban form wouldbe the opposite of old Russian cities whose street patterns wererandom and without large squares and avenues. Peter introducedthe so-called ‘‘red line,’’ which prohibited the protrusion of build-ings onto street space in order to achieve architectural uniformity.Strict directives organized the built fabric of the city and included:(1) the creation of a well-built, modern city, with straight streetslined with dense brick houses, and large gardens; (2) the incorpo-ration of waterways such as the Neva River, canals, and channelsinto a general plan (see Fig. 5 and Fig. 6); and (3) the requirementthat all buildings conform to strict architectural specifications(Luppov, 1957, pp. 23–24; see also Fig. 7 and Fig. 8). The city wasofficially proclaimed the new capital of Russia in 1713. In 1716Jean Baptiste Alexander Leblond became its chief architect andworked closely with government officials of the Russian statewho were now organized into 12 ‘‘colleges’’ or ministries, housedin the building of its same name today (see Fig. 9). The cityemerged ‘‘as a large scale exercise in absolute royal power’’ (Dlu-hosch, 1969, p. xxiv). At the same time the new city had an enor-mous influence on implanting a new planning tradition andculture in other cities in Russia by introducing new ways of orga-nizing public services, municipal government and city manage-ment (French, 1995; Luppov, 1957).

After Peter the Great, the so-called ‘‘Age of Empresses’’ followed,a period that impacted the city’s built fabric significantly. It is oftennoted in the literature that ‘‘the frame of St. Petersburg is Peter’s,but the gold garlands and colorful decorations are the legacy ofthe empresses’’ (Dluhosch, 1969, p. xxvii). Under the reign of Cath-

erine the Great, when the architectural style of academic classicismbecame popular, the city was transformed ‘‘into a large and elegantmetropolis vying in beauty and excitement with the other large cit-ies of the continent’’ (ibid.). The city soon became the center of theRussian Enlightenment. Peter founded the Naval Academy, Acad-emy of Sciences, first national scientific museum, and first publiclibrary (Dianina, 2008; Egorov, 1969). During the second half ofthe 18th century, a wider range of cultural and educational institu-tions emerged, including the Academy of Arts, the University, theObservatory, and the Institute of Geography. St. Petersburg becamethe birthplace of Russian secular literature with such famousnames as Lomonosov, Trediakovsky, and Kantemir. Their traditionswere later continued by other such brilliant talents as Pushkin, Go-gol, Dostoevsky, Bely, Akhmatova, Brodsky and others in the 20thcentury. Collectively those literary works came to be called ‘‘thePetersburg(er) Text’’ (Toporov, 2003). The city proved to be a fruit-ful place in many other cultural realms. The composers Tchaikov-sky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Glinka, and Shostakovitch all worked inthe city. St. Petersburg itself became a cultural and literary text(see also Buckler, 2005). Speaking in modern terms of globaliza-tion, if the latter is conceived as an exchange of economic, politicaland cultural practices, then the process could be described as ‘‘theinterpenetration of cultures and forms of life’’ (Appiah, 1998, p. xi).Undoubtedly St. Petersburg in this context serves as an example ofglobalization of the early 18th century, as Peter the Great’s goalswere clearly driven by his global visions of a multifunctional citywell positioned both in Russia and in Europe.

The urban industrialization of the late 19th and the beginning of the20th centuries

St. Petersburg was considered one of Europe’s more powerfulindustrial regions (Ruble, 1990), a recognized financial center bythe late 19th and early 20th centuries (Axenov, Brade, & Bondar-chuk, 2006), and in the context of 19th century Europe, St. Peters-burg is viewed by some observers as a world city (Knox, 1997, p.22). The industrialization of that period shaped the social processes

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Fig. 9. The 400 m-long ‘‘Building of Twelve Colleges’’ (on right of photo), built by commission of Peter the Great, and now part of St. Petersburg State University, was designedto house the 12 sections of the Petrine-period government.

N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 475

of the city. A steady in-migration of peasants in search of work re-sulted in high population growth and overcrowding. The numberof factory workers increased from about 35,000 in 1867 to200,000 by 1913 (Bater, 1976, p. 385). The city was the eighth larg-est city in the world by population in 1900 (Chandler, 1987). Lowliving standards, in comparison with other European capital cities,and a wet climate caused continued epidemics and high deathrates. Zoning regulations, unlike in the 18th century, were weak-ened under the pressures of industrialization, and as a result, sev-eral large factories came to be located in central areas of the city.The industrialization process in St. Petersburg, unlike in otherEuropean metropolises, did not have a pronounced suburbaniza-tion stage (Bater, 1976).

The high density of the city center resulted in intensive devel-opment on the right embankment of the Neva River and especiallyon the Petersburgskaya Storona. This district developed into ahighly populated commercial area with the notable architecturalstyle Moderne. The newly constructed stone Troitsky (Trinity)bridge, designed by Gustave Eiffel (of Eiffel Tower fame) becamethe longest across the Neva River at 582 m, connecting the Peters-burgskaya Storona to the center (Avseenko, 1993). Municipal gov-ernment and the City Duma (city council) made efforts to improveliving conditions by providing better municipal services, such asimproved water supply management (French, 1995). A street-rail-way system was introduced, and together with a new water supplysystem, they were considered by the municipal government to beprofit-making by 1910. Development of public transportation inSt. Petersburg was rather slow and the first electric tram ran onlyin 1907. In 1914 most of the tramlines in the city outskirts werestill horse-drawn (Bater, 1976; French, 1995).

Petrograd and Leningrad, the Soviet CityThe events of the First World War, Bolshevik Revolution, and

3 years of Civil War caused a large migration of Petrograd residentsto the countryside. In 1917, Petrograd had 2.5 million residents; by

1920, only 722,000 remained (Bater, 1980, p. 21). In the wake ofthe October Revolution, the national capital was transferred toMoscow in 1918. Selective physical change came to the built fabricof Leningrad during the first decades of Soviet rule. Mass national-ization of private property including land followed, making theState not only responsible for city planning, but also giving it therole as the sole land-allocator and developer. With the disappear-ance of a free market in property, urban land lost its value andwas distributed for industrial and residential needs, as well as forpublic space such as large parks, gardens, sports stadiums, andmemorials. Functional changes included the conversion of pri-vately owned structures into public spaces. Many famous St.Petersburg palaces after the Revolution became cultural centers,museums, sanatoriums, movie theaters, or offices for city officials.Under Bolshevik leadership, an antireligious campaign also led tomany churches, cathedrals, monasteries and convents beingclosed. In the worst cases, they were entirely demolished; otherswere converted into a range of cultural and athletic facilities(including swimming pools), or became storage facilities. WhileMoscow-based architects tried to take a radical route in renewingand modernizing that city’s built form, Leningrad-based architectsstrongly believed in the city’s classical tradition in developing theirown architectural solutions (see Ol’, 1975; Suzdaleva, 1991). St.Petersburg displays today many masterpieces of the early Sovietarchitecture school of Constructivism (L. Il’in, I. Fomin, N. Trotsky,A. Belogrud, S. Serafimov, A. Gegello, D. Krichevsky). Those Sovietarchitects who incorporated the Petersburger classical traditionin their architectural approach are known as part of the ‘‘Lenin-grad’’ architectural strategy. City districts bordering the centralones were developed in the style of Stalin’s classicism.

According to the General Plan of 1936, the city administrativecenter was to be moved southward several kilometers along Mos-kovsky [International at that time] Prospect. The plan was neverrealized and the administrative center remained in the historicalcenter. Development of heavy industry was prioritized over new

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Population (x1000) of St. Petersburg by Year

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

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6000

1764

1845

1914

1931

1948

1965

1982

1999

Population

4300

4400

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1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

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1997

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1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

20

0420

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0820

09

Fig. 10. The city population reached five million by 1990. Sharp declines in city population are visible during the First World War and Civil War (1918–1921) period, SecondWorld War, and the post-socialist period beginning in 1991. An erosion of level of health care in the 1990s and sharp drop in new families with children accounted for thedecline of the post-socialist period. In 2007, the life expectancy for men in St. Petersburg was 64 years and 75.4 for women (Petrostat, 2008, p. 13); both figures are low byEuropean standards. Source: Petrostat, 2010, and NIPTs General’nogo plana Sankt-Peterburga, 2010.

4 Today a total of 2400 ‘‘khrushchevki’’ structures with a total of 9 million squaremeters (or about 10% of the total housing stock) are left in the city; a new renovationprogram (renovatsiia khrushchevok) to replace the ‘‘khrushchevki’’ has begun, but willtake years to complete (Vishnevsky, 2006, 2008).

476 N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

housing, whose shortage became critical. Single flats in residentialhouses typically became multi-family occupied (kommunalki). Thecity’s population increased steadily, rising from 1.3 million to 3.1million between 1929 and 1939 (Ruble, 1990, pp. 41–45; see alsoFig. 10). The 900-day siege of Leningrad, from 1941 to 1944, ledto a sharp population decrease due to war casualties, evacuationand starvation. There were only 639,000 inhabitants remaining inthe city by the end of the second winter’s blockade (Salisbury,2003). With the end of the Second World War an inflow of ruralin-migrants followed; they continued to come to the city in steadynumbers (annually in the 20,000–40,000 range) well into the1980s (Ruble, 1990, pp. 49–51).

Extensive reconstruction after the war also followed. While thehistoric city center suffered relatively minor damage, the historicpalaces of the city’s outskirts, including the palaces of Pavlovsk,Pushkin, and Petergof, were almost fully destroyed by the war.Reconstruction in the city center and outlying palaces became animportant goal of national and city leaders. In the immediatepost-war period, the city’s 1947 General Plan included suchlarge-scale projects as construction of the metro, a new airport,and expansion of the port.

The Soviet Union’s military-industrial complex established alarge presence in Leningrad in the post-war period. In the 1950s,Soviet party leaders sought ‘‘the reorientation of the Leningradeconomy around technologically specialized industrial production’’(Ruble, 1990, p. 61). By the mid-1970s the city was leading thecountry in introducing new technologies in construction and pro-duction. During this period 10% of all Soviet export machinery,52% of all turbines, 52% of all generators, and 26% of all printingfacilities were produced in Leningrad (Ruble, 1990, p. 64). If inthe early post-war years rural in-migrants were sent to Leningradto reconstruct the city and its economy, in the 1970s in-migrantsbegan to come for educational and vocational purposes. Neverthe-less, quotas for the so-called ‘limitchiki’, in-migrants who came towork at large factories and other large projects (such as the metroand anti-flood dam projects), were established. By the end of thesocialist era 70% of the city’s population had not been born there(Axenov et al., 2006, p. 35). As elsewhere in the centrally plannedeconomies, the state sought – largely unsuccessfully – to controlin-migration into its cities (Boren & Gentile, 2007). Leningrad re-mained in desperate need of housing and the city became infamousfor its communal apartments, especially in its historic center. In

the early 1950s an average of 3.3 families lived in each Leningradapartment (Shaw, 1978, p. 189).

Soviet general plans required the city to grow in its outskirtsrather than in its center, leaving the historical center largely un-touched. Under Khrushchev, in the mid-1950s, a housing campaignwas launched nationwide to construct residential buildings in newdistricts of Soviet cities, significantly expanding the housing stock(French, 1995). The program would last until 1970. These buildingsincluded the five-story ‘‘Khrushchevki’’ and later, with the introduc-tion of industrialized constructing technologies, superblocks, ormassive buildings made out of prefabricated concrete panels.4 Thelack of aesthetic appeal and monotony caused mockery in films(e.g. Ironia sud’by, ili s legkim parom!) and made people refer to suchstructures as ‘‘boxes’’ (‘korobki’). Leningrad grew in its outskirts,forming vast grey monotonous microdistricts (mikrorayony), whichbecame bedroom suburbs (spalnyie rayony), with large (and typicallypoorly landscaped) open spaces between massive buildings, offeringlimited consumer, health, educational and cultural facilities. Themicrodistricts were intended to include employment and recrea-tional opportunities, but in reality residents commuted long dis-tances through the city. The city came to rely heavily on anextensive public transportation of underground metropolitan, tram-ways, streetcars, trolleybuses and buses. Fares were inexpensiveand the number of passengers doubled between 1950 and the early1970s (Ruble, 1990, p. 78). While the problem of residential high den-sity in the city center was relieved by moving residents into new dis-tricts in the city outskirts, large retail stores and cultural sites werestill closely concentrated within the city’s historic core and ‘kommu-nalki’ were destined to survive well into the post-socialist era.

Post-socialist St. Petersburg

Following the collapse of one-party Communist rule, municipalelections in Leningrad led in 1990 to the rise of the city’s first dem-ocratically elected mayor, Anatoly Sobchak. After a city-wide refer-endum in 1991, he returned the city’s name to St. Petersburg.Sobchak’s administration sought to revitalize the city as an

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Table 1Trend of foreign direct investment in St. Petersburg. Petrostat, 2009, p. 194.

Year 1995 2000 2005 2006 2007 2008

FDI in million USD 157.5 1159.9 1417.1 5254.8 6284.0 5927.5Great BritainGermanyCyprusBelorusUnited StatesFinlandSwitzerlandOther

Fig. 11. Country of origin of Foreign Direct Investment in St. Petersburg, Petrostat(2009, p. 194). FDI from Cyprus is widely considered to be returning capital flightthat originally had come from Russia during the 1990s.

N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 477

important trade and finance center, transportation gateway to andfrom Europe, and multi functional post-industrial urban center(Axenov et al., 2006).5 New national economic policies of priceliberalization and privatization led to disruptive social restructuringin the city. A handful of the population had benefited from the re-forms, but the vast majority was left impoverished and disillusioned.High levels of unemployment ensued. Many people, if not unem-ployed, went unpaid at work for months, and were forced to find sec-ond or even third jobs. Toward the middle of the 1990s thecollapsing economy in the city reached its nadir and inflation,including months of hyperinflation, began to subside. Many cityresidents who had lost their jobs in industry began to find new workin the service sector and retailing, which grew rapidly after decadesof consumer goods shortages during the Soviet period (though St.Petersburg and Moscow were traditionally better provisioned thanother urban centers of the Soviet Union).

Widespread commercialization and privatization resulted insignificant changes to the functional use of the city’s non-residen-tial building stock. Many educational, scientific, and cultural non-profit institutions began to lease or sublet space in their buildingsto emerging private firms in order to pay their employees.Throughout the 1990s wealthy individuals and private firms pur-chased residential dwellings in the city center to remodel themeither as elite residential homes or as new office spaces. Communalapartments in this way began to be transformed into individualapartments.6 Buyers typically purchased communal apartments inthe city center in exchange for multiple individual apartments inthe city’s outskirts. Other widespread changes involved the conver-sion of basements and ground floors in the city center into commer-cial sites, such as small retail outlets, services, cafes and restaurants.Large state-owned retail outlets in the city center went through aprocess of fragmentation; multiple retail owners came to rent spacewithin a single large building, e.g. the stores Passazh and GostinyDvor leased their most desirable store space to multiple privateretailers. Food stores and bakeries located in central city areas, asa rule, changed their profile and use with new owners, and afterremodeling, became yet another clothing or jewelry store. Suchwell-known Soviet food stores as Okean on Sennaia Square, Ryba

5 Sobchak’s staff included many future leaders of the country, including RussianPrime Minister Vladimir Putin. There has been a consistent post-Soviet record ofhaving highly placed officials who are from St. Petersburg, including RussianPresident Dmitry Medvedev, in the Kremlin.

6 Approximately 200,000 communal apartments remained in the city in 2010. Seehttp://zaks.ru/new/archive/view/76188 (last accessed on May 2, 2011).

on Nevsky Prospect, and eventually the famous Yeliseyevsky storealso on Nevsky Prospect, vanished.7

The process of privatization of the city’s retail trade and cater-ing enterprises occurred at a pace in St. Petersburg faster than inother cities in Russia (see Axenov et al., 2006; Bater, 1996) withthe exception of Moscow (Alden et al., 1998; Argenbright, 1999;Makhrova & Molodikova, 2007; Medvedkov & Medvedkov, 2007).The real estate market flourished and real estate prices in the citycenter rose rapidly. As in other post-socialist metropolises (see An-drusz, 2006; Hirt, 2006, 2008; Keivani, Parsa, & McGreal, 2002;Sykora, 2005), globalization of commercial and tertiary sectors oc-curred. Foreign Direct Investment in the city grew 10 times be-tween 1995 and 2005, and then another four times between2005 and 2008 (see Table 1 and Fig. 11). Foreign chain retailers,such as Benetton, Sisley, Adidas, Yves Rocher, as well as foodchains, e.g. McDonalds, Subway, and Pizza Hut began to openstores in the city center and eventually spread to the city outskirts.A wide range of banks appeared, including the Dresdner Bank, theBanque Nationale de Paris, and Citibank. FDI into the city in 2008was almost 40 times higher than it had been in the mid-1990s.In later years, global automobile makers, e.g. Toyota, Nissan, GMand Hyundai, were invited to open car assembly plants underfavorable tax rules either within city limits or in the adjacentLeningrad Oblast (creating the ‘‘Russian Detroit’’ considered to beone of the most successful of the city’s strategic projects, accordingto city officials, Vishnevsky, 2010). Those factories and other indus-trial enterprises with production sites in the city center were relo-cated as the price soared on the land on which they had stood fordecades.8

Turn of the millennium and land-use changes in city centerWith sharply higher prices of natural resources on the world

market, Russia’s national economy set a new pace of growth atthe turn of the millennium. St. Petersburg’s city budget and privateinvestment benefited handsomely. City officials made clear theirvision for the city’s future as a global world city around science,technology, construction, and culture in their tricentennial cele-bration speeches in 2003 (www.spb300.ru). City leaders soughtnew investment seemingly in all spheres (Golubchikov, 2010). Sev-eral factors influenced new development in the city: (1) an influxof investment, predominantly Russian (from Moscow), but also for-eign; (2) a flourishing real estate market and rising prices; (3) anew commodification of the city’s heritage; and (4) opportunity-led planning practices (between only two actors - municipal gov-ernment and developer) and its consequences (Tasan-Kok, 2006).A related factor has been the widespread use of very low paidworkers from former Soviet republics (gastarbeitery) as migratorylabor for those projects (Belovranin, 2010).

The city’s built fabric in the historical center began to changeespecially rapidly with the arrival of Valentina Matvienko as citygovernor in 2003. The abolishment of elections for governorsthroughout Russia 2 years later, initiated by President Putin soon

7 Okean became the property of one of the biggest real estate companies in St.Petersburg ‘‘Adamant’’, the building changed its use, containing now various servicesand plumbing equipment, Ryba became one of the clothing chain retailers, and it isstill unclear what the Yeliseyevsky store is destined to become.

8 This process continues today with such a large property owners as theshipbuilding factory Admiralty Wharves (Admiralteskie Verfi), which is to be relocatedfrom its center location to Kotlin Island, west of the city.

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Fig. 12. Business centers have opened at a rapid pace in the last decade, with a preference for location in the city’s historical center. Much of that new office space was leftvacant by the 2008 world financial crisis. New business centers nevertheless continue to open. Map source: NIPTs General’nogo plana Sankt-Peterburga (2010).

9 This figure is based on a comparative analysis by the NGO EKOM. See http://ecom.su/news/index.php?id=1408.

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after the Beslan tragedy in southern Russia, represented a stepback not only as to the democratic development of the country,but also as a way of making the city’s existing political elite evenmore powerful (Vishnevsky, 2011). Corruptive practices betweeninvestors and city officials for issuing permits for urban investmentprojects became nearly institutionalized (see, e.g., Likhanova,2009a, 2009b). Those practices have had dire consequences onthe cityscape.

Investors and developers launched major redevelopment pro-jects in highly desirable locations inside the city’s historical core.Two main types of land-use changes in central areas emerged:new commercial development (especially hotels, business centers,and retail outlets; see Fig. 12); and the creation of elite housing forthe growing number of newly affluent residents. A trend of renova-tion of dwellings in old historical buildings had already emerged inthe 1990s, where higher sales prices or rent could be charged forso-called ‘‘European standard’’ housing. New construction in thecity’s historical center at the turn of the millennium also resultedin the emergence of gated communities with underground garagesand/or restricted or guarded courtyards. Small gentrified buildingcommunities arose within the historical city and on its edge, e.g.like those on Krestovsky Island. Approaches for investors to imple-ment such new projects can be characterized by the following fourtypes.

First, developers and investors in the city have aggressively pur-sued a practice of infill (uplotnitel’naia zastroika). City officials as-sisted by identifying so-called ‘‘lacunae’’ and allowing them to beintensely developed. There were from 230 to 400 lacunae in thecity center in 2000, according to city officials and developers(Donskov, 2004). Overall a significant loss of public space occurredas a result of that infill, as gardens, squares, schools, playgroundswere converted to hotels, business centers, and elite housing.Examples of new buildings that have replaced ‘‘lacunae’’ are theTerrasa building next to the Kazan Cathedral, Novotel buildingoff of Nevsky Prospekt, and Regent Hall business center on Vladi-mir Square (see Fig. 13). This officially embraced policy of promot-

ing infill development has come to be widely criticized byresidents and city officials alike (e.g., see Likhanova, 2010a;Strel’nikova, 2004). Yet new legislation passed in 2010 has in effectcontinued the policy of reclassifying green space in the city in or-der that future infill can take place. The 2010 city law ‘‘On GreenSpace for Public Use’’ (O zelenykh nasazhdeniiakh obshchegopol’zovaniia, or ZNOP) designed to protect green space in the citysignificantly weakened an earlier 2007 law by reducing the totalamount of protected green space in the city by at total of 2466hectares.9

A second practice has focused on aggressive reconstruction ofexisting buildings in the city’s central districts. This reconstructionin effect involved the demolition of existing structures, frequentlyby retaining only the original building’s façade. The public referredto such practice as ‘‘reconstruction through demolition’’ (‘‘rekon-struktsia so snosom’’). Whole blocks have been destroyed in thismanner in the city’s historical core. In the case of the new NevskyCenter owned by the Finnish firm Stockmann, which opened inNovember 2010, historical façades which were meant to be pre-served later ‘‘collapsed’’ during reconstruction. Despite promisesby the city governor that the new building’s recreated façadewould be identical to its historical façade, the Nevsky Centernow contains a series of oversized glass office spaces on its top thatcity residents have referred to as a ‘‘greenhouse.’’ The project hasevoked sharp criticism among the city’s public and has becomethe target of a boycott of the store by the preservationist group Liv-ing City (Zhivoi Gorod) (Likhanova, 2010b). Another example ofaggressive reconstruction (and in effect demolition) of an entirehistorical block of buildings on Zoologichesky Pereulok near thePeter and Paul Fortress occurred in 2008 (see Fig. 14). Other prom-inent buildings, such as Nevsky Prospect 68, are slated for similar‘‘reconstruction’’ (see Fig. 15).

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Fig. 13. Regent Hall business center on Vladimir Square. The 18th-century Dom Delviga (left foreground) was left standing, but is visually eclipsed by the new businesscenter.

Fig. 14. Destruction of 19th century buildings on Zoologicheskii Pereulok in June 2008. Several of the buildings’ facades were at first left standing, but then were laterdemolished.

10 Widespread public criticism of the city’s new Stock Exchange (birzha) building onVasilyevsky Island resulted in its height being lowered by the dismantling of twofloors after its construction (e.g. see Likhanova, 2008; see also Fig. 18). This hasproven to be a rare exception in the annals of new development in the city in the lastdecade.

N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 479

A third approach has involved the controversial addition ofextra floors (mansardy) to existing historical buildings. Develop-ers can gain more space and improved window views of the his-torical center in this way. One of the most striking and highlycriticized examples of disharmonious construction is the HotelRenaissance with its oversized glass and steel cap on Pochtamts-kaya Ulitsa, near St. Isaac’s Cathedral (see Fig. 16). Other exam-ples continue to arise throughout the historical center. Fewblocks of the city center have escaped the widespread practiceof adding new floors with steel siding and large windows toexisting historical buildings. Several mansard projects have al-ready been completed in the immediate vicinity of Palace Squareand at several different locations along Nevsky Prospect, onceconsidered to be masterpieces of the city’s historical center(see Fig. 17). Apartment owners are largely powerless to stop

such construction even in their own building. Zoning height vio-lations have become frequent with such modern glass and steelconstruction.10

A fourth approach has been extensive land reclamation. Earlierattempts at reclamation were made in the Soviet period, but in the21st century the practice of landfill (namyv) has become veryaggressive in the Neva Bay area on the west side of Vasilyevsky Is-land. One of the city’s megaprojects, the Maritime Façade (MorskoiFasad), is being implemented on reclaimed land. As part of that

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Fig. 15. ‘‘Literaturny dom’’ at Nevsky Prospect 68 on the corner of the Fontanka River is to be ‘‘reconstructed’’ as a hotel. Photo taken in November 2010. The building wasentirely dismantled in January 2011.

Fig. 16. Hotel Renaissance on Pochtamskaya Ulitsa.

480 N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

project, approximately 300 ha of land reclamation on the westernshore of Vasilyevsky Island provide a new port for cruise ships.The reclamation project will eventually provide territory for newresidential high-rise buildings on the edge of the historical center.This and other large-scale projects have been criticized for theirlack of financial transparency in spending state funds (Vishnevsky,2009). A further land reclamation project is now planned to the

north of the city. A flood-protection barrier on the western sideof Neva Bay has been under construction for almost 20 years andhas had large cost overruns.

Transportation and environmental problemsWhen the city’s large factories began to close in the 1990s with

the collapse of the Soviet-era centrally planned economy, St.

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Fig. 17. Planned construction of additional floor (mansard) on 19th-century building on Nevsky Prospect.

N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 481

Petersburg’s air and water quality improved for the first time indecades. Nevertheless, water and air pollution remain seriousproblems for city residents. They continue to boil their tap waterbefore use, as during the Soviet period. Despite new investment,the city’s water delivery and wastewater systems continue to suf-fer from decades of underfunding (Trumbull, 2007). The extraordi-nary growth in automobile use has played the largest role in recentyears in increasing levels of air pollution in the city. As elsewhere,city residents have expressed a strong desire to purchase (often forthe first time) and drive their own automobiles (Argenbright,2008). The city’s motor fleet has than doubled in the last decadeand quadrupled since 1995 (see Fig. 19 and Fig. 20). With this in-crease in automobile ownership have come prolonged traffic jamsin the city center, whose 18th and 19th-century bridges and streetswere never designed for intensive automobile use. Some counter-measures have been undertaken. Construction of the city’s firstring road, KAD (Kol’tsevaya avotmobil’naya doroga Sankt-Peter-burga), which includes the city’s first bridge (Bol’shoi Obukhovskiimost) to pass sufficiently high over the Neva River not to requireraising for barge traffic, has provided relief for traffic that mustpass through the city.11 Trucks have been largely banned from thecity’s center. Russia’s first toll road, the Western High-Speed Diame-ter (Zapadnyi Skorostnoi Diametr, www.whsd.ru), will help to redirectthe city’s traffic around the city’s center, although it will also have anegative impact on the Yuntolovsky Nature Reserve and several cul-tural monuments (see Ponomareva, 2007). There have also beenunforeseen consequences. The forced removal of covered garage

11 The ring road’s high cost (one km is reported to be cost more than almost anyother road construction in the world), inferior quality, poorly marked exits, andfrequent traffic jams have drawn the ire of city residents. Prime Minister VladimirPutin made a point of publicly criticizing the quality of the ring road’s surface toGovernor Matvienko in November 2010. Traffic loads on the ring road already exceedby 50% those foreseen in its design specifications (Direktsiia po stroitel’stvutransportnogo obkhoda goroda Sankt-Peterburg, 2010).

units by the city (nominally for eminent domain purposes) from tensof thousands of city residents, with only below-market compensa-tion, has triggered a well-organized citizen protest movement inthe city (Lonkila, 2011).

Passenger volumes on all forms of city public transportation aredown sharply over the last two decades (see Table 2). Once knownas the ‘‘tramway capital,’’ the city’s extensive system has shrunksharply since having been the world’s largest tramway system.12

Tramway lines and rails continue to be removed regularly as theyare considered an impediment to private automobile traffic (seeFig. 21). Tramway parks are being closed (Likhanova, 2009a; see alsoFig. 22). The number of metropolitan stations continues to grow onlyslowly. The city’s trolleybus and bus fleets still have a large percent-age of old equipment, despite some new purchases for those fleets.Drivers often cite the poor condition of the public transportationinfrastructure as one of their main reasons for using a private car, de-spite the city’s overloaded road system. One positive developmenthas been the creation of dedicated bus and trolleybus lanes on somemain avenues, including Nevsky Prospect. Another welcome changefor city residents has been the introduction of several pedestrianzones in the city center, e.g. Malaya Sadovaya, Malaya Kon-iushennaya, and 6-a linia on Vasilyevsky Island. Parking space inthe city center remains catastrophically absent. Those same pedes-trian zones and many city sidewalks are often informally used forparking cars.

Historical city center emerges as subject of public controversyChanges in the built fabric of the city’s historical center has

emerged as one of the leading sources of public discontent amongcity residents in the last 5 years (see, e.g., Moskvina, 2004; Obrash-chenie, 2008; Strel’nikova and Donskov, 2005; Vishnevsky, 2011).Indeed, several historical city squares are widely perceived bythe public as having been irreversibly marred by the recent

12 This distinction is according to Guinness World Records.

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Fig. 18. The new Stock Exchange (on right) and Finansist residential complex (on left) on Vasilyevsky Island. The buildings have been the target of much criticism as havingruined the historical skyline of the city’s historical center.

Total number of private automobile (thousands)

0

200

400

600

800

1000

1200

1400

1990 1995 2000 2005 2006 2007 2008

Total number of privateautomobile (thousands)

Fig. 19. Based on figures from Petrostat (2008, p. 159, 2009, p. 156).

482 N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

construction of disharmonious steel and glass construction in thevicinity of existing architectural ensembles (see Fig. 23). Suchstructures include the eight-story glass-and-steel business centerRegent Hall on Vladimir Square with its kitsch Roman columns,facing the 19th century Vladimirsky Cathedral and looming overthe 18th-century Dom Delviga, the huge glass-and-steel mall retailoutlet ‘‘PIK’’ on Sennaya Square, and previously mentioned Renais-sance Hotel on St. Isaac’s Square. The new high-rise residentialbuildings of elite housing of ‘‘Avrora’’, ‘‘SKY’’, and ‘‘Monblan’’ onPetrogradskaya Storona, and twin towers of the residential

building of ‘‘Finansist,’’ whose upper floors protrude above thelow-lying horizon and historical panorama of Vasilyevsky Island,and a series of eight clustered highrises on Moskovsky Prospect,towering over the Novodevichi Convent, are widely cited examplesof clear violations of zoning height restrictions (Likhanova, 2009b).Preservationists have also focused their criticism on the impendingloss of such historical buildings as Dom Rogova (see Fig. 24) andcountless other less known historical buildings (see Fig. 25). As aresult of strong public outcry, the city government has acknowl-edged that several new buildings in the city’s historic core are offi-cially recognized ‘‘urban planning mistakes’’ (Strel’nikova, 2005). Alarge number of factors, including a weakening of planning regula-tions, lack of effective control over city developers, and assumedinsider negotiations between city officials and private developershave enabled the completion of new construction in the city’shistoric core that has become so highly controversial (see Fig. 26).

‘‘It’s our city’’ (Eto nash gorod!) is now one of the leading slogansshouted by preservationists and members of opposition politicalparties (especially Yabloko, a national opposition party) at theirdemonstrations and meetings. A wide range of professional andactivist architectural preservationist groups (Zhivoi Gorod, VOO-Piik, EKOM, Bellona, and others) have organized demonstrations,street theater, petitions, exhibits, press conferences, and boycottsto call attention to the city’s loss of its built fabric (Likhanova,2006, 2010a,b; Strel’nikova, 2008; Vishnevsky, 2007). They havemade highly effective use of social networking for organizationalpurposes and in publicizing (throughout Russia and to Westernreaders) the magnitude of loss of architectural and cultural heritagein Russia’s cultural capital. These activists and political oppositionmembers state that they wish to preserve those cultural treasuresacquired during two centuries of the city’s rather spectacular

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Fig. 20. High traffic volumes in the city’s historical center lead to frequent and large traffic jams. The sharp growth in cars using the narrow canal embankments and streets ofthe city center is a difficult transportation challenge.

Table 2Length of network by type of transport, as measured at end of year, and totalpassenger volumes. Petrostat, 2009, p. 155.

Year 1990 1995 2000 2005 2007 2008

Tramway (km) 691 698 659 623 590 582Passengers (mln) 986 694 936 768 474 491

Trolleybus (km) 685 695 695 683 686 686Passengers (mln) 565 459 640 506 272 256

Metropolitan (km) 259 269 294 307 309 325Passengers (mln) 1203 728 799 820 832 836

13 Well-known cultural leaders, including the movie director Alexander Sokurov,have sought to appeal directly to the city governor to request that city officials begin adialogue with citizen groups about the fate of the city’s historical center.

N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 483

development (though city preservationists are equally protective ofSoviet monuments and architectural icons) from the new ‘‘vandal-ism’’ of an upstart Russian economic and political elite.

Ironically, much of the built fabric of St. Petersburg, and espe-cially the treasures of its 18th and 19th-century architectural her-itage, is broadly Western rather than explicitly Russian. A politicalstruggle between city residents and a wealthy elite, claiming (lar-gely disingenuously, given their coziness with city officials) to bethe new standard bearers of Western capitalism, is thus playingout over the preservation of St. Petersburg’s Western architecturalheritage. Most city residents view the city’s existing built fabricand cultural heritage as more valuable to them, and more worthyof protection, than the economic profits to be made by (and untilnow rightly perceived as being exclusively for) the city’s alreadywealthy elite. Preservationist and Yabloko activists have been par-ticularly critical of the city’s planning bureaucracy in failing to pro-tect the city’s architectural and related cultural heritage frominvestors and developers. The activists call for more opennessand an even application of existing laws within the sphere of thecity’s urban planning as one of their main political demands.Nevertheless, the city’s public remains largely disenfranchisedwith regard to the concerns the current planning and managementof their own city.

A number of high-visibility major redevelopment projects in thecity center, e.g. the on-going construction of a new building (‘‘Sec-ond Stage’’) for the Mariinsky Theater (Zolotonosov, 2008) andreconstruction of the island of New Holland (Likhanova, 2010b;Strel’nikova and Ivanov, 2006) have elicited great alarm among citypreservationists due to the modern architectural solutions pro-posed for the sites, both in the heart of the historical center. TheMariinsky Theater project involved the destruction on an entirehistorical block in the city center. Obviously, the city governmenthas actively promoted these iconic projects in order to enhancethe city’s image and to seek world class status as one of Europe’scultural capitals. However, Sassen (1998) points out that if placesstrive to become centers for transnational tourism, they cannot al-low development that would significantly change them, and oughtto retain the quality that distinguishes them and marks as uniqueplaces and hence attracts consumers. This factor is only rarelybeing taken into account by policy makers in St. Petersburg andan equilibrium between ‘‘achievements of the past’’ and ‘‘ambi-tions for the future’’ (Miles, 2005, p. 913) has not yet been found.

Most controversial became the proposal for a 403-m super sky-scraper, the Okhta Center, in the near vicinity of the historical citycenter as the corporate headquarters of the Russian gas giant Gaz-prom (Dixon, 2010a). Because the completed skyscraper wouldmar visually the existing skyline of the city’s historical center,opponents criticized it vehemently (Fig. 27). They asked how astate-owned enterprise, Gazprom, could so visibly ignore its owncitizen’s preferences. UNESCO World Heritage representatives alsovoiced regular concern over the skyscraper project as endangeringthe current standing of the city’s historical center on the WorldHeritage List.13 After 4 years of intensive preparatory work on the

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Fig. 21. Palace bridge. Tramway rails on the bridge were removed several years ago.

Fig. 22. Photo of Tramway Depot No. 2 on Sredny Prospect of Vasilyevsky Island. Half of the Depot is slated for destruction. Photo taken in November 2010.

484 N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

proposed site of the Okhta Center skyscraper, Governor Matvienko ina surprise announcement in December 2010, following increasingly

vocal criticism from the city’s cultural elite, announced that theOkhta Center skyscraper would not be built in the historical center.

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Fig. 23. Map of protected zones with height restrictions for buildings in the historical center. The same zones have nevertheless been the site of many highrise projects inrecent years. Source: http://www.save-spb.ru/section/genplan.html (accessed on May 11, 2011).

Fig. 24. Dom Rogova has been left by investors without a roof, apparently on purpose, and is deteriorating rapidly.

N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 485

The current proposal for the Gazprom headquarters places it on NevaBay in the city’s Lakhta district. The case of the Okhta Center never-theless may prove to be exceptional.14

14 Some evidence suggests that the decision to reject the project’s originallyproposed location in the city’s historical center was made by President DmitryMedvedev.

City officials give the clear impression of being largely unac-countable to city residents in terms of facilitating public participa-tion in the urban planning process. Public hearings for large-scaleprojects are conducted in a cursory manner. Opinions from thepublic expressed at the hearings bear little legal weight and thehearings are poorly publicized. Two expert councils which rendertheir opinion on architectural projects in the city are the City

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Fig. 25. An 18th-century residential building on Vasilyevsky Island was partially destroyed (in order to make way for the passage of heavy equipment) and has been leftexposed to the elements by investors.

486 N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

Architectural Council (Gradsovet) and Council for the Preservationof Cultural Heritage for the Government of St. Petersburg (Sovetpo sokhraneniu kul’turnogo nasledia pri Pravitel’stve Sankt-Peter-burga). In practice the councils have not discussed some of themost controversial development projects in the city, and appearto exist largely pro forma (Likhanova, 2009b). Many historical mon-uments, especially after adoption of a new law in 2008 permittingprivatization of those monuments, are today being ‘‘delisted’’, thatis, excluded from a list of designated historical monuments. The ci-ty’s official preservationist agency, the Committee for the StateControl, Use, and Protection of Historical and Cultural MonumentsKomitet po gorudarstvennomu kontroliu, ispol’zovaniiu i okhranepamiatnikov istorii i kul’tury (KGIOP), is widely seen by city preser-vationists as highly ineffective and very dependent on politicalpressure from high-level city officials acting often in backing pri-vate developers’ interests. The committee’s long-standing chair-person, Vera Dementieva, was voted ‘‘least respected citizen’’ bythe ‘‘Living City’’ preservationist group in 2009 (Strel’nikova, 2009).

15 St. Petersburg’s municipal legislative assembly today complies with almost all ofthe governor’s initiatives and policies; the legislative assembly introduces fewer newlaws than the governor’s office. In order to assure obedience from the legislativeassembly, state ‘‘administrative resources’’ are deployed in advance of nationalparliament and municipal legislative assembly elections to promote the Kremlin’sparty of power (United Russia) and its candidates.

Conclusion

Despite its geographical proximity to Western Europe andincreasing economic integration into the global market, post-socia-list St. Petersburg has developed in a decidedly different way thanother post-socialist cities in Eastern and Central Europe. St. Peters-burg’s official institutional development reflects Russia’s overalltrajectory in the political realm since Vladimir Putin’s rise to powerin 2000 (president from 2000–2008, and now prime minister). Pu-tin’s self-proclaimed creation of a ‘‘vertical’’ power hierarchy hasgiven large powers to a small political elite. One might also arguethat this same elite also has corporate interests (Specter, 2007),both nationally and at the municipal level throughout Russia. The‘‘spirit of money’’ has emerged as one of the few threads of govern-ment ideology in post-socialist Russia (Economist, December 9,

2010). The strengthening of a strict vertical political and economichierarchy in Russia has in effect disenfranchised much of the coun-try’s population, including the vast majority of residents of its twolargest cities. Critically, the St. Petersburg and Moscow governorswent from being freely elected in municipal elections to being ap-pointed directly by the Russian president beginning in 2005. Thevertical power hierarchy extends from the highest level downthrough the governor’s office to that of the city planner manager.15

This ‘‘vertical’’ power relationship is further reflected in the sphere ofurban planning. Planning officials answer directly to the governor’soffice and her deputies, and largely ignore public opinion. City plan-ning officials only in a rare handful of cases have reacted to the mostvocal demands of citizen initiative groups, and only upon a change ofofficial view from the governor’s office.

All but a wealthy elite of city residents experience the dailyinconveniencies and longer-term consequences of St. Petersburg’sdecaying municipal infrastructure. Despite a growing annual bud-get (approximately 10 billion USD in 2010), residents remainhighly discontented with the city’s infrastructure. Those includea clogged road network, an eroding public transportation system,deteriorating air quality, a continuing decline in public greenspace, and second-rate municipal services (state education andmedical assistance is considered to be inferior to that during theSoviet period, and despite regular rate hikes, centralized residentialheating is often insufficient, tap water remains impotable, and hotwater in residential buildings continues to be turned off for weeksin summer in a reprise of a Soviet-era practice.) The details of a sys-tem of municipal governance in which bribery, kickbacks, and red

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Fig. 26. The opening of Stockmann’s Nevsky Center in November 2010, and unveiling of its large glass ‘‘greenhouse’’ above reconstructed historical facades, generated muchcriticism about the official permitting process for such buildings in the city’s historical center. Two large city blocks with 19th century buildings were demolished duringconstruction. The shopping center is the target of an ongoing boycott by members of the preservationist group Living City (Zhivoi Gorod).

N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490 487

tape on the part of city officials and managers is common, and withwhich far too many residents have had personal experience, arewidely reported in the city press and blogosphere. They appearto be reported to no avail.16 As elsewhere in Russia, the most highlyplaced city officials (and often their relatives) operate within a realmof their selective application of the rule of law, and local judicialcourts oblige those officials’ preferences.17 It seems unlikely that res-

16 For example, heavy snows in 2009 and 2010 left city streets on several occasionsnearly paralyzed, with regular pedestrian deaths due to falling icicles from unclearedbuilding roofs; residents concluded that cleanup funds and equipment were beingdiverted as city managers could not organize effective snow and ice removal.

17 The governor’s 37-year son is widely reported to be worth about $1 billion dollars(Delovoi Peterburg, 2009). Sergey Matvienko acquired that net worth only in the periodof seven years since his mother became the city governor in 2003. St. Petersburgresidents could take vicarious satisfaction in the sacking by President Medvedev inSeptember 2010 of the long-standing governor of Moscow for exactly suchtransgressions.

idents of cities in Eastern, Central, and Western Europe would toler-ate such obvious perceptions of corruption.

As concerns the built fabric of the city center, St. Petersburg’scity planners have not succeeded so far in creating a coherentand consistent vision of the future of the city’s historical centerin the post-socialist context. Because the city is currently mono-centric and lacks existing plans for the development of newlarge-scale commercial sites outside of its historical center (theChinese-funded Baltic Pearl project represents a rare exception,Dixon, 2010b), the retention of a large number of administrativeand commercial functions in the city’s historical center suggeststhat the built fabric of the city’s historical center will remainunder the intensive pressure of a wealthy elite of investorsand developers (working closely if not in collusion with city offi-cials) in the coming years and decades. High demand for newelite housing in the city’s historical center only increases thatpressure. The sharp rise in automobile ownership and decline

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Fig. 27. Photo montage from an exhibit organized by city preservationists in order to show how the planned Okhta Center super skyscraper (planned height of 403 m) wouldimpact visually the city’s existing low-horizon skyline.

488 N.S. Trumbull / Cities 31 (2013) 469–490

of public transportation further aggravates the complexity offinding effective urban planning solutions for the historicalcenter.

Whether St. Petersburg is destined to witness an even greaterloss of public space, social stratification in terms of displacementof less affluent residents to the outskirts, an emphasis on com-mercial land use (e.g. hotels, offices, and large retail) in the citycenter, and the continuing addition of disharmonious architecturewithin the existing built fabric of its historical center, remains tobe seen. By most measures, the vast majority of St. Petersburgresidents in the last decade have experienced a city that hasbecome less livable. If city officials can manage to find ways fornew development in the city center to be more balanced in socialand cultural terms (including preservation), and sustainable ineconomic and environmental terms, the city may eventuallysucceed in joining other financial and cultural metropolises inEurope in developing a livable city. The economic, institutional,and political processes of transformation of this post-socialist cityare far from over.

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank the three anonymous reviewers fortheir insightful comments and Andrew Kirby for his dedicatededitorial assistance.

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