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Dr. Sergey Zagraevsky

 

 

Where should we sail?

 

 

Published in Russian: Çàãðàåâñêèé Ñ.Â. Êóäà æ íàì ïëûòü?  ñïðàâî÷íèêå «Åäèíûé õóäîæåñòâåííûé ðåéòèíã», âûï. 6. Ì., 2002.

 

 

Attention!

The following text was translated from the Russian original by the computer program

and has not yet been edited.

So it can be used only for general introduction.

 RUSSIAN VERSION

 

 

Rather, "Where we sail" was the title of an article by Lev Kolodny, published in the driven them heading of "Moskovskiy Komsomolets", 28 December 2001. In no case will not blame Lev Kolodny in ignorance of Pushkin's poetry: "...the community is now broken and cuts through the waves. Floats. Where shall we sail?" - these lines in his article, presented in the epigraph. Just seemed to him that without the letter "g" name will sound better - that's removed. Great importance if only one letter? And that, along with her lost not only unique sound of Pushkin's lines, but also their emotional coloring, the author of the article doesn't bother - without the letter "W" is more modern and even blagovaone, but the meaning seems to be the same.

But God is with him, with the title. I recall the plot of the article - it (as in many other oral and written statements of Lev Kolodny) expressed joy and optimism about the rapid construction in the center of Moscow. With a "plus" commemorated the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour complex "Okhotny Ryad" at the Manege, Gostiny Dvor and fresh retail and entertainment complex on the Garden ring near Kursky station. Along the way, with a "minus" sign in the article appear A.A. Klimenko, the A.I. Komech and A.P. Kudryavtsev is a "known adherents of preservation of old Moscow", "frightening the people of inventions", "Stalin's Ghost", "flesh and Barkashov Vasiliev.

And photo attached to the article - dilapidated walls with crumbling plaster. As such ugliness, he says, not to carry and not to build something sverhprezentabelnoe, with clock security, security cameras and underground car Park?

And yet, let's look at the situation calmly and efficiently, without the fiery denunciations and violent emotions.

So, on the one hand - %

On the other hand - "adherents of conservation, fighting for every historic building, for every tree in the center - and this, too, they are absolutely right. Where is the truth?

In order to understand it, will have to start from afar. Since the XIX century.

The fact that the rapid commercial construction in Moscow started at that time - and began a very haphazard. Go to almost any of the historical Moscow street is a two - storey houses everywhere are combined with the so-called "apartment houses", built in the eclectic style, or - in the 1890s, or modern - in the 1900s and 1910s-that is Common to all "apartment houses" was their increased number of storeys - up to 7-8 floors. The streets were not extended, and got such dark "wells", as, for example, Obydensky lanes (about Ostozhenka). And as close to "apartment houses" were standing two-storey, the obligatory "firewalls" (blank side walls, saving profitable house in case of fire in the neighbouring) very unaesthetic remained in sight. Now they are, however, cover billboards, but still a spectacle so myself...

Not afraid to say that this was the first "battle for Moscow", which had its own "progressives"and their "adherents of conservation. And last lost - the number of "false teeth" in the form of a giant "apartment houses" among the two or three-story building amounts to many hundreds.

The second "battle for Moscow" began in the late twenties, when the party and the government" decided to build "a model Communist city" in the historical center. "The adherents of the old" lost it - if Stalin had managed to implement all of your ideas on the spot Zamoskvorechye so beloved by Lev Kolodny, the rays would diverge three broad prospect m isPlease note that this property is in the depth there was held a "red line" one of the new avenues. What there historical buildings...

And hotel "Moscow"? Seemed familiar, and the architect is not someone, and Shchusev, and yet, if an unbiased look at the next door of her monstrous facade with towers of the Kremlin - this, I may say, "the architectural ensemble" other than a mockery of the history of Russia, you will not name. Now it is to be reconstructed and made more comfortable, but the facade, apparently, will "hang" over the Kremlin for ever. Maybe someday descendants would guess at least delay it to the glass, but as long as it is consistent with the style of Moscow's eclectic"promoted by Lev Kolodny and his high-ranking patrons.

And stuck in the middle of Moscow "false teeth" of the Stalin era, forming more or less harmonious (albeit esthetically dubious) bands only on Tverskaya, Kutuzov and some embankments and then not entirely.

The next "battle" took place in 1960-70-ies. Needless to say that "the adherents of the old" and lost it? For examples of the new "false teeth" do not go far is the Palace of Congresses in the Kremlin, and Novy Arbat street, and many needy panel houses - and on the Garden Ring, and inside it.

What is left from Moscow after the three "battles", and that today are struggling members of the "fourth"?

Not afraid to say - from Moscow as a single architectural ensemble does not remain anything. No one area that could be called solid, aesthetically unified architectural complex in Moscow no. Well, unless Strogino or Northern Chertanovo, only aesthetics there is even more doubtful than Stalin Naberezhnye...

So will the historical Moscow neceg the%

Do the rights of Lev Kolodny, Moscow perishes where not build", and "go and then one in this direction" - that is, in the direction specified by deveciusagi thousands Moscow builders, which in whatever was necessary to download the work, otherwise they will not be able to feed one and a half million members of their families?

And can "adherents of conservation A.A. Klimenko, the A.I. Komech and A.P. Kudryavtsev fighting for what is not? But supposedly intelligent people who occupy a respectable position, and quite unlike the dreamers and visionaries...

But jokes aside, then, of course, historical Moscow there - if not as a single architectural ensemble, as a unique urban environment with its unique atmosphere.

And we are not in vain started a conversation with the ethical inadmissibility "edit" Pushkin's lines. No need to be a scholar to understand: it so happens that the loss of one letter makes the poem into chaos. And similarly, we should not be arhitekturovedom understand any city - the most complex organism, and historic, "Museum" component plays an important role in it. Let us explain.

First of all, such a trivial thing as a tourist attraction. Many of the city live - and well it feels." It is well known that tourism enhances the credibility of the country and brings revival of economic ties, in fact not one pensioners come to gawk at the painting "Ivan the terrible kills his son," in tours travel and businessmen, and many then arises a desire to invest in the country, which they liked.

But the question is: will we, for example, tourists enjoy the bus or car journey to Moscow today, despite the fact that the city, in the words of Lev Kolodny, "beamed lights"? Hardly. Why? But because from early morning to late at night on the streets of congestion. Why congestion? But because the center is being praised by Lev Kolodny rapid office building, and when the existing radial-circular lay-out of Moscow not unload or third, or fourth, or fifth ring road - people still go to work in the centre.

And if you reduce the business building in centre, stopping the expansion of existing areas and adjusting the monuments not office, but under the museums and mini-hotels? And if not evict Muscovites from the center of a fuss, and to improve their living conditions? Do not drop it at the same traffic load on the streets, avenues and alleyways, and will not decrease if congestion?

That being closed one of the most complicated "vicious circle", which we call the urban environment. These "circles" a lot, even when not connected problems of ecology, power, water, heat supply, sanitation, and other, not less prosaic things. And it turns out that the issue of demolition, reconstruction or preservation of any historic building, development of any empty%D

The Builder and urban planner - as they say, two big differences. The Builder executes orders, and town planner - a scientist - developing integrated approaches that take into account all the problems of the territory, laying of sewage to the frequency of visits by tourists.

And so when you read articles like the one that was published in the "MK", it hurts. Not because of what we Lev Kolodny appreciate the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, the reconstruction of the Manege square and sculpture Shemyakin with different aesthetic positions (he likes, I don't like). In the end, it's a private matter. Pain becomes due to the fact that the "powers that be" do not understand that in the city of scale Moscow cannot nothing at all to do - build nor to conserve or to reconstruct or to muzeefitsirovat - without complex, system of town-planning approach.

And this approach, in turn, should take into account all the political, macroeconomic, social and aesthetic trends of our city. In the end, we need to understand what we want - that Moscow was a city-factory, city warehouse, city office, city-Museum or memorable "garden city"? And if all at once, in what proportion?

To do this, take a little obschemoskovskie urban development plans based on the approximate zoning districts and areas, as is done now. Necessary to attract major Russian (and possibly the world), scientists, urban planners, the overall prospects of development of Moscow and discussion with the public - even before making the most serious is%8

Only then the age-old debate "progressives" and "conservatives" will enter in a constructive way, and the "battle for Moscow" may finally be won - not someone from the opposing sides, and Muscovites.

 

2002.

 

 © Sergey Zagraevsky

 

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