VIRTUAL Barcelona
Abstract
Researchers exploring the governance system in Russia outline modest municipal autonomy and high financial dependence of the periphery on the сentre. Indeed, minor resources of Russian cities are the reason for hesitant decision making processes and problems with promoting initiatives. However, this assumption is limiting due to the underestimation of the potential that cities possess. The periphery — Russian provinces — does not necessarily undertake the practices of the centre. Some problems with the realisation of local urban projects can be currently observed in the peripheral cities, yet the municipalities are discovering a new resource for space development — people. City centre reconstruction in Rybinsk (Yaroslavl region, Russia) is an outstanding example of a local policy, where the top-down hierarchy was shifted by an initiative citizen in cooperation with the municipal administration and businesses. The results of the copartnership were a resurrection of the city’s tourist attractiveness and an economical growth caused by the spatial transformation of the city centre. Accordingly, the buildings were reconstructed to resemble their pre-revolutionary architectural appearance, and all the modern signboards were replaced with old-fashioned ones. Since 2016, urban space “comfortisation” has been an errand of a federal scale in Russia. Although it was intended to give an impetus to the urban areas development, scholars note unification and consequential loss of identity of Russian cities. In the Rybinsk case, we observe the switch of the focus from space to people: how locals modify and develop the urban area. In order to research the way the cultural potential of the territory can become profitable for the city, we held a few discussions with local experts: Rybinsk municipal officials from different departments, and the initiative citizen — local artist and entrepreneur.
Ekaterina Lettieva
Ollie Kuchina
Sofya Torosyan
All authors are 4 year bachelor students of urban planning, our research group’s main interests are cultural space of Russian cities, urban spatial planning, peripheral cities developmental patterns. We share a common experience of participation in urban studies international conferences in Higher School of Economics and Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences.