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Bloomberg
An ambitious project to make central Moscow more pedestrian friendly has drawn mixed reactions from the city’s residents: some love the upgrade, others worry the soul is being ripped out of historic neighbourhoods. Bulldozers and drills are humming away around the centre as more than 50 roads are being torn up, a quarter of the total number chosen for a revamp under the “My Street” scheme. City authorities say the three-year project — which will cost a total 126 billion rubles ($1.96 billion) — is the largest redevelopment in the history of modern Moscow.
In many streets, piles of paving stones, mountains of sand and fenced-off construction sites make awkward obstacle courses for Muscovites — who spend half the year blanketed in snow and are keen to make the most of the summer with a stroll. “It does hinder traffic quite significantly but maybe it’s actually good because afterwards it will flow faster,” said 19-year-old Muscovite Vladimir Molchanov. “The city is transforming itself, becoming more and more beautiful,” he said.
“There is a lot to be done,” he said. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin won a second term in office in 2013 vowing to raise the quality of life in the wealthy but notoriously congested, polluted and often uninviting metropolis, home to 15 million people. Since then he has pushed through massive investment in the road network and improved public transport, building a 50-kilometre (30-mile) circular railway line due to open in the autumn.
The mayor’s critics, including Alexei Navalny, a prominent opposition leader and runner-up in the 2013 mayoral race, allege that the massive construction projects are rife with corruption. There are also complaints that the rich and diverse cultural life on some of the newly pedestrianised streets has been replaced by bland government-sponsored events and tacky decorations.
“They built all these new pedestrian streets (but) the streets are empty and there are sad people walking along them,” said Sergei Sadov, a veteran busker. Speaking on Arbat, one of the central Moscow streets under redevelopment, Sadov said police detained him last year as he was playing his guitar and charged him with organising the “mass presence or movement of people leading to public disturbance”.
Since then, most of the street musicians have been charged with similar offences, he said. Undeterred, Sadov, who heads an association of street musicians, continues to busk here as he has done for the last 30 years.
Lately police have started confiscating musicians’ instruments, he said. “The prefecture’s offices are stuffed with musical instruments and portraits” confiscated from musicians and artists, he said. While he approves the recent creation of designated busking spots on Moscow’s metro, he lamented that only five had been designated for the thousands of musicians who had applied to play on the network.