From 'bulvar' to 'magistral'. Crossed history of words and forms in Russian and soviet urban design

From bulvar to magistral Crossed history of words and forms in Russian and soviet urban design

ELISABETH ESSAĂ?AN

From bulvar to magistral Crossed history of words and forms in Russian and soviet urban design

ELISABETH ESSAĂ?AN

“The theoretical form of the plan of Moscow has been established

The present article proposes to examine the urban changes after the

[…]. It is a regular arrangement comprised of three concentric

implementation of the “Stalinist Plan” of reconstruction of Moscow in 1935.

circles whose spokes are all attached to a core approximately 1500 meters across. The system is abundantly clear; everything converges on the Kremlin, that triple-armored heart in which

How, the radio concentric structure, inherited from the past was reconsidered ?

the unique political, religious, and military authority of the tsar

What ways of intervention had been explored ?

is focused. The plan of the ancient capital of Russia presents all

What words were used to define the streets that were transformed and

the characteristics of the seat of power of an absolute empire. 1”

the new streets opened ?

It is in these terms that the French architect Eugène Hénard describes

And lastly – what is the existing gap between the project and the reality?

and analyzes the plan of Moscow in one of his famous Études de transformations de Paris, published in 1905. Four years later, in Town Planning in Practice, English architect Raymond Unwin reiterates this morphological classification, an illustration of a map of Moscow being captioned with the words: “clearly shows radiating and ring roads.2” In

In order to understand the nature of these transformations, it will be handy to return to the past and briefly explain the main stages of Moscow formation and the principle changes survived after the Soviet revolution of 1917.

fact, by the beginning of the 20th century, when the writings of these two major exponents of the fledgling discipline of town-planning appeared, it had already been two centuries since Moscow ceased developing according to this age-old schema. Nonetheless, a night flight today over Moscow does indeed betray its radio-concentric form i.e., a succession of radiating roads and beltways, stretching over a land area some fifty times larger than the original radio-concentric core that crystallized in the 16th century. What, then, happened in the intervening hundred years? When and why was this once abandoned structure of “radiating and ring roads” thought worthy of resurrection?

Beginning and end of radio-concentric expansion Until the 16th century Moscow grows as a model of radio-concentric city. Successive enclosures determine the layout of the principal road radiating into the city running from the Kremlin fortification to the major routes. At the beginning of the 18th century, with the creation of the new capital of Peterburg, by Peter the first, the underlying reasons for the radio-concentric structure — the assertion of the centralized power and its defensive function — disappeared.

In this context the city grew along the rivers Moskova and Yauza and along the main roads of Peterburg. At the beginning of the 19th century,

1 Eugène Hénard, Études sur l’architecture et les transformations de Paris [19031909] (introduction, Jean-Louis Cohen), Paris: Editions de la Villette, 2012, p. 164.

2 Raymond Unwin, Town Planning in Practice, London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1909, p. 19 (ill. 8).

in the wake of the Russian victory over Napoleon a new rebuilding phase is inaugurated, facilitated by the wholesale destruction occasioned by the great fire of 1813. The 1817 plan clarifies the structure by imposing

1 Stalin and Kaganovitch on the background of perspective of the General plan of reconstruction of Moscow of 1935. Moskva rekonstruiruetsia, 1938.

realignments and widening the open spaces. Boulevards were created on the site of the demolished fortifications.

It is interesting to note that the Russian word bulvar, does not come from the German word but from the French - just before the Napoleon War, inspiring by the Parisian model of planted walk built on demolished fortification. However, contrary to the French evolution of this word,

Abolition of private landowner and real estate On March 16, 1918, once again Moscow became the nation’s capital and a new political, economic, and industrial heartland.

But the most visible and immediate repercussions on the urban and social fabric result in the changes in the law.

which a large tree-lined street, in Russian bulvar conserved, until now,

Two decrees issued shortly after the Revolution, one concerning the

the sense of a walking, linear planted space, protected from the flow by

abolition of private landowner and the other the abolition of real estate

a low fence. This difference of use is easy to illustrate with research on

in urban areas resulted in a new system of land use. Land could “neither

Google images, up with the Russian and down with the French word. (fig.1)

be sold, nor bought, nor leased, nor mortgaged, nor expropriated in

As for a structure, one final encirclement appears with the construction

rehouse inhabitants, if, “in certain localities, the supply of land proves

of the circular railroad in 1903. This new ring made the center of the city migrating to the north, the layout represents a “fan” shape. Within this physical limit, the area now extended to 160 km2 , fully eight times the size of its 16th-century heart.

any manner whatsoever,” while the State was authorized to move and insufficient to satisfy the local population.”

The suppression of private landowner also signaled the demise of the concept of the plot or parcel. The plot now ceased to be the smallest unit of an urban division and of the building process.

It is important to notice that the density of Moscow was very low. It’s a porous urban tissue, with a great part of 2-3 floor buildings put in urban sprawl to prevent the spread of fire.

What content and form for the Socialist city?

The pejorative désignation “Moscow Big village”, was current in

The responsible for development strategy sought to define the content

opposition with the real, “european city”, Sankt Peterburg.

and form of a Socialist city. Their analysis was based primarily on

Even in the middle of 1920th, the philosopher Walter Benjamin travelling in Moscow, still wrote that behind the carriage entrances, one discovered the countryside.

What changes was made with the 1917 revolution?

the writings of Marx and Engels, revised by Lenin on a critique of the alienation caused by the concentration of the masses in great cities.

They aim to abolish the distinction between city and countryside.

The various promoters of development were agreed on a “horizontal” vision of land occupation and defended both urban decentralization and density reduction.

The 1920’s saw the emergence of two master plans for Moscow: New

2 Widening of main streets.

Moskva rekonstruiruetsia, 1938.

Moscow, under the direction of the architect Alexey Shchusev, and

construction of socialist cities 3, Nikolay Milyutin recommends applying

Greater Moscow, headed by engineer Sergey Shestakov.

linear principles of the production chain to town-planning by way of a

In the first one Shchusev limits the growth of the city, proposing to

strict zoning system.

reduce density with “garden-cities connected to the center by trunk

The report published in June nineteen thirty one by the head of Moscow

roads.” Insisting on the preservation of the existing radio-concentric

party, Lazar Kaganovich, signaled the end of the debate on the Socialist

structure, the plan clarifies it by widening the radial roads.

city by affirming that Soviet cities “became Socialist with the October

Professor Sergey Shestakov’s Greater Moscow has expanded the

Revolution” and denied their essential Socialist character “is to see

Moscow’s land area ten times bigger than its initial size. The plan is

things from a completely false, Menshevik, point of view.”4 He also

a response to a strict principle of zoning. It is split into five zones: a

stressed the fact that one cannot predict the future shape of these cities,

central city zone, a zone of parks and industry, a zone of garden-cities,

nor should parallels be drawn between the form and the meaning of a

a treed greenbelt zone, and a zone of railroads which are cut into “pie

city in the light of which “the radial system or the ring system would be

slices” within the four concentric rings.

feudal systems, the chess board system, capitalist, the ribbon system, petit-bourgeois, and so on.”5

“Socialist cities are already Socialist” The late 1920s saw a debate flare up around the constitution of the form and the contents of the Socialist city. The debate coalesced into three

Preservation or eradication of the radio-concentric structure: the 1932 planning competition

principle positions: the opposing views of Gosplan economists Leonid

In 1932, a tender for the redevelopment of Moscow was launched. Seven

Sabsovich and Mikhail Okhitovich (whose partisans were respectively

teams were invited to compete.

dubbed urbanist and dezurbanisty), and the approach formulated by the People’s Commissar of Education, Nikolay Milyutin.

For Sabsovich it thus became feasible to build factories near the sources of raw materials, in the countryside, where they could be associated with large-scale agricultural concerns. In his vision, existing cities are placed on hold, while new settlements are established at 30 to 50 km from the major centers. Okhitovich preached the total suppression of the concept of the city and the dispersal of urban functions evenly throughout the country. This process is facilitated by the widespread uptake of the private car. A year later, in Sotsgorod, the problem of the

Four of these proposals inaugurate a deliberate break with the radioconcentric structure of the city.

Nikolay Ladovsky and Viktor Kratiuk proposed to develop the city along a single linear axis: to the northwest for the former and to the northeast for the latter. Le Corbusier and the proletarian VOPRA team planned to 3 Nikolaj Milutin, Socgorod, Problema stroitel’stav socialističeskix gorodov, Moskow/ Leningrad: Gosizd, 1930.

4 Quotation taken from the French version of the text in L. M. Kaganovich, L’Urbanisme soviétique, Paris: Bureau d’éditions, 1932, p. 95.

5 Lazar Kaganovič, op. cit., p. 101.

3 Widening of the Gorki street. Moskva rekonstruiruetsia, 1938.

4 Change of divisions of kvartaly (blocs).

Moskva rekonstruiruetsia, 1938.

apply a new grid over the existing city. The three other entrants preserve

stops would be located. Residential dwellings of 6-7 storeys are

the existing structure of the city, but retain solely its radial component.

distributed around a perimeter enclosing a sizable public garden at the

Thus Ernst May prolongs its development in clusters built-up along the

center. The heart of the kvartal was constituted by low-rise buildings

radiating roads, Hannes Meyer establishes several new centers around

intended for local amenities such as public nurseries, kindergartens,

the Garden Ring, and German Krasin opts for a linear urbanization

and schools. Stores and shops were located street-side on the ground

along the radial roads.

floor. Residential access was from a courtyard reached by way of vast

None of the proposals were chosen.

archways opening through the first two to three floors of the block.

In this urban planning the word bulvar conserves the same meaning as

The New Moscow Plan of 1935

before the revolution, which is : the linear walking way protected from trafic. This space is not classified in category of streets but in one of

Devised under the direction of city-planner Vladimir Semionov

planted spaces. The idea of walking down the street doesn’t meet the

between 1932 and 1934 the conception of the plan renamed the “General

new concept of the city control. The streets are first of all conceived to

Plan for the Reconstruction of Moscow” took place under the auspices

receive an important traffic and not to be used for a walk, except for

of Commission for Architecture and City Planning (APU) chaired by

manifestations.

Lazar Kaganovich.

Two other words emerge: magistral an prospect. The first one, which

The master plan for rebuilding Moscow was conceived on a large scale,

clearly insists on traffic function, will stay a planning word and would

the aim being to double the size of the city, to create new systems (parks,

not pass in common language to name a street. No streets named

riverways, and means of transport), and to triple the surface area set

Lenin or Stalin Magistral. The second word, prospect, which comes

aside for housing. (fig. 2). It was based on the preservation of the city’s

from German in the context of the construction of Peterbourg in the

radio-concentric structure, an arrangement consolidated by the layout

eighteenth century, means perspective. It has the same original sense

of new radial and concentric arterials and the widening of existing

that the French word avenue, which at the beginning meant leading

roadways. The plan defines also a basic unit of development: the

to something, to a palace, even if sometimes this palace disappeared

kvartal (block) of 10 to15 hectares. (fig.3) Such an area was directly related

shorltly after . But if the French avenue is always a trie-lined street, the

to questions of transport, pedestrian flow, and to the introduction of

prospekt stays mineral. This large and mineral street necessarely leads

new street sections. The longer side of a kvartal was 500 meters; a

to a monument. And the most great monument in this planning is the

length, considered like an ideal distance between two intersections. It

Palace of Soviets, never realized. (fig. 4)

was designed to improve traffic flow without encouraging speeding.

Meanwhile, the inhabitants of a given kvartal would only have to walk, at least, 250 m to reach the corner of any block where transportation

Now, how these ambitions were really executed?

5/7 Captures of the movie Novaia Moskva (New Moscow) of Alexander Medvedkine. 1938.

The effect of the preexisting city on the project If we take the example of Gorky Street — the main road of Moscow— we can see that such ambitious were soon being curtailed. The street did

they were secured by a ring of metal and transported on rails. Thus, they could be set back in a courtyard, realigned with the street, or else rotated through 90°. (fig. 6)

indeed doubled in width, from 18m. to 40m., but it fell short of 60 m.

If the kvartal plan was never put into operation in the historic center,

initially planned. Sovetskaya Square was indeed enlarged, but to a far

nonetheless, the creation of a long, continuous street front in identical

lesser degree than might be imagined from the published plans. Behind

dimensions and architectural style presents, from the street, the

new frontages, enormous archways were opened not onto a greened

impression of a complete, unified project.

zone, but into a dense network comprised of the pre-existent built

I would like to finish by presenting the way the cinema translated these

environment crisscrossed by meandering alleyways. (fig. 5) What explains this discrepancy between project and practice?

Firstly it is due to economical reasons. The housing shortage was so

transformations through a surprising movie, Novaïa Moskva (New Moscow), realized by Alexander Medvedkine in 1938 and censored right after it’s release.

acute that the demolition of even rundown constructions which might be used as shelters had become problematic. In addition, the forcible evictions such a project necessitated obliged the State to compensate part of the expropriated population.

Novaïa Moskva The central point of the film is the public presentation of The General Plan of Reconstruction of Moscow. Around this point, three

It would appear that the unity of the urban façade had primacy over

protagonists: Aliocha, an engineer who participated in Siberia to the

the development of the interior, and the public dimension of the street

production of a moving model of reconstruction of Moscow; Zoia,

predominated over the “secluded” values of the inner courtyard.

curator of the exhibition; and Fedia, a painter, who must create views of

Unlike Baron Haussmann’s openings in Paris, which concentrated on

the ancient Moscow, to show the degree of its transformation. The three

low-value buildings towards the center of existent blocks, the 1935

protagonists are linked by a love affair : Fedia, who also represents the

plan focuses on road widening, thus destroying something far more

past, is in love with Zoia, who falls in love with Aliocha, who represents

prominent: the façade facing the street.

the future. Aliocha is also in love with Zoia, who, to prove her love

Whether a construction was to be preserved or not depended on how feasible it was to convert or remove it. In the first case, a certain number

accepts to leave Moscow, in spite of its privilege, to follow him to build new socialist towns in Siberia.

of buildings were provided with a new frontage or raised to make room

The film mixes scenes of fiction, shooted in studio or in the street

for the widened roads. On the other hand, some of the more important

and filmic news with scenes of real demolitions or constructions

or solid buildings were physically moved by the use of an American

of buildings, as well as project drawings. It opens on the scene of

technique invented in the 19th century. Severed from their foundations,

production of the moving model in a distant siberian village, where the

engineers are fighting with mosquitos. A crane moves a chapel and a

capital, by which the possibility of having an individual housing,

new building is built instead. (fig. 7) Aliocha is named to bring the model

follows him in these distant part of the country. And it is under the

to Moscow, with his grandmother as chaperone to make sure that he

Stalin’s portrait, that the gathered couple, sings the glory to Moscow

will return in Siberia and will not be seduced by the advantages offered

and to Stalin, the brilliant architect of it’s new Plan of Reconstruction.

by the capital.

In the same time in Moscow, Fedia paints the urban landscape, but

Elisabeth Essaïan

everything disappears under his eyes: buildings are destructed or being moved. (fig. 8) A manner to reinterpret, in sarcastic way, the practice of moving the buildings. But here, for the needs of the intrigue, houses move along the streets, which is obviously absurd. We can see the grandmother of Aliocha visiting her sister, when the building starts to move. The two old ladies panic thinking that it is Moscow who moves, until a technician comes to reassure them by explaining that they move only buildings. What activates this sentence at the grandmother: “Moscow is a piece of furniture or what?”

At last comes the day of public showing. Aliocha is late and the show begins without him. But the film is put on the wrong way and, instead of the New Moscow, the public see emerging the old Moscow, with its churches, its wooden peasant houses. Even the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, blown up to the construction of the Palace of the Soviets, is reborn of its ashes. (fig. 9) Aliocha finally arrives and puts the film in the right order. And we see opening under our eyes new perspektivy lined with high buildings, new bridges stepping the Moskova river, which level has raised; but also views of the Moscow of the future, built from collage of drawings, which looks more like an American city than a model socialist on.

Aliocha did not fail in his citizen’s duty. He returns in Siberia, where during his absence a new town was built, with big and regular kvartaly and vast magistrali. Zoia, abandoning the privileges offered by the

No centenário da avenida da cidade [On the Centenary of the City´s Avenue] was a joint initiative of the Marques da Silva Foundation and Porto City Council, designed to mark the start of the construction process of Porto´s civic centre, symbolically dated 1 February 1916 Do plano abstrato à cidade real [From the abstract plan to the real city] was the second module of the program, Discussion-Conferences which sought to highlight the importance of the original design for the avenue and its evolution in the specific context of Porto´s culture.

Under the impetus of industrial expansion in Germany and the understanding of a need for overall city planning, the urban planning ideology grew in Europe with the spread of advanced models in the reconstruction and expansion of cities. A certain cult of the experiences of Paris following the standard set by the boulevards was broadly adopted in the refounding of European cities and praised by Porto culture.

Elisabeth Essaïan’s seminar was given on the 26th September 2016 at Rivoli Theatre.

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