Master plans to help: what updates are planned in Russian cities

They will cover more than 2 thousand settlements

At the proposal of President Vladimir Putin there will be prepared 200 master plans for the development of large and small cities. They will cover more than 2 thousand settlements throughout the country. A master plan for the Arkhangelsk agglomeration (Arkhangelsk, Severodvinsk, Novodvinsk and adjacent territories of the Primorsky district) until 2035 is already being supported and developed.

The specificity of this approach is that, unlike the general plan, the master plan is not a mandatory document from the point of view of state planning, and is also “outside” the regulatory framework for managing the strategic development of regions and agglomerations. This gives the master plan a number of advantages: the absence of a regulatory framework allows planning to be carried out taking into account territorial specifics; the master plan can be adapted and include more necessary infrastructure than when preparing a master plan, the creation of which is strictly regulated by the building and land codes. The master plan is more flexible, and this makes it truly adaptive to the problems of a particular region or territory. However, this is where a drawback emerges: the master plan is not mandatory for execution and can be put “on the table” due to lack of funding, but, as practice shows, this limitation is easily solved through the available tools of state support, for example, through the state corporation VEB.RF.

Another feature of the master plan is that it makes it possible to attract commercial organizations and large enterprises, including state corporations, to participate in urban development. Thanks to this, an interesting precedent has been formed when the customer of a document on the planning and development of certain territories is not regional or municipal authorities, but rather commercial organizations. This may be a large city-forming enterprise interested in preserving quality labor resources. And for this it is necessary to invest in the living conditions of employees and develop urban infrastructure. Therefore, the enterprise orders or develops a master plan, because it does not have the authority to change the master plan. For example, the development of a master plan for the city of Vorkuta initiated local company Vorkutaugol. The goal is to build a city in which the company’s employees and their families live, comfortable in order to connect their lives with it for many years, and also to solve the problem of mass outflow of the population.

Now financial institutions are actively involved in master planning. For example, with the support of VEB.RF, master plans for five cities in the Far East were previously developed, and a development plan for the Arkhangelsk agglomeration is now being prepared. And such an approach is more than justified, since the state corporation further participates in the development of infrastructure, co-financing the construction of planned facilities. Sometimes funding is not enough to implement ambitious projects, especially in remote regions of the Far East and the Arctic. The state corporation is one of the most active investors in the Far East and the Arctic – the total volume of investments in projects with its participation exceeds 4.8 trillion rubles. Such investments most often have a non-linear effect, and the money is returned through related industries. For example, the effect of a paved road is the development of logistics, business and the city as a whole.

The involvement of the facility operator allows not only to accurately estimate the cost of implementing the master plan, but also to accurately outline the implementation of tasks. In this case, both local authorities and residents will always have a clear understanding that the master plan will be implemented. And it is advisable to scale such a practice, since it allows us to solve the key problem of 99 percent of Russian cities – the deterioration of engineering infrastructure and housing stock.