Developing Historical Industrial Belt of St. Petersburg

UBC Commission on Urban Planning and Public Design organised, in cooperation with the city of St. Petersburg, District Administration of Admiralty, Vybosky and Petrodvoretz districts and the real estate company Becar, a seminar in St. Petersburg on "Developing the historical industrial belt of St. Petersburg and the new masterplan". 35 participants from 15 UBC cities took part in the event.

The participants were presented with the main strategies and principles of the new masterplan of St. Petersburg, main investment areas in the city centre and the main problems of the conservation and revitalization of the historical industrial belt

The part of the meeting concentrated on best practices from different cities. A very good one from Tampere: "How to develop a historically important area called Finlayson and Tampella in the city centre" was presented. It showed the long, slow and complicated process of changes from textile factories to high tech office and housing area.

The other example was the industrial areas of the town of Sillamae. In the Soviet times it was a closed town. Nowadays the city wants to develop as an industrial centre.

The next example was the city of Helsinki showing how Nokia ex-cable factory has been converted to cultural and art centre called Cable in Ruoholahti. Also a representative of the city of Vantaa made an imposing presentation about the Vantaa Airport City - how to plan and build with a public-private co-operatin a large scale business centre in the vicinity of the main airport of Finland, some 16 km from the centre of Helsinki.

The workshops concentrated on two areas in this huge belt around the historical centre. The first group of participants studied how to develop the area around the former Warsaw railway station in the south. The group pointed out the triangle between airport, harbour and the former-railway station and its potential economic importance. The second workshop worked on the Vyboskaja Embankment area by the Nevka-river and the vicinity of the hotel St. Petersburg. The group pointed out that area belongs to the historical tsarists city thus skyscrapers should not be built there. The other idea was to open those blocks to the river and reduce private car traffic along its banks.

The participants could also see an exhibition of actual housing and office investments, two large maquettes of the historical centre of St. Petersburg, as well as masterplans from the 1940's, 1950's and 1960's.