In the Russian language, the word ‘gostinka’ means a condominium with very small apartments. In the Soviet Union, gostinkas were mostly built for factory and enterprise workers in the 60s and 70s but today many of them are abandoned. Check out photos of a gostinka in Norilsk.
Advertisement:
‘Turn on, turn off’.
‘Elevator’.
‘History of the Middle Ages’.
‘In case of fire call 01. Fire hose and fire-hose barrel are on the main floor’.
’48, Laureatov Street’.
Location: Norilsk
via nordroden
I guess these places will never be fixed up with russias declining population.
Why not? A home, no matter how small and cramped, will still be better than no home at all.
It is in the middle of frozen wilderness, there is nothing except closed facility and abandoned panel housed – no electricity, no heat. Nobody can live there. There were some cities abandoned, when central heating stop working – it was -50 C inside buildings overnight.
ptc
so you’d rather live out in the open than in here, is that it?
The problem is that nobody wants to live here because everybody wants the best infrastructure that only the major cities can afford.
If by fixed up you mean blown up with dynamite i’m all in favor of them being fixed up.
“History of the Middle Ages?” Sounds interesting… I would have carried away that tome…
Yup, house the workers in a high- rise Gulag, call it a ‘gostinka’ and all will be well in our world. If you lived in such, you’d know why it was called it a go- stinka.
Yes,reminds me of the great UK workers paradise,high rise never ending block in Sheffield,South Yorkshire-built in the 60′s for the steel workers,source of crime and poverty until destroyed in the late 80′s.
What’s with the “Glory Holes”???
How were these prefab Soviet apartment blocks heated? From a centralized manufacturing waste heat facility that piped the heat to the buildings or what? Because from what i’ve seen these prefab building are all solid concrete slab construction with no insulation whatsoever. If one had to pay for it, it would cost a fortune to keep them heated.
On picture 10 under the window you can see where the heating pipe was placed. Every room had those.
Central heating – in the frozen wilderness, thin panel walls, wooden windows rims – no isolation – typical soviet building – cheap. When central heating malfunction, whole city was abandoned (in two days)
These places exist all over the world, think of Gary, Indiana, or downtown Detroit. Sure we have them here in Sweden as well, there have been some interesting stuff written about them for instance creative destruction and some other things. What is interesting is to compare what is left behind and what is removed in for instance Russia and France or Russia and the U.S
IN CANADA WHEN A BUILDING IS TOO OLD THEY DESTROYED IT ,THEY SHOULD DO THE SAME