The planned enlargement of Moscow’s boundaries is going to include more land than first thought.
City Hall says the Russian capital will now grow by 16,000 hectares. The expansion will be mainly in the south of the city.
Moscow will grow to include Skolkovo town, which hosts Russia’s new innovation hub, and Rublevo-Arkhangelskoe village, where Russia’s international financial center will be located.
Moscow and the Moscow region have yet to agree on the final boundaries and to pass the plans through parliament. Mayor Sergei Sobyanin says this will take at least two years.
It is not clear how the newly acquired territories will be used. City Hall plans to hold an international contest called “Big Moscow” to attract development ideas.
President Dmitry Medvedev first raised the idea of extending the capital’s limits at the St. Petersburg Economic Forum in June. The direct order came following Moscow and the Moscow region’s agreement, after a decade of talks, on an exact border between the two districts.
The original idea behind the plan was to relocate the headquarters of state officials outside the capital. Medvedev believes that this could be a good way to decongest the capital’s overcrowded roads and to make the city more attractive for financial workers, thus turning it into an international financial center.
Apart from housing administrative buildings, the new land will also be used for residential construction. More than 2 million new homes are expected to be built on the new territory within the next 20 years.
The district will also see renovations to the transportation infrastructure. The government plans to spend a large sum of money on the reconstruction of the Kiev and Kaluga highways that go through the territory.