
A microdistrict or microraion is a residential complex—a primary structural element of the
residential area
A residential area is a land used in which housing predominates, as opposed to industrial and commercial areas.
Housing may vary significantly between, and through, residential areas. These include single-family housing, multi-family residen ...
construction in the
Soviet Union
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
and in some
post-Soviet and former
socialist state
A socialist state, socialist republic, or socialist country is a sovereign state constitutionally dedicated to the establishment of socialism. This article is about states that refer to themselves as socialist states, and not specifically ...
s. Residential districts in most of the cities and towns in Russia and the republics of the former Soviet Union were built in accordance with this concept.
According to the Construction Rules and Regulations of the Soviet Union, a typical microdistrict covered the area of 10–60
hectare
The hectare (; SI symbol: ha) is a non-SI metric unit of area equal to a square with 100-metre sides (1 hm2), that is, square metres (), and is primarily used in the measurement of land. There are 100 hectares in one square kilometre. ...
s (30–160 acres), up to but not exceeding 80 hectares (200 acres) in some cases, and comprised residential dwellings (usually multi-story
apartment building
An apartment (American English, Canadian English), flat (British English, Indian English, South African English), tenement ( Scots English), or unit (Australian English) is a self-contained housing unit (a type of residential real estate) ...
s) and public service buildings. As a general rule, major motor roads,
greenways, and natural obstacles served as boundaries between microdistricts, allowing an overall reduction in city road construction and maintenance costs and emphasizing
public transportation. Major motor roads or through streets were not to cross microdistricts' territories. The entrances to a microdistrict's territory were to be located no further than 300 meters (1000 ft) apart.
Standards also regulated the accessibility of the public service buildings (excluding schools and pre-school facilities) by imposing a 500-meter (1,500–foot) limit as the farthest distance from any residential dwelling. Unlike Western countries, the Soviet Union did not
redevelop existing residential or commercial areas; microdistricts were always built further and further out from old parts of cities, so planning of local services, and transportation to employment in old parts of the city were critical. One of the city-planners' tasks was to ensure that the public buildings were built to cover the microdistrict's territory in accordance with the norms. Typical public service structures include
secondary schools, pre-school establishments (usually combined
kindergarten
Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th cen ...
and
nursery), grocery stores, personal service shops,
cafeterias, clubs,
playgrounds
A playground, playpark, or play area is a place designed to provide an environment for children that facilitates Play (activity)#Children, play, typically outdoors. While a playground is usually designed for children, some are designed for othe ...
, and building maintenance offices, as well as a number of specialized shops. The exact number of buildings of each type depended on the distance requirement and the microdistrict's population density and was determined by means of certain per capita standards.
History
1920s–1950s
The history of microdistricts as an urban planning concept dates back to the 1920s, when the Soviet Union underwent rapid
urbanization
Urbanization (or urbanisation in British English) is the population shift from Rural area, rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. ...
. Under the
Soviet urban planning ideologies of the 1920s During the 1920s, Soviet urban planning ideologies established along two competing lines: the urbanist and disurbanist schools. Whilst the proposed form of the city differed between the two ideologies, their visions of social organization for commun ...
, residential complexes—compact territories with residential dwellings, schools, shops, entertainment facilities, and
green spaces—started to prevail in urban planning practice, as they allowed for more careful and efficient planning of the rapid urban expansion. These complexes were seen as an opportunity to build a collective society,
[Ir. M.H.H. van Dijk, IsoCaRP Congress 2003, ''Planning and politics''] an environment suitable and necessary for the new way of life.
[Michael Gentile, Dept. of Social and Economic Geography, ]Uppsala University
Uppsala University (UU) () is a public university, public research university in Uppsala, Sweden. Founded in 1477, it is the List of universities in Sweden, oldest university in Sweden and the Nordic countries still in operation.
Initially fou ...
, ''Urbanism and Disurbanism in the Soviet Union
/ref>
In the 1930s, residential complexes grew in size, covering territories of up to five to six hectares. A system of building residential complexes was gradually replaced with a concept of a city block. Such blocks generally comprised residential buildings along the perimeter, and residential buildings intermingled with public service buildings on the interior. However, it proved unfeasible to provide all public services within every city block, due to the latter's relatively compact size; it was not unusual to have a school, a kindergarten, or a store serving the population of several blocks, which were often separated by major motor roads. The system of the city block also required a developed network of roads, thus increasing the maintenance and construction costs and complicating the organization of public transportation.
The 1940s and 1950s saw further enlargement and grouping of the city blocks. However, new construction was based on the same principles as in the previous decades, and could not keep up with the increasing housing demand. Labor-intensive industrialization of the country demanded ever more workers, which was hard to achieve with housing accommodation lacking.
1950s–1990s
Soviet authorities revisited issues of urban planning in the mid-1950s. The new urban planning concept was built on the idea of residential districts (with 10,000–30,000 inhabitants each), consisting of several microdistricts (with 8,000–12,000 inhabitants each), which in their turn comprised several residential complexes (with 1,000–1,500 inhabitants each). In larger cities, residential districts were grouped into urban zones, the population of which could reach one million.
Each microdistrict provided the people with facilities needed on a daily basis, whereas services in lesser demand were available on the residential-district level. This concept was backed up with the reorganization of the Soviet construction industry— panel-block apartment buildings became widespread as they allowed for fast, although often low-quality, construction, reduced costs, and economies of scale
In microeconomics, economies of scale are the cost advantages that enterprises obtain due to their scale of operation, and are typically measured by the amount of Productivity, output produced per unit of cost (production cost). A decrease in ...
. The whole construction process became simplified and standardized
Standardization (American English) or standardisation (British English) is the process of implementing and developing technical standards based on the consensus of different parties that include firms, users, interest groups, standards organiza ...
, leading to the erection of the rows and rows of faceless grey rectangular apartment buildings which now prevail in every city and town of the countries of the former Soviet Union. Such a drastic reduction in building costs was necessary because, after World War II
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
, there was a significant deficit in housing caused by the destruction of infrastructure in the Soviet Union during the war, with many major cities being completely destroyed and their buildings becoming unusable.
Humorous insights into the potential consequences of living in such a bland and repetitive atmosphere appear in the hugely popular Mosfilm production '' The Irony of Fate'' (1976).
China
In China, this type of neighbourhood unit is known as 'xiaoqu' (). First built in the 1980s in Jinan
Jinan is the capital of the province of Shandong in East China. With a population of 9.2 million, it is one of the largest cities in Shandong in terms of population. The area of present-day Jinan has played an important role in the history of ...
, Tianjin
Tianjin is a direct-administered municipality in North China, northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the National Central City, nine national central cities, with a total population of 13,866,009 inhabitants at the time of the ...
, and Wuxi
Wuxi ( zh, s=无锡, p=Wúxī, ) is a city in southern Jiangsu, China. As of the 2024 census, it had a population of 7,495,000. The city lies in the southern Yangtze delta and borders Lake Tai. Notable landmarks include Lihu Park, the Mt. Lings ...
, preceding the Chinese economic reform
Reform and opening-up ( zh, s=改革开放, p=Gǎigé kāifàng), also known as the Chinese economic reform or Chinese economic miracle, refers to a variety of economic reforms termed socialism with Chinese characteristics and socialist marke ...
, they were very similar to the concept as known in the Soviet Union, and are considered to be an evolution of the work unit (). Xiaoqu similarly promoted a sense of community among the inhabitants.
After the economy was opened up more for commercial real estate developers, xiaoqu continued to be built in recent decades, but evolved in several ways such as differentiation in luxury, safety and available services. The apartments are owned by the inhabitants, and the Xiaoqu is often enclosed by a wall, with the entrance gate being guarded. The xiaoqu often also have their own government representatives and property managers. The number of residents can vary greatly depending on the kind of xiaoqu, with Beijing's Tiantongyuan suburb having more than 700,000 residents as of 2019, whereas other xiaoqu only consist of one building housing a few hundred residents.
2016 State Council guidelines called for opening up private roads in xiaoqu, and building smaller scale xiaoqu, to allow a finer road network in cities.
See also
* 15-minute city
* Falowiec
* Gated community
* High-rise building
A tower block, high-rise, apartment tower, residential tower, apartment block, block of flats, or office tower is a tall building, as opposed to a low-rise building and is defined differently in terms of height depending on the jurisdiction ...
* Housing estate
A housing estate (or sometimes housing complex, housing development, subdivision (land), subdivision or community) is a group of homes and other buildings built together as a single development. The exact form may vary from country to count ...
* Kommunalka
* Neighbourhood
A neighbourhood (Commonwealth English) or neighborhood (American English) is a geographically localized community within a larger town, city, suburb or rural area, sometimes consisting of a single street and the buildings lining it. Neighbourh ...
** Neighbourhood unit
* Panelák, Panelház, Plattenbau
* Urban planning in communist countries
*
*
Notes
References
Sources
*''Great Soviet Encyclopedia
The ''Great Soviet Encyclopedia'' (GSE; , ''BSE'') is one of the largest Russian-language encyclopedias, published in the Soviet Union from 1926 to 1990. After 2002, the encyclopedia's data was partially included into the later ''Great Russian Enc ...
'', entry on
микрорайон
* "Строительные нормы и правила. Градостроительство. Планировка и застройка городских и сельских поселений", СНиП 2.07.01—89, 1989 — ''Construction Rules and Regulations. City-Planning. Planning and Development of Urban and Rural Settlements'', SNiP 2.07.01—89, 1989
* Н. С. Сапрыкина, "Основные градостроительные концепции и современные проблемы реконструкции жилой среды середины 1950-х — 1960-х гг. — N. S. Saprykina, ''Principal city-town concepts and modern problems of reconstruction of the mid-1950s—1960s residential environments'
External links
excerpts from ''The Soviet Review'', a journal of translations, Vol. 2, no. 4, April 1961
Further reading
*{{cite journal, title=Rise and Fall of the Microdistrict in Pyongyang, North Korea, year=2019, author=Dongwoo Yim, doi=10.33526/EJKS.20191901.73, journal=European Journal of Korean Studies, volume=19, issue=1, pages=73-85
Architecture in the Soviet Union
Human habitats
Neighbourhoods
Public housing
Urban studies and planning terminology