Floating City, City on the Water — an investment project envisaging the development of Grebnevskie Peski island and the Yarmarka embankment.
Nature of the project
A city to be erected, in a most extraordinary fashion, on sand islands in various parts of Nizhny Novgorod.
To avoid conjuring up the notion of "a city built on sand" in the minds of investors, the project has been named the City on the Water.
Project details
The project, to be implemented by the Moscow-based LLC "Mezhregionalnaya Investitsionnaya Kompaniya" (Inter-Regional Investment Company), envisages the construction of entertainment and hotel facilities, as well as restaurants, shops, and playgrounds. The development area will be 31,000 sq. m, with a total building area of 150,000 sq. m.
The investor intends to put $250 million into the project.
Construction of the complex is scheduled to begin in 2009 and be completed in 2011.
Expert opinions
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Analysts describe the construction of large facilities near water as risky, due to the possibility of flood inundation. "An extraordinarily high embankment would need to be created near Grebnevskie Peski island in order to hold back the force of the flowing water," says Vladimir Yerashov, head of the international investment projects department at M-Industriya. "Even at a water level of 63 metres, this island floods in spring, and once the Cheboksary hydroelectric station mark is brought up to 68, colossal sums will have to be invested before any construction can begin there," believes Tatyana Romancheva, director of the Nizhny Novgorod Centre for Scientific Expertise. Former head of the Cheboksary hydroelectric station Vladimir Privalov believes that only the use of modern engineering structures will make it possible to erect buildings on the embankment and avoid flooding. If the project is realised, analysts believe it will pose serious competition to the actively developing entertainment zone at the Rowing Canal nearby. "On the whole, building 'on the water' is a very attractive investment — the market price per square metre on the island will be several times higher than the cost price," explained a representative of one of the federal development companies. | 
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Interesting facts
- A special metro line is planned to run under the island.
- Visitors will be served by a five-star hotel with 100 rooms.
- A dedicated emergency vehicle bridge is to provide access to the island.
- A beach is planned for the stretch of the Oka where the non-freezing effluents from the Avtozavod flow.
Opinion of Nizhny Novgorod residents
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Any excavation pit on the island will be flooded within twenty-four hours. We used to do it as kids for fun — we'd dig a hole a couple of metres from the bank (brought a shovel along), and the next day there was water in it — warm and clean (filtered, naturally).
Meaning the bottom of any pit has to be at water level, with everything else well above it. They were telling us about a cable car here the other day — apparently they're building its foundation on the island by sinking concrete rings, and then the foundation will be poured inside. And that's just A FEW SUPPORTS. Yet here we have fantasists who've decided to build an entire city that way. I wonder — did the designers actually visit the site, as usual? |
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