|
POST FACTUM
On the eve of its 300th anniversary, the city on the banks of the Neva is pon-dering its future. St. Petersburg has come to the conclusion that it must have been much easier to make the decision about founding the city than to de-termine at the end of the 20th century what it should be like in 20-30 years or solve all the problems confronting it now. The city's problems in the areas of transport, housing and the environment - problems that accompany the development of any metropolis - have been getting worse since the 1960s. Numerous projects and programmes elabo-rated in the city were implemented whenever the city could afford it and of course reflected the limited human ability to predict historical develop-ments. It seems unlikely that anyone at that time could have foreseen the dramatic and radical political and ideological changes that occurred in the vast territory of the USSR that occupied one sixth of the globe's land sur-face. Who could predict that many of the numerous achievements of the city would be deemed failures in the 1990s. Nevertheless, that has happened. The enormous industrial and scientific potential of St. Petersburg, mainly designed to satisfy the demands of the country's defense complex, appeared incapable of quickly adjusting to free market conditions. On losing its material support the city's priceless cultural heritage has begun to deteriorate. Even the city's trump card - its proximity to Europe - is now changing hands and is being used by the Baltic States and Scandinavian countries, rather than by St. Petersburg itself. Moreover, freight traffic in Russia and the means to provide for it has been transformed so much lately that St. Petersburg is no longer Russia's sole window on the West. So what is the city's role today in the new and changed Russia? It turned out that naive attempts to transform the birthplace of Russian in-dustry into a financial and tourist centre were bound to fail from the start. The future of St. Petersburg has been discussed and analysed by various projects elaborated by the city's experts, at the Petersburg Economic Forum and other conferences, as well as by the Strategic Plan for St. Petersburg's Growth. These have made it clear that the city's future lies in the efficient development of St. Petersburg and all of Russia's northwestern border re-gions into a major transport junction uniting all waterways, railroads and motorways. Needless to say, this involves uniting the transport infrastruc-ture of the entire area, something that will provide close links between Rus-sia, its regions, the CIS and Europe. Such an infrastructure will include a system of traffic flow monitoring, a comprehensive service industry and fi-nancial facilities. This will result in the revival and transformation of the area's industry and will lead to important social changes. The peculiarity of the "European Gates of Russia" project is that both Russia and Europe are working together on providing Russia's entry onto the European stage. The fact that both sides are interested in developing trade, financial and securities markets, works as an incentive for investors and encourages both Russian and foreign entrepreneurs to participate in such a promising venture. Peter the Great's prophecy that "all foreign flags will call at our ports" may well soon be realized.
|
