Cramped Moscow looks to raze or renew old low-rises

Moscow will not expand before the year 2020. As reported by Rosbalt, this was the view put forward Wednesday at a roundtable on the problems of the megapolis by Aleksandr Kosovan, first deputy chief of the Department of Architecture, Construction, Development and Reconstruction of the Moscow Administration. He said that, because of the growing shortage of appropriate unused sites for urban development, there will be a change in the way existing city properties are used. Priorities will be placed on the razing or reconstruction of and capital repairs to decrepit five-story housing stock and to reworking existing industrial properties.