March 24. Saturday. 7:30 am. And in the Ekaterinburg metro there is a rush like on weekdays during rush hour. Citizens travel to the center of the Ural capital to say goodbye to the unfinished TV tower.
An hour and a half later, it seemed like half the city had gathered at the demolition site.
The tower will fall on us anyway, some say warily. But no one moves.
No, they thought of everything. But the fragments can fly, others suggest.
The tower was to be demolished exactly at 9:00. However, the "show" was delayed. The townspeople were already starting to worry, but then the howl of sirens was heard. It later turned out that the demolition was delayed due to a false report that unauthorized persons had entered the site. And yet, after the second beep, two explosions occurred.
The spectacle was epic. The unfinished television tower, which stood in the city center for 27 years (and construction of the tower began in 1983), cracked and fell to one side. All that remains of the former “luxury” is a stub that will be removed with special equipment. The site must be cleaned within two weeks after demolition.
Somehow she fell too easily. It was as if she hadn’t stood here for almost 30 years. It just tilted and swooped and disappeared behind the houses. Where is the tower? There is no tower. We are parting ways... - a resident of the city, Ivan Petrov, told Komsomolskaya Pravda.
Everything went as normal. The charges were activated with an interval of several seconds, so for the observer they merged into one. The tower partially collapsed inward and partially lay flat on the erected “cushion.” The remaining 30 meters will be dismantled in about two weeks. It was not possible to dismantle it immediately, preliminary, due to poor concrete. But this risk was built into the project, reported the UMMC company, which became the customer for the demolition.
Now an ice palace is to be built on a sweet spot in the center of Yekaterinburg, where a TV tower used to stand.
By the way, one of the townspeople was hit by a concrete fragment when the TV tower collapsed. According to eyewitnesses, it was the size of two fists. The guy was taken away in an ambulance. UMMC admits that one of the spectators was taken to the hospital. However, the connection between the incident and the demolition of the television tower is categorically denied.
A few hours after the unfinished TV tower became history, the city was plunged into melancholy. Citizens are pouring out their sadness on social networks. They post photographs of landmarks that have become history on their pages. They remember funny and amusing incidents from life.
All. She was gone: a symbol of the city, albeit unfinished, but a symbol; architectural dominant; historical value. The era has passed, and with it the symbols are crumbling. The only memories that will remain are photos, video materials, and the roar of the explosion in the ears of those who looked at it. To be honest, I cried from this roar and the irreversibility of what was happening,” wrote city resident Anastasia Kosareva ( author's spelling and punctuation - preserved).
KP Help
Let us remind you that the construction of the 361-meter-high TV tower in Sverdlovsk began in 1983. It was supposed to cover the entire Sverdlovsk region with a television and radio signal. Construction was carried out using a technology unique for that time. Workers placed the concrete form on the ground, installed reinforcement and poured concrete. The form was then raised, narrowed and filled with concrete again. And so they built up the tower meter by meter.
In addition to radio and television transmitters, the tower was to house a revolving restaurant and an observation deck. You could get into it using one of two elevators with a lifting capacity of up to 1000 kg.
Alas, in 1991, when the tower reached 220 meters, construction was frozen. The reason is the financial crisis. Due to the difficult situation in the country, there was simply not enough money for the ambitious project.
By the way
On the eve of demolition, several young people decided to climb the TV tower. They carried backpacks filled with food, warm clothes and even sleeping bags, all in order to stage a protest and spend the night on the summit. Anticipating the moment when the guards would make another round of the territory, the entire gang of protesters rushed to the base of the TV tower. But some of them still fell into the clutches of security.
Four activists still managed to break through, jump onto the stairs and climb up. At about 5 o'clock in the morning the Russian tricolor began to flutter on the tower itself.
The unfinished TV tower is one of the main symbols of Yekaterinburg and at the same time the tallest abandoned building in the world. At the beginning of 2018, work began on its demolition. On March 24, this object, which could be turned into a unique attraction, will be blown up... Unless a miracle happens... The construction of a new television tower in Sverdlovsk began at the end of 1983. Perhaps this was the most ambitious project of the Soviet government in this city. In addition to the tower, there should have been a park, a museum, a planetarium, and a house of pioneers. The construction was carried out by the Spetszhelezobetonstroy trust, which previously erected the Ostankino TV tower. Active construction continued until 1989, then problems with financing began. However, construction continued until 1991, then it was frozen. Left without funding, the builders simply left without mothballing the tower and leaving it exposed to unfavorable external conditions. Construction stopped at 219.25 meters (according to other sources, 220.4 meters). And if we take into account the metal structures rising above, the height of the tower is 231.7 meters. A metal antenna with a height of 141 meters was to be installed above. The design height of the structure was 361 meters. For comparison, the height of the tallest skyscraper in the city, the Iset Tower, is 209 meters. If the TV tower had been completed, it would have become the second tallest in Russia - after the Ostankino Tower in Moscow. The new tower would significantly expand signal coverage – all the way to Nizhny Tagil. At an altitude of 188 meters, a restaurant was to be located on a rotating platform (analogous to “Seventh Heaven” in Ostankino). The prototype of the television tower was an ordinary reinforced concrete chimney, only higher and more voluminous, with appropriate rooms for equipment. The tower is a monolithic structure made of reinforced concrete with a wall thickness of 50 centimeters at the base to 30 centimeters at the top. High-strength concrete grade M400 was used (in the modern classification B30). This type of concrete is used in the construction of bunkers, weapons depots, and protective structures. The thickness of the protective layer of concrete on the outer surface of the trunk is 40-70 millimeters, on the inner surface - 30-50 millimeters. The design volume of shaft concrete is 3066 m3. Concrete was brought from the concrete factory, lifted upstairs and poured onto reinforcement welded for strength. The work platform was ascended by a shaft lift inside the tower. Inside the tower trunk there is a hollow cylinder with a diameter of 15 meters at the bottom and 7 meters at the top. Along the entire height of the trunk there are numerous window openings of various shapes and sizes. At levels from 199.6 to 208.9 meters, an installation opening measuring 9.3 x 5.72 meters was left in the tower trunk on the southwestern side. Through it (using a beam crane installed inside the television tower) it was planned to install the elevator shaft, elevator equipment and the elevators themselves. After this, the hole would be concreted. At the level of 231.7 meters, a platform with a diameter of 12 meters was built on the trunk, with a fence. The metal structures of the mine hoist are mounted along the entire height of the reinforced concrete shaft of the tower. When the tower was abandoned, extreme sports enthusiasts who were eager to conquer the tower climbed up them. The mine hoist was installed to the level of 239.7 meters. A walking staircase was installed outside along the entire height of the tower. Over time, it rusted and in some places moved away from the trunk. After an accident occurred on it, the lower part of the stairs was cut off. After termination construction work appearance The tower did not change, except that, at the request of the prosecutor's office, red altitude lights were installed for flight safety and, over time, the huge inscription “Kisa” that appeared at the top was erased for the sake of the Russian tricolor. One of the builders of the television tower, foreman Walter Reingold, recalled: “When I arrived, the tower was 20 meters high. I built another 200 meters. We worked without stopping - the essence of the monolith is continuous concreting without joints or seams. The construction of the reinforced concrete shaft was carried out by two teams of eight people. From morning until evening, and in recent months around the clock, they climbed to heights, knitted a mesh of reinforcement, assembled formwork, and poured concrete. As a result, the 200-meter shaft was erected in six months. We did our job and passed it. Afterwards, heating engineers, fitters, elevator operators, plumbers, and electricians began working there. The next step was to build the spire.” In 2017, experts assessed the degree of readiness of the tower at 47%, the degree of wear and tear at 24.6%. The object was valued at 654 million rubles, of which 588 million rubles was the cost of the land plot. The huge abandoned area near the circus soon began to attract extreme sports enthusiasts and simply informal people. Risking their lives, they climbed to the very top along internal structures and external stairs. Some even spent the night on the tower with tents. There were many who climbed the tower dozens and hundreds of times. Sometimes paratroopers jumped from here. There were also accidents - it was not difficult to fall off the tower structures. In the end, the tower was closed, and the area around it began to be guarded. However, from time to time, thrill-seekers still entered the tower. TV tower restoration projects The construction of the tower at that time was carried out according to a new standard project. In addition to Sverdlovsk in Russia, similar towers were supposed to appear in Perm and Vladivostok, but the crisis prevented them. But towers according to this project were built in Tallinn (Estonia) and Vilnius (Lithuania), only the platform at the top was different. Looking at them, you can understand what the TV tower in Sverdlovsk-Ekaterinburg would be like. But even in the form of unfinished construction, according to many Yekaterinburg residents, the tower adorned the city. This is the dominant thing that the eye clings to. From time to time, regional authorities announced plans to restore the site. In 2007, an investor was found who expressed his readiness to invest about 500 million rubles in the completion of the tower, and to build business centers nearby to recoup the costs, but the financial crisis of 2008 prevented it. The unfinished tower was listed on the balance sheet of the federal state unitary enterprise RTRS. In 2012, the Sverdlovsk region bought an unfinished television tower, paying 500 million rubles from the regional budget. The following year, 2013, the regional authorities held a competition for best project reconstruction of an unfinished television tower. The winner was the company "NAI BEKAR Ural" with the project "Green Hill Park". According to the project, it was planned to build a registry office and an observation deck on the tower, and in the lower part - hotels, shops and entertainment centers. However, no investors were found for the construction of the facility. Second place in the competition went to the Global Lighthouse project, which proposed turning the tower into a scientific and educational center. And the third is the “Star of the Urals” with floating rings using the principle of magnetic levitation. In total, more than 70 projects were submitted to the competition. Some suggested installing a statue of St. Catherine on top. There was also a proposal to turn the tower into a “dandelion” - to create a huge art object. According to the idea of the project authors from the TigerTiger agency, there should be an observation deck at the top of the tower, and at the bottom there could be exhibition or office space. At night, the stem of the “dandelion” would be illuminated in green, and the top - white. In 2017, it became known that the Tengo Interactive studio had created a VR project about the Yekaterinburg TV tower. The project was called “The Tower VR”. Wearing a virtual reality helmet, you can play the game by visiting the famous TV tower and climbing to the top. On February 22, 2017, the authorities put the tower and the land around it up for auction. The starting price was set at 652.8 million rubles. The Atomstroykompleks company, which planned to build 120 thousand square meters, showed interest in the auction. m. of housing and commercial real estate. The tower was planned to be reconstructed by installing a long spire, due to which its height would increase to 361 meters. They wanted to build an observation deck on the tower. However, after deliberation, Atomstroykompleks refused to acquire the unfinished property. The auction did not take place due to lack of applications. At the same time, the owner of UMMC, billionaire Andrei Kozitsyn, showed interest in the site. As a result, in 2017, the Sverdlovsk authorities donated an unfinished television tower purchased from federal authorities for half a billion budget rubles, the UMMC company - in exchange for a promise to demolish the TV tower and build another ice arena in its place (literally a few blocks from here is the Uralets Ice Sports Palace). In November 2017, the Sverdlovsk organization of the Union of Architects of Russia sent a letter to the head of UMMC Andrei Kozitsyn asking him to reconsider the decision to demolish the TV tower and build an ice arena in this place. The former governor also spoke out against the demolition of the TV tower. Sverdlovsk region Eduard Rossel: “There are 165 meters of metal structures left to be completed there. This needs to be done, paint the TV tower, install the equipment. There you can make a good cultural center - a new point of attraction for the townspeople, for young people,” he told reporters. But the current governor Kuyvashev, who came to the Urals from the Tyumen region, welcomes the demolition of one of the symbols of a city foreign to him. “The tower is definitely not a monument. And not a symbol of some kind historical event. This is a symbol of mismanagement. We were looking different shapes use of a television tower. And I must state that there are no investors to implement any idea. This is a purely economic issue. It's funny to call it some kind of symbol. It’s bad that we can’t bring this territory into circulation. That is why the decision was made to demolish...,” Kuyvashev said at his press conference. To create a negative image of the TV tower, a memorial was built near the security booth at the construction site, called by its creators as “40 corpses” (although the official number of those who crashed on the TV tower due to their own stupidity is 11 people), and in the media and on social networks, UMMC PR people send out a video about the “tower of death ". In January 2018, active demolition work began on the tower. They are rushing to finish it in time for the FIFA World Cup, four matches of which will be held in Yekaterinburg. At the request of UMMC, the demolition was carried out by a company with the simple name “Special Explosive Works” from Magnitogorsk (Chelyabinsk region). The cost of demolishing the TV tower has not been disclosed. There have been approximate estimates in the media of 200 million rubles. The demolition of the tower will take place on Saturday, March 24, 2018. After the explosion, the remains of the tower will go to Uralmash. They will be taken to the landfill at the end of Kommunisticheskaya Street. It is there that you will be able to pick up a part of the legendary long-term construction as a souvenir. Simultaneously with the news about the impending demolition of the tower, reports appeared about the plans of the Federal State Unitary Enterprise "RTRS" to build a new television tower, even higher than the unfinished one. According to plans, it should appear at Uralmash, on the territory of a former radio center. The TV tower project assumes a height of 236 meters. Construction is planned to be completed in 33 months. If another crisis doesn't interfere...
The unfinished TV tower is one of the main symbols of Yekaterinburg and at the same time the tallest abandoned building in the world. On March 24, by the sole decision of Kuyvashev and Kozitsyn, an object that could have been turned into a unique world-class attraction was blown up despite the protests of the townspeople...
History of the construction of the television tower
The construction of a new television tower near the circus building in Sverdlovsk began at the end of 1983. Perhaps this was the most ambitious project of the Soviet government in this city. In addition to the tower, there should have been a park, a museum, a planetarium, and a house of pioneers.
Active construction continued until 1989, then problems with financing began. However, construction continued until 1991, then it was frozen. The construction was carried out by the Spetszhelezobetonstroy trust, which previously erected the Ostankino TV tower. Left without funding, the builders simply left without mothballing the tower and leaving it exposed to unfavorable external conditions.
Construction stopped at 219.25 meters (according to other sources, 220.4 meters). And if we take into account the metal structures rising above, the height of the tower is 231.7 meters.
A metal antenna with a height of 141 meters was to be installed above. The design height of the structure was 361 meters. For comparison, the height of the tallest skyscraper in the city, the Iset Tower, is 209 meters. If the TV tower had been completed, it would have become the second tallest in Russia - after the Ostankino Tower in Moscow.
At an altitude of 188 meters, a restaurant was to be located on a rotating platform (analogous to Seventh Heaven in Ostankino).
After the completion of the construction of the new television tower, the 192-meter tower in the park named after Pavlik Morozov was to be demolished. The new tower would significantly expand signal coverage – all the way to Nizhny Tagil.
The prototype of the television tower was an ordinary reinforced concrete chimney, only higher and more voluminous, with appropriate rooms for equipment. The tower is a monolithic structure made of reinforced concrete with a wall thickness of 50 centimeters at the base to 30 centimeters at the top. High-strength concrete grade M400 was used (in the modern classification B30). This type of concrete is used in the construction of bunkers, weapons depots, and protective structures.
The thickness of the protective layer of concrete on the outer surface of the trunk is 40-70 millimeters, on the inner surface - 30-50 millimeters. The design volume of shaft concrete is 3066 m3.
Concrete was brought from the concrete factory, lifted upstairs and poured onto reinforcement welded for strength. The work platform was ascended by a shaft lift inside the tower.
Inside the tower trunk there is a hollow cylinder with a diameter of 15 meters at the bottom and 7 meters at the top. Along the entire height of the trunk there are numerous window openings of various shapes and sizes.
At levels from 199.6 to 208.9 meters, an installation opening measuring 9.3 x 5.72 meters was left in the tower trunk on the southwestern side. Through it (using a beam crane installed inside the television tower) it was planned to install the elevator shaft, elevator equipment and the elevators themselves. After this, the hole would be concreted.
At the level of 231.7 meters, a platform with a diameter of 12 meters was built on the trunk, with a fence.
The metal structures of the mine hoist are mounted along the entire height of the reinforced concrete shaft of the tower. When the tower was abandoned, extreme sports enthusiasts who were eager to conquer the tower climbed up them. The mine hoist was installed to the level of 239.7 meters.
A walking staircase was installed outside along the entire height of the tower. Over time, it rusted and in some places moved away from the trunk. After an accident occurred on it, the lower part of the stairs was cut off.
After the completion of construction work, the appearance of the tower did not change, except that, at the request of the prosecutor’s office, red altitude lights were installed for flight safety and, over time, the huge inscription “Kisa” that appeared at the top was erased for the sake of the Russian tricolor.
Unfinished for extreme sports enthusiasts
The huge abandoned area near the circus soon began to attract extreme sports enthusiasts and simply informal people. Risking their lives, they climbed to the very top along internal structures and external stairs. Some even spent the night on the tower with tents. There were many who climbed the tower dozens and hundreds of times. Sometimes paratroopers jumped from here.
TV tower restoration projects
The construction of the tower at that time was carried out according to a new standard design. In addition to Sverdlovsk in Russia, similar towers were supposed to appear in Perm and Vladivostok, but the crisis prevented them. But towers according to this project were built in Tallinn (Estonia) and Vilnius (Lithuania), only the platform at the top was different. Looking at them, you can understand what the TV tower in Sverdlovsk-Ekaterinburg would be like.
TV tower in Tallinn. Photo from Bookingcar.su
TV tower in Vilnius. Photo from the site votpusk.ru
Even in the form of unfinished construction, according to many Yekaterinburg residents, the tower adorned the city. This is the dominant thing that the eye clings to. The tower was also visible in the outskirts of the city, for example from the Devil’s Settlement (long before high-rise buildings and skyscrapers began to appear in the city).
Thanks to the tower, the view from Plotinka downstream of the Iset River was reminiscent of the panorama in the city of Washington (USA) with the monument to George Washington. At one time, this photo comparison was widespread on the Internet.
From time to time, regional authorities announced plans to restore the site. In 2007, an investor was found who expressed his readiness to invest about 500 million rubles in the completion of the tower, and to build business centers nearby to recoup the costs, but the financial crisis of 2008 prevented it.
The unfinished tower was listed on the balance sheet of the federal state unitary enterprise RTRS. In 2012, by decision of Governor Kuyvashev, the Sverdlovsk region bought the unfinished television tower, paying 500 million rubles from the regional budget.
The following year, 2013, the regional authorities held a competition for the best reconstruction project for the unfinished television tower. The winner was the company "NAI BEKAR Ural" with the project "Green Hill Park". According to the project, it was planned to build a registry office and an observation deck on the tower, and hotels, shops and entertainment centers in the lower part.
Second place in the competition went to the Global Lighthouse project, which proposed turning the tower into a scientific and educational center. And the third is the “Star of the Urals” with floating rings using the principle of magnetic levitation.
In total, more than 70 projects were submitted to the competition. Some suggested installing a statue of St. Catherine on top (for example, instead of a temple on a pond). There was also a proposal to turn the tower into a “dandelion” - to create a huge art object. According to the idea of the project authors from the TigerTiger agency, there should be an observation deck at the top of the tower, and at the bottom there could be exhibition or office space. At night, the stem of the “dandelion” would be illuminated in green, and the top - white.
In 2017, it became known that the Tengo Interactive studio had created a VR project about the Yekaterinburg TV tower. The project was called “The Tower VR”. Wearing a virtual reality helmet, you can play the game by visiting the famous TV tower and climbing to the top. A video with renderings of the project has been posted on the studio’s YouTube channel. It can be seen that the tower is reproduced in great detail. To do this, company employees carried out careful photography inside and outside the tower. You can read more about this project on the website vc.ru.
Demolition of the Yekaterinburg TV tower
On February 22, 2017, the authorities put the tower and the land around it up for auction. The starting price was set at 652.8 million rubles. The Atomstroykompleks company, which planned to build 120 thousand square meters, showed interest in the auction. m. of housing and commercial real estate. The tower was planned to be reconstructed by installing a long spire, due to which its height would increase to 361 meters. They wanted to build an observation deck on the tower. However, after deliberation, Atomstroykompleks refused to acquire the unfinished property. The auction did not take place.
At the same time, the owner of UMMC, billionaire Andrei Kozitsyn, showed interest in the site. As a result, in 2017, the Sverdlovsk authorities freely transferred the unfinished television tower, purchased from the federal authorities for half a billion budget rubles, to the UMMC company - in exchange for a promise to demolish the television tower and build another ice arena in its place (literally a few blocks from here there is an ice sports palace " Uralets" and Datsyuk Arena). The new ice arena will have a capacity of 15 thousand people. However, the corresponding infrastructure (in particular, extensive parking) is not provided. According to experts, on the days of major events there will be a traffic collapse in this part of the city.
Photo by Nadezhda Shimalina
In November 2017, the Sverdlovsk organization of the Union of Architects of Russia sent a letter to the head of UMMC Andrei Kozitsyn asking him to reconsider the decision to demolish the TV tower and build an ice arena in this place.
Some townspeople compare the demolition of the TV tower with the destruction of Ipatiev's house, believing that in the future descendants will remember Kuyvashev and Kozitsyn with unkind words for the destruction of one of the symbols of the city.
Photo by Nadezhda Shimalina
The former governor of the Sverdlovsk region, Eduard Rossel, also spoke out against the demolition of the television tower:
“There are 165 meters of metal structures left to complete. This needs to be done, paint the TV tower, install the equipment. There you can make a good cultural center - a new point of attraction for the townspeople, for young people.”, he told reporters.
But the current governor Kuyvashev, who came to the Urals from the Tyumen region, welcomed the demolition of one of the symbols of a city that was foreign to him.
“The tower is definitely not a monument. And not a symbol of some historical event. This is a symbol of mismanagement. We were looking for different uses for the TV tower. And I must state that there are no investors to implement any idea. This is a purely economic issue. It's funny to call it some kind of symbol. It’s bad that we can’t bring this territory into circulation. That is why the decision was made to demolish it. And even during the discussion on my Instagram, the majority supported", - Kuyvashev said at his press conference.
It is worth noting that under the leadership of Kuyvashev, who talks about the tower as a symbol of mismanagement, the debts of the Sverdlovsk region have grown to stratospheric heights. Thus, according to data at the beginning of 2018, the region’s debt amounts to more than 75 billion rubles. This is twice as much as the entire annual budget of the capital of the Urals.
In January 2018, active demolition work began on the tower. They were in a hurry to finish it in time for the FIFA World Cup, four matches of which will be held in Yekaterinburg. At the request of UMMC, the demolition was carried out by a company with the simple name “Special Explosive Works” from Magnitogorsk (Chelyabinsk region). The same company demolished an elevator near the Makarovsky Bridge for Kozitsyn. The cost of demolishing the TV tower has not been disclosed.
This is how the demolition process was described in project documentation. At the first stage, the lower structure at the base of the tower is dismantled. At the same time, it is preparing earthen rampart, which should become a kind of “cushion” when the structure falls.
The dismantling of the tower barrel will take place in two stages. Holes will be drilled and cuts will be made at 70 and 10 meters. The blastholes will contain an Enamat impulsive gas generator. It was planned to put a net on top of the TV tower - a kind of “mourning stocking”. However, a few days before the demolition, this rag, which was supposed to protect against flying concrete fragments, was torn to shreds by the wind.
Scheme of drilling holes for the Enamata backfill at an altitude of 70 meters.
Everyone who was in Yekaterinburg could see a tall, lifeless tower almost in the center of the city. I would not dare to call it a landmark of the city, but the object is definitely worthy of attention... our attention. As I wrote before, the TV tower was our primary goal on our trip to Ekb. That’s why we couldn’t help but climb on it :)
1.
Inside the TV tower
The history of this object is not attractive in any way, everything is banal - a large-scale project, construction started in the 80s, and due to the crisis, construction was frozen in the early 90s. After the freeze, extreme sports enthusiasts, climbers, and basers flocked to the tower. There have been cases of suicide and the conception of children at the facility - some less, others more..
And so, the design height of the television tower is 361 m, it was planned to move all the city’s television and radio communications there. They only built ~220m and they are still arguing whether they will continue to build? There is no exact answer.
The Sverdlovsk project is similar to the Vilnius TV tower, successfully built in 1977. According to the project, the RTPS should have looked like this: a concrete pillar 220 meters high, below - a 6-story extension for a television studio, a cafeteria and a conference room; at an altitude of 188 meters there is a restaurant with a rotating floor (rotation speed - 1 rpm), like on the Ostankino TV tower. A metal antenna 141 meters long should have been located on top of the pillar. The entrance to the TV tower was planned through an underground tunnel from Dekabristov Street.
The spitting image! This is roughly what the TV tower in Yekaterinburg should be like. 
2.
But in our case we have this:
3.
She's the same
Today this tower, even in its unfinished state, is the tallest building in Yekaterinburg (the city's first skyscraper, Antey-III, is 25 meters lower). This tower is also the tallest abandoned building in the world. (Masts don’t count, because a mast is not a building :))
In the end, we killed two birds with one stone!
I'll tell you how we climbed. The history of our “frosty” hall dates back to the moment when I and raskalov_vit We arrived in Yekaterinburg and, looking at the weather, decided to postpone the climb until later, when the weather got better. But the weather did not get better, and the temperature dropped. And so, last days our stay in Ekb - we have to climb! It’s decided, we’ll go at dawn. We go out, and it’s -25* outside...
4.
Start! 0 meters
It’s cool, but we’ve never seen such frosts. We climbed inside the tower and climbed up to the top. The sun had not yet come out and we had to climb in the dark along steel structures similar to scaffolding. The first 150 meters were even pleasant to climb - once a window, two windows, you look through them, see the height, and how the sky brightens. But when it came to open areas, my body began to feel cold, or rather my hands, because of the snow on the scaffolding (see 1st photo). I got to the first site from where we filmed the sunrise 5 minutes earlier than Vitali, spending 30-35 minutes getting up. :)
5.
What they climbed for
The restricted time did not last long; the 5 minutes I gained gave me a lot of dawn shots with the city lighting turned on.
6.
8.
The bends of the Iset River
10.
11.
12.
13.
At this point the city began to “go dark” and slowly wake up
We met the dawn and decided to climb to the very top. Having got out, we realized that we couldn’t stay there for long - it was colder at altitude, it was about -28*, and there was a strong wind that penetrated everything.
I got an unforgettable experience, despite the fact that the height became boring. The feeling that you are at the very top and there is nothing nearby in the city. Everything is somewhere down there, in the fog and light blue. A large area, plenty of room to spread out, beauty all around - take as many photos as you like! But damn, it's freezing cold! As soon as I take the camera, my hands begin to go numb, and as luck would have it, my gloves are torn on the scaffolding and do little to protect me from the cold.
So it turned out that I spent most of the time warming up my hands, and at that time Raskalov was running around, saying that it was awesome, filming it and eventually frostbiting his nose: D
14.
Conquest!
15.
The very top, the finish line! 220m
16.
A downward view, photos of which we did not find on the Internet. By the way, I painted the tricolor devel43
with your friend. It seems they even promise to add a white stripe. We are waiting)
17.
18.
Dawn halo
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20.
Vysotsky, aka Antey
21.
22.
And these are some kind of residential areas in the distance. Like some polar city
23.
One more look down and we get off
24.
They climbed up and down like this. There are 200 meters of metal underfoot. By the way, tell me where there are whole pine trees on the scaffolding inside? At an altitude of 70 meters! How were they dragged there and why?
25.
At the first “lookout”, from where they filmed the sunrise
26.
When we got downstairs we went home to bed. Personally, when I stepped on the ground, I “exhaled” and was depressed all the way home. But still, the impressions from the TV tower are unforgettable. I would repeat it. In summer.
Thank you for your attention.
Thirty years ago, a concrete high-rise appeared in the center of Sverdlovsk, which was supposed to become the second tallest tower in Russia after Ostankino. Similar towers based on a standard design with a revolving restaurant at the top were built in Vilnius and Tallinn in those years. But the project stopped halfway in the late 80s: the spire was never raised onto the 200-meter concrete frame, the money ran out, and the builder state was gone. The symbol of Yekaterinburg has turned into an abandoned long-term construction site and a monument to Soviet ambitions.
At the top it was proposed to open a registry office or install a figure of St. Catherine; base jumpers and those who decided to commit suicide jumped from the tower. But only now has things moved forward - in January, construction equipment appeared under the TV tower, and the governor announced that the concrete pipe, surrounded by a vacant lot, will be demolished. The unequivocal decision upset the townspeople, and the tower even had a nostalgic telegram channel, where people recall stories about the high-rise and offer alternatives to demolition. The Village tracked down Walter Reingold, who oversaw the construction of the tower decades ago, and asked him to talk about the past of the legendary unfinished building.
Names: TV Tower, “Tower of Death”, “Stone Flower”, “Trumpet”
Address: st. Stepana Razin, 15
Planned height: 361 meters
Actual height: 220 meters
Start of construction: 1983
Termination of work: 1991
Start
“This was the most significant and ambitious project of the Soviet government in Sverdlovsk. For a long time, in the reception room of the chief architect there was a three-meter model of a television tower made of plastic and wood,” recalls Sergei Skrobov, curator of the Yekaterinburg History Museum. The tower was supposed to become part of a comfortable quarter on the Iset embankment. Between Dekabristov and Kuibyshev streets, on the site of a pre-revolutionary residential wooden block, city planners conceived a beautiful area with a large park. A circus with an openwork dome, a nature museum with a planetarium, the Palace of Pioneers, located right above the river, and a television tower with a restaurant and an observation deck at the top - the complex was supposed to become the main vacation spot for Soviet citizens.
The circus was built in the early 80s, and it quickly became the calling card of Sverdlovsk. Then, in 1983, construction of the TV tower officially began. The townspeople saw the frame only towards the end of the decade, when the foundation was ready and the pipe crawled up to a 200-meter height. The main part was built very quickly - in six months. The tower was built from heavy-duty concrete and using the method of monolithic casting, that is, the pipelayers rose to the top step by step without stopping.
Towards the end of construction, they wanted to demolish the small 192-meter TV tower in the park named after Pavlik Morozov. Built in 1955, it no longer satisfied the growing demands of television - its signal barely reached Shuvakish (a village on the northwestern outskirts of Yekaterinburg), and then only intermittently. And the new one would broadcast to the whole of Sverdlovsk and the nearest cities right up to Nizhny Tagil. They were also planning to open the Seventh Heaven restaurant in the tower, like in Moscow, and house the equipment of state security agencies. Because of them, the construction site was given military significance, and photographs of the construction could not be published in the press.
The project was typical: exactly the same towers were built in Vilnius and Tallinn with a difference in the shape of the platform at the top. On the territory of the RSFSR standard towers should have appeared in Sverdlovsk, and also in Perm and Vladivostok. By 1991, the builders had only completed the concreting phase - they erected a frame of a concrete pipe with portholes and made a hole at the top so that parts of the metal spire could be lifted. But with the beginning of perestroika, the facility was no longer funded, and people simply left. No one cared what would happen to the tower next - it was not protected from bad weather and cold, and the iron reinforcement remained sticking out of the concrete walls.
Walter and his tower
The family of 75-year-old Walter Rheingold still lives in the house he inherited from working on the TV tower. IN three-room apartment Workers used to live in Zarechny; sweatshirts hung on nails in the hallway. Now there is nothing at home that reminds us of the collective past. On the bookshelf there are volumes on pipe construction, and from the window you can see the boiler room chimney. The builder points to the red and white tower and says: “A TV tower and a pipe are one and the same. The tower is a prototype of a reinforced concrete chimney, only taller and more voluminous, it has portholes and ceilings with rooms for equipment.”
When I arrived, the tower was 20 meters high. I built another 200 meters. We worked non-stop - the essence of the monolith is continuous concreting without joints or seams
Three decades ago, Walter went on a business trip from Kazakhstan to closed Sverdlovsk to work a little on the local TV tower, and then go to Perm and build exactly the same high-rise there. “My wife set a condition for me: enough business trips, it’s time to hit the shore. I was supposed to build a facility on the Kama, but there was not enough money, and the Perm project was closed. Then the boss said, stay here, and then you will build pipes in the region. He handed me the keys to the apartment, I called my wife and said that we would live in Sverdlovsk.”
Reingold worked as a foreman. Every day he went upstairs and made sure that the formwork was lubricated and that there were no traces of rust on the reinforcement. In addition, he dealt with documents, submitted concrete samples for testing, and controlled the quality of building materials: “If you pick up the documents now, they will all have my signature.”
“When I arrived, the tower was 20 meters high. I built another 200 meters. We worked non-stop - the essence of the monolith is continuous concreting without joints or seams,” he recalls. The construction of the reinforced concrete shaft was carried out by two teams of eight people. From morning until evening, and in recent months around the clock, they climbed to heights, knitted a mesh of reinforcement, assembled formwork, and poured concrete. As a result, the 200-meter shaft was erected in six months. “We did our job and passed it,” says Walter. “After that, heating engineers, fitters, elevator operators, plumbers, and electricians began working there. The next step was to build the spire.”
The builder is confident that the right place was chosen for the construction of the tower: “They planned to open an observation deck at the top, and the city center was perfect for this. During the first climbs, I liked to look at Sverdlovsk from such a height: wide avenues, houses, factories, parks. And then I quickly got used to it, and the romance went away. It was never scary. Many people think that pipelayers are desperate people, but in reality there is nothing special: there are fences and strict safety precautions everywhere at the top.”
Exactly the same towers were built in Vilnius and Tallinn with the difference being the shape of the platform at the top. On the territory of the RSFSR, standard towers were supposed to appear in Sverdlovsk, as well as in Perm and Vladivostok
When the concrete work was completed, Walter went to other city sites, but kept an eye on the fate of the main city tower. “When we handed it over, we didn’t even think that everything would end like this. I remember there were some problems with the cranes that were supposed to install the spire. And then perestroika began and everything went to hell. The tower turned out to be of no use to anyone,” recalls the builder.
The last time Reingold came to the tower was about ten years ago: the structures that were supposed to hold the spire at the top were rusting on the ground. The builder cannot say unequivocally what to do with the tower: “On the one hand, for national economy she is no longer needed. On the other hand, I cringe inside when I think that she will be gone. Thanks to her, my wife and I came to this beautiful city, my children and grandchildren grew up here. I am proud that I built it, but it hurts me when I see this dead monument.”
Desolation and end
After the tower was abandoned, fires started. “The wooden scaffolding inside and the cabins around were burning. The tower gained particular popularity in 1998, when people lined up to watch the fireworks in honor of the city’s anniversary,” says historian Sergei Skrobov. There are no exact statistics on how many people have crashed here. Numbers ranging from a few to 50 people are flashed in the media. Local TV channels often filmed trash stories at the foot of the mountain - the iron mine easily crushed people who had escaped, and more and more epitaphs began to appear on the walls.
Urban folklore renamed TV tower to the “Tower of Death”, and visitors began to be told legends about the bloody floor and ghosts on the tower. In the early 2000s, the authorities decided to stop the madness, welded up the entrance, and organized a parking lot around it, where guards with dogs made sure that no one approached the tower.
Five years ago, the tower and 4.5 hectares around it were transferred to the ownership of the regional authorities. They promised to hold a competition and decide what to do with the object next. Architects proposed opening a registry office at the top, building high-rise residential buildings around it, making a lighthouse or a giant church inside, or simply placing a statue of St. Catherine holding a cross on the top. But the competition ended ingloriously.
“We haven’t progressed beyond a few pictures where the banter is indistinguishable from a rational idea,” urban researcher Dmitry Moskvin says he doesn’t see the point in aestheticizing the tower. - It is impossible to treat it as a functional structure, but rather as an art object. However, in our country, even installing an ordinary street sculpture is a whole epic. This tower does not have any distinct meaning or value for the townspeople, and I believe that dismantling the tower is possible and permissible.”
“The tower is definitely not a monument. And not a symbol of some historical event. This is a symbol of mismanagement. We were looking for different uses for the TV tower. And I must state that there are no investors to implement any idea. It’s bad that we can’t bring this territory into circulation. That is why the decision to demolish it was made. And even during discussions on my Instagram, the majority supported him,” said Evgeny Kuyvashev, governor of the Sverdlovsk region, at the annual press conference.
Using directed destruction technology, the upper part will first fold into the lower part, and then the trunk will fall towards the Iset River, onto an earthen embankment. The process will take place in two stages with a difference of 1 to 5 minutes
The authorities seriously announced that the tower would be demolished for the first time in 2017. The tower and the land around it were transferred to the Ural Mining and Metallurgical Company, so that in its place there would be an ice palace for the Avtomobilist hockey club. Metallurgists held a competition and told how they would demolish the TV tower. Using directed destruction technology, the upper part will first fold into the lower part, and then the trunk will fall towards the Iset River, onto an earthen embankment. The process will take place in two stages with a difference of 1 to 5 minutes. The demolition of the tower will be carried out by a company from Magnitogorsk - the company "Special Explosive Works".
In mid-January, the equipment goes to the foot of the tower. While some specialists are on site designing the demolition, others will install a new construction site fencing and begin building an earthen embankment for falling debris - a damper. The city does not find any compelling arguments for preserving the tower, but at the same time the authorities announce the start of construction of a new television tower at Uralmash.
Since 2000, the tower has been decorated with garlands for Christmas, and since 2015 - with 36 laser beams. During the World and European Basketball Championships, a basketball hoop was placed on the tower, and the TV tower is also decorated with medals of the winners of the Vilnius marathons. In 2018, when the Yekaterinburg TV tower disappears from the horizon, the TV tower in Vilnius is planned to be closed for reconstruction.
The third sister of the towers, the Tallinn one, was opened a year earlier than the Vilnius one, in 1980. The tower with 50-centimeter concrete walls reaches a height of 314 meters and weighs more than 20 thousand tons. There are 1,050 steps leading from the tower's basement to the spire. It has been reconstructed more than once - in 1994, for example, a new antenna installed from a helicopter pierced the roof and windows of the observation restaurant. The last time the tower was closed for reconstruction was for five years and was reopened in 2012.
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