Preservation by Neglect in Soviet-Era Town Planning in Tartu, Estonia

Abstract

In the former Soviet Union, traditional urban districts with pre–World War II housing were considered obsolete and the aim was to demolish them, but in practice they were frequently ignored, because efforts were focused on new housing production in order to address acute housing shortages. Inertial forces stymied plan implementation for older districts during a rich period of plan making while new residential districts were built at a fast pace on virgin land. This research analyzes more than a dozen written planning documents from various periods during the twentieth century for Tartu, Estonia, where, had mid-twentieth century town plans been implemented, entire districts of nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century wooden houses and apartment buildings would have been demolished. Findings suggest that several factors acted in concert to set the conditions for both neglect and preservation of such districts during the second half of the twentieth century that resulted in continuous occupancy of the dwellings and preserved the built form (and the social structure) of the district. These factors include a focus on building new housing and new districts rather than renovating older districts; a lack of resources to renovate older districts; and a lack of resources to implement plans. This synthesis of town planning in Estonia demonstrates how planning ideas have evolved throughout the twentieth century parallel to—but temporally delayed compared to—Western Europe and North America.