The North of Sverdlovsk Oblast: A System of Cities on the Edge of the Old-Developed Urals

Regional Research of Russia. 2022. Vol. 12. No. 1. P. S176–S185.

Averkieva K., Denisov E. A.

This article discusses the territorial development of the system of cities in the north of Sverdlovsk
oblast, which is interesting in that it occupies a border position between the mining Urals and the resourcerich
North. This territory is distinguished by an abundance of single-industry towns with a difficult socioeconomic
situation. They have been undergoing a massive economic restructuring over the past 10 years, accompanied
by changes in labor markets and spatial redistribution of the population within urban okrugs. The
study is based on a retrospective analysis of the factors of formation of the urban system and the diagnosis of
the current state of all its elements. Statistical indicators of the dynamics of the population and industrial production,
on which the local economy relies, were considered, and institutional changes were studied, which
entailed, among other things, the restructuring of the economic base. The upper levels of the manufacturing
industry in most cities are being liquidated due to market conditions, changes in the strategies of the new
owners, and obsolescence of technologies and equipment. Old enterprises of the extractive industry close due
to the exhaustion or unprofitability of resource extraction, but new enterprises and industries appear that are
less labor-intensive and are often localized outside urban areas. Conceived as a new center for the industrial
development of the territory Bogoslovsky Industrial Park faced serious restrictions in its implementation and
could not become an alternative to retiring enterprises, either in the labor market or in the formation of the
local budget. Cities are rapidly losing population, while in the economy, small enterprises dispersed throughout
the studied urban okrugs come to the fore for extraction and primary processing, similar to what happened
more than 200 years ago during the resource development of the north of Sverdlovsk oblast.

Keywords: single-industry towns, urban shrinkage, mining industry, Sverdlovsk oblast, mining Urals