Kazan Mayor on snow removal: ‘Last winter's results are unacceptable’
“We have joined in and collected additional funding. <...> We are helping to recruit people with our resources. It must be clearly understood that we have offered our shoulder to lean on, but no one is going to risk their neck," Ilsur Metshin, the mayor of Kazan, commented on the upcoming winter season during Business Monday meeting. Last year, more than 3,000 violations related to unfair snow removal were recorded. At the same time, work continues in Kazan in other problematic areas — the deterioration of utility networks, the reconstruction of dangerous sections of roads, and lighting in villages. Read the details in the material of Realnoe Vremya.
“Nobody is satisfied with the results of last winter”
More than 3,000 violations of the winter maintenance of the city's infrastructure were recorded in Kazan in the winter of 2023-2024. This was stated during the meeting by Nail Minvaleev, the head of the Department of Administrative and Technical Inspection.
Each object, he said, was checked twice. If all violations were eliminated during the day, then the owners did not bear the consequences. Otherwise, administrative materials were compiled — there were 1,121 of them last season. A year earlier, the figure did not reach 900 (892 materials).
The majority of the materials concerned the failure to clear the territory — 639 documents in 2023-2024 and 406 the previous year. There were also 383 cases of non-cleaning of the roof last year and 392 in 2022-2023. The data on unfair storage of snow amounted to 99 and 94 materials, respectively. The majority of violations — 41% — are attributed to management companies of homeowners' associations (TSZh).
In order to avoid last year's mistakes, 42 preventive talks on proper snow removal were held in Kazan.
“Nobody is satisfied with the results of last winter. We understand that there is not enough power of enterprises, not enough money, not enough people. We got involved and collected additional funding. We understand that this is important for the city. We help recruit people with our resources — in less than a month, the HR department recruited 36 new employees. It must be clearly understood that we have offered our shoulder to lean on, but no one is going to risk their neck," Ilsur Metshin, the mayor of Kazan, commented on Minvaleev's report.
The mayor advised management companies to mobilise their forces this year and cope with any snowfall, “so as not to bring the situation to personnel decisions”.
Metshin also spoke about the morning conversation with the rais of Tatarstan, Rustam Minnikhanov:
“We talked with Rustam Nurgalievich this morning. He asked me how things were going. I told him that as long as there is no snow, everything is fine. He laughed too, just like you. But snow is needed, because there are winter crops, there is agriculture.
53 billion rubles are needed for the reconstruction of networks
They also talked about the deterioration of water supply and sanitation networks in Kazan — on average it is 70%, said Rustam Abdulkhakov, the director of the Vodokanal Municipal Unitary Enterprise. More than half of them were built back in the 1930s-70s, the wear of the networks reaches 100%.
It is wear and tear that causes accidents and failures in the city, Abdulkhakov explained. So, in the first 10 months of 2024, more than 54,000 appeals were received from residents of the capital of Tatarstan. As the speaker assured, most of them are satisfied.
In the first 10 months of this year, 1,035 accidents occurred on water supply networks — the same number for the same period last year. 2.18 thousand km of networks were affected, 2.16 thousand for the whole of last year.
In 10 months, 149 accidents occurred on the city's sewer networks, they affected 1.47 thousand km of infrastructure. During the same period last year, 178 accidents were recorded, 1.46 thousand km of networks were affected for the whole year.
53 billion rubles are needed for the reconstruction of networks in the next 10 years, Abdulkhakov said. During this time, it is planned to repair 72 km of drainage networks — 80% of worn-out reinforced concrete collectors and 320 km of water supply networks — 43% of water supply networks with 100% wear.
This year, reconstruction of 26 sections of water pipelines with a total length of 19.6 km has been completed in Kazan, the speaker added.
During the same period, 2 km of water supply networks and 3 km of wastewater disposal networks were built in the city to connect capital construction facilities in the city. These are schools on Rodina, Kurynova, Rauis Gareev streets, and the new theater named after Galiaskara Kamala, Maksat residential complex, 11 public toilets.
As for engineering networks, work is underway at 31 sites. The improvements affected the living conditions of more than 650,000 residents of Kazan.
On the roads — 31.25 billion
During the meeting, they also discussed another acute problem — the repair and improvement of road safety. Igor Kulyazhev, the deputy head of the Executive Committee of Kazan, reported on the current work in this area.
This year, according to him, more than 31.25 billion rubles have been allocated to improve the condition of roads and courtyards of the city. Of this amount:
- 17.1 billion rubles — for the construction and modernisation of road infrastructure;
- 10.4 billion rubles for road repairs;
- 3.75 billion rubles — for the implementation of the Our Yard programme.
This year, more than 2.4 million square metres have been renovated in Kazan. The number of roads is one third more than in 2023, Kulyazhev added.
In addition, according to him, during the designated period, road workers eliminated 71 emergency sites, installed 900 LED lights in 34 residential areas.
And in six years of work on the construction of access roads to garden associations, 19 roads leading to 27 settlements, with a total length of about 24 km, were repaired.