I’ve heard criticism of the Commie Block housing all my life and like damn I wish I could have a small flat surrounded by trees instead of the three storey particle board bullshit we get
This Lithuanian YouTuber has a video about Soviet Housing (using a famous Lithuanian housing district as an example) where he goes into detail about the Pros and Cons. One thing he points out is that a lot of the Cons weren’t things the Soviet government was unaware of, the fact the buildings looked monotonous and had poor sound insulation was addressed by the government. But there was still a lot of positives to the project overall.
A lot of it just has to do with the fact these were built in a time when resources were not abundant and technology hadnt advanced as much yet. Like China builds stuff like this today and theirs do not have as many issues because 1. China exists in different economic conditions, and 2. technology is better now for things like soundproofing.
This is widely repeated and only partially true. Prior to WW2, the Eastern Block was mostly preindustrial, meaning 90%ish of people lived rural peasant lives in rural areas and rural housing. They literally had to build housing in cities for half of the population of the eastern block, and they successfully did it in record time.
Yeah I was kind of lumping that all into the economic conditions umbrella. The stuff messing with the USSR was a laundry list of totally insane threats. Since its founding it was ostracized by the world. Had the revolution. Then it got invaded by the Nazis. Then it had to rebuild half of europe. Try to get a huge population of reactionaries who had just invaded it under control. Half the countries on its borders (Iran, China, India/Pakistan) were in states of upheaval too. The fact they did so much is a complete miracle of state planning.
I’ve heard criticism of the Commie Block housing all my life and like damn I wish I could have a small flat surrounded by trees instead of the three storey particle board bullshit we get
This Lithuanian YouTuber has a video about Soviet Housing (using a famous Lithuanian housing district as an example) where he goes into detail about the Pros and Cons. One thing he points out is that a lot of the Cons weren’t things the Soviet government was unaware of, the fact the buildings looked monotonous and had poor sound insulation was addressed by the government. But there was still a lot of positives to the project overall.
Knew it was Lazdynai even before opening the video.
A lot of it just has to do with the fact these were built in a time when resources were not abundant and technology hadnt advanced as much yet. Like China builds stuff like this today and theirs do not have as many issues because 1. China exists in different economic conditions, and 2. technology is better now for things like soundproofing.
they were also built in the context of a country recovering from a civil war and then a world war
This is widely repeated and only partially true. Prior to WW2, the Eastern Block was mostly preindustrial, meaning 90%ish of people lived rural peasant lives in rural areas and rural housing. They literally had to build housing in cities for half of the population of the eastern block, and they successfully did it in record time.
Yeah I was kind of lumping that all into the economic conditions umbrella. The stuff messing with the USSR was a laundry list of totally insane threats. Since its founding it was ostracized by the world. Had the revolution. Then it got invaded by the Nazis. Then it had to rebuild half of europe. Try to get a huge population of reactionaries who had just invaded it under control. Half the countries on its borders (Iran, China, India/Pakistan) were in states of upheaval too. The fact they did so much is a complete miracle of state planning.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy: