New Neighborhoods in St. Petersburg: Cohesion and Self-Organization

During the last 15-20 years an active suburban area development occurred in Russia. St. Petersburg, as one of the largest cities in Russia, was one of the first cities which territories were changed by suburbanization due to the active development of suburban areas in 2000-s. As a result, new suburban neighborhoods appeared. They are remote from the city, relatively autonomous, have a better environmental situation and lower housing prices. Foreign studies of suburban neighborhoods show that they provide a good basis for a cohesive community [Fischer 1982]. However, these results were obtained in the low-rise neighborhoods, while there are suburban neighborhoods with high-rise buildings in Russia. Such new suburban neighborhoods are explored in this paper. The main focuses of this paper are social cohesion and self-organization of new suburban neighborhoods in St. Petersburg. This study is based on data collected during the sociology students’ annual winter field-period in the NRU HSE St. Petersburg. 126 semi-structured interviews were conducted in two new suburban neighborhoods in St. Petersburg. The data was analyzed in two steps: qualitative and quantitative analysis. Results contain the description of suburbanization in St. Petersburg, main factors that are connected with social cohesion and self-organization in new suburban neighborhoods and comparison of two studied neighborhoods.