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Nizhnekamsk (Tat. Tүbən Kama) is a city (since 1966) in the Republic of Tatarstan, Russia. It is the administrative center of the Nizhnekamsk region, forms an urban settlement, the city of Nizhnekamsk.
The city arose in the early 1960s as a settlement during the construction of the Nizhnekamsk plant, since 1966 - the city of Nizhnekamsk. The city's name comes from the hydronym of the Kama River. The modern form of hydronym is Udmurt, Udm. Kam means “river, big river” (cf. Udm. Vatkam “Vyatka river”).
Nizhnekamsk is the result of a large-scale program of
industrial development of the territory off the left bank of the
Kama. It became a kind of experimental platform on which new methods
of planning and building cities were worked out.
A clear
functional zoning of the city's territory is noticeable in the way
the residential areas of the city are separated from the industrial
zone of the chemical plant. The industrial zone is located a few
kilometers east of the city's neighborhoods.
Planning and
starting construction
On May 8, 1958, the Council of Ministers of
the USSR adopted a Resolution “On the list of construction projects
re-started by design in 1958”. On July 23, 1958, the Central
Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR
adopted the Resolution "On accelerating the production of artificial
and synthetic fibers, plastics and other synthetic materials and
products to meet the needs of the population and the needs of
industry in 1958-1965." These documents approved a project for the
creation of the Nizhnekamsk industrial region in the north-eastern
part of the Tatar ASSR. It was planned to build the largest
petrochemical complex in Europe, which was supposed to process oil
produced in the southeast of TASSR and produce new types of
plastics, synthetic rubbers, as well as other hydrocarbon raw
materials for further chemical processing.
In accordance with
the project of the regional planning of the Nizhnekamsk industrial
region, the collective of the State Order of the Red Banner of Labor
of the Institute for Urban Design (Giprogor) in 1959 created a
master plan of the city for an estimated number of 170 thousand
people. The author of the general plan was V. A. Pashkov, the head
of the work was E. I. Kutyrev. The general plan of Nizhnekamsk,
developed by them, was awarded the 1st degree Diploma and the Gold
Medal of the USSR Exhibition of Economic Achievements in 1960 at the
All-Union review-competition of projects of new cities.
On
December 25, 1960, the first, and on January 2, 1961, the second
sledge-tractor trains arrived in the area of the village of
Afanasovo with enthusiastic first builders. A settlement of builders
arose, nearby (6 km southeast of the village of Sobolekovo in the
forest area) a grandiose construction of a power unit and a chemical
plant was unfolded. She was awarded the status of the All-Union
shock Komsomol construction site.
On April 19, 1961, by the
Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Tatar ASSR, the
newly emerged settlement of the Afanasyevsky village council of the
Chelninsky district of the TASSR was registered with the assignment
of the name Nizhnekamsk. Its population was about 500 people.
In 1962, Giprogor developed a technical and economic report
(TED) on the development of the production forces of the Tatar ASSR,
and in 1965 - a draft regional planning of the Naberezhno-Chelninsky
industrial area, which provided for the further development of the
complex of enterprises of the Nizhnekamsk industrial hub with the
inclusion of an additional number of new industries. These documents
determined the estimated population of the city of Nizhnekamsk at
250 thousand people.
In April 1964, the foundation of the
first residential apartment building was laid, and two years later
the city's population reached 30 thousand people. The pace of
construction and the pathos of creating a new city inspired the
composer A. Pakhmutova and the poet N. Dobronravov to write a song
about the builders of new cities "The Courage of the City Takes".
On January 12, 1965, by separating it from the Chelninsky and
Sheremetyevsky regions, the Nizhnekamsk region of the TASSR was
formed.
On September 22, 1966, the workers' settlement of
Nizhnekamsk was given the status of a city. It was named
Nizhnekamsk. This day is considered the official birthday of the
city, although the celebration of the city's day has recently been
held on August 30, the Day of the Republic of Tatarstan.
Industrial complex
The first city blocks and factory buildings of
the chemical plant were built at the same time. Moreover, the
construction of factories went faster. The construction was
supervised by the Institute "Giprokauchuk". In 1967, to the 50th
anniversary of the October Revolution - just six and a half years
after the first building peg was driven into an open field, the
Nizhnekamsk Petrochemical Plant produced its first products. In
1969, it was put into operation with the subordination of the Main
Directorate for the production of rubber of the Ministry of Oil
Refining and Petrochemical Industry of the USSR.
On the basis
of the order of the Ministry of Oil Refining and Petrochemical
Industry of the USSR dated December 13, 1976, the chemical plant was
reorganized into the Nizhnekamsk Order of Lenin Production
Association "Nizhnekamskneftekhim".
In the industrial zone, an energy block was also built, a source
of heat and electricity for Nizhnekamsk - the Thermal Power Plant.
The project of the first stage of CHPP-1 with a capacity of 562 MW
was created in 1959 by the Kiev branch of the Teploelektroproekt
Institute (in August 1964, the design of CHPP-1 was entrusted to the
Gorky branch of Teploelektroproekt, which developed a task for
expanding CHPP-1 to 630 MW); Phase II of CHPP-1 with technical
documentation was provided by the Gorky branch of the
Teploelektroproekt Institute and the Kuibyshev branch of
Orgenergostroy; III-rd stage - Lviv branch "Teploelektroproekt".
By order of the Minister of Energy and Electrification of the
USSR No. 60 of April 14, 1967, Nizhnekamsk CHPP-1 was included in
the number of operating power plants in the country.
Also, 30
km south of Nizhnekamsk in the village of Novy Zai, the construction
of the Zainsk SDPP, the largest thermal condensing power plant of
the Tatar Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (design capacity of
2.4 GW), has been carried out since 1956. In addition, 25 km
upstream, on the Kama near Naberezhnye Chelny, in 1963, construction
began on the Nizhnekamsk hydroelectric power station (design
capacity 1248 MW).
Expansion of construction
In connection
with the development of the automotive industry in the USSR in April
1967, Minister V. Fedorov instructed specialists to study the issue
of the possibility of building a plant for the production of
automobile tires as part of the Nizhnekamsk petrochemical plant. A
specific task was set: to provide the Volzhsky and Ulyanovsk
automobile plants with modern high-quality tires, as well as the car
park of the nearest regions.
After the construction of a tire
production was included in the State Plan, the Rezinoproekt
Institute received an assignment from the USSR Ministry of
Petrochemical and Oil Refining Industry to develop a project for the
Nizhnekamsk Tire Plant with a capacity of 7 million units of tires
and 9.2 million units of car tubes per year. On May 7, 1968, the
builders of SMU-8 Tatenergostroy laid the first concrete block under
the foundation of the first production building of the future tire
plant. On May 25, 1971, the minister signed order No. 342 on the
separation of the tire plant under construction from the Nizhnekamsk
chemical plant as an independent self-supporting enterprise with its
renaming into the Nizhnekamsk tire plant. And on June 15, by order
of the minister, Nikolai Aleksandrovich Zelenov was appointed
director of the NShZ, who previously served as the head of the main
production of the Voronezh tire plant. After the organization of the
plant as an independent enterprise and the appearance of its
director, construction and installation work proceeded at an
accelerated pace.
In connection with the construction of a
plant for heavy vehicles in Naberezhnye Chelny in December 1973 in
Nizhnekamsk, the construction of a second plant for the production
of truck tires for KamAZ vehicles began. On July 15, 1974, by order
of the USSR Ministry of Oil and Gas Industry No. 608, the estimated
cost of this plant was approved with a design capacity of 3.8
million pieces of truck tires and 5 million 490 thousand pieces of
driving chambers per year.
Already on October 25, 1974, the
Nizhnekamsk Tire Plant counted out the first million tires. The tire
with the serial number 100,000,000 was produced on December 19,
1987.
In the 1970s-1980s, 30 km upstream of the Kama, the
construction of the New City of Naberezhnye Chelny was also carried
out, the population of which in those years increased from 30 to 500
thousand people.
In the 1980s, the construction of the Tatar
nuclear power plant and a city for 40 thousand inhabitants, Kamskie
Polyany, began in the Nizhnekamsk region. However, the construction
of the nuclear power plant was never completed due to environmental
protests, which intensified after the 1986 Chernobyl accident. The
outflow of the population began from the Kamsky glades; due to the
socio-economic crisis, it constantly decreased (to 14.7 thousand
people in 2005).
Modern look
In connection with the
increase in the scale of development of Nizhnekamsk and taking into
account the city-forming objects of the Nizhnekamsk industrial
complex, in 1969 Giprogor revised the general plan of the city
(authors - Yu. K. Karzanov and Yu. E. Belyaev, head of work - L. R.
Shmakh).
As a result of the reform in accordance with the
Laws "On General Principles of Organization of Local Self-Government
in the Russian Federation" and "On Local Self-Government in the
Republic of Tatarstan", the city of Nizhnekamsk is a part of the
Nizhnekamsk municipal district formed on January 31, 2005, at the
same time being its administrative center.
Today Nizhnekamsk
is the third largest city in Tatarstan in terms of population, a
large industrial, cultural and sports center of the republic.
Three times Nizhnekamsk received the title of the most
comfortable city in Russia and the most comfortable city of the
Republic of Tatarstan, became the "Cultural Capital of the Volga
Region - 2002".
Since 2006 in Nizhnekamsk the project of construction of the
"Complex of oil refineries and petrochemical plants" is being
implemented. This is one of the most important investment projects
on the basis of public-private partnership in the field of
petrochemicals in Russia. As of September 2009, with a project cost
of more than 200 billion rubles, a third of the complex has already
been built. Despite the difficult times, about 100 million rubles
are spent on its construction every day.
On December 25,
2017, by decree of the Prime Minister of Russia Dmitry Medvedev, the
city was given the status of TASED.