Functional design transformations of urban infrastructure: the results of sociological research on the example of Smolensk

Within the framework of the international cross-cultural project, the urban space of the central part of Smolensk was explored by the methods of sociology as a product of culture and as a cultural value. In the development of Smolensk over the last twenty-five years there have been interesting structural and social changes affecting not only the socio-economic and spatial, but also the cultural sphere. The main trend of these changes is the growth of the services sector, which is reflected in the infrastructural transformations of the urban space. Entertainment, shopping and office spaces are created instead of industrial sites and residential zones. The horizontal and vertical transformation of the urban infrastructure of Smolensk is revealed. In the first case, service companies replace the housing function from the city center, and then from other areas. In the second case, they occupy first the basements of apartment buildings, then their groundfloors and first floors. “Verticalization” of infrastructure is manifested in the creation of multi-storey shopping malls. The commercialization of urban space creates new social groups, which leads to a different distribution of different social strata of the population along the urban space. Under the circumstances of the consistent displacement of the housing fuction from the city center, elite housing appeared in it during the infill construction. The buildings of the center of Smolensk acquired a polarized and mixed structure. The positive side of such changes is the improvement of the city center in general and the expansion of the range of activities of the population and visitors. The processes described in the process of research indicate a slow but steady transformation of Smolensk from a socialist city into a city of the western type.