Development of coasts: socio-ecologic-economic specifics

Preferential settlement along the coasts of water bodies (rivers, lakes, seas), dictated by a variety of production and recreational factors, has always been accompanied by environmental disruptions. A specific complex of social, environmental and economic problems arose with the beginning of mass cottage development of Russian coasts. At the same time, certain environmental risks were ignored. Until that time, the country had strict restrictions on the approach of dwellings to water and the operational regimes of households in the water protection zone. Particularly strict regulation for construction and operation of dwellings existed for the coasts of sources of communal water supply to cities and rural settlements and in resort and recreation zones. Today, coastal development is in many ways a chaotic process, accompanied by a wide range of legal and environmental violations. A critical situation developed on the sources of water supply in Moscow, at water supply facilities in other cities of the Russian Federation, on the sea coasts of the Krasnodar Krai and Crimea. Residents of prestigious coastal settlements form a large social group with a specific mentality. Very often it is based on a persistent desire to ignore environmental-legal imperatives for the sake of possessing expensive real estate and elitist recreation conditions. The methodology for study of the situation, based on the general principles of systemic analysis of socio-environmental-economic processes, makes it possible to significantly bring the economic interests of the social group in question closer to environmental and state interests. There is proposed a concept of improving the situation through proof of the inevitable depreciation of coastal real estate due to environmental degradation of water bodies on the banks of which unregulated development is conducted. At the same time, both the deterioration of the recreational climate up to a complete discomfort and the immediate economic losses of the population expressed by drop in the price of land and households in the real estate market, are equally important factors of depreciation.