Russia is a country with a fairly high level of urbanization. Today in our country there are 15 million-plus cities. Which Russian cities are leading in terms of population at the moment? You will find the answer to this question in this fascinating article.
Urbanization and Russia
Urbanization - is it an achievement or a scourge of our time? It is difficult to answer this question. After all, this process is characterized by great inconsistency, provoking both positive and negative consequences.
Under this concept in a broad sense understand the growth of the role of the city in human life. This process, bursting into our lives in the 20th century, fundamentally changed not only the reality around us, but also the person himself.
Mathematically, urbanization is a measure of the proportion of a country's or region's urban population. Those countries in which this indicator exceeds 65% are considered highly urbanized. In the Russian Federation, about 73% of the population lives in cities. You can find a list of Russian cities by population below.
It should be noted that the processes of urbanization in Russia took place (and are taking place) in two aspects:
- The emergence of new cities that covered new areas of the country.
- The expansion of existing cities and the formation of large agglomerations.
History of Russian cities
In 1897, within the boundaries of modern Russia, the All-Russian population census counted 430 cities. Most of them were small towns, there were only seven large ones at that time. And all of them were located to the line of the Ural Mountains. But in Irkutsk - the current center of Siberia - there were hardly 50 thousand inhabitants.
A century later, the situation with cities in Russia has changed dramatically. It is quite possible that the main reason for this was the quite reasonable regional policy pursued by the Soviet authorities in the 20th century. One way or another, but by 1997 the number of cities in the country had increased to 1087, and the proportion of the urban population had grown to 73 percent. At the same time, the number of large cities increased twenty-three times! And today almost 50% of the total population of Russia lives in them.
Thus, only a hundred years have passed, and Russia has been transformed from a country of villages into a state of large cities.
Russia is a country of megacities
The largest cities in Russia in terms of population are distributed quite unevenly across its territory. Most of them are located in the most populated part of the country. Moreover, in Russia there is a steady trend towards the formation of agglomerations. It is they andform the framework grid (socio-economic and cultural) on which the entire settlement system, as well as the country's economy, is strung.
850 cities (out of 1087) are located within European Russia and the Urals. In terms of area, this is only 25% of the territory of the state. But in the vast Siberian and Far Eastern expanses - only 250 cities. This nuance greatly complicates the process of developing the Asian part of Russia: the shortage of large metropolitan areas is felt especially acutely here. After all, there are colossal deposits of minerals. However, there is simply no one to develop them.
The Russian North also cannot boast of a dense network of large cities. This region is also characterized by focal settlement of the population. The same can be said about the south of the country, where in the mountainous and foothill regions only lonely and brave cities-dared men "survive".
So can Russia be called a country of big cities? Of course. Nevertheless, this country, with its vast expanses and colossal natural resources, still lacks large cities.
The largest cities in Russia by population: TOP 5
As mentioned above, as of 2015, there are 15 million-plus cities in Russia. As you know, such a title is given to that settlement, the number of inhabitants of which has exceeded one million.
So, let's list the largest cities in Russia by population:
- Moscow (from 12 to 14million inhabitants according to various sources).
- St. Petersburg (5.13 million people).
- Novosibirsk (1.54 million people).
- Yekaterinburg (1.45 million people).
- Nizhny Novgorod (1.27 million people).
Next on the list are Kazan, Samara, Omsk, Chelyabinsk and Rostov-on-Don. The number of inhabitants in all these cities also exceeds one million.
If you carefully analyze the rating of Russian cities in terms of population (namely, its upper part), you will notice one interesting feature. We are talking about a fairly large gap in the number of residents between the first, second and third lines of this rating.
Thus, over twelve million people live in the capital, about five million live in St. Petersburg. But the third largest city in Russia - Novosibirsk - is inhabited by only one and a half million inhabitants.
Moscow is the largest metropolis on the planet
The capital of the Russian Federation is one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world. It is very difficult to say how many people live in Moscow. Official sources speak of twelve million people, unofficial sources give other figures: from thirteen to fifteen million. Experts, in turn, predict that in the coming decades, the population of Moscow may even increase to twenty million people.
Moscow is included in the list of 25 so-called "global" cities (according to Foreign Policy magazine). This isthose cities that make the most significant contribution to the development of world civilization.
Moscow is not only a significant industrial, political, scientific, educational and financial center of Europe, but also a tourist center. Four objects of the Russian capital are included in the UNESCO heritage list.
In conclusion…
In total, about 25% of the country's population lives in 15 million-plus cities in Russia. And all these cities continue to attract more and more people.
The largest cities in Russia are, of course, Moscow, St. Petersburg and Novosibirsk. All of them have significant industrial, cultural, as well as scientific and educational potential.
