The West Kazakhstan city of Uralsk: population and history

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:55

Kazakhstan city was once founded by the Yaik Cossacks and was a distant outpost resisting the raids of local nomads. Currently, it is the administrative center of the West Kazakhstan region. The population of Uralsk is growing rapidly, largely due to the development of the Karachaganak oil and gas condensate field.

General information

The city was built on the right bank of the Ural River (in the middle reaches) and on the left bank of the Chagan River (in its lower part) in a picturesque steppe plain in the north of the Caspian lowland. The Derkul River, the right tributary of the Chagan, flows nearby. The area is characterized by significant elevation changes, the most famous hill is Svistun Mountain.

The city has many green spaces, parks and squares, the total area of which is 6,000 hectares. The length of the territory from north to south is 8 km, from west to east the city stretches for about 23 km. The city akimat (this is the name of the administration in Kazakhstan) also controls several nearby villages. The total area of the territory is700 km². The area of urban housing stock is 4 million m^{2. The population of Uralsk in 2018 was 305,353 people representing over 80 different nationalities and nationalities.}

Foundation of the city

Some experts believe that large settlements on the site of the modern city arose in the days of the Golden Horde, as evidenced by archaeological finds. However, the settlement known in modern history arose only in 1584, when the Cossacks and fugitive peasants who joined them settled here. Now this urban area in simple everyday life is called "Kureny" by the population of Uralsk (a kuren is a Cossack dwelling). The first buildings were laid between the rivers Ural (then Yaik) and Chagan. In 1591, the Yaik Cossacks accepted Russian citizenship, but lived quite independently.

In 1613, the sprawling village received the status of a city and was named the Yaitsky town. True, this was already the second Cossack settlement with this name, the first was another Kazakh city located nearby, which is now called Atyrau. The modern city of Uralsk is also quite often confused with Kamensk-Uralsk, which has a much smaller population.

Before the revolution

Residents of the city took an active part in the uprising led by Yemelyan Pugachev. Yaik Cossacks became the core of his army. After the defeat of the Pugachevites in 1775, in order to erase the memory of the popular uprising, the Russian Empress Catherine II orderedrename the river to Ural, and the city to Uralsk. The main occupation of the population of Uralsk was fishing, cattle breeding and melon growing. The main income was given by red fish, as sturgeon fish was called in those days.

In 1868 the city became the administrative center of the newly formed Ural province. It was during these years that Uralsk began to be built up with stone houses, a theater, a printing house and a music school were built. The population of Uralsk became multinational, in addition to Russian and Ukrainian peasants, many Tatars lived in the city. According to the 1897 census, 36,466 inhabitants lived here, of which 6,129 people called Tatar their native language.

Soviet times

After the difficult years of the civil war and collectivization, the city gradually became an industrial center. This was also facilitated by the fact that during the Great Patriotic War, 14 industrial enterprises were evacuated here. For example, one of the city's leading enterprises, the Ural plant "Zenith", which produces weapons for ships, was created on the basis of the evacuated Leningrad plant "Dvigatel". In 1959, the population of Uralsk reached 103,914.

In subsequent years, the city grew rapidly and improved, new multi-storey microdistricts and industrial enterprises were built. The number of residents grew rapidly due to the influx of specialists from many regions of the country. In 1991, the city already had 214,000 inhabitants.

In independent Kazakhstan

In the 90s urbanthe industry went through hard times, many enterprises were closed. Some of them changed their profile and began to produce competitive products, mainly for the oil and gas industry. However, due to the presence of a large hydrocarbon deposit in the region, the development of the economy continued.

Since 1999, the population of the city of Uralsk has steadily increased, with the exception of a small decline in 2009. In 2017, there were already 300,128 Ural residents in the city.