Residents weren't even warned: how high-rise buildings with people were moved in the USSR

TheUSSR was famous for its gigantomania and its penchant for astonishing, though rather ridiculous projects. So the country's authorities turned riverbeds, built unreasonably huge technological structures and, which is no less difficult to explain, moved houses from place to place.

OBOZ.UA tells how it was done. Soviet engineers developed a technology that allows you to move buildings, and together with the inhabitants.

So, in the 1930s, to demonstrate their technological superiority, the Soviet authorities were rapidly developing the capital, Moscow. These plans included, in particular, the expansion of the city's central streets. But to demolish old houses and build new ones was long and also spoiled the appearance of the center. Therefore, some houses decided not to destroy, but to move.

Difficulties arose due to the fact that the weight of such a structure is more than 20 thousand tons, and the house stands on the foundation, so to move it must be separated from the foundation, without damaging it. It was also important to move everything without much tilting and jerking in order not to destroy anything.

To solve this problem, a special office was created in Moscow in 1936. Metro construction engineers headed by Emmanuel Handel developed plans for the transfer of houses. At that time Handel already had the relevant experience - he participated in the relocation of the feeder substation weighing more than 300 tons.

Special cables were used to separate the houses from the foundation. Before that, the building was propped up with jacks, and the load-bearing walls were reinforced with I-beams around the perimeter. Having strengthened the structure with such a framework, holes for railroad tracks were drilled under it.

On the way of moving the building, workers dug trenches. In these trenches, a strong concrete base was poured, on which the rails were laid, with special rollers on top of them. This way the building could be moved as smoothly as possible while still maintaining its relative stability.

When everything was ready, the house began to move along the prepared rails with the help of hydraulic jacks. These jacks had a rigid kinematic linkage that allowed for the same rate of extension of the rods of all hydraulic cylinders, regardless of the amount of resistance on each jack. The house moved moderately and relatively easily.

At first, six small structures were repositioned in this manner to test the technology. After that, they began to move larger objects. In total, by the beginning of the German-Soviet War, 23 stone houses had been moved in this way in Moscow. Most of them were moved together with the inhabitants inside.

It is even said that people asked engineers to warn them about the date of relocation so that they could move somewhere else at that time. But they were allegedly purposely not told anything to make the relocation process even more impressive.

After the war, the practice of moving houses was resumed, although on a smaller scale. Thus, in the fall of 1958, for the laying of Komsomolsky Avenue in Moscow moved two buildings: the building of the Research Institute VODGEO and Research Institute Promstroyproekt. In 1979 the building of the editorial office of the newspaper "Trud" was moved. And in 1983, changed its place building, which is the theater of the Moscow Art Theatre.

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