Every visitor to Kyiv knows Andriyivsky Uzviz. This meandering, cobblestoned street snakes down a hill from the city center to the historic Podil neighborhood, and boasts notable landmarks such as Saint Andrew’s Church and the house of the famous writer Mikhail Bulgakov. With an abundance of cafes, theaters, art galleries, and gift shops, the street is a major tourist attraction in the city.
But the charm of Andriyivsky Uzviz is fading as it falls into disrepair. Shabby old buildings stand abandoned, their walls covered in graffiti, with collapsed roofs and trees growing within them. Once a pedestrian-only street, it is now clogged with chaotically parked cars. On top of that, irregularities and lawsuits have marred the construction of a new hotel that is planned to have twice as many floors than legislation allows for this national heritage site.
Ghost houses
Andriyivsky Uzviz is numbered from bottom to top. From Pokrovska Street on Kontraktova Ploshcha, the first old house, No. 2A, is a three-story town mansion that survived the 1811 fire that destroyed most of the Podil neighborhood. Now it is slowly being ruined by age and neglect.
Like the majority of the dilapidated historic buildings scattered around Kyiv’s center, No. 2A’s private owners are failing to fulfil their obligation to maintain the building. Its legal owner, Diamant Bank, was declared insolvent and put up for liquidation in 2017 but according to locals the house has been empty for at least 15 years.
A little further up stands a three-story house, No. 9, which has a canvas cloth covering its façade that fails to obscure its crumbling walls, collapsed roof, and trees growing inside. It is registered as belonging to an elderly woman from Donetsk, the eastern Ukrainian city which has been under Russian occupation since 2014. Local activists have tried to find the woman and failed. The fate of this 1880s house is uncertain.
Similarly, house No. 26 is literally falling to bits. It is at a visible slant, and the interior is used for storage. The sign hanging on the dirty canvas that barely covers the ramshackle edifice reads “For sale. From owner. 646 square meters. Payment by instalments. Bargain.”
A woman who picked up the phone number given on the sign shared some details: The price of the building is $700,000, and the sale process is handled by Alfa Bank and Ukrsotsbank. The banks, which both belong to the Luxembourg-based ABH Holdings SA of Russia’s Alfa Group, are soon to be merged.
Olga Rutkovskaya, the co-founder of a public organization The Community of Andriyivskyi Uzviz, says private owners have no financial incentive to restore historic houses, which can’t be demolished either due to the status of architectural monuments.
“Rather than restoring them it’s cheaper to allow these buildings to collapse and use the space for a new construction,” she told the Kyiv Post.
She said the historic preservation authorities don’t have the legal mechanisms they need to force property owners to maintain and repair architectural monuments. Nor is there a vacant property tax.
“The historic preservation authorities may fine owners of historic buildings that are in a critical condition, and they often do. The problem is it is a one-time penalty, and sometimes it’s hard to find the ultimate owner,” Rutkovskaysa said. “They can also warn negligent owners and seize their property through the courts. But due to the complexities of Ukrainian legislation and the judicial system, cases drag on for years.”
But there have been precedents of a historic building being returned to state ownership. In March, Kyiv court confiscated Hostynnyi Dvir, a giant 19th century trade house on Kontraktova Ploscha, from private company Ukrrestavratsiya, which is linked to the entourage of the ousted former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych.
Rutkovskaya says it would be better to return historic buildings to city ownership so that citizens and local councils could take care of them, but currently there is no law that would allow this.
New hotel
The epicenter of the capital’s tourism and urban life, Andriyivsky Uzviz is at risk of destruction, city activists say, as a new hotel is being built in violation of ordinances for the protected heritage site.
According to Andriyivsky Uzviz activists and some Kyiv city council members, the height of a new eight-storey hotel significantly exceeds the limit permitted by the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine for this area, and threatens surrounding houses.
“Andriyivsky Uzviz was included in two protected zones that allow buildings no more than 9-12 meters in height. But the plan for the hotel hasn’t changed: it will be 30 meters in height,” Yegor Nedashkivskyi, an attorney for the activists, told the Kyiv Post.
Activists blocked the construction site several times and demanded the cancellation of the lease for the land plot with the developer – a Kyiv-based private company called Markon. According to Markon’s director, Valeriy Pavlyuk, the project is being financed and built by KADORR Ukraine, part of Odesa-based KADORR construction group, which is owned by Kyiv Post publisher Adnan Kivan.
Markon, a company owned by a British Virgin Island firm Kentron Development Inc., obtained a building permit for the hotel in 2010 from Kyiv city authorities, but didn’t start construction immediately. In September 2016, it was granted a permit for ground work by the Ministry of Culture, which oversees the protection of historic sites. In mid-2017, after Andriyivsky Uzviz was included in the UNESCO protected zone of the Sophia of Kyiv historic and architectural reserve, as well as already being part of the Saint Andrew’s Church protected area, the ministry didn’t renew Markon’s permit.
But there might be more technical irregularities in construction of the 182-suite hotel.
An old wooden house on 16 Andriyivsky Uzviz, stands back-to-back with the future hotel. Its owner, Olga Kroshka, who said her family had bought this property in 1898, has been in conflict with Markon for years. She says the builders damaged the drainage system, and her house’s foundation may collapse.
“The hotel is just three meters away from my house. There are cracks in my walls caused by the construction. When it’s built, all the smells and noises will come my way,” she told the Kyiv Post. “I filed complaints with all of the authorized agencies, and the prosecutors’ office. You have to understand: not only my property is at risk – so is my health.”
An inspection of the construction site by the State Inspection for Architecture and Construction found violations of technical norms, and Markon’s building permit was revoked in January. However, the company soon overturned the decision through the court of appeals. The state inspection has now filed a counter-appeal.
The State Inspection for Architecture and Construction didn’t reply to a request to provide the details of the results of its inspection.
While the city authorities and the developer continue their legal dispute, KADORR is going ahead with the building. According to Pavlyuk, so far they have finished the underground section and an anti-landslide structure, and they have now started on the first floor. In the meantime, he said, the Ministry of Culture has given Markon the green light to continue.
However, in a written reply to a request from the Kyiv Post, the Ministry of Culture clarified that the permit it issued to Markon was not for construction, but to complete ground works for the installation of an anti-landslide wall next to Kroshka’s house.
“According to the information provided by Markon, it is currently strengthening the slopes of Andriyivsky Uzviz and engineering protection against landslides in order to eliminate geological risks that appeared as a result of the incomplete construction of the retaining wall and the implementation of other anti-landslide measures,” the ministry’s statement read.
“We were surprised and outraged by the decision of the ministry,” said Nedashkivskyi, the lawyer. “It’s a blatant violation of the ordinances for a protected heritage site. We will keep looking for a solution. There are grounds for breaking off the lease contract.”
Pavlyuk denied his company had ever broke any laws and called the campaign against the hotel a politically motivated attack on his business. He complained that the poor protections for business in Ukraine were scaring off investors.
“We have all the permits. We carried out all of the necessary technical examinations and have experts’ evaluations,” he said. “The activists’ claims that we’re threatening the area and nearby houses are slander and lies.”
