Sochi prepares for the Olympic Games 2014. This preparation is a starting point of boosted development of the region. The mayor of the city Anatoly Pakhomov told journalists about changes in Greater Sochi and prospects for the future decade.
“The Olympics for us aren’t merely a sporting event, it’s an opportunity to create such an infrastructure and logistical system that will make our city a competitive international resort. Back in Soviet times and in today’s Russia we have always called Sochi an international resort and the resort capital of our country. To be honest, it was far from true. We have inveterate problems with energy supplies, with logistics, with transport and, what is worse, with services, so the resort couldn’t meet international standards. The very notion of the ‘resort season’ – whether it is good or bad in itself – came down to the weather: if the summer is hot, the season is good. So businessmen here had to live off three or four months, so the prices were inappropriate – they understood that they had to make money for the whole year in these three months.
Now we have enormous opportunities. We can plan our tourism business for the period of 2014-2020 in advance and by events. For example, we know we’re holding the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2014. They will last from February 7th to March 15th. But we also know that the tourists and participants will come before the start, in January, and they will not leave till the end of March. So we know in advance that we have to accommodate 450,000 guests – this is the top capacity of so-called ‘Greater Sochi’.
The next international event is the ‘Formula-1’ in November. It will end on November 15th. We already know that some 350,000 tourists will come to see the event. We will host ‘Formula-1’ six years in a row. The World Football Cup in 2018 is another international event, and we also can pre-plan it already.”
According to Pakhomov, “the infrastructure that is being created today will give us an opportunity to have a good expo-center already in 2014. The Olympic facilities complex is almost ready by now; we will hold the first test-competitions in the Ice Palaces. Some of these Palaces will become the non-sporting heritage of the Olympics, for example the Skating Center will be turned into an expo-center. This center is owned by the Krasnodar Territory administration, as it was the main investor in this construction. The administration will continue to own the center after the Olympics, and we are already planning 8 exhibitions, including international ones, that are expected to attract 10,000 tourists each. We are also planning an annual ‘Light Festival’ with the Phillips Company.
“In 2016 we are planning to host an international folklore festival, and we expect it to attract some 20,000 tourists. So all these events of international, federal and republican as well as territorial and city scale will fill our curriculum till 2020.”
Pakhomov said that for the first time in our history we can plan and we can make our resort a year-round one: “Actually, since 2011 we already are a year-round resort, even though our capabilities for now are limited. When I say that we already are a year-round resort, I mean that three new skiing resorts have already been opened: the Laura, the Rosa-Khutor and the Gornaya Karusel (Mountain Carousel). Let us picture the old Sochi airport that existed till 2010 – it was humiliating. A tourist would come to this airport – constructed in 1938 as a temporary solution – get his luggage, but no services, nothing. When he comes out of the airport, he is met by a crowd of yelling taxi drivers, no organized transportation or logistics. So what has changed? First of all, there’s an up-to-date comfortable airport. Today our guests have no problems with finding transport to get to the city – we have already opened a new railway station that is called ‘Airport’ and has a direct connection to the airport. So one can easily get to the station from the airport and get on a train that will take him to ‘Sochi’ station – the route has been open since February 15th and has 4 runs a day – we’ll increase this number in summer. We will also probably prolong the line to ‘Lazarevka’.”
Talking about railway communications in general, I can tell you that Sochi is going to be the only city in Russia that has trains for urban transport: we are constructing a railroad that can get you to any point in ‘Greater Sochi’.
Our main transport hub is Adler – this is the point where the trains from the Airport go, this is the destination of the trains from Krasnaya Polyana and Esto-Sadok (these are ski resorts), from Olympic park and from Tuapse. The whole of ‘Greater Sochi’ will be accessible for the residents of these all regions via rail. This is the unique feature of our resort. Our guests will be able to feel the advantages of our new logistical system already in 2012.
Apart from rail transport we are constructing three major highways in addition to our main Kurortny Prospect (for now the only road for transportation of our guests), and they will be ready by the beginning of the tourist season. The first one will circle Sochi, and it will be used by those driving to Abkhazia, Krasnaya Polyana and Adler. The other one will be part of the Krasnodar road system and will lead to the Olympic facilities; it will be also used by those who want to get to the Khostinsk region. The third one – the alternative to Kurortny Prospect - won’t be completely ready, but we will open the passage between ‘Sputnik’ and the Sochi River.
We are also developing maritime transport. 8 ports are under construction. This year we will open four of them – Lazarvka, Adler, Sochi and Dagomys.
The hotels that once greeted guests here used to work under the principle ‘you don’t have any other choice but to stay here, so we can offer poor services’. We understand that our rivals – Turkey, Italy, Spain – were much better than in this regard. Today we have an obligatory state system of hotel classification. And foreign companies organize high-class hotels here and show local hoteliers how they should work. But the system itself is also very efficient – it forces all the owners make their hotels worthy. The classification will be completed by June, so all the hotels will be in due form by then. And of course if it is a three-star hotel it will render the corresponding services, and the prices will be the same as it is for the same class of hotels in Turkey or Spain or Italy.
Sochi is a place of contrasts – you can already swim in the warm Black Sea in Adler now, in April, and from the beach you can see the snowy slopes where people are still skiing. The ski resorts of Krasnaya Polyana are still open. I hope you will take the opportunity to go see the contrast for yourselves.”
