They want to scrap the historical buildings of Russian Post for debts

Old age is not a joy

It recently became known that Russian Post may abandon the Main Post Office building in St. Petersburg, built in 1789. The reason is that there are no funds for restoration, and the architectural monument is really dying. But there are financial nuances: six months ago, the general director of Russian Post JSC, Mikhail Volkov, admitted that the St. Petersburg “main post office could be sold to pay off debts.” What debts are we talking about?

Nikolai Lvov building

First, a little history. The Main Post Office of St. Petersburg is naturally located on Pochtampskaya Street. The building was commissioned in 1789 and took eight years to build. Architect’s project Nikolai Lvovbut later the business was continued by a colleague Yakov Schneider. At that time, the building housed not only a post office, but also apartments – Lvov himself lived there. This is an entire block, with internal outbuildings, its own infrastructure in the form of glaciers, wood sheds, an open kitchen, and even sometimes a slaughterhouse. So the Main Post Office building is not a house, but a separate area. The architectural solutions are interesting – arches, porticos, and generally purely St. Petersburg decor – lions’ faces and all that. And even though a resident of St. Petersburg Nikolai Gogol I wrote about another mail, but noticed a line:

“Postmaster Shpekin is an unusually stupid person. He considers his easy service a pleasant pastime. To make the service even more enjoyable, the postmaster prints out and reads with pleasure other people’s letters, and simply collects the most interesting ones“

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Eh, paper letters are leaving us.

30 cultural heritage buildings

But to relevance. What is Russian Post now? Nowadays, in the era of the Internet, paper letters have become almost obsolete. However, other services have developed, most notably made-to-order goods. Delivery in all branches works smoothly. That’s why it’s interesting what debts the Main Post Office has accumulated. General Director of Russian Post Mikhail Volkov said that cultural heritage sites, which is the Main Post Office, are difficult from the point of view of restructuring:

“Due to the requirements and restrictions, this requires significantly larger financial investments than for conventional facilities. Therefore, some of these buildings may be put up for auction to pay off debts. The publication notes that the organization has about 30 buildings throughout Russia that are objects of cultural heritage“

Although last year Volkov had different moods. The Post Office’s 2023 report lists among its “sustainable development priorities” the “preservation of sites of cultural and historical value, including post offices and postal districts.” And the Main Post Office is a city block. Old age is not a joy; many post office buildings are, in the literal sense, three centuries old. It seems to be even more valuable.

Social organization

But about debts. At the end of 2022, Russian Post suffered a loss of 30 billion (there are no more recent data), and its debt amounted to 133 billion rubles.

Gendir noted that the company is on the verge of default.

Last year a precedent already happened in St. Petersburg. On Khersonskaya Street, the house where there was a Russian Post office was sold on behalf of Russian Post JSC. Sold for 132 million rubles. A penny for the center, but maybe there was no other way.

I was able to talk with the St. Petersburg manager of Russian Post, his opinion:

“The post office buildings are indeed old and require careful maintenance from the housing and communal services sector. But I am against the sale – if we take St. Petersburg, for example, the post offices are located in the historical center, the sums for their sales are fabulous. You can’t give them away. Why are we in debt? Because in addition to parcels, we are a deeply non-profit organization. Social. Yes, we try to sell newspapers, postcards, chocolates and even stews with household chemicals there, but it’s a pittance. And the fact that many post office buildings in the center are architectural monuments is a historical fact. I may be biased, but emails like this need to be preserved. It’s a relic. Debts arise from utilities; it would be nice to have government subsidies. After all, mail is also a cultural heritage; we are not united by the Internet. Mail is our history. And our pensioners come there, mainly St. Petersburg – the leader in pensioners, and they are accustomed to withdrawing money from the card“

Hole

Nevertheless, it should be noted that Russian Post JSC, with its debts, in a bad sense, interested the highest powers. Thus, the speaker of the Federation Council of the Russian Federation Valentina Matvienko voiced:

“This is a financial hole, without government intervention it will turn into a huge hole where everything will fall through“

Here, of course, you can write that the world is changing, and mail is no longer needed for its intended purpose. But it’s not all about money. A lyrical moment. The St. Petersburg author has two familiar post offices – in Peterhof and Strelna. Both are architectural monuments, the first was built in 1854 according to the design of Nikolai Benois, the second was built in the 18th century, in 1785. And the architect, again, is Nikolai Lvov. The buildings are designed in the style of neo-Gothic and neoclassicism. It would be a shame if they closed. These are the stories about the Russian post office, without quotes.

Melissa “Mel” Carter

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