According to the Russia Beyond (RBTH) website, Russia ranks 4th in the world for the number of cities with populations exceeding 1 million, following China, India, and Brazil. According to the latest United Nations data, Russia’s current population is nearly 146 million, accounting for 1.82% of the global population and placing it 9th in the world population ranking of countries and territories.
With a total land area of 16,299,981 km2, approximately 74.93% of the population lives in urban areas (109,346,052 people as of 2019). The level of urbanization in this country has consistently remained above 70% for many decades.
Why Do Residents of the World’s Largest Country Prefer Living in Big Cities?
A residential area in Moscow.
Most of the cities in Russia with populations over one million are the result of a specific national strategy aimed at granting these cities special status and attracting more funding. This means that they offer higher quality education, housing, and healthcare compared to other regions.
Climate issues are also a significant factor driving people to live in large cities in this country. In winter, when the weather becomes more severe than ever, living in large cities provides residents with greater convenience for transportation. Accordingly, subways are only built in 13 major cities in Russia, leading people to flock to these areas for easier commuting.
In addition, large cities offer more public transportation options and safer road conditions during harsh weather.
Moscow Subway.
Moreover, these large cities have numerous shopping centers, cafes, and entertainment venues with warm areas. Here, people can enjoy leisure time with friends or family even when the weather turns bad. Large cities also attract business and investment, leading to more job opportunities, which in turn draws a significant workforce to live and work here.
In Moscow alone, there are over 12 million residents, and when including the nearby areas, that number exceeds 20 million.
Besides the Russian capital, there are over one million residents living in the following cities: St. Petersburg (5 million), Novosibirsk (1.6 million), Yekaterinburg (1.5 million), Kazan (1.3 million), Nizhny Novgorod (1.2 million), Chelyabinsk (1.2 million), Samara (1.1 million), Omsk (1.1 million), Rostov-on-Don (1.1 million), Ufa (1.1 million), Krasnoyarsk (1.1 million), Voronezh (1.1 million), Perm (1.1 million), and Volgograd (1 million).
From Rural to Urban
Nizhny Novgorod at night.
Outside of Moscow and St. Petersburg, the major cities in Russia only began to emerge around the early 20th century. According to the 1897 census, Moscow had about one million residents, while St. Petersburg had 1.3 million. The next cities with populations over one million only appeared in the late 1960s, including Gorky (now Nizhny Novgorod), Novosibirsk, Kuibyshev (now Samara), and Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg).
The issue was that prior to the 1917 Revolution, only 15% of Russians lived in urban areas, while the rest lived in rural areas and engaged in agriculture. This changed as the government pushed for industrialization. In the 1920s, cities sprang up around factories and mining sites across the country. These areas aimed to provide people with jobs and housing, as well as interesting social and recreational activities.
A residential area in Yekaterinburg.
This rapid urbanization process did not even halt during World War II, during which over 50 cities were established due to many factories being evacuated from central Russia. The end result of all this was that by the mid-20th century, many people migrated to cities in search of better jobs, education, and more comfortable living conditions.
