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Novokuznetsk

  Novokuznetsk, formerly Stalinsk from 1932 until 1961, in southwestern Siberia Russia. A major industrial center in the mineral-rich Kuznetsk Basin, the city is at the head of navigation of the Tom' River and is served by several railroad lines. Manufactures include iron and steel, chemicals, aluminum, and coke. The city was founded as Kuznetsk in 1617 around a Russian fortress. In 1932 an iron and steel works was completed nearby, and the new industrial sector was united with the older settlement and named Stalinsk. The city was renamed Novokuznetsk in 1961. Population (1999 estimate) 565,000. city (1991 est. pop. 595,000), S central Siberian Russia, on the Tom River. Steel, mining equipment, chemicals, and aluminum are produced. The old town of Kuznetsk was founded by Cossacks in 1617 and was a trading center until the 20th cent. It was developed in the 1930s as Stalinsk, an iron and steel center of the Kuznetsk Basin, and was merged with its newer industrial section in 1932. The name Novokuznetsk dates from 1961.

About Novokuznetsk...

The city of Novokuznetsk (by name Stalinsk ) is the biggest city in Kemerovo Region. It is the centre of Novokuznetsk rural area. It is situated along the bent of the Tom river that flows into the Ob covering the area 50 km long in the valleys of Tom and its tributaries Aba and Kondoma at the heights of 190 to 210 m above the see level.

The geographical co-cordinates of Novokuznetsk are 58°48' , 87°11E.

The river Tom within the urban area is 400 to 600 m. wide with many small islands and spits composed of sand and gravel flown down from  high lands of Gornaya Shoria, what strongly hampers the shipping in that part of the river.

Natural resources and climate.

The location of Novokuznetsk at the south boundary of the Kuznetsk basin surrounded by spurs of Kuznetsk Alatau, Gornaya Shoria and Salair Ridge determines its resources of row materials, its climate and natural vegetation.

The main natural resource found within the urban area is coal deposited near localities Aralichevskoe, Baydaevskoe, Bunguro-Chumyshskoe, Kusheyakovskoe and Erunakovskoe. The total geological estimate of the coal resources are above 30 billion tons. There are three pits and 11 mines extracting coal from Novokuznetsk coal fields.

The climate in Novokuznetsk is relatively mild with the highest for this region annual mean temperature of +1.2°C otherwise the climate is continental with long and cold winter and short and hot summer. The most cold temperatures can be as low as -52°C, while the hottest one was recorded to be +38°C. The total number of days in a year when the temperature exceeds zero point is 195 and there are only 120 days a year when it exceeds 10°C.

Industry.

One can hardly found another one city in Russia, but Novokuznetsk, with such a high concentration of metallurgical enterprises of both ferrous and non-ferrous metallurgy, coal extracting mines and pits, building industry, power production plants, metal and timber working plants and chemical enterprises.

Of course, the leading place belongs to the four enterprises (The Joint Stock society Kuznetsk Metellurgical Combinat, the joint stock society West Siberian Metallurgical Combinat, the Joint Stock society Novokuznetsk Aluminium Plant, the Joint Stock Company Kuznetsk Ferroalloys) not only in Russia but in the CIS countries as well.

Unique memorial places of history, culture and nature.

1. Today we have some parts of the fortress and buildings of the old Kuznetsk (the fortress lost its significance yet in the middle of the XIX century), and now there is here a historical and architecture Museum Kuznetsk Fortress.

2. Home-museum of F.M. Dostoyevsky, where this famous writer lived in 1856.

3. Archaeological memorial places are the settlement Mayak, Paleolithic settlements, and Kuznetsk settlements.

4. Topolniki - the grove of black poplars.

5. Lime-tree island - the relict grove of tertiary flora (60 km. far from the city)

6. Blue rocks on the river Chumysh - the geological reference section (stratotype) of marine carbon (20 km. far from the city)

7. "Strelniy  stone"  on the river Kondoma - rephigium of Altai rhubarb (50 km. far from the city).