Checkpoint at the entrance to Zheleznogorsk, a closed city in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, in 2011.
Created to protect Soviet military and nuclear projects, ZATO continues to limit access to thousands of residents and shows how the secret geography of the Cold War still survives in Russia.
Russia still maintains today dozens of closed cities — essentially, restricted-access territories created to protect military, nuclear and scientific facilities largely inherited from the Soviet Union.
These locations are officially called THAT’S WHYRussian acronym for “closed administrative-territorial formations“.
The exact number of these secret cities varies depending on the sources and method of counting. According to , there are still at least 44 publicly recognized cities, with around 1.5 million inhabitants, but more recent listings indicate that there are currently only 38 of these cities.
In any case, there continue to be areas where entry, residence and circulation are subject to special authorization.
The system was born in the late 1940s, when the Soviet Union built nuclear laboratories, military research centersnaval bases and facilities linked to the space program in remote locations, especially in the Urals, Siberia and in strategic regions of the Russian north and Far East.
For decades, many of these cities did not appear on public maps or were identified by fake names and special zip codes.
Sarov is one of the best-known examples. The city, now associated with the Russian Federal Nuclear Center, was for decades known as , although it is about 75 kilometers from the real Arzamas.
In the Soviet period, access required authorization from security servicesthe perimeters were guarded and residents were instructed not to reveal where they lived.
The entry of foreigners into closed cities in Russia is strictly prohibited
In exchange for isolation, these cities offered superior conditions those of many other Soviet regions: better housing, better-stocked stores, more attractive salaries and social status associated with working on strategic State projects.
Some of these cities are gradually opening up, the British newspaper reported in 2014 in a report, illustrated with a splendid photo gallery, that shows life in the closed city of Zarechny.
At the moment, Some of these ZATO appear on maps and have official namesbut dozens remain closed to the outside world or maintain access controls for security reasons. Its existence shows as part of the secret architecture of the Cold War survived the end of the Soviet Union.
