Kstovsky District

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Kstovsky District (Russian: Кстовский район) is an administrative district in the Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia. Its administrative center is the town of Kstovo.

[edit] Geography

Kstovsky District is located along the southern shore of the Volga River, immediately to the east of city of Nizhny Novgorod.

The westernmost part of the district is adjacent to Nizhny Novgorod. It is gradually becoming more suburban, its housing developments and shopping centers closely linked to the life of the city. In fact, the resort settlement of Zelyony Gorod, although geographically located in Kstovsky District, is administered by Nizhegorodsky District (borough) of Nizhny Novgorod.

The city of Kstovo, although within an easy commuting distance (around 20 km) from downtown Nizhny, is a fairly self sufficient industrial city, with most people working and shopping locally.

The east of the district is more rural, with potato, root crops, and grain fields and cattle pastures alternating with forests and urbanites' second homes.

The district is divided into 15 administrative units: the town administration (Kstovo), urban-settlement administration of Leninskaya Sloboda, and 13 village administrations (selsovet), which include 122 villages.

The area of the district is 1260 square kilometers.

[edit] Demographics

Population: 113,703: 66,944 in the town of Kstovo and 46,759 in the rest of the district. (2002 Census).

[edit] Economy

Most of the industry in the district is located in and around Kstovo. The rest of the district is mostly agricultural, although the metalworking plant in Bezvodnoye and brick factory in Afonino are well known in the region.

The construction of a nuclear heating plant (Gorky Nuclear District Heating Plant, Горьковская Атомная Станция Теплоснабжения), meant to provide heating for a large part of Nizhny Novgorod, was started in the early 1980s western part of the district, near the Royka railway station and the village of Fedyakovo. A few years later, after the Chernobyl disaster, construction stopped, and the large, almost completed building remains mostly disused to this day (2006).

One of Nizhny Novgorod metropolitan area's largest shopping malls, anchored by an IKEA store and an Auchan hypermarket, is located near the same Fedyakovo, across the road from the hulking uncompleted nuclear plant building. Conveniently located to both Nizhny Novgorod and Kstovo, the mall is connected to both cities by free shuttle buses.