Сортировочная станция в Ядрово
Сортировочная станция в Ядрово
EXCURSION
Monuments of anthropocene/Landfill
Trash is gradually becoming a new geological layer of the earth and giant landfills form a new landscape which is already easy to view from a satellite. Waste landfills are new monuments, wonderful works of the Anthropocene era, in creation of which unwittingly participated millions of people. Each of us has sent a trash can for their construction more than once. In the future our descendants will study our epoch through these giant garbage ziggurats. So why no take a look at this new landmark? The excursion helps to see and accept this new reality and also to think in what kind of relationship we want to be with it. Everyone should visit this place in order to understand what mark we leave after ourselves and what happens to things after we throw them out.
This is weird.
What does the tour look like?
Where does it take place?
Is it dirty and does it smell bad?
Near the Kuchino soild waste landfill. In Balashikha, near the village Fenino in the Moscow region.
No, nowadays the polygon is almost fully recultivated. From the outside it looks like a grassy hill. There is no bad smell and it is safe as well. But it’s important to wear a sturdy pair of shoes which you wouldn’t mind getting dirty. The rubber boots will do.
What will I learn and see
during the tour?
You will find out why the villagers went to the top of the landfill every day, try to find things that you once threw away in the garbage field, go down into the garbage caves and climb the garbage hills. You will welcome local herds of sheep and cows and will also visit the site of village built entirely from waste. In addition, you will understand why the landfills are as difficult to build as the Egyptian pyramids and why in Russia everything always is just dumped. Next you will see what kind of trash prevails in the landfill and what is going inside this construction. At last you’ll be told the legend of the mighty sleeping giant - the Garbage Monster - and will meet him as closely as possible.
During the tour each participant will also receive an electronic booklet with some useful info about trash and what you are going to see along the route.
Who conducts the excursion?
Ekaterina Balaban
documentary artist and a photographer
Sergey Popov
cameraman
Ekaterina Balaban and Andrey Yakovlev have explored the Kuchino landfill for almost 4 years. They made an article about it and also told about it in the book and in a photo project.
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The Route
How long does the excursion take?
How to get there?
We organize a transfer from the Kuchino railway station to starting point of the excursion in a comfortable minibus. Travel time is 10-15 minutes. At the end of the tour, we will bring you back to the Kuchino station. Group bike trips are possible as well - this way we will leave a smaller carbon footprint.
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1
The village Fenino
2
The garbage field
3
The garbage quarries
4
Former settlement of homeless people
5
Trash hills
6
Filtrate lake and a viewpoint
7
Touching the landfill, listening to the Garbage Monster
The route takes 1 hour. But you also need to think of the travel time: it takes half an hour to travel from the Kursk railway to the Kuchino station. Trains from the Kursk railway station leave approximately every 15 minutes. The schedule can be found here.
Registration for the tour is suspended