RUSSIA:Russia is to feed its growing demand for housing by building a new $10 billion (€7.6 billion) city for half a million people close to Moscow.
Great Domodedovo is being billed as a saviour for young families who cannot get on the property ladder because of rocketing prices in the capital.
Promoters say the new city will be an urban paradise free of traffic jams and air pollution, where "every person will make his or her dream come true".
It will have kindergartens, schools, supermarkets, fitness centres, hospitals, parks, restaurants, and houses and apartment blocks for up to 450,000 residents.
United Arab Emirates developer Limitless described the 18,000-hectare (44,000-acre) city as "one of the largest projects planned by an international developer anywhere in the world today".
The project's first 7,500-acre phase is to be started by the Dubai-based company in partnership with the Russian investment and development enterprise Coalco late next year. Graphics of the first phase show high-rises in the centre, a Manhattan-style island in an artificial lake and neat grids of brick townhouses on the outskirts. It will be situated to the southeast of Moscow.
Since the Soviet collapse, house prices in Moscow have soared out of reach of many young buyers. According to government estimates, 61 per cent of Russian families lack adequate housing and only 12 per cent can afford to buy an apartment.