Sverdlovsk-45, Russia
Sverdlovsk-45 is one of the USSR’s closed towns build in 1948 for the purpose of top-secret scientific research. Unlike most of the post-soviet spaces, the plan of the city is extremely simple half-circle, as it had to be rapidly erected by Stalin’s orders: to build a city around a uranium-enrichment facility that can be easily and quickly navigated by the researchers. As all the research was super confidential, extreme surveillance was easier to maintain in a town with a basic structure of wide radial roads leading to one open point – the public embarkment. Moreover, the town is completely surrounded by vast forests and a river, limiting access to unsupervised exit and entry.