Vladivostok

Vladivostok, seaport and administrative centre of Primorsky kray (territory), extreme southeastern Russia. It is located around Zolotoy Rog (“Golden Horn Bay”) on the western side of a peninsula that separates Amur and Ussuri bays on the Sea of Japan. The town was founded in 1860 as a Russian military outpost and was named Vladivostok (variously interpreted as “Rule the East,” “Lord of the East,” or “Conqueror of the East”). Its forward position in the extreme south of the Russian Far East inevitably led to a major role as a port and naval base. In 1872 the main Russian naval base on the Pacific was transferred there, and thereafter Vladivostok began to grow. In 1880 city status was conferred on it. The city also grew in importance after the construction of the Chinese Eastern Railway across Manchuria to Chita (completed in 1903), which gave Vladivostok a more direct rail connection to the rest of the Russian Empire. Yet the city is detached from the major Far Eastern node of land transportation routes.

During World War I Vladivostok was the chief Pacific entry port for military supplies and railway equipment sent to Russia from the United States. After the outbreak of the Russian Revolution in 1917, Vladivostok was occupied in 1918 by foreign, mostly Japanese, troops, the last of whom were not withdrawn until 1922. The antirevolutionary forces in Vladivostok promptly collapsed, and Soviet power was established in the region.

During the Soviet period Vladivostok remained the home of the Pacific Fleet, which was greatly enlarged in the decades after World War II. Vladivostok’s military importance was such that it was closed to foreign shipping and other contacts from the late 1950s until the waning days of Soviet power in 1990. Its chief role as a commercial port subsequently reemerged, both as a link to other Russian ports of the Far East and as a port of entry for consumer goods from China, Japan, and other countries. The port is the eastern terminus of the Northern Sea Route along Russia’s Arctic seaboard from Murmansk and is the principal supply base for the Arctic ports east of Cape Chelyuskin.

The principal exports of Vladivostok are petroleum, coal, and grain, while clothing, consumer electronics, and automobiles are the main imports. Into the port also comes much of the catch or processed fish from other Russian Far Eastern ports for onward transmission to the rest of the country.

The industrial base of Vladivostok was much diversified during the Soviet period. In addition to large ship-repair yards, there are railway workshops and a plant for the manufacture of mining equipment. Light industry includes instrument and radio factories, timberworking enterprises (notably those producing furniture and veneer), a chinaware works, and manufacturers of pharmaceutical products. Food industries—principally the processing of fish and meat and flour milling—and the building industry (prefabricated building panels) are important. In the 1990s, in the post-Soviet period, most industry declined, with the exception of food processing. Mechanical engineering continues to be important. A railroad town, Vladivostok is the eastern terminus of the Trans-Siberian Railroad. The city also has an airport.

Vladivostok is the chief educational and cultural centre of the Russian Far East. It is the site of the Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Far Eastern State University (founded 1920), and medical, art education, polytechnic, trade, and marine-engineering institutes. Students enrolled in institutes of higher education make up a significant proportion of the city’s total population. The city has theatres as well as a philharmonic society and symphony orchestra. There are also museums of local history and of the history of the Pacific Fleet. Pop. (2005 est.) 586,829.