Webcam Bratsk. Peace Street, Kirov Street (Irkutsk region).
One of the main energy centers in Russia is the city of Bratsk, which, thanks to the famous hydroelectric power plant, is the source of electricity for most of Eastern Siberia. In fact, the reason for the creation of the city and served this very plant, which was built in the middle of the twentieth century. The official history of the city begins in 1955, but in fact the first settlements appeared much earlier.
The first information about Bratsk associated with ostrog, created to consolidate the new territories by order of the Tsar in 1631. Since the development of Siberia was successful, gradually a village appeared around the first stockaded town, whose residents preferred to engage in tillage and hunting.
It was the Bratsk settlement that became the place of exile for famous people such as Avvakum, Radishchev, and Chekanovsky.
Over time, next to the village, which was renamed Bratsk, began to appear the villages, which are now in separate districts of the city.
For example, the first village Padun appeared, which was created to send ships through the rapids of the same name. Its inhabitants actively used the nearby islands for their economic purposes, and not only gathered mushrooms and berries on them, but also sowed bread and made hay for livestock. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the Padun Rural Council was formed on this territory, which united all the nearby villages. By the middle of the century, its population was about seven hundred and fifty people, but in the next few decades has grown significantly, thanks to the construction of the Bratsk hydroelectric power plant.
The modern city is located north of the first Bratsk settlement, as it was flooded during the creation of the reservoir. Currently, the city is the largest industrial center in the country and the second most populous in the Irkutsk region.
