Neighbors of film director Nikita Mikhalkov have vowed to appeal to the European Court of Human Rights after a Moscow court threw out their challenge to the legality of a hotel being built on the site of his film studio.
"We will go to the European court because residents' rights have been violated," Yelena Tkach of the Public Coalition in Defense of Moscow, an architectural conservation group backing the residents, said Tuesday.
Residents of Maly Kozikhinsky Pereulok had filed a complaint about the city authorities' failure to impose ground reinforcement measures on the project when they authorized it. The Presnensky District Court threw out the complaint on Saturday.
Mikhalkov's company has contracted BEL Development to build a seven-story hotel with a two-level underground parking garage on the small street not far from Patriarch's Ponds.
Work on the hotel, which will cost about $20 million to build, began in June with the razing of a 19th-century building that housed Mikhalkov's own Trite studio.
But residents complain the project is damaging their own buildings and threatens the character of the historic area.
Tkach said the spring thaw has worsened the situation, with melted water seeping into the foundations of neighboring buildings.
"We will do everything to stop this construction, up to and including blocking it in the streets," Tkach said.
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