A large sale of shoes, knitwear and small goods is underway in central Irkutsk, as vendors rush to clear stock because street trading near the Shanghai market will soon disappear.

A large-scale sale of shoes, knitwear, and household odds and ends is underway in the center of Irkutsk along the road. There are many buyers, but the vendors are still lowering prices, and the economic situation has nothing to do with it. The sellers have very little time to sell their goods - soon there will be no places left for street trading in the area of the Shanghai market at all. In essence, these stalls are already illegal now.
Construction of a business center will soon begin right in the city center. More than two years went into all the negotiations and approvals. Today, the work of the owner of this territory, where trade was taking place until recently, can already be assessed. The pavilions were demolished a month ago. Only one wall of the last building remains, but the remaining construction materials will also be removed in the near future.
The builders have already completed one of the main stages of the work. A two-meter-deep pit was dug for the foundation of the future business center. The building’s basement level will be located here.
The area of the new building will be four and a half thousand square meters. Pavilions, office space, and a café will be placed on three floors. The project has already been developed and approved, despite the protest actions by traders that took place in 2006.
At that time, the authorities decided to completely improve the area of the so-called Shanghai market. But difficulties arose: 11 markets were operating here side by side. And only specialists could tell where one market ended and another began. Nevertheless, two sections were cleared and a parking lot was built in their place. Now the third one is being brought into order. More than forty truckloads of garbage were removed from here.
Almost all the sellers from this site have moved to neighboring markets. Those who did not have enough space are still trading on the sidewalk. Price tags are no longer displayed - the price of the goods is changed several times a day. Today, a pair of shoes is sold for two hundred rubles, but tomorrow it may cost even less. Many traders are planning to leave for their homes - to China.
By the opening of the new business center, this place should be clean. Its construction is planned to be completed by the end of this year.