Many people know about the well-known criminological theory, “If one glass is broken in a building and no one replaces it, then after a while there will not be a single whole window left in this building.” Indulging in vandalism causes its avalanche-like growth. Unfortunately, this theory works almost everywhere, and our city is no exception.

For a long time, the house at Lopans’kyi Lane, 13, was a real architectural landmark of the neighborhoods near the Annunciation Cathedral.

It was built in 1912-1914 as a trade and manufacturing building, designed by architect O. Rzhepishevsky for M. Shpolyansky. During the construction process, a scandal arose with the city authorities regarding the developer’s self-encroachment on part of the city’s land, which was widely covered in the newspaper “Utro”.

In the 1920s and 1930s, the building housed the pavilions of the VDNH industrial exhibition of the Ukrainian SSR, then a prosthetic factory, a font foundry, and in the 1990s, the first floor was occupied by the Split casino.

Since the 2000s, the building has been abandoned.

This was until the spring of 2016, when the closed building was “opened” and “stalkers” and selfie lovers began to climb its roof. Both clips and professional photo shoots were shot here.

The building is in disrepair, the reinforced concrete floors inside have already collapsed in waves, there are no stair railings, just like there is no roof railing – so getting out there is a real danger to life.

For some time now, the police have regularly started catching youngsters and holding educational conversations with them, but this helps little. However, the large number of people passing through this building has also brought a large number of broken windows.

Literally in a few months, the building has lost all its attractiveness, losing a significant part of the glazing.

How to solve these problems? With severe administrative fines, security for a house that no one needs, and alarms? Unfortunately, this will not deter vandals.

The best way is to reuse it. And it doesn’t matter that it will be a warehouse, office, apartment, or an art gallery. Because a house in which people live or work will live as well.

And practically any house without people is doomed to disappear. Like that little house, the ghostly outline of which remained on the wall of a dying building at Lopans’kyi Lane, 13.