Aston, the local developer, is believed to postpone the commissioning of its Aston Plaza, an eighteen-storey building in Radischev-Gurzufskaya St, until the end of 2008. In the meantime, the builder’s official website still says that the building will be finished in the third quarter of 2008, even though their press officer does admit the terms have changed.

Remarkably, Aston keeps putting up the building despite Sverdlovsk Region’s public prosecution authorities’ demands that the construction process should be stopped.

The building in question has already been featured in eleven lawsuits, and the neighboring buildings’ dwellers have laid numerous claims against the developer as well as engaged in large-scale protest picketing.

The complaints have to do with the fact that that this high-rise building would block all the sunshine from the nearby apartment block, while Aston hasn’t yet done much to make up for this.

According to Aston’s Chairman Vyacheslav A. Trapesnikov, thirty apartments in the building, northerly located, only had thirty minutes of sunshine a day in the first place. According to the existing regulations, though, at least one room in any building must get at least two hours of sunshine a day. So, this particular building was poorly designed from the very beginning, but the new building blocks the sunshine altogether.

Sverdlovsk Region’s public prosecution authorities insist on freezing the illegal construction process after reacting to the local residents’ numerous complaints and conducting an investigation that revealed that depriving them of sunshine infringes on the dwellers’ natural right to nice environment.

Apart from that, the developer operates on the basis of the permit issued by Yekaterinburg’s municipal council. However, the regional experts report Aston’s design documentation and engineering survey reports do not meet the legal requirements and have to be improved on.

As a result, the public prosecution authorities protest against the illegal construction permit and have already taken legal action against Aston’s top executive.

Experts believe the above-mentioned lawsuits and public prosecution authorities’ claims could not help affecting the demand for the apartments. Vyacheslav Trapesnikov admits they have only been able to sell a third of all the apartments so far. Besides, the demand may go down due to a number of other factors: firstly, the land allotment where Aston Plaza is located actually borders with Ivanovskoye cemetery, and this is believed to decrease an apartment’s popularity.

On top of that, the building isn’t fitted with a convenient driveway or enough parking lots.

Aston is planning to organize a presentation on the apartments in the Plaza on June 5, 2008, but no reporters are expected to take part in the event.