Kola peninsula is a cape in North-Western Russia. This region borders Norway and Finland and has direct access to the Northern Ocean. Because of it's prevailing strategic position it was valued much by Russian army and hundreds of army bases were placed on the peninsula. During 1990s Russian army got tremendous budget cut off and had to cut its costs. One of the way to save for the army was to give up some bases and concentrate bases from bordering locations to one. So it was done and many of the army bases were abandoned. Then the other way to reduce costs was to pay less to the personnel, so during 1990s many Russian soldiers and officers had to give up Army service cause they couldn't sustain normal living from it.
Especially at the Northern territories where it was impossible to keep natural living sources like gardens or domestic animals. People naturally fled from North. The apartments prices were falling down at just lightning speed rates, going to as low as $2000 for a 4 room flat, and then it all finished up with hundreds of residential multi-stored houses stayed abandoned with no occupancy. Army has built a lot of small cities during the Soviet period around its military objects. Those were left first. Now tens of such towns stay all across Kola Peninsula not visited, not inhabited. Here are just some photos from the empty streets of Kola Peninsula Ex-Army Town.