Published in: Helsinki-Info, 26th of October, 2003

- FORTIFIED CITY 

- Person who likes open air, should wander around the old fortification chain, with it's trenches and gun batteries in Helsinki. During the First World War, fortification chain was started to construct around Helsinki. Some parts of this chain are still in a good shape around the city. First only quite light fieldworks were build at the line of Meilahti - Pasila - Koskela - Herttoniemi. This work however was stopped and during the years 1915 - 1917 construction of an outer chain was started at the line of Leppävaara - Pakila - Malmi - Vartioharju. With this outer fortification chain, it was thought that the city could be saved from the artillery fire, as it was out of the range of artillery guns. This new chain was to be a permanent and a sturdy fortification and the materials like stone and concrete were used during the construction work. 

- Due to a strategic reasons, the fortifications are build on top of hills. At that time, defense was based on the combined use of infantry and artillery. The landscape around the fortifications was very different back then, because all of the trees were cut down, so that there would be no obstacles in the field of fire. 

- Before Finland gained it's independency, Helsinki was a militarily important city for the Imperial Russia. The base for the Baltic fleet was located here and the fleet used to anchor at the front of Kruunuvuori or Viapori (Suomenlinna). In Katajanokka at the Merikasarmi, where today the Ministry for Foreign Affairs is located, was the base for the Baltic fleet. Helsinki was also the capital of grand-principality and it had a great meaning in the protection of St. Petersburg, like the whole Finland and Gulf of Finland had. 

- Imperial Russia, that had gotten quite weak after the war against Japan, started to plan the fortifying of Finland, because the threat of war had again started to rise. Trenches, bunkers and other fieldworks are the memory from that. They were designed to strengthen the defense, if the enemy would attack towards St. Petersburg, through Helsinki. The construction sites were under the supervision of engineer administration of St. Petersburg and the workers were mainly Russian soldiers and Finnish people, who were either taking part to the work voluntarily or were forced to do so. Even when the work was dangerous, the good salary and the uncertainty during a war time, made it a very tempting place to work. Also few thousand prisoners from Far-East took part to the construction work. It's estimated that to the actual fortifying job, around 100 000 people took part. The country at that time, had around three million people. Ultimately, the fortifications were never completely finished in Helsinki, because the revolution started in Russia. Also the fortification chain was never used in it's original purpose. During the Finnish civil war, the Red's did use the trenches around Pasila, when they were trying to defend against the German troops approaching the city.

-  From the year 1971, the fortification chain has been protected by the relic of antiquity law. Decades the appreciation for the fortification as a part Helsinki's history was low. However, the fortification is historically valuable. The fortification was build in a decentralized system and it's a product of the First World War. From this kind of system, the land and sea fortifications around Helsinki, are the first examples. Sometimes the fortification was used as an illegal dump pits, but during the year 1995 project was started, that catalogued the fortifications and after this job, Viapori has been actively renovated and kept in shape. It's intended that the fortifications should be a part of the living and working city. Also in the city planning, the fortifications should be thought about, so that they will remain part of the Helsinki's history in the future also. 

- The places like Nuotiopuisto in Pakila and Kaivantopuisto in Jakomäki are few examples of the places that the city has renovated in the past few years. They are a perfect places to walk around if you are interested about history. One of the future renovating targets is located in Veijarinpuisto at Lauttasaari. 

- There are many interesting places around Helsinki, like the gun batteries in Myllypuro and the fortifications in Kivikko and in Keskuspuisto.