Kontula ( sv, Gårdsbacka) is a ''quarter'' of

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

, part of the

Mellunkylä Mellunkylä ( sv, Mellungsby) is a neighbourhood in East Helsinki, Finland. The area of Mellunkylä is 9,9 km2 and it has population of 36,360 (2005).http://www.hel2.fi/tietokeskus/helsinki_alueittain_2005/703Mellunkyl%C3%A4.pdf 2005 statistic ...

neighbourhood A neighbourhood (British English, Irish English, Australian English and Canadian English) or neighborhood (American English; see spelling differences) is a geographically localised community within a larger city, town, suburb or rural are ...

. Kontula was built mostly in the 1960s and 1970s when more housing was required in Helsinki. Many people from the city centre moved to Kontula; due to its little higher than average concentration of government tenant housing complexes,

immigrant Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not natives or where they do not possess citizenship in order to settle as permanent residents or naturalized citizens. Commuters, tourists, and ...

and

refugee A refugee, conventionally speaking, is a displaced person who has crossed national borders and who cannot or is unwilling to return home due to well-founded fear of persecution.

population it is regarded as an average eastern Helsinki suburb. Kontula has generally been considered one of the most notorious suburbs in

East Helsinki East Helsinki ( fi, Itä-Helsinki, sv, Östra Helsingfors) is an area in Helsinki, Finland, usually thought to comprise the city's eastern and south-eastern major districts (, ), including the districts of Vartiokylä, Myllypuro, Mellunkylä, ...

largely due to prevailing incidents of

violence Violence is the use of physical force so as to injure, abuse, damage, or destroy. Other definitions are also used, such as the World Health Organization's definition of violence as "the intentional use of physical force or Power (social and p ...

and

drug dealing The illegal drug trade or drug trafficking is a global black market dedicated to the cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of prohibited drugs. Most jurisdictions prohibit trade, except under license, of many types of drugs throug ...

, the latter of which local

youth Youth is the time of life when one is young. The word, youth, can also mean the time between childhood and adulthood ( maturity), but it can also refer to one's peak, in terms of health or the period of life known as being a young adult. You ...

s actively run a drug trade near the shopping area and the

metro station A metro station or subway station is a station for a rapid transit system, which as a whole is usually called a "metro" or "subway". A station provides a means for passengers to purchase Train ticket, tickets, board trains, and Emergency eva ...

. Despite its mixed reputation, it might also be the clue to its attractiveness, because Kontula pops up in many movies, books, and songs. The

metro Metro, short for metropolitan, may refer to: Geography * Metro (city), a city in Indonesia * A metropolitan area, the populated region including and surrounding an urban center Public transport * Rapid transit, a passenger railway in an urba ...

was expanded to Kontula in 1986, which made the area easy to reach. The Kontula Metro Station is daily used by 20,000 people. In 2006, the Finnish Local Heritage Foundation picked Kontula as the Borough of the Year in Finland.

Buildings

Kontulan Ostoskeskus, the mall

Kontula offers services to its inhabitants. There are various grocery stores, banks, pharmacies and over 20 shops and around 20 bars, Kontulan Ostoskeskus (''The Shopping Centre'' or ''the mall'') opened in 1967. The Shopping Centre also includes the health centre, a library, a swimming pool, gym, and a skateboard hall. There are also food production facilities in the area, for example, the famed ice cream house Kolme kaveria ('Three friends').

Mikaelinkirkko

The church representing

modernist Modernism is both a philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new forms of art, philosophy, an ...

church architecture, St. Michael's Church (''Mikaelinkirkko''), was consecrated on May 7, 1988. In 1980, the Helsinki Parish Association announced an architectural competition for the new church, which was attended by 138 architects. Construction was due to begin as early as 1984, but because the winning draftsman was

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

, the plan had to be abandoned, and the new plan took the second place work of competition on which the current church was based.

References

External links

Kontula's homepage

Kontulan Ostoskeskus.
Quarters of Helsinki {{SouthernFinland-geo-stub