Belovo, Kemerovo Oblast

Belovo (Russian Белово ) is a city in the Russian Kemerovo Oblast (Western Siberia) with 76 764 inhabitants (as of October 14, 2010 ).

Geography

The city is located in the west of the central part of the Kuzbass, about 150 km south of the Oblasthauptstadt Kemerovo, the river Batschat, a tributary of the Inja. The climate is continental.

The city is the administrative center of the homonymous Belovo Rajons Belovo, but does not belong to Rajon, but forms a separate urban district. The town includes, besides the city of four settlements of urban type and two villages, so that the total population of the urban circle Belovo is 134 512. The settlements of urban type are:

• Batschatski ( 14 402 )
• Gramoteino ( 12,996 )
• Inskoi ( 12,590 )
• Novy Gorodok ( 15,750 )

The 1953 to Belovo associated settlement Krasnobrodski was spun off into a separate county in 2006.

History

A village called Belovo was first mentioned in 1726, named after the escaped serfs Fedor Belov, who settled here on the banks of Batschat. 1855 began the hard coal mining. 1938, the site of a town.

Demographics

Note: Census data (1939 rounded)

Economy and infrastructure

Belovo is one of the industrial centers of the Kuzbass with coal industry, machinery, building materials industry. Near Inskoi is the thermal power plant Belovo ( Беловская ГРЭС ).

The town lies on the railway line Novosibirsk - (or Kemerovo - ) Novokuznetsk. Here a side road branches off to Guryevsk and wages.

Sons and daughters of the town

• Viktor Mamatow (* 1937), biathlete