Elektrostal celebrated its 70th birthday in 2008. It is an industrial city nearly 40 miles east of Moscow. It is built on both sides of a rail spur going north off the Moscow-Nizhni Novogorod line. The rail spur provides passenger access to Elektrostal and its older sister, Noginsk, but also provides freight service to the industrial plants around which Elektrostal gradually developed, starting with the building of the first two factories in 1916. The original settlement was called Zatishie; it was renamed Elektrostal in 1928 and given official city status in 1938.
According to Elektrostal's official Web site, the city has 144,600 inhabitants. Of those, about 29,000 work in industry. The city has both government and independent schools through undergraduate university level. Among the independent schools is the New Humanitarian Institute with its two faculties--Linguistics and Intercultural Communication, and Design.
Elektrostal is served by an extensive network of bus routes, along with a large number of passenger vans (marshrutki). Trains connect Elektrostal with Moscow several times a day (even more frequently from the rail junction at Fryazevo), and buses leave for Moscow every 20-30 minutes.
The steel foundry that originally gave Elektrostal ("electro-steel") its name celebrated its 90th anniversary in 2007; take a tour here. Elektrostal played an important role in the Soviet Union's nuclear science program. One of the most prominent local businesses, Mashinostroitel'ny Zavod (Elemash for short), specializes in fuel rods and related products for nuclear power plants. Its parent company supplies about 17% of the world's commercial nuclear fuel.
During much of the Soviet era, Elektrostal's importance as a center of military industry made it a closed city. In the first years after the end of the USSR, several of its major plants went into decline, but in recent years the city has enjoyed an industrial and economic revival.