"...possesses a remarkable quality: it consists of a space for the circulation of the public bounded by numbered houses; the numbering follows the order in which the houses are located – which infinitely eases the quest for the house you are seeking." (Bély 1913-16, p.23) 

The prospékty are a European idea.  They were introduced by Peter the Great in an attempt to build the ideal Western capital in the midst of a Russian marsh, and ever since, Russian architects have planned their cities in this way.  When Stalin and Khrushchev decided to modernize Old Moscow and turn that "heap of wooden shacks" (Bély, ibid.) into a showcase of Communism they slashed prospékty through its mesh of winding streets.  The prospékt is the clearest possible symbol of Order, clarity, visibility, efficiency and – hence – modernity and power.  On Névsky, the masses mill past, bodies touch, cars, trolleys and buses race to and fro, the atmosphere is hectic, the mob of pedestrians dense even for such huge sidewalks.  This is Civilization, we are made to understand, Culture.  Here the marshlands are definitely tamed by the oaken pillars and granite foundations pounded into it by Peter's slave laborers.  The wide river is chained by beautiful, flying bridges.  The very word prospékt gives associations of a free, open view2.  Neither does it pass unnoticed that both the word and the reality it denotes are imports from the West, foreign. 

But the quote from Bely is an (intentional) oversimplification, for the quadrangles enclosed by the prospékty, línii and bul'váry are much too large to be easily accessible from the street.  Locating the house you seek may turn out to be harder than you imagine.  Each block consists of quite a number of houses, approached by narrow, crisscrossing alleyways and tiny parks.  These are the zádnye dvorý, the back yards.  They are as closed, as intimate and disorderly as the prospékty are open, official and formal.  The dvor is home-grown and genuinely Russian – originally the word meant simply a farm-yard.  "Na dvoré" – "in the yard" – is a way of saying "outdoors".  In the dvor the bábuski (grandmothers, old women) sit in the sun on worn benches, the children play, piles of garbage lie about, and random plantings of bushes and weeds grow knee high or are trampled to the root as the case may be.  This is home, private, and a stranger strolling past is noted.  It's comfortable in the dvor – prósto, but hardly Civilized – kul'túrno.  It is a closely guarded bit of un-tamed nature.   >>>>>> 

Finn Sivert Nielsen: The Eye of the Whirlwind, Chapter 1