Riviera", opened on June 14, 1909 (O.S.). Sochi was granted town status in 1917.
During the Russian Civil War, the littoral area saw sporadic armed clashes involving the Red Army, White movement forces, and the Democratic Republic of Georgia, after war sochi become Russian territory. In 1923, Sochi acquired one of its most distinctive features, a railway which runs from Tuapse to Georgia within a kilometer or two of the coastline. Although this branch of the Northern Caucasus Railway may appear somewhat incongruous in the setting of beaches and sanatoriums, it is still operational and vital to the region's transportation infrastructure.
Sochi was established as a fashionable resort area under Joseph Stalin, who had his favorite dacha built in the city; Stalin's study, complete with a wax statue of the leader, is now open to the public.[24] During Stalin's reign the coast became dotted with imposing Neoclassical buildings, exemplified by the opulent Rodina and Ordzhonikidze sanatoriums. The centerpiece of this early period is Shchusev's Constructivist Institute of Rheumatology (1927�31). The area was continuously developed until the demise of the Soviet Union.
Following Russia's loss of the traditionally popular resorts of the Crimean peninsula (transferred away from the Russian SFSR to the Ukrainian SSR in 1954 by Nikita Khrushchev), Sochi emerged as the unofficial summer capital of the country. During Vladimir Putin's term in office, the city witnessed a significant increase in investment, although many Russian holidaymakers still flock to the cheaper resorts of neighbouring Abkhazia (Georgia), Ukraine, or to the Mediterranean coast of Turkey.[citation needed] Additionally, Sochi has also served as the location for the signing of many treaties, especially those between the Georgian, separatist Abkhazian, and separatist South Ossetian governing authorities
