The article examines the changes in the structure of the vegetation cover resulting from the building of a corduroy road in the Samotlor Swamp, a major oil‐producing area of West Siberia. The road runs through three major associations: a pine‐shrub‐sphagnum complex, a string‐bog complex, and a string‐bog‐with‐pools complex. The impact of the road on each of these is studied in turn in great detail, with emphasis on the changes in species composition with time, depending on distance from the road. [The translation is by William Barr, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon.]