Leningradsky Railway Station
The prominent architect Konstantine Andreevich Ton was ordered to prepare the design of the stations in the both capitals – Moscow and Petersburg. It is enough to say that he was the designer of the Ekaterininskaya church in Petersburg, Christ the Savior Temple and the Big Kremlin Palace in Moscow. The place for construction of the station was determined at the Kalanchevskoye field. Nowadays this the famous “three stations square”. In the XVII century the wooden tzar palace was built at the Kalanchevskoye field. This palace used to have a tower, in the Tatar language - “kalancha”, that is why the palace was called Kalanchevsky palace, and the whole vicinity around it was also called Kalanchevskoye field.
In reality, two other places for the station were initially considered – near the Tverskaya zastava (gate) and Trubnaya square. But the both were rejected for fear of fire because of fire and sparks coming out of the steam engine fire-box and because of “hell of a noise” made by it.
The first operating train arrived from St. Petersburg to Moscow on August 3, 1851. And on August 19, His Majesty the Emperor Nikolay I tested the railway. Regular traffic on the first Russian line was inaugurated on November 1, 1851.
Construction of the station itself was completed earlier – in 1849. It was designed in the spirit of late classicism with ornamental parts, reproducing the forms of the old Russian art. The ground floor of the building housed a spacious two-bay vestibule, passenger halls and emperor's chambers, the first floor housed service rooms for specialists and station masters. Inner decoration of the station was excellent: oak parquet floor, decorated with marble Sweden stoves, fireplaces in water-closets.
Covered platform with two tracks and stone passenger bays was adjacent to the railway building from the side of tracks.
For many years of its existence the station was modernised more than once. However, they always tried to preserve its original face to the maximum extent. In 1950 according to the design of A.N. Dushkin the rather worn interior of the station was given a new finish. In 1977 the station was subjected to a bigger modernisation. Nearby the station, from the side of the Yaroslavsky station there is an overhead pavilion of the metro station “Komsomolskaya”.
Express trains “Krasnaya Strela” (Red Arrow), «Aurora», «Russian troika» are running between Moscow and Petersburg. Trains to Tver, Pskov, Novgorod, Helsinki, Tallinn start from here. Electricity powered suburban trains can take you to Khimki, Shodnya, Zelenograd, Solnechnogorsk, Klin, Konakovo.
