123-463: The Saint Petersburg to Moscow railway (1855–1923 – Nikolaevskaya railway ) runs for 649.7 kilometers (403.7 mi) through four oblasts : Leningrad , Novgorod , Tver and Moscow . It is a major traffic artery in the north-west region of Russia, operated by the October Railway subdivision of Russian Railways . On 1 February 1842, Tsar Nicholas I issued a ukase ordering
246-525: A bomb explosion. There were 30 injuries and no deaths, and railway traffic was blocked in both directions for a few days. Two men from the Ingushetia region of North Caucasus , Salambek Dzakhkiyev and Maksharip Khidriyev, were charged in relation to this incident. They were acquitted in January 2010 on the terrorism charge, but sentenced to prison terms on related charges. The court decided they delivered
369-408: A carbody design that would reduce wind resistance at high speeds. A long series of tests was carried. In 1905, St. Louis Car Company built a railcar for the traction magnate Henry E. Huntington , capable of speeds approaching 160 km/h (100 mph). Once it ran 32 km (20 mi) between Los Angeles and Long Beach in 15 minutes, an average speed of 130 km/h (80 mph). However, it
492-532: A fortress at the mouth of the Neva River in 1611, which was later called Ingermanland . The small town of Nyen grew up around the fort. Before the 17th century, this area was inhabited by Finnic Izhorians and Votians . The Ingrian Finns moved to the region from the provinces of Karelia and Savonia during the Swedish rule. There was also some Estonian , Karelian , Russian and German population in
615-578: A high-speed railway network in Russian gauge . There are no narrow gauge high-speed railways. Countries whose legacy network is entirely or mostly of a different gauge than 1435mm – including Japan and Spain – have however often opted to build their high speed lines to standard gauge instead of the legacy railway gauge. High-speed rail is the fastest and most efficient ground-based method of commercial transportation. However, due to requirements for large track curves, gentle gradients and grade separated track
738-704: A new design phase was given approval, though construction is yet to begin. The maximum speed is 250 km/h (155 mph), however this speed is allowed only on less than 10 km (6.2 mi) of the line. A maximum speed of 220 km/h (140 mph) is permitted for 110 km (68 mi) of the line. The rest of the route allows a maximum speed of 200 km/h (124 mph). The fastest train takes 3 hours and 30 minutes (which gives an average speed of 185 km/h (115 mph)). The Siemens Velaro RUS train, also known as Sapsan , has operated on this line since 2009, running below their maximum speed of 300 km/h (186 mph) because of difficulties upgrading all
861-496: A new general plan was outlined, whereby the city should expand to the south. Constructivism was rejected in favour of a more pompous Stalinist architecture . Moving the city centre further from the border with Finland, Stalin adopted a plan to build a new city hall with a huge adjacent square at the southern end of Moskovsky Prospekt , designated as the new main street of Leningrad. After the Winter (Soviet-Finnish) war in 1939–1940,
984-591: A new plan in 1737. The city was divided into five boroughs, and the city centre was moved to the Admiralty borough, on the east bank between the Neva and Fontanka . It developed along three radial streets, which meet at the Admiralty building and are now known as Nevsky Prospect (which is considered the main street of the city), Gorokhovaya Street and Voznesensky Avenue . Baroque architecture became dominant in
1107-546: A new top speed for a regular service, with a top speed of 160 km/h (99 mph). This train was a streamlined multi-powered unit, albeit diesel, and used Jakobs bogies . Following the success of the Hamburg line, the steam-powered Henschel-Wegmann Train was developed and introduced in June 1936 for service from Berlin to Dresden , with a regular top speed of 160 km/h (99 mph). Incidentally no train service since
1230-493: A parallel high-speed railway allowing speeds up to 400 km/h (250 mph), at an estimated cost of 696 bn roubles with an original estimated completion of 2018. Major stations include (south to north) Kryukovo (Zelenograd) , Klin , Redkino , Tver , Likhoslavl , Kalashnikovo , Vyshny Volochyok , Bologoye , Okulovka , Luka , Malaya Vishera , Chudovo , Lyuban , Tosno and Obukhovo . There are 32 direct express trains daily from Moscow to Saint Petersburg, from which
1353-539: A population of 5,601,911 residents as of 2021, with more than 6.4 million people living in the metropolitan area . Saint Petersburg is the fourth-most populous city in Europe, the most populous city on the Baltic Sea, and the world's northernmost city of more than 1 million residents. As the former capital of Imperial Russia , and a historically strategic port , it is governed as a federal city . The city
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#17327872734551476-569: A rectangular grid of canals. The project was not completed but is evident in the layout of the streets. In 1716, Peter the Great appointed Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Alexandre Le Blond as the chief architect of Saint Petersburg. The style of Petrine Baroque , developed by Trezzini and other architects and exemplified by such buildings as the Menshikov Palace , Kunstkamera , Peter and Paul Cathedral , Twelve Collegia , became prominent in
1599-744: A short period of time between 1728 and 1730). After the October Revolution in 1917, the Bolsheviks moved their government to Moscow. The city was renamed Leningrad after Lenin's death in 1924. It was the site of the siege of Leningrad during the Second World War , the most lethal siege in history. In June 1991, only a few months before the Belovezha Accords and the dissolution of the USSR , voters supported restoring
1722-555: A some other interurban rail cars reached about 145 km/h (90 mph) in commercial traffic. The Red Devils weighed only 22 tons though they could seat 44 passengers. Extensive wind tunnel research – the first in the railway industry – was done before J. G. Brill in 1931 built the Bullet cars for Philadelphia and Western Railroad (P&W). They were capable of running at 148 km/h (92 mph). Some of them were almost 60 years in service. P&W's Norristown High Speed Line
1845-569: A world record for narrow gauge trains at 145 km/h (90 mph), giving the Odakyu engineers confidence they could safely and reliably build even faster trains at standard gauge. Conventional Japanese railways up until that point had largely been built in the 1,067 mm ( 3 ft 6 in ) Cape gauge , however widening the tracks to standard gauge ( 1,435 mm ( 4 ft 8 + 1 ⁄ 2 in )) would make very high-speed rail much simpler due to improved stability of
1968-476: Is a set of unique features, not merely a train travelling above a particular speed. Many conventionally hauled trains are able to reach 200 km/h (124 mph) in commercial service but are not considered to be high-speed trains. These include the French SNCF Intercités and German DB IC . The criterion of 200 km/h (124 mph) is selected for several reasons; above this speed,
2091-498: Is combined with the city's Russian heritage. Another nickname of Saint Petersburg is "The City of the White Nights" because of a natural phenomenon which arises due to the closeness to the polar region and ensures that in summer the night skies of the city do not get completely dark for a month. The city is also often called the "Northern Palmyra ", due to its extravagant architecture. Swedish colonists built Nyenskans ,
2214-689: Is home to the Hermitage , one of the largest art museums in the world, the Lakhta Center , the tallest skyscraper in Europe , and was one of the host cities of the 2018 FIFA World Cup and the UEFA Euro 2020 . The name day of Peter I falls on 29 June, when the Russian Orthodox Church observes the memory of apostles Peter and Paul . The consecration of the small wooden church in their names (its construction began at
2337-501: Is how I want my railway built". What actually happened was that the road was laid out by engineers and he endorsed their advice to build in a straight line. The curve, also called the Verebinsky bypass, was actually built in 1877, 26 years after the line came into being, to circumvent a steep gradient that lasted for 17 km (10.6 mi). Heading for St Petersburg, trains would pick up so much speed that they steamed straight past
2460-539: Is still in use, almost 110 years after P&W in 1907 opened their double-track Upper Darby–Strafford line without a single grade crossing with roads or other railways. The entire line was governed by an absolute block signal system. On 15 May 1933, the Deutsche Reichsbahn-Gesellschaft company introduced the diesel-powered " Fliegender Hamburger " in regular service between Hamburg and Berlin (286 km or 178 mi), thereby achieving
2583-448: Is still named Leningrad . Having passed the role of capital to Petersburg, Moscow never relinquished the title of "capital", being called pervoprestolnaya ('first throned') for 200 years. An equivalent name for Petersburg, the "Northern Capital", has re-entered usage today since several federal institutions were recently moved from Moscow to Saint Petersburg. Solemn descriptive names like "the city of three revolutions" and "the cradle of
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#17327872734552706-652: Is Αγία Πετρούπολη, Agia Petroupoli ). Saint Petersburg has been traditionally called the "Window to Europe" and the "Window to the West" by the Russians. The city is the northernmost metropolis with more than 1 million people in the world, and is also often described as the " Venice of the North" or the "Russian Venice" due to its many water corridors, as the city is built on swamp and water. Furthermore, it has strongly Western European-inspired architecture and culture, which
2829-619: The Chicago-New York Electric Air Line Railroad project to reduce the running time between the two big cities to ten hours by using electric 160 km/h (99 mph) locomotives. After seven years of effort, however, less than 50 km (31 mi) of arrow-straight track was finished. A part of the line is still used as one of the last interurbans in the US. In the US, some of the interurbans (i.e. trams or streetcars which run from city to city) of
2952-553: The 0 Series Shinkansen , built by Kawasaki Heavy Industries – in English often called "Bullet Trains", after the original Japanese name Dangan Ressha ( 弾丸列車 ) – outclassed the earlier fast trains in commercial service. They traversed the 515 km (320 mi) distance in 3 hours 10 minutes, reaching a top speed of 210 km/h (130 mph) and sustaining an average speed of 162.8 km/h (101.2 mph) with stops at Nagoya and Kyoto. Speed
3075-681: The Aérotrain , a French hovercraft monorail train prototype, reached 200 km/h (120 mph) within days of operation. After the successful introduction of the Japanese Shinkansen in 1964, at 210 km/h (130 mph), the German demonstrations up to 200 km/h (120 mph) in 1965, and the proof-of-concept jet-powered Aérotrain , SNCF ran its fastest trains at 160 km/h (99 mph). In 1966, French Infrastructure Minister Edgard Pisani consulted engineers and gave
3198-704: The Gold Star sign was installed in April 1985. In October 1946 some territories along the northern coast of the Gulf of Finland , which had been annexed into the USSR from Finland in 1940 under the peace treaty following the Winter War , were transferred from Leningrad Oblast to Leningrad and divided into Sestroretsky District and Kurortny District . These included the town of Terijoki (renamed Zelenogorsk in 1948). Leningrad and many of its suburbs were rebuilt over
3321-618: The Great Northern War , Peter the Great captured Nyenskans and soon replaced the fortress. On 27 May [ O.S. 16 May] 1703, closer to the estuary (5 km (3 mi) inland from the gulf ), on Zayachy (Hare) Island , he laid down the Peter and Paul Fortress , which became the first brick and stone building of the new city. The city was built by conscripted peasants from all over Russia; in some years several Swedish prisoners of war were also involved under
3444-978: The Heraldic Council of the President of the Russian Federation . It is also a seat for the National Library of Russia and a planned location for the Supreme Court of Russia , as well as the home to the headquarters of the Russian Navy , and the Leningrad Military District of the Russian Armed Forces . The Historic Centre of Saint Petersburg and Related Groups of Monuments constitute a UNESCO World Heritage Site . Saint Petersburg
3567-530: The Leningrad Affair (1949–1952), a notable event in the postwar political struggle in the USSR . It was a product of rivalry between Stalin's potential successors where one side was represented by the leaders of the city Communist Party organization – the second most significant one in the country after Moscow. The entire elite leadership of Leningrad was destroyed, including the former mayor Kuznetsov ,
3690-590: The Marienfelde – Zossen line during 1902 and 1903 (see Experimental three-phase railcar ). On 23 October 1903, the S&;H-equipped railcar achieved a speed of 206.7 km/h (128.4 mph) and on 27 October the AEG-equipped railcar achieved 210.2 km/h (130.6 mph). These trains demonstrated the feasibility of electric high-speed rail; however, regularly scheduled electric high-speed rail travel
3813-647: The Morning Hiawatha service, hauled at 160 km/h (99 mph) by steam locomotives. In 1939, the largest railroad of the world, the Pennsylvania Railroad introduced a duplex steam engine Class S1 , which was designed to be capable of hauling 1200 tons passenger trains at 161 km/h (100 mph). The S1 engine was assigned to power the popular all-coach overnight premier train the Trail Blazer between New York and Chicago since
Saint Petersburg–Moscow railway - Misplaced Pages Continue
3936-705: The Narva Triumphal Arch . In 1825, the suppressed Decembrist revolt against Nicholas I took place on the Senate Square in the city, a day after Nicholas assumed the throne. By the 1840s, neoclassical architecture had given way to various romanticist styles, which dominated until the 1890s, represented by such architects as Andrei Stackenschneider ( Mariinsky Palace , Beloselsky-Belozersky Palace , Nicholas Palace , New Michael Palace ) and Konstantin Thon ( Moskovsky railway station ). With
4059-556: The October Revolution , which led to the end of the social-democratic provisional government , the transfer of all political power to the Soviets , and the rise of the Communist Party . After that the city acquired a new descriptive name, "the city of three revolutions", referring to the three major developments in the political history of Russia of the early 20th century. In September and October 1917, German troops invaded
4182-530: The October revolution " used in the Soviet era are reminders of the pivotal events in national history that occurred here. Petropolis is a translation of a city name to Greek, and is also a kind of descriptive name: Πέτρ- is a Greek root for 'stone', so the "city from stone" emphasizes the material that had been forcibly made obligatory for construction from the first years of the city (a modern Greek translation
4305-694: The Order of Saint Anna by the Russian Emperor in 1847 but contracted cholera and died on 7 April 1849, in Saint Petersburg , Russia, two years before the line was completed. It was built by serfs with heavy loss of life, a fact bemoaned by Nikolay Nekrasov in his 1864 poem The Railway . After ten years of construction, the line opened on 1 November 1851. The first passenger train left Saint Petersburg at 11:15 and arrived in Moscow at 21:00
4428-545: The Prussian state railway joined with ten electrical and engineering firms and electrified 72 km (45 mi) of military owned railway between Marienfelde and Zossen . The line used three-phase current at 10 kilovolts and 45 Hz . The Van der Zypen & Charlier company of Deutz, Cologne built two railcars, one fitted with electrical equipment from Siemens-Halske , the second with equipment from Allgemeine Elektrizitäts-Gesellschaft (AEG), that were tested on
4551-729: The Tōkaidō Shinkansen , began operations in Honshu , Japan, in 1964. Due to the streamlined spitzer -shaped nose cone of the trains , the system also became known by its English nickname bullet train . Japan's example was followed by several European countries, initially in Italy with the Direttissima line, followed shortly thereafter by France , Germany , and Spain . Today, much of Europe has an extensive network with numerous international connections. More recent construction since
4674-532: The United Kingdom , the United States , and Uzbekistan . Only in continental Europe and Asia does high-speed rail cross international borders. High-speed trains mostly operate on standard gauge tracks of continuously welded rail on grade-separated rights of way with large radii . However, certain regions with wider legacy railways , including Russia and Uzbekistan, have sought to develop
4797-619: The West Estonian archipelago and threatened Petrograd with bombardment and invasion. On 12 March 1918, Lenin transferred the government of Soviet Russia to Moscow, to keep it away from the state border. During the Russian Civil War , in mid-1919 Russian anti-communist forces with the help of Estonians attempted to capture the city, but Leon Trotsky mobilized the army and forced them to retreat back to Estonia . On 26 January 1924, five days after Lenin's death, Petrograd
4920-474: The World Bank , whilst supporting the project, considered the design of the equipment as unproven for that speed, and set the maximum speed to 210 km/h (130 mph). After initial feasibility tests, the plan was fast-tracked and construction of the first section of the line started on 20 April 1959. In 1963, on the new track, test runs hit a top speed of 256 km/h (159 mph). Five years after
5043-466: The emancipation of the serfs undertaken by Alexander II in 1861 and an Industrial Revolution , the influx of former peasants into the capital increased greatly. Poor boroughs spontaneously developed on the outskirts of the city. Saint Petersburg surpassed Moscow in population and industrial growth; it became one of the largest industrial cities in Europe, with a major naval base (in Kronstadt ),
Saint Petersburg–Moscow railway - Misplaced Pages Continue
5166-435: The 1920s and 1930s, the poor outskirts were reconstructed into regularly planned boroughs . Constructivist architecture flourished around that time. Housing became a government-provided amenity ; many "bourgeois" apartments were so large that numerous families were assigned to what were called "communal" apartments ( kommunalkas ). By the 1930s, 68% of the population lived in such housing under very poor conditions. In 1935,
5289-573: The 21st century has led to China taking a leading role in high-speed rail. As of 2023 , China's HSR network accounted for over two-thirds of the world's total. In addition to these, many other countries have developed high-speed rail infrastructure to connect major cities, including: Austria , Belgium , Denmark , Finland , Greece , Indonesia , Morocco , the Netherlands , Norway , Poland , Portugal , Russia , Saudi Arabia , Serbia , South Korea , Sweden , Switzerland , Taiwan , Turkey ,
5412-600: The Axis invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941. The siege lasted 872 days, or almost two and a half years, from 8 September 1941 to 27 January 1944. The Siege of Leningrad proved one of the longest, most destructive, and most lethal sieges of a major city in modern history . It isolated the city from food supplies except those provided through the Road of Life across Lake Ladoga , which could not make it through until
5535-642: The French National Railway started to receive their new powerful CC 7100 electric locomotives, and began to study and evaluate running at higher speeds. In 1954, the CC 7121 hauling a full train achieved a record 243 km/h (151 mph) during a test on standard track. The next year, two specially tuned electric locomotives, the CC 7107 and the prototype BB 9004, broke previous speed records, reaching respectively 320 km/h (200 mph) and 331 km/h (206 mph), again on standard track. For
5658-565: The French National Railways twelve months to raise speeds to 200 km/h (120 mph). The classic line Paris– Toulouse was chosen, and fitted, to support 200 km/h (120 mph) rather than 140 km/h (87 mph). Some improvements were set, notably the signals system, development of on board "in-cab" signalling system, and curve revision. The next year, in May 1967, a regular service at 200 km/h (120 mph)
5781-603: The German words Sankt and Burg . In March 1917, during the February Revolution Nicholas II abdicated for himself and on behalf of his son, ending the Russian monarchy and over three hundred years of Romanov dynastic rule . On 7 November [ O.S. 25 October] 1917, the Bolsheviks , led by Vladimir Lenin , stormed the Winter Palace in an event known thereafter as
5904-645: The Investigative Committee, was injured and hospitalised. The incident was reported to have similarities with the 2007 explosion . Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg , formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad , is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow . It is situated on the River Neva , at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea . The city had
6027-608: The Neva River, and a seaport on the Baltic. The names of Saints Peter and Paul , bestowed upon the original city's citadel and its cathedral (from 1725 – a burial vault of Russian emperors) coincidentally were the names of the first two assassinated Russian emperors, Peter III (1762, supposedly killed in a conspiracy led by his wife, Catherine the Great ) and Paul I (1801, Nikolay Alexandrovich Zubov and other conspirators who brought to power Alexander I ,
6150-549: The Soviet era, many historic architectural monuments of the previous centuries were destroyed by the new regime for ideological reasons. While that mainly concerned churches and cathedrals, some other buildings were also demolished. On 1 December 1934, Sergey Kirov , the Bolshevik leader of Leningrad, was assassinated under suspicious circumstances, which became the pretext for the Great Purge . In Leningrad, approximately 40,000 were executed during Stalin's purges. During World War II, German forces besieged Leningrad following
6273-504: The Soviet–Finnish border moved northwards. Nevsky Prospekt with Palace Square maintained the functions and the role of a city centre. In December 1931, Leningrad was administratively separated from Leningrad Oblast . At that time it included the Leningrad Suburban District, some parts of which were transferred back to Leningrad Oblast in 1936 and turned into Vsevolozhsky District , Krasnoselsky District , Pargolovsky District and Slutsky District (renamed Pavlovsky District in 1944). During
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#17327872734556396-413: The US, 160 km/h (99 mph) in Germany and 125 mph (201 km/h) in Britain. Above those speeds positive train control or the European Train Control System becomes necessary or legally mandatory. National domestic standards may vary from the international ones. Railways were the first form of rapid land transportation and had an effective monopoly on long-distance passenger traffic until
6519-400: The Winter Palace and prohibited spacing between buildings. During the reign of Catherine the Great in the 1760s–1780s, the banks of the Neva were lined with granite embankments. However, it was not until 1850 that the first permanent bridge across the Neva, Annunciation Bridge , was allowed to open. Before that, only pontoon bridges were allowed. Obvodny Canal (dug in 1769–1833) became
6642-508: The acting mayor Pyotr Sergeevich Popkov, and all their deputies; overall 23 leaders were sentenced to the death penalty, 181 to prison or exile (rehabilitated in 1954). About 2,000 ranking officials across the USSR were expelled from the party and the Komsomol and removed from leadership positions. The Leningrad Metro underground rapid transit system , designed before the war, opened in 1955 with its first eight stations decorated with marble and bronze . However, after Stalin's death in 1953,
6765-412: The area. At the end of the 17th century, Peter the Great, who was interested in seafaring and maritime affairs, wanted Russia to gain a seaport to trade with the rest of Europe. He needed a better seaport than the country's main one at the time, Arkhangelsk , which was on the White Sea in the far north and closed to shipping during the winter. On 12 May [ O.S. 1 May] 1703, during
6888-403: The beginning of the construction work, in October 1964, just in time for the Olympic Games , the first modern high-speed rail, the Tōkaidō Shinkansen , was opened between the two cities; a 510 km (320 mi) line between Tokyo and Ōsaka. As a result of its speeds, the Shinkansen earned international publicity and praise, and it was dubbed the "bullet train." The first Shinkansen trains,
7011-443: The cancelation of this express train in 1939 has traveled between the two cities in a faster time as of 2018 . In August 2019, the travel time between Dresden-Neustadt and Berlin-Südkreuz was 102 minutes. See Berlin–Dresden railway . Further development allowed the usage of these "Fliegenden Züge" (flying trains) on a rail network across Germany. The "Diesel-Schnelltriebwagen-Netz" (diesel high-speed-vehicle network) had been in
7134-426: The city Menshikov is maybe also the author of the first nickname of Petersburg which he called Петри ( Petri ). It took some years until the known Russian spelling of this name finally settled. In 1740s Mikhail Lomonosov uses a derivative of Greek: Πετρόπολις (Петрополис, Petropolis ) in a Russified form Petropol ' (Петрополь). A combo Piterpol (Питерпол) also appears at this time. In any case, eventually
7257-514: The city architecture of the early 18th century. In 1724 the Academy of Sciences , University and Academic Gymnasium were established in Saint Petersburg by Peter the Great. In 1725, Peter died at age fifty-two. His endeavors to modernize Russia had been opposed by the Russian nobility . There were several attempts on his life and a treason case involving his son. In 1728, Peter II of Russia moved his seat back to Moscow. But four years later, in 1732, under Empress Anna of Russia , Saint Petersburg
7380-400: The city authorities arranged for the mayoral elections and a referendum upon the city's name, when the original name Saint Petersburg was restored. The turnout was 65%; 66.13% of the total count of votes went to Anatoly Sobchak , who became the first directly elected mayor of the city . Meanwhile, economic conditions started to deteriorate as the country tried to adapt to major changes. For
7503-496: The city authorities until December 2010, when after the statement of President Dmitry Medvedev , the city decided to find a more appropriate location for this project. In the same year, the new location for the project was relocated to Lakhta , a historical area northwest of the city centre, and the new project would be named Lakhta Center . Construction was approved by Gazprom and the city administration and commenced in 2012. The 462 m (1,516 ft) high Lakhta Center has become
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#17327872734557626-407: The city during the first sixty years, culminating in the Elizabethan Baroque, represented most notably by Italian Bartolomeo Rastrelli with such buildings as the Winter Palace . In the 1760s, Baroque architecture was succeeded by neoclassical architecture . Established in 1762, the Commission of Stone Buildings of Moscow and Saint Petersburg ruled that no structure in the city could be higher than
7749-415: The city was renamed Leningrad in January 1924. The referendum on restoring the historic name was held on 12 June 1991, with 55% of voters supporting " Saint Petersburg " and 43% supporting " Leningrad ". The turnout was 65% . Renaming the city Petrograd was not an option. This change officially took effect on 6 September 1991. Meanwhile, the oblast whose administrative center is also in Saint Petersburg
7872-438: The city's original appellation in a city-wide referendum . As Russia's cultural centre, Saint Petersburg received over 15 million tourists in 2018. It is considered an important economic, scientific, and tourism centre of Russia and Europe. In modern times, the city has the nickname of being "the Northern Capital of Russia" and is home to notable federal government bodies such as the Constitutional Court of Russia and
7995-562: The construction of high-speed rail is more costly than conventional rail and therefore does not always present an economical advantage over conventional speed rail. Multiple definitions for high-speed rail are in use worldwide. The European Union Directive 96/48/EC, Annex 1 (see also Trans-European high-speed rail network ) defines high-speed rail in terms of: The International Union of Railways (UIC) identifies three categories of high-speed rail: A third definition of high-speed and very high-speed rail requires simultaneous fulfilment of
8118-464: The curve radius should be quadrupled; the same was true for the acceleration and braking distances. In 1891 engineer Károly Zipernowsky proposed a high-speed line from Vienna to Budapest for electric railcars at 250 km/h (160 mph). In 1893 Wellington Adams proposed an air-line from Chicago to St. Louis of 252 miles (406 km), at a speed of only 160 km/h (99 mph). Alexander C. Miller had greater ambitions. In 1906, he launched
8241-432: The deputy director Marcel Tessier at the DETE ( SNCF Electric traction study department). JNR engineers returned to Japan with a number of ideas and technologies they would use on their future trains, including alternating current for rail traction, and international standard gauge. In 1957, the engineers at the private Odakyu Electric Railway in Greater Tokyo Area launched the Odakyu 3000 series SE EMU. This EMU set
8364-508: The development of the motor car and airliners in the early-mid 20th century. Speed had always been an important factor for railroads and they constantly tried to achieve higher speeds and decrease journey times. Rail transportation in the late 19th century was not much slower than non-high-speed trains today, and many railroads regularly operated relatively fast express trains which averaged speeds of around 100 km/h (62 mph). High-speed rail development began in Germany in 1899 when
8487-423: The early 20th century were very high-speed for their time (also Europe had and still does have some interurbans). Several high-speed rail technologies have their origin in the interurban field. In 1903 – 30 years before the conventional railways started to streamline their trains – the officials of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition organised the Electric Railway Test Commission to conduct a series of tests to develop
8610-416: The explosives to the person who actually planted them, the leader of the terrorist cell, Pavel Kosolapov , at large at time of the trial, but were not aware how it was going to get used. Dzakhkiyev and his defense lawyer, Magomed Razakov, were also convicted of trying to bribe the investigator. Dzakhkiyev was sentenced to ten years' imprisonment, Khidriyev four years, Razakov two years two months. The acquittal
8733-585: The first tallest skyscraper in Russia and Europe outside of Moscow. High-speed rail High-speed rail ( HSR ) is a type of rail transport network utilizing trains that run significantly faster than those of traditional rail, using an integrated system of specialized rolling stock and dedicated tracks . While there is no single standard that applies worldwide, lines built to handle speeds above 250 km/h (155 mph) or upgraded lines in excess of 200 km/h (125 mph) are widely considered to be high-speed. The first high-speed rail system,
8856-552: The first time since the 1940s, food rationing was introduced, and the city received humanitarian food aid from abroad. This dramatic time was depicted in photographic series of Russian photographer Alexey Titarenko . Economic conditions began to improve only at the beginning of the 21st century. In 1995, a northern section of the Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya Line of the Saint Petersburg Metro
8979-438: The first time, 300 km/h (185 mph) was surpassed, allowing the idea of higher-speed services to be developed and further engineering studies commenced. Especially, during the 1955 records, a dangerous hunting oscillation , the swaying of the bogies which leads to dynamic instability and potential derailment was discovered. This problem was solved by yaw dampers which enabled safe running at high speeds today. Research
9102-632: The following are a selection. There are many more sleeper trains. International trains to nearby countries such as Finland and Estonia use this line. The line runs only an absolutely unavoidable minimum of freight trains. However, with only one track in each direction (with the exception Moscow to Zelenograd, which has three tracks), expresses are often delayed by slower local commuter trains. Introduction of Sapsan service saw massive changes in suburban train timetables with some trains now having long stops at passing loops to allow overtaking and others cancelled, causing resentment in towns and settlements along
9225-575: The following two conditions: The UIC prefers to use "definitions" (plural) because they consider that there is no single standard definition of high-speed rail, nor even standard usage of the terms ("high speed", or "very high speed"). They make use of the European EC Directive 96/48, stating that high speed is a combination of all the elements which constitute the system: infrastructure, rolling stock and operating conditions. The International Union of Railways states that high-speed rail
9348-474: The head of the city administration . The title of the city head was changed from "mayor" to "governor". In 2000, Yakovlev won re-election. His second term expired in 2004; the long-awaited restoration of the broken subway connection was expected to finish by that time. But in 2003 Yakovlev suddenly resigned, leaving the governor's office to Valentina Matviyenko . The law on election of the City Governor
9471-414: The impacts of geometric defects are intensified, track adhesion is decreased, aerodynamic resistance is greatly increased, pressure fluctuations within tunnels cause passenger discomfort, and it becomes difficult for drivers to identify trackside signalling. Standard signaling equipment is often limited to speeds below 200 km/h (124 mph), with the traditional limits of 127 km/h (79 mph) in
9594-461: The initial ones despite greater speeds). After decades of research and successful testing on a 43 km (27 mi) test track, in 2014 JR Central began constructing a Maglev Shinkansen line, which is known as the Chūō Shinkansen . These Maglev trains still have the traditional underlying tracks and the cars have wheels. This serves a practical purpose at stations and a safety purpose out on
9717-420: The lake froze. More than one million civilians were killed, mainly from starvation. There were incidents of cannibalism, with around 2,000 residents arrested for eating other people. Many others escaped or were evacuated, so the city became largely depopulated. On 1 May 1945 Joseph Stalin , in his Supreme Commander Order No. 20, named Leningrad, alongside Stalingrad , Sevastopol , and Odesa , hero cities of
9840-542: The late 1940s and it consistently reached 161 km/h (100 mph) in its service life. These were the last "high-speed" trains to use steam power. In 1936, the Twin Cities Zephyr entered service, from Chicago to Minneapolis, with an average speed of 101 km/h (63 mph). Many of these streamliners posted travel times comparable to or even better than their modern Amtrak successors, which are limited to 127 km/h (79 mph) top speed on most of
9963-487: The line. A fourth track between Moscow and Zelenograd is under construction, and there are plans to extend the third track beyond Zelenograd to Tver. On 16 August 1988, 31 people were killed when the Avrora derailed while traveling at high speed on a stretch of defective track near Bologoye . On 13 August 2007 an intercity passenger train to St Petersburg from Moscow derailed shortly before reaching Malaya Vishera after
10086-432: The lines in the event of a power failure. However, in normal operation, the wheels are raised up into the car as the train reaches certain speeds where the magnetic levitation effect takes over. It will link Tokyo and Osaka by 2037, with the section from Tokyo to Nagoya expected to be operational by 2027. Maximum speed is anticipated at 505 km/h (314 mph). The first generation train can be ridden by tourists visiting
10209-496: The masses were allowed to travel. It was decided that only the affluent would be allowed to use the line; every passenger was to be subjected to strict passport and police control. Although the Tsarskoye Selo Railway , built by German engineer Franz Anton von Gerstner in 1837, was Russia's first public railway line, the cost overruns led Tsar Nicholas I and his advisors to doubt Gerstner's ability to execute
10332-505: The network. The German high-speed service was followed in Italy in 1938 with an electric-multiple-unit ETR 200 , designed for 200 km/h (120 mph), between Bologna and Naples. It too reached 160 km/h (99 mph) in commercial service, and achieved a world mean speed record of 203 km/h (126 mph) between Florence and Milan in 1938. In Great Britain in the same year, the streamlined steam locomotive Mallard achieved
10455-503: The next day. When completed, the line was the longest double-track railway in the world. Tsar Nicholas I figures in an urban legend about the railroad. When it was planned in 1842, he supposedly demanded the shortest path be used despite major obstacles in the way. The story says he tried to use a ruler to draw the railroad in a perfectly straight line. By the Msta River the tsar's pencil hit an awkwardly placed finger which he
10578-470: The next station, while those heading for Moscow needed four locomotives to get up the hill. In 2001, the bypass was closed as a new viaduct had been opened. In 2001, Russia's first high-speed rail line was planned to be constructed along the same route, but the project was eventually shelved amid ecological protests and concerns about the fragile environment of the Valdai Hills . In 2019, the start of
10701-469: The official world speed record for steam locomotives at 202.58 km/h (125.88 mph). The external combustion engines and boilers on steam locomotives were large, heavy and time and labor-intensive to maintain, and the days of steam for high speed were numbered. In 1945, a Spanish engineer, Alejandro Goicoechea , developed a streamlined, articulated train that was able to run on existing tracks at higher speeds than contemporary passenger trains. This
10824-416: The original name, Sankt-Peterburg , was returned by citywide referendum. Today, in English the city is known as Saint Petersburg . Local residents often refer to the city by its shortened nickname, Piter (Russian: Питер , IPA: [ˈpʲitʲɪr] ). After the October Revolution the name Red Petrograd (Красный Петроград, Krasny Petrograd ) was often used in newspapers and other prints until
10947-489: The perceived ornamental excesses of the Stalinist architecture were abandoned. From the 1960s to the 1980s many new residential boroughs were built on the outskirts; while the functionalist apartment blocks were nearly identical to each other, many families moved there from kommunalkas in the city centre to live in separate apartments. On 12 June 1991 , simultaneously with the first Russian SFSR presidential elections ,
11070-680: The planned St. Petersburg–Moscow line. So Melnikov and another colleague traveled to the United States in 1839 to study railroad technology, where they met George Washington Whistler , who designed the Canton Viaduct for the Boston and Providence Railroad . Upon Melnikov's recommendation, Tsar Nicholas I invited Whistler to help build the railway. Whistler left for Russia in June 1842, accompanied by imperial engineer Major Ivan F. Bouttatz, who would become Whistler's friend. He received
11193-608: The planning since 1934 but it never reached its envisaged size. All high-speed service stopped in August 1939 shortly before the outbreak of World War II . On 26 May 1934, one year after Fliegender Hamburger introduction, the Burlington Railroad set an average speed record on long distance with their new streamlined train, the Zephyr , at 124 km/h (77 mph) with peaks at 185 km/h (115 mph). The Zephyr
11316-488: The post-war decades, partially according to pre-war plans. The 1948 general plan for Leningrad featured radial urban development in the north as well as in the south. In 1953, Pavlovsky District in Leningrad Oblast was abolished, and parts of its territory, including Pavlovsk, merged with Leningrad. In 1954, the settlements Levashovo , Pargolovo and Pesochny merged with Leningrad. Leningrad gave its name to
11439-600: The preservation of its historical and architectural environment became controversial. After 2005, the demolition of older buildings in the historical centre was permitted. In 2006, Gazprom announced an ambitious project to erect a 403 m (1,322 ft) skyscraper (the Okhta Center ) opposite to Smolny , which could result in the loss of the unique line of Petersburg landscape. Urgent protests by citizens and prominent public figures of Russia against this project were not considered by Governor Valentina Matviyenko and
11562-467: The railway's construction. The railway was a pet project of Pavel Melnikov (1804–1880), an engineer and administrator who supervised its construction and whose statue may be seen near the southern terminus , the Leningradsky railway station in Moscow. The idea of a railway connecting the two capitals gave rise to a prolonged controversy, with some reactionary officials predicting social upheaval if
11685-528: The same time as the citadel) made them the heavenly patrons of the Peter and Paul Fortress , while Saint Peter at the same time became the eponym of the whole city. When in June 1703 Peter the Great renamed the site after Saint Peter, he did not issue a naming act that established an official spelling; even in his own letters he used diverse spellings, such as Санктьпетерсьбурк ( Sanktpetersburk ), emulating German Sankt Petersburg , and Сантпитербурх ( Santpiterburkh ), emulating Dutch Sint-Pietersburgh , as Peter
11808-670: The son of their victim). The third emperor's assassination took place in Saint Petersburg in 1881 when Alexander II was murdered by terrorists (see the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood ). The Revolution of 1905 began in Saint Petersburg and spread rapidly into the provinces. On 1 September 1914, after the outbreak of World War I, the Imperial government renamed the city Petrograd , meaning "Peter's City", to remove
11931-655: The southern limit of the city. The most prominent neoclassical and Empire-style architects in Saint Petersburg included: In 1810, Alexander I established the first engineering higher education , the Saint Petersburg Main military engineering School in Saint Petersburg. Many monuments commemorate the Russian victory over Napoleonic France in the Patriotic War of 1812 , including the Alexander Column by Montferrand, erected in 1834, and
12054-541: The supervision of Alexander Menshikov . Tens of thousands of serfs died while building the city. Later, the city became the centre of the Saint Petersburg Governorate . Peter moved the capital from Moscow to Saint Petersburg in 1712, nine years before the Treaty of Nystad of 1721 ended the war. He referred to Saint Petersburg as the capital (or seat of government) as early as 1704. While the city
12177-535: The test track. China is developing two separate high-speed maglev systems. In Europe, high-speed rail began during the International Transport Fair in Munich in June 1965, when Dr Öpfering, the director of Deutsche Bundesbahn (German Federal Railways), performed 347 demonstrations at 200 km/h (120 mph) between Munich and Augsburg by DB Class 103 hauled trains. The same year
12300-523: The track. Russian Railways spent nearly $ 1 billion on eight trains. In 2019, a third order of €1.1 billion for 13 more trains of the same model was signed. Since 1931 the famous Krasnaya Strela ( "Red Arrow" ) train has left Moscow at 23:55 daily, arriving in St Petersburg at 07:55 the next morning, and vice versa. The railway is relatively congested, which means that only a few high speed trains can run each day. There are proposals to build
12423-449: The usage of prefix " Sankt- " ceased except for the formal official documents, where a three-letter abbreviation "СПб" ( SPb ) was very widely used as well. In the 1830s Alexander Pushkin translated the "foreign" city name of "Saint Petersburg" to the more Russian Petrograd (Russian: Петроград , IPA: [pʲɪtrɐˈgrat] ) in one of his poems. However, it was only on 31 August [ O.S. 18 August] 1914, after
12546-558: The war with Germany had begun, that Tsar Nicholas II renamed the city Petrograd in order to expunge the German words Sankt and Burg . Since the prefix "Saint" was omitted, this act also changed the eponym and the "patron" of the city from Saint Peter to Peter the Great, its founder. On 26 January 1924, shortly after the death of Vladimir Lenin , it was renamed to Leningrad (Russian: Ленинград , IPA: [lʲɪnʲɪnˈgrat] ), meaning 'Lenin City'. On 6 September 1991,
12669-664: The war. A law acknowledging the honorary title of "Hero City" passed on 8 May 1965 (the 20th anniversary of the victory in the Great Patriotic War), during the Brezhnev era . The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR awarded Leningrad as a Hero City the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star medal "for the heroic resistance of the city and tenacity of the survivors of the Siege". The Hero-City Obelisk bearing
12792-540: The wider rail gauge, and thus standard gauge was adopted for high-speed service. With the sole exceptions of Russia, Finland, and Uzbekistan all high-speed rail lines in the world are still standard gauge, even in countries where the preferred gauge for legacy lines is different. The new service, named Shinkansen (meaning new main line ) would provide a new alignment, 25% wider standard gauge utilising continuously welded rails between Tokyo and Osaka with new rolling stock, designed for 250 km/h (160 mph). However,
12915-629: The world's population, without a single train passenger fatality. (Suicides, passengers falling off the platforms, and industrial accidents have resulted in fatalities.) Since their introduction, Japan's Shinkansen systems have been undergoing constant improvement, not only increasing line speeds. Over a dozen train models have been produced, addressing diverse issues such as tunnel boom noise, vibration, aerodynamic drag , lines with lower patronage ("Mini shinkansen"), earthquake and typhoon safety, braking distance , problems due to snow, and energy consumption (newer trains are twice as energy-efficient as
13038-470: Was achieved by providing the locomotive and cars with a unique axle system that used one axle set per car end, connected by a Y-bar coupler. Amongst other advantages, the centre of mass was only half as high as usual. This system became famous under the name of Talgo ( Tren Articulado Ligero Goicoechea Oriol ), and for half a century was the main Spanish provider of high-speed trains. In the early 1950s,
13161-600: Was again designated as the capital of the Russian Empire . It remained the seat of the Romanov dynasty and the Imperial Court of the Russian tsars , as well as the seat of the Russian government, for another 186 years until the communist revolution of 1917 . In 1736–1737 the city suffered from catastrophic fires. To rebuild the damaged boroughs, a committee under Burkhard Christoph von Münnich commissioned
13284-530: Was also made about "current harnessing" at high-speed by the pantographs, which was solved 20 years later by the Zébulon TGV 's prototype. With some 45 million people living in the densely populated Tokyo– Osaka corridor, congestion on road and rail became a serious problem after World War II , and the Japanese government began thinking about ways to transport people in and between cities. Because Japan
13407-593: Was being built, Peter lived in a three-room log cabin with his wife Catherine and their children. During its first few years, the city developed around Trinity Square on the right bank of the Neva, near the Peter and Paul Fortress. However, Saint Petersburg soon started to be built out according to a plan. By 1716 the Swiss Italian Domenico Trezzini had elaborated a project whereby the city centre would be on Vasilyevsky Island and shaped by
13530-530: Was changed, breaking the tradition of democratic election by universal suffrage that started in 1991. In 2006, the city legislature re-approved Matviyenko as governor. Residential building had intensified again; real-estate prices inflated greatly, which caused many new problems for the preservation of the historical part of the city. Although the central part of the city has a UNESCO designation (there are about 8,000 architectural monuments in Petersburg),
13653-400: Was cut off by underground flooding, creating a major obstacle to the city development for almost ten years. On 13 June 1996, Saint Petersburg, alongside Leningrad Oblast and Tver Oblast , signed a power-sharing agreement with the federal government, granting it autonomy. This agreement was abolished on 4 April 2002. In 1996, Vladimir Yakovlev defeated Anatoly Sobchak in the elections for
13776-403: Was extended a further 161 km (100 mi), and further construction has resulted in the network expanding to 2,951 km (1,834 mi) of high speed lines as of 2024, with a further 211 km (131 mi) of extensions currently under construction and due to open in 2031. The cumulative patronage on the entire system since 1964 is over 10 billion, the equivalent of approximately 140% of
13899-516: Was founded by Tsar Peter the Great on 27 May 1703 on the site of a captured Swedish fortress , and was named after the apostle Saint Peter . In Russia , Saint Petersburg is historically and culturally associated with the birth of the Russian Empire and Russia's entry into modern history as a European great power . It served as a capital of the Tsardom of Russia , and the subsequent Russian Empire, from 1712 to 1918 (being replaced by Moscow for
14022-543: Was made of stainless steel and, like the Fliegender Hamburger, was diesel powered, articulated with Jacobs bogies , and could reach 160 km/h (99 mph) as commercial speed. The new service was inaugurated 11 November 1934, traveling between Kansas City and Lincoln , but at a lower speed than the record, on average speed 74 km/h (46 mph). In 1935, the Milwaukee Road introduced
14145-612: Was multilingual and a Hollandophile. The name was later normalized and russified to Санкт-Петербург. A former spelling of the city's name in English was Saint Petersburgh . This spelling survives in the name of a street in the Bayswater district of London, near St Sophia's Cathedral , named after a visit by the Tsar to London in 1814. A 14 to 15-letter-long name, composed of the three roots , proved too cumbersome, and many shortened versions were used. The first General Governor of
14268-466: Was not only a part of the Shinkansen revolution: the Shinkansen offered high-speed rail travel to the masses. The first Bullet trains had 12 cars and later versions had up to 16, and double-deck trains further increased the capacity. After three years, more than 100 million passengers had used the trains, and the milestone of the first one billion passengers was reached in 1976. In 1972, the line
14391-486: Was renamed Leningrad . Later many streets and other toponyms were renamed accordingly, with names in honour of communist figures replacing historic names given centuries before. The city has over 230 places associated with the life and activities of Lenin. Some of them were turned into museums, including the cruiser Aurora – a symbol of the October Revolution and the oldest ship in the Russian Navy . In
14514-525: Was resource limited and did not want to import petroleum for security reasons, energy-efficient high-speed rail was an attractive potential solution. Japanese National Railways (JNR) engineers began to study the development of a high-speed regular mass transit service. In 1955, they were present at the Lille 's Electrotechnology Congress in France, and during a 6-month visit, the head engineer of JNR accompanied
14637-402: Was still more than 30 years away. After the breakthrough of electric railroads, it was clearly the infrastructure – especially the cost of it – which hampered the introduction of high-speed rail. Several disasters happened – derailments, head-on collisions on single-track lines, collisions with road traffic at grade crossings, etc. The physical laws were well-known, i.e. if the speed was doubled,
14760-477: Was too heavy for much of the tracks, so Cincinnati Car Company , J. G. Brill and others pioneered lightweight constructions, use of aluminium alloys, and low-level bogies which could operate smoothly at extremely high speeds on rough interurban tracks. Westinghouse and General Electric designed motors compact enough to be mounted on the bogies. From 1930 on, the Red Devils from Cincinnati Car Company and
14883-578: Was upheld by the Supreme Court in March 2010. On 27 November 2009 four cars from train No. 166 derailed while travelling between Moscow and St. Petersburg. The derailment was a terrorist act caused by the detonation of 7 kilograms (15 lb) of TNT equivalent . At least 27 people were killed and 96 injured. In a secondary explosion on 28 November, directed at investigators, Alexander Bastrykin , head of
15006-399: Was using to hold down the ruler, creating a bend in the line. The legend says that the engineers wanted to execute the tsar's order exactly, and the result was a perfectly straight track apart from a single bend. The false story became popular in Russia and Britain as an explanation of how poorly the country was governed. By the 1870s, Russians were telling a different version, claiming the tsar
15129-543: Was wise to overcome local interests that wanted the railway diverted this way and that. A similar story is told about the Ulm-Friedrichshafen railway that includes a remarkably straight stretch bypassing many settlements - as the story goes due to endless debates between local advocates about what village to serve, which were ended when the King of Württemberg took out a ruler and drew a straight line saying "this
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