Location: Saint Petersburg Russia
Hotels, motels and where to sleep
Restaurant, taverns and where to eat
Center
The tourist and commercial
center of the city, where you will find the Hermitage, the Russian
Museum, the Summer Garden, St. Isaac's Cathedral and much more
Kolomna
Quiet central area with
its own character
Vasilyevsky Island
Spit of Vasilyevsky
Island, Kunstkamera, Academy of Arts, Erarta
Petrograd side
Peter and Paul Fortress, Aurora, TsPKiO on Elagin Island, Zenith
Stadium
North
Vyborg side, Clearance, Citizen, Commandant
Right bank
Ladoga, Bolsheviks, Cheerful village
Obukhovo
Historic industrial area along the left bank of the Neva
Volkovo and Kupchino
Legendary sleeping area with interesting
cemeteries
Moscow avenue
The best Soviet architecture of
St. Petersburg, Grand Layout and Victory Park
Southwest
Estates of the Peterhof road surrounded by industrial zones and new
buildings
Bridges across the Neva.
Bolshoy Obukhovsky ("Shta") bridge.
Doesn't raise up.
Volodarsky bridge 02: 00–03: 45 04: 15—05: 45
Finnish Railway Bridge 02: 20—05: 30
The bridge of Alexander
Nevsky 02: 20—05: 10
Bridge of Peter the Great Bridge (formerly
Bolsheokhtinsky Bridge) 02: 00—05: 00
Foundry Bridge 01: 50—04:
40
Trinity Bridge (formerly Kirovsky Bridge) 01: 40—04: 50
Bridges over the Bolshaya Nevka
Sampsonievsky bridge 02: 10—02:
45 03: 20—04: 25
Grenadier Bridge 02: 45—03: 45 03: 20—04: 50
Kantemirovsky Bridge 02: 45—03: 45 04: 20—04: 50
Bridges
across the Malaya Neva
Exchange Bridge 02: 00—04: 55
Tuchkov
bridge 02: 00—02: 55 03: 35—04: 55
Bridges over the Bolshaya
Neva
Palace Bridge 01: 25—04: 55
The Annunciation Bridge
(formerly Lieutenant Schmidt Bridge) 01: 25—02: 45 03: 10—05: 00
Petersburg was built in the delta of the Neva, where it is divided
into many branches and channels. The arms of the Neva are called:
Bolshaya Neva - the left arm from the spit of Vasilyevsky Island
to the Gulf of Finland;
Malaya Neva - the right branch from the
spit of Vasilyevsky Island to the Gulf of Finland;
Bolshaya Nevka
- the right branch, departing sharply to the north between Liteiny
and Troitsky bridges and further dividing into Malaya and Srednyaya
Nevka;
Malaya Nevka - the left arm of the Bolshaya Nevka,
departing from it at the eastern tip of Kamenny Island;
The
Middle Nevka is the left branch of the Bolshaya Nevka, departing
from it at the eastern tip of Elagin Island.
Main rivers and
canals:
on the left bank of the Neva: the Fontanka, Moika,
Pryazhka, Monastyrka and Griboedov, Kryukov, Admiralteysky, Obvodny
canals;
the Smolenka River separating Vasilievsky Island and
Decembrist Island;
the Zhdanovka River separating the
Petrogradsky and Petrovsky Islands;
the Karpovka River separating
the Petrogradsky and Aptekarsky Islands;
the Krestovka River
separating Kamenny and Krestovsky Islands;
Kronverk Strait
separating Zayachiy and Petrogradsky Islands;
the Okhta River,
the right tributary of the Neva;
Okkervil River, left tributary
of the Okhta.
From Moscow to Saint Petersburg
The route from Moscow to St.
Petersburg is by far the most popular route in the country. Planes
between the two capitals fly on average every 20 minutes, and trains
depart at intervals of 1.5-2 hours, which is completely unthinkable
for any other city in Russia. There are three ways to move between
Moscow and St. Petersburg:
by night train (8-10 hours) - the
cheapest option, tickets to the reserved seat from 900 rubles
daytime high-speed train (4 hours) - in advance sales, prices start
at 1,500 rubles, but closer to the departure date, tickets become
more expensive, especially for trains running at peak times (Friday
and Sunday evenings, Monday mornings); already 10 days before
departure, tickets are usually cheaper than 2500 rubles, the average
price is 3000-3500 rubles
by plane - the competition in this
direction is so high that a relatively inexpensive ticket can be
taken even on the day of departure; prices are usually comparable to
high-speed trains, 2500-3500 rubles
The question of whether
to travel from Moscow to St. Petersburg by train or fly by plane is
the subject of eternal disputes between lovers of rail and air
transport. In terms of time, a high-speed train and a plane are
almost identical: taking into account the road to the airport and
the waiting time, you are unlikely to spend less than the 4 hours
that the train travels on the road. The trains are very punctual and
give you a better guarantee that you will arrive on time.
The number and variety of flights cannot be compared with Moscow.
The only St. Petersburg carrier is the Rossiya airline, other
airlines fly to St. Petersburg relatively little, although S7,
Pobeda, Nordavia and Ural Airlines operate several direct flights
from here, and Ural Airlines even fly abroad. There are no
long-distance intercontinental flights as a class; it is usually
impossible to fly to the east further than Irkutsk. The network of
European routes for the fourth largest city in Europe is also very
modest, although major European airlines fly to St. Petersburg,
offering connections around the world.
1 Pulkovo Airport
(IATA: LED), Pulkovskoe shosse, 41B. ☎ +7 (812) 337-38-22, +7 (812)
337-34-44. It is located 15 km south of the city center almost on
the border of residential development, but not so close to the city
that the airport can be quickly reached from the center. After a
large-scale reconstruction, one large terminal remained here, part
of which is the former Pulkovo-1 - an original monument of Soviet
architecture with five glass towers, reminiscent of glasses to some,
and cooling towers to others.
The terminal is arranged according
to the usual scheme for modern airports of three floors with an
arrival hall at the bottom, a departure hall at the top and an
intermediate second floor, on which there are chairs without
armrests, where transit passengers sleep at night. The spacious
arrival hall accommodates a couple of shops, mobile phone shops, a
left-luggage office (600 rubles for the first day, then 300 rubles /
day), as well as numerous restaurants and cafes, including McDonalds
with almost city prices and the Stopexpress store located next to
it, where they sell pretty good baked goods. On the street in front
of the entrance to the arrivals area is a tiny "Teremok". In a clean
area, it is cheapest to eat at Burger King, and during the day you
can go to the Kamchatka self-service cafe, which offers a
three-course lunch for about 350 rubles. The clean area of
international flights is made in the best traditions of modern
airports, there are stands with sockets and USB connectors for
charging phones. The clean zone of domestic flights is a converted
old terminal and cannot boast of such a service, but it has a funny
monument to Peter the Great with a suitcase on wheels. This monument
is used as a landmark and even mentioned in the announcements about
the beginning of the landing.
How to get there: buses 39 and
39e go to the airport from metro 2 (Moskovsko-Petrogradskaya)
Moskovskaya line (there are stops at both exits). Express goes
non-stop for 15-20 minutes, a regular bus travels 25-35 minutes.
Everywhere there is a city tariff, you can pay with the Plantain
card. Interval of movement: 10 minutes for the bus, 15-20 minutes
for the express, they run from 5 am to 1 am, i.e. even longer than
the subway.
Taxi: in the arrivals area, immediately after
baggage claim, there is an official Pulkovo Taxi counter with fares
of 600-700 rubles to the southern part of the city, 1000 rubles to
the center and 1200-1500 rubles to the northern regions. Yandex,
Uber, Gett have the cheapest trip to the center for about 600
rubles, but there may not be free cars. Private traders walk around
the arrivals hall and are generally unobtrusive.
There are five railway stations in St. Petersburg - Moskovsky,
Vitebsky, Baltiysky, Finlyandsky and Ladozhsky. Electric trains run
from any of them, while long-distance trains are distributed as
follows: from Finlandsky to Helsinki, from Vitebsky to the south and
south-west, from Moscow and Ladoga to all other directions, and
there are no long-distance trains at the Baltiysky station at all.
Be sure to check which station the train you need leaves from!
Regular and high-speed trains run from Moscow to St. Petersburg.
Expressways are represented by Sapsan and private Nevsky Express.
These are, in fact, the only trains in Russia that have the right to
be called high-speed: they cover 650 km in 3.5-4 hours. they go in
pairs with an interval of 10 minutes, and the interval between pairs
is usually 2 hours. Some peregrine falcons make intermediate stops
in Tver, Vyshny Volochek, Bologom or Chudovo; others drive non-stop.
The trains are similar to the German ICE, divided into first and
second class, contain a dining car. Free Wi-Fi and sockets are only
in first-class carriages, in second-class Wi-Fi is paid (149
rubles). The Nevsky Express travels the same 4 hours. It consists of
ordinary passenger cars adapted for speeds up to 200 km/h. The cars
are divided into six-seater compartments, the ticket price includes
meals in the form of a sandwich, a bottle of water and something
else. Unlike Sapsan, Nevsky Express runs only once a day, but it is
convenient in that ticket prices remain relatively low even the day
before the trip, while Sapsan has strict dynamic pricing, and 7-10
days before departure tickets become more expensive. On the other
hand, "Nevsky Express" is "famous" for its technical problems and
can be late, sometimes very late.
Night trains from Moscow to
St. Petersburg are of two types - direct and passing. There are
usually 7-8 direct trains a day, among them the branded Grand
Express and Red Arrow, where there are only compartment and luxury
cars, and the prices, respectively, are 30-50% higher than usual:
these trains run along the most convenient schedule with departure
around midnight and arrival at 8 am; the condition of the cars and
the level of service are beyond praise. Cheaper trains depart or
arrive at less convenient times, some of them also have cheap
reserved seat, although over the years the reserved seat on the St.
Petersburg direction is becoming less and less. The iconic train for
traveling between the two capitals is Moscow-Tallinn: it runs at
relatively reasonable times and always has the cheapest reserved
seat cars. Finally, the extreme option for those who have not found
anything better is passing trains such as St. Petersburg-Chelyabinsk
or St. Petersburg-Adler, arriving in Moscow at Kursky, and not
Leningradsky Station. Some of these trains are deliberately slowed
down to 9-10 hours due to long technical stops. Compared to direct
trains, comfort levels can be low.
High-speed Allegro trains
run from Helsinki to St. Petersburg four times a day with border
control while moving. Travel time: 3.5 hours. Trains have free
Wi-Fi, sockets at each seat and a Finnish dining car with
corresponding prices. Tickets are sold through the websites of
Russian and Finnish railways. The standard price is €59 in pre-sale
and €79 the day before departure. Discounted rates start from €29.
From March 27, 2022, the movement of Allegro trains has been
canceled for an indefinite period.
2 Moskovsky railway
station , Nevsky prospect, 85 ( 1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) line of
Vosstaniya Square). Built in 1851 and has a "twin brother" at the
other end of the railway from St. Petersburg to Moscow. Being the
central station of the city of Moskovsky, on the one hand, it boasts
the most diverse service, and on the other hand, almost everything
here is paid (and not the cheapest), and the seats in the free
waiting room are almost constantly occupied. There is a manual
storage room in the basement (230 rubles/day); there is an automatic
one nearby, but it is much more expensive (450 rubles / day) and
does not make any sense unless you plan to regularly return to your
bags and take something from them. There is a free waiting room (you
can charge your phone - 40 rubles). And paid extra comfort - the
first hour 190 rubles, each subsequent 90 rubles (paid WiFi 80
rubles / h, computer 120 rubles / h, use of the socket 70 rubles /
h). Rest rooms: for a bed in a multi-bed room - from 700 for a
6-hour stay, and from 900 for a day, in the season from May 1 to
September 30 more expensive.
3 Vitebsky railway station,
Zagorodny pr., 52 ( 1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) Pushkinskaya line). The
oldest of the railway stations in Russia. The first wooden building
was built in 1837 to connect St. Petersburg with Tsarskoye Selo (now
the city of Pushkin) and rebuilt in stone in 1852. The modern Art
Nouveau building was erected in 1904, and it is worth spending half
an hour to inspect its interiors: go up to the second floor, examine
the railings, carvings, twisted ladders and other decorative
elements. There are left-luggage offices, a waiting room, rest
rooms, cafes, shops, ATMs, free Wi-Fi.
4 Baltic Station, emb.
Bypass Canal, 120 ( 1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) Baltic line). The
station building was built in 1858, based on the Gare de l'Est in
Paris. It was originally built to serve the railway to Peterhof and
was called Peterhof.
5 Finlyandsky railway station, pl.
Lenina, 6 ( 1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) line of Lenin Square). The
station is small and not crowded: only trains to Helsinki departed
from far away from here until cancellation in 2020-2022 (the usual
Repin and Sbelius and the high-speed Allegro), and for 2022 there
were only a couple of electric trains per hour to the north of the
Leningrad Region : to Vyborg, Sestroretsk, Priozersk, Vsevolozhsk
and Lake Ladoga. The station building was erected in 1870, and in
1960 it was radically rebuilt; the façade of the old station has
been preserved; it is built into the side wall of the new building.
There are three halls at the station: in the first one there are
four cash desks and two dozen terminals for the sale of suburban
tickets (the terminals accept cards, banknotes and coins); in the
second - a waiting room with automatic luggage storage and a kiosk
where you can drink espresso with cakes. Free Wi-Fi advertised but
intermittent. Through a separate Express hall (entrance from the
side of Botkinskaya Street), Allegro trains were boarded; .
6 Ladoga railway station, Zanevsky pr. 73 ( 4 (Pravoberezhnaya)
line Ladozhskaya). The newest of the city stations was built in 2003
at a station with a completely non-urban name Dacha Dolgorukov.
Unlike the others, this terminal is neither historical nor a dead
end, and is a concourse with exits to the platforms. The station
building contains a fair number of round-the-clock canteens and
cafes, and prices increase as you move from the exit of the metro:
the cheapest way to eat is in the dining room in front of the
concourse, there is also a bakery and puffery. There is a
left-luggage office (230 rubles/day) and rest rooms. From the
platform you can see the building of the old station built in 1913.
From St. Petersburg, such roads begin as:
A181 (E18) Primorskoye
Highway - Scandinavia highway, starting in the northwestern part of
the city and running along the northern coast of the Gulf of Finland
towards Finland. Connects St. Petersburg with Sestroretsk,
Zelenogorsk, Vyborg, Helsinki, Turku.
A122 Vyborgskoye shosse is
a highway starting in the northwestern part of the city. Connects
St. Petersburg with Pargolovo, Sertolovo, Simagino.
A121 is a
highway starting in the northwestern part of the city from
Vyborgskoye Highway. It connects St. Petersburg with Orekhovo,
Sosnovo, Otradnoye, Larionovo, Priozersk, Kuznechny, Sortavala and
then goes to P21 in the village of Pryazha, a little south of
Petrozavodsk. On the highway up to Losevo (90 km from St.
Petersburg), the speed limit of 110 kilometers per hour is almost
continuously in effect. After Losevo, the track becomes less fast,
has many turns and even serpentines, sharp elevation changes and
oversized places. You should not be distracted by beautiful views,
especially if you are driving along the road for the first time - a
significant part of the traffic here is made up of heavy trucks
carrying granite, often with overload and speeding.
41K-064 -
Road of life. The highway, starting in the northwestern part of the
city from the Ryabovskoye highway, flows into the Road of Life
highway. It connects St. Petersburg with Vsevolozhsk and the
southwestern shore of Ladoga.
P21 (E105) Murmansk highway - the
Kola highway, starting from the intersection of Narodnaya st. etc.
Bolsheviks, going east along the southern shore of Lake Ladoga and
then turning north. It connects St. Petersburg with Lodeinoy Pole,
Petrozavodsk, Murmansk, Kirkenes. It also leaves the stream to
Tikhvin and Vologda, after the bridge over the Volkhov, turning onto
the A114 Novaya Ladoga - Vologda. The first 50 km of the route have
two traffic lanes in each direction, built back in the 80s, and the
further section up to the bridge over the Volkhov in 2022 is in the
process of a protracted reconstruction to the same look.
М10
(E105) Moskovskoye Highway - the highway "Russia", starting in the
southern part of the city from the square. Victory and going to the
southeast. Connects St. Petersburg with Tosno, Veliky Novgorod,
Tver, Moscow. After the construction of a paid understudy, the route
was overgrown with traffic lights, speed limits (up to 40 kilometers
per hour) and cameras for its control, which significantly increased
the travel time along it.
M11 - the Neva highway, starting in the
southern part of the city on the ring road and going southeast. Paid
and faster understudy of the Moscow highway. It connects St.
Petersburg with Veliky Novgorod, Okulovka, Bologim and Tver, where
it breaks off due to legal and financial delays in the construction
of a bypass around the city. After Tver, the route starts again and
goes to Moscow, but the prices for the so-called "Moscow region"
section are approximately equal to the prices for the section from
St. Petersburg to Tver, despite the fact that the distance is
several times less. Is it worth the detour of traffic jams near
Moscow, let everyone decide for himself. The highway has a speed
limit of 110, and on the central section as much as 130 kilometers
per hour.
P23 (E95) Pulkovskoe highway - the Pskov highway,
starting in the southern part of the city from the square. Pobeda
and going south past the Pulkovo airport. Connects St. Petersburg
with Gatchina, Luga, Pskov, Vitebsk, Gomel, Kiev, Odessa. Until the
end of the Gatchina bypass road, it has three lanes in each
direction, then it turns into a regular two-lane highway.
A180
(E20) Tallinn highway - Narva highway, starting in the southwestern
part of the city. Connects St. Petersburg with Kingisepp, Ivangorod,
Narva, Tallinn. For 2022, the repair of the highway continues with
the expansion and construction of bypasses for settlements.
A121
Petergofskoye Highway is a highway starting in the southwestern part
of the city and running along the southern coast of the Gulf of
Finland. Connects St. Petersburg with Strelna, Peterhof, Lomonosov,
Bolshaya Izhora, Sosnovy Bor, Ust-Luga, Ropsha.
A ring road
(KAD) has been built around the city, which connects all highways
starting from St. Petersburg and the most important streets of the
city, has a speed limit of 110 km / h.
7 Bus station , emb. Obvodny Canal, 36 ( 5 (Frunzensko-Primorskaya)
Obvodny Canal line, 5-7 minutes walk from the metro station). ✉ ☎ +7
(812) 766-57-77. The main bus station, from which the vast majority
of long-distance flights depart, incl. international, although many
of them then stop at the Baltic Station, which is usually more
convenient than going to the bus station itself. The bus station
building is relatively small and quiet, on the second floor there is
a fairly decent and inexpensive dining room with a coffee machine.
Around the bus station is the inevitable shawarma and a small
confectionery "Sever", other food options are just next to the
metro. There is a left-luggage office at the bus station
(5:30–23:30, break: 14:30–15:00), 60 and 100 rubles per day for a
small and large bag, respectively.
8 Northern bus station
(Murino), Murino, Privokzalnaya square ( 1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya)
Devyatkino line). ☎ +7 (812) 242-89-09. Demolished in November 21st,
instead of it from the old bus, a ticket office was made (routes
continue to run). New building . as such, it is not planned - they
are going to make a massive transport hub "TPU Devyatkino". The
project for December 2022 has not yet begun construction. There are
few routes, mostly served (almost once an hour) by buses to
Priozersk, one or two flights a day to Petrozavodsk via Sortavala
and Pitkyaranta, routes to Slantsy, Volkhov, and other cities of the
Leningrad region.
Also, many routes depart from metro stations,
mainly follow the nearest suburbs:
1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya)
line Avtovo: Strelna, Peterhof, Lomonosov
1
(Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) line Baltiyskaya Lomonosov, Volosovo, Luga
1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) line Leninsky Prospekt: Peterhof, Kingisepp
1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) line Prospekt Veteranov: Peterhof, Gatchina
2 (Moscow-Petrogradskaya) line Kupchino: Kolpino, Pushkin
2
(Moscow-Petrogradskaya) line Moskovskaya: Pushkin, Pavlovsk,
Gatchina
2 (Moscow-Petrogradskaya) line Parnassus: Vyborg,
Primorsk, Sosnovy Bor
2 (Moskovsko-Petrogradskaya) line Prospekt
Prosveshcheniya: Osinovaya Grove, Sertolovo
3
(Nevsko-Vasileostrovskaya) Begovaya line: Kronstadt, Sestroretsk,
Zelenogorsk
3 (Nevsko-Vasileostrovskaya) line Rybatskoye:
Ust-Izhora
4 (Right Bank) line Ladozhskaya: Vsevolozhsk
4
(Right Bank) line Dybenko Street: Shlisselburg, Kirovsk
5
(Frunzensko-Primorskaya) line Staraya Derevnya: Kronstadt,
Sestroretsk
Line 1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) Vosstaniya Square:
private buses to Finland. Departure from the Oktyabrskaya Hotel 9
10 Marine Station , pl. Sea Glory, 1. ☎ +7 (911) 337-20-60. The
station building was built in 1973-1983 and has 7 floors: the hotel
is located on the top 3 floors, the 4th floor is technical, the 3rd
is a consumer service area, the 2nd is occupied by the station
staff, the 1st is the customs and border services . There is a
restaurant. Vessels moor at one of the five available berths.
Regular cruises depart from this station to Helsinki (14 hours on
the way, 10 hours in Helsinki), as well as Helsinki - Stockholm -
Tallinn (the total duration of the cruise is almost 4 days, the ship
costs 8-10 hours in each city), organized by ST .PETER LINE
11
Sea cargo-and-passenger port of St. Petersburg (“Marine facade”),
bank of the Neva Bay V.O., 1. ☎ +7 (812) 303 -67-40. The new sea
port of St. Petersburg under construction on Vasilyevsky Island.
There are no regular flights, ships of foreign cruise companies are
served. So the first accepted passenger ship was the Norwegian Jewel
cruise liner of Norwegian Cruise Line. Navigation period from May to
September.
The old river passenger station, located at 195
Obukhovskoy Oborony Ave., was demolished in 2012. All flights from
there have been transferred to the berths in Utkina Zavod.
12 Piers in Utkina Zavod, Oktyabrskaya embankment, 31. ☎ +7 (812)
335-2196. Serves passenger river vessels of the Vodokhod company (+7
(495) 730-58-85) and Mosturflot. Both organize river cruises of
various durations to Moscow, visiting all or part of the listed
cities along the way - Valaam, Mandrogi, Kizhi, Goritsy, Yaroslavl,
Myshkin, Uglich, Petrozavodsk. In addition, Vodokhod offers cruises
around the cities of Karelia (including Valaam and Kizhi) with a
return back to St. Petersburg. Departure of ships from berths 8 and
9.
Opening hours: the metro operates from 5:30 am to midnight
(departure from terminal stations). Buses, trolleybuses and trams
run approximately in the same mode. It is also possible to use
electric transport (trams and trolleybuses) following the park -
such vehicles are allowed to carry passengers along the entire
route, and they can run up to 1:30. The same is true for the morning
release of electric transport from the park to the routes, which
starts running at 5 am (the first tram leaves the park at 4:30).
There is no stable night public transport in St. Petersburg, the
exceptions are mass city or state events and holidays (Night of
Museums, Scarlet Sails, May 1 and 9, City Day, New Year, Christmas
and others, it is necessary to check the information individually
for each event), when the metro and several surface routes run all
night.
Route planning: the routes of St. Petersburg transport
are well known by Yandex. The Yandex.Maps application is also
useful, but it shows all transport in real time. 2GIS and Google
Maps also work well. Local resources: PiterTransport, TransportSpb,
the official portal of the Committee for Transport. When using paper
maps, remember that minibuses were completely abolished in the
spring of 2022.
Tickets
There are many payment options for
public transport. The recommended way for travelers is the Plantain
card. By default, it works in the electronic wallet mode. In land
transport, there is no cash at all. There are many nuances, but, as
a rule, paying with Plantain is the easiest and cheapest. You can
buy (80Р, 70Р - with a stereo effect, 100Р - a keychain) and
replenish the card at metro stations in terminals (both cash and
non-cash payments are available). To pay in land transport, you need
to attach the card to the validator until the green arrow appears.
In the subway, to pass, the card must be applied to the yellow
circle at the turnstile. The cost of the trip (2023) on the map on
the metro is 49 rubles, on land transport - 44 rubles. There are
discounts in ground transport for transfers within an hour.
Metro
Petersburg metro is the second largest underground
transport system in Russia. The first trains were launched on
November 15, 1955 from Ploshad Vosstaniya to Avtovo. Currently,
there are five lines with a total length of 114 kilometers and 67
stations (including 7 interchange nodes).
It is easy to
navigate the St. Petersburg metro - there are no circle lines, and
there is only one interchange hub for transferring from each line to
each. Access to the platform with rare exceptions (transfer hub 1
(Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) line 2 (Moskovsko-Petrogradskaya) line
Technological Institute, 1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) Devyatkino line,
2 (Moskovsko-Petrogradskaya) Kupchino line, 2
(Moskovsko-Petrogradskaya) Parnas line, 3
(Nevsko-Vasileostrovskaya) Rybatskoye line, 5
(Frunzensko-Primorskaya) Sportivnaya line) is carried out on the
left side in the direction of the train. Almost always (except for
1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) line 2 (Moskovsko-Petrogradskaya) line of
the Technological Institute and 5 (Frunzensko-Primorskaya)
Sportivnaya line) trains of the same line come to the same platform,
and at transfer stations (except for 1 (Kirovsko-Vyborgskaya) line
2 (Moscow-Petrogradskaya line of the Technological Institute) in
order to move from one line to another, you need to go on an
escalator or through a pedestrian crossing to another underground
lobby.
Tram
The tram network of St. Petersburg, which
previously entangled the entire city with long routes, has undergone
several stages of reduction. There are only 4 routes in the city
center, for the most part they are unsuitable for sightseeing.
However, on the outskirts, the tram still complements the subway. In
recent years, both the city and private investors have been actively
investing in the tram, which has led to the renewal of the rolling
stock and the repair of the preserved old one. 4 routes in the east
of the city were transferred to a private concession, which
implemented, among other things, an automatic traffic light control
system that allows trams to pass at intersections almost without
stops and, thus, increases their speed.
The current list of
tram routes and their schedule can be found on the carrier's
website. All trams accept bank cards and travel tickets
"Podorozhnik". There are no conductors on most routes (except the
busiest ones) - cash payments are made to the driver at stops.
Bus
City buses form the main frame of the St. Petersburg land
transport route network. An up-to-date list of city routes and their
schedule can be found on the website of the Organizer of
Transportation. Buses start at 5 am and finish around 1 am.
All city bus routes accept a travel ticket "Podorozhnik". In
connection with the implementation of the transport reform in 2022,
cash is not accepted for payment on the routes of the "new model" -
only "Podorozhnik", bank cards (1 trip - 60 rubles) and QR codes for
one-time trips (1 trip - 60 rubles) . However, on a number of
existing routes the situation is reversed - cash is accepted for
payment, but cards are not accepted.
Also in the outlying
areas there are bus routes of the Leningrad region. They do not have
travel tickets for St. Petersburg. In exceptional cases, on some
routes, Podorozhnik cards and bank cards are accepted for payment,
but the main payment instrument is cash. The main way to distinguish
a city route from a regional route is numbering. Bus routes of St.
Petersburg, with rare exceptions, are assigned numbers from 1 to
399; suburban ones have numbering from 400 and above.
trolleybus
The current list of trolleybus routes and their
schedule can be found on the carrier's website. All trolleybuses
accept bank cards and travel tickets "Podorozhnik". There are no
conductors on a number of routes - cash payments are made to the
driver at stops.
Minibuses
Minibuses are represented by
buses with 15-20 seats, as well as PAZs and have the prefix "K" in
front of the number. Some minibuses duplicate buses, differing
little in price. Minibuses stop on demand, including between stops.
There are usually no conductors in minibuses, you have to pay the
driver.
As part of the transport reform in the summer of
2022, all minibuses operating on the inner city routes of St.
Petersburg were closed and replaced with social buses. At the same
time, the reform did not affect suburban routes, with numbering from
400 and above.
Railway transport
There are no city train
routes in St. Petersburg, but the commuter train can be used as
urban transport. Suburban rail passenger transportation is serviced
by the North-Western Suburban Passenger Company, tel. hotline +7
(812) 458-68-68. Rail transport in St. Petersburg can serve as a
good substitute for the metro in those parts of the city where there
are no metro stations. Compared to land transport, the schedule is
strictly observed here, the speed is higher and there are no traffic
jams. The minimum fare within the city is 40 rubles (2016). Also,
electric trains are convenient for traveling to the suburbs of St.
Petersburg and traveling around the Leningrad Region. It is
especially convenient to use the train in the morning from 6 to 9
o'clock and in the evening from 15 to 20 o'clock, at other times you
can choose other modes of transport. In addition, in all directions
on weekdays in the morning there are so-called. "windows" when the
movement of trains is interrupted for 1.5-2 hours.
The cost
of the trip depends on the distance. You can find train schedules
and fares on the company's website. There are also round-trip
tickets, subscription tickets for 1, 2, 3 or 4 months, weekend
tickets. For children from 5 to 7 years old, accompanied by adults,
there is a 50% discount (children under 5 years old - free of
charge).
All types of tickets can be bought at the box office
of the stations. The train schedule and information about changes in
it is also posted there. Stations of St. Petersburg and some
stations are equipped with turnstiles for automatic control of the
entrance and exit of passengers. To pass through it, you need to
place a ticket with a barcode on a special reading panel, wait for
the green signal to appear and go through the turntable.
Unfortunately, it often happens that the turnstile cannot read the
barcode correctly and does not let the passenger through. In this
case, show your ticket to the nearby controller, and he, having
checked the ticket, will let you onto the platforms. Keep your
ticket until the end of the trip to present it to the controllers on
the trains and pass through the turnstiles at the destination
station.
At suburban stations (and especially in the
Leningrad region), ticket offices are sometimes absent or closed. In
this case, you can buy a ticket on the train from the controller,
saying at which station you boarded the train and where you are
going.
Water transport
River walks are among the most
popular tourist attractions in the city. They are of two types:
circular routes along the Moika-Kryukov Canal-Fontanka with access
to the Neva (1-1.5 hours) and night excursions to the bridges. The
peak of such excursions is in the summer, but daytime boat trips
begin in the spring and continue until late autumn. Tickets are sold
right on the street in all places where tourists gather - Nevsky
Prospekt is especially promising in the area of Anichkov Bridge,
Gostiny Dvor and Kazan Cathedral. The estimated price of such a walk
is 1200 rubles (2022), but it can be significantly higher depending
on the impudence of the sellers and the season. On a fine day,
Petersburg is very beautiful from the water, and it makes sense to
look at it from this angle.
All excursions are organized
almost the same and take place in "automatic mode" under an audio
recording, in which information about the sights is interspersed
with the recitation of poems about St. Petersburg. On larger ships
there is a cafe-bar.
There are also regular "Meteors" in
Peterhof. During the season, departures are approximately every
hour, but there may not be tickets for the near future. There are
also longer walks along the Neva with access to the Gulf of Finland.
All this must be sought on the Palace and Admiralteyskaya
embankments.
When going on a water excursion, remember that
it is usually not hot in St. Petersburg, and even in summer you need
to dress warmly for an excursion. In spring and autumn, you most
likely won’t have to enjoy the view from the open deck at all, as it
will be cold and windy.
Taxi
All well-known mobile
applications for calling a taxi (Yandex, Uber, Gett) work in St.
Petersburg, the fare in the city is from 70 rubles and more, from
the airport to the center - about 1000 rubles.
January 18, the day the blockade was broken - on this day in 1943,
during Operation Iskra, the troops of the Leningrad and Second
Volkhov Fronts reunited in the Shlisselburg area.
January 27, the
day of the complete lifting of the blockade - on this day in 1944,
as a result of the offensive of the Red Army, German troops were
driven back from Leningrad at a distance of 60 - 100 km.
May 9,
Victory Day is a national holiday in honor of the end of the Great
Patriotic War. In St. Petersburg, it is celebrated with a military
parade on Palace Square and evening fireworks from the beach of the
Peter and Paul Fortress.
May 27, City Day - on this day in 1703,
the Peter and Paul Fortress was founded on Hare Island. On this day,
the city administration arranges a masquerade parade along Nevsky
Prospekt.
3rd Saturday of June, Scarlet Sails - a holiday of
school graduates of St. Petersburg. An evening concert is held at
the Palace and Birzhevaya squares, after the concerts, fireworks
begin. On this evening and night, it is better not to plan walks in
the city center, as it is full of crowds of not very sober
teenagers.
August 2. Airborne Day. The holiday is celebrated by a
small but loud, drunken and sometimes aggressive part of the city.
Veterans of the Airborne Forces love to drink on this day, swim in
the fountain and fight with anyone. On this day, it is not advisable
to walk around the city center.
Paying for purchases with bank cards
In addition to cash, in
almost all stores in St. Petersburg, you can pay for your purchase
with a bank card. Usually the following types of cards are accepted
for payment: World, Visa, Visa Electron, MasterCard, MasterCard
Electronic and Maestro. Cards of other payment systems (for example,
American Express) are accepted very rarely.
Hypermarkets and
supermarkets
Auchan. Five hypermarkets located in the shopping
malls MEGA Ikea, Leto Teorema and Gulliver. MEGA Ikea shopping malls
are located outside the city limits. Due to the inconvenient
location, they can only be recommended if you want to visit other
stores in the MEGA Ikea complexes or if you are traveling by car.
There are three stores within the city, near metro stations 3
(Nevsko-Vasileostrovskaya) line Elizarovskaya and 5
(Frunzensko-Primorskaya) line Staraya Derevnya, as well as in the
vicinity of the railway station Borovaya.
Dixie. A large (96
stores) chain of supermarkets in almost all areas of the city.
Prices are below average, but the assortment of goods is less than
in hypermarkets. Dixy sells groceries and a small range of
essentials. The rooms are usually small and cramped.
Quarter. A
supermarket chain that sells food and essentials. There are no
discount cards. It is a direct competitor of the Dixy and
Pyaterochka stores, but the price level in the Kvartal is slightly
higher. There are 22 supermarkets of this network in St. Petersburg.
Ribbon. ☎ +7 (800) 700-41-11. around the clock. A network of large
hypermarkets that sell primarily food and essential goods, there are
small departments of clothing, household appliances, goods for
children and electronics, as well as a cookery where you can buy
ready-made food. The price level is average. There are 14
hypermarkets in St. Petersburg.
OK. A network of large
hypermarkets that sell primarily food and essential goods, there are
small departments of clothing, household appliances, goods for
children and electronics, as well as a cookery where you can buy
ready-made food. The price level is average. There are 16
hypermarkets in St. Petersburg.
Crossroads. Implemented in two
versions: "Crossroads" and "Crossroads-hyper" (former "Carousel"),
the assortment in them is the same, the prices are slightly higher
than average. At the same time, there are constant queues at the
cash desks, which even the introduction of self-service cash desks
could not overcome.
Pyaterochka. A large supermarket chain owned
by the same owner as Crossroads. Prices are below average, but the
range of goods is less than in hyper- and supermarkets. Here you can
buy food and a small assortment of essential goods. The rooms are
both cramped and more or less spacious. It is often difficult to
find a price tag for a product - either they are not displayed at
all, or the product is placed to the left or to the right of its
usual place under another, obviously lower price tag. Meat
departments simply rent space in the store, the store is not
responsible for the quality of their products. Red caviar is not
worth buying here, it is cheap, but made from frozen ovaries, it is
bitter and tastes of iron. All stores have self-service checkouts,
allowing you to walk through the store in a couple of minutes even
at rush hour.
St. Petersburg is distinguished by its special and original
traditions of public catering, which are much deeper and more
significant than the linguistic disputes around the concepts of
shawarma/shawarma, buckwheat/buckwheat and crumpets/doughnuts. When
in the 1990s the fashion for Western fast foods began in the
country, and the words "glass", "cheburechnaya", "sandwich" or
"khinkalnaya" were firmly associated in the public mind with
something bad, dirty and certainly unhygienic, St. commitment to
institutions of this kind. Here, behind the scenes, but quite
systematically, two principles are implemented: a cafe in every
house and a cafe for everyone - from those who like to talk over a
cup of coffee to those who are looking for where to have another
glass. If the residential areas of St. Petersburg are in many ways
similar to Moscow and other large Russian cities, then the
historical center is a very special catering environment, which is
no less interesting to explore than to look at the buildings or
wander along the embankments.
Cafes and restaurants in the
very center, that is, on Nevsky, in the area of the Admiralty, the
Savior on Spilled Blood, St. Isaac's Cathedral and other mass
attractions are mainly aimed at tourists. Here you will surely find
a menu in English, and the prices are likely to be
disproportionately high. However, even in the tourist epicenter it
is quite possible to find an inexpensive cafe or canteen, if you set
yourself such a goal; There is also a network of fast food. However,
in general, you need to look for places for locals in residential
areas, that is, in the center behind the Griboyedov Canal, on
Vasilyevsky Island and on the Petrograd side. Outlying areas are
dominated by chain cafes.
There is probably no local food in
St. Petersburg - there are only special names and special traditions
for its use in gingerbread, shawarma, and so on. Smelt, a small
marine fish with a specific cucumber smell, which is fried and
rolled in flour, has crept up to the status of “local cuisine” as
much as possible. During the spawning period, stalls for selling it
fresh grow up in the city like mushrooms after rain, fish is served
in many cafes and bars, and in mid-May, a “smelt festival” is held
annually on the territory of the Peter and Paul Fortress. There are
a number of breweries in the city, but the Baltika and Nevskoye
brands, which are widespread throughout Russia, are not popular with
local residents who prefer the draft Vasileostrovskoye, a really
good “live” beer found in almost every cafe, except for of course,
expensive and pretentious.
Cheap
The network
establishments listed below make up only a small proportion of
inexpensive cafes in St. Petersburg. Most of them belong to the
category of canteens and drinks, and the line between the latter is
blurred: most often it is a canteen with distribution and a separate
counter-bar where alcoholic drinks are poured. There are, however,
more classic wineries (they are also cheburek, khinkal, dumplings),
where the order is placed at the counter, and then the food is
brought as it warms up or is ready. Each of these establishments is
distinctive and self-sufficient, and the quality of food can vary
from “disgusting” to “very tasty and homely”: trust your own
intuition and see who and what is eating at the neighboring tables.
You can eat for 150-300 rubles (2019), drink and eat for about the
same. A motley audience will keep you company: from local drunkards
to St. Petersburg intellectuals.
There are also
establishments with a special flavor in the city. Firstly, puffy
ones, where the main and sometimes the only food will be donuts
thickly sprinkled with powdered sugar (under no circumstances call
them donuts: the locals will not appreciate it!) with tea or crappy
coffee from plastic cups. The most popular is the pyshnaya on
Bolshaya Konyushennaya, which has existed since Soviet times: it’s
really hard to imagine a more nostalgic place. Another
characteristic St. Petersburg institution is shawarma. You can call
them whatever you like (doner, kebab, etc.), but the fact is that in
St. Petersburg, like Western Europe, this street food was for the
first time in Russia awarded separate cafes with tables, plates, and
sometimes even waiters.
Pita's is not surprising that a new
generation shawarma was born in St. Petersburg. The youngest food
service chain in the city has a somewhat hipster tinge, but offers
shawarma (albeit with quite different ingredients) and almost
nothing else. Hi-tech interiors. Wi-Fi and the ability to charge
gadgets are available by default.
Teremok is a pancake fast food
that gradually turned into just a dining room where pancakes are
baked fresh, but hot dishes are heated and served in plastic dishes.
At the same time, prices are quite high and start from 100-150
rubles, and for lunch you can lay down from 300 rubles (however, set
meals are much cheaper).
Stolle - very tasty pies.
Pirogovy
yard - a dozen and a half points located both in the center and in
the sleeping areas of the city. The main specialization of the
institution is, as you might guess, pies, the assortment of which is
diverse, and the taste is at its best. There are inexpensive and
hearty complex lunches (soup, salad, two weighty pieces of different
pies and tea), as well as breakfasts and dinners, in the evening a
discount is offered for pies, they are also sold to take away. If
you are not attracted to pies, then a rather long menu allows you to
do without them, although not all food can be tasty (say, desserts
are not very good at this place). Nice and stylish interior, very
fast service.
Argo bakery - high-quality and varied pastries with
a huge selection of toppings and dough.
Shaverno - literally a
network of shawarma. Grows extremely fast. Shawarma itself is a
confident average. Everywhere is a nice and modern interior. There
is delivery.
Average cost
Cheburechnaya Brynza is a
network institution that breaks the stable image of the Soviet
cheburechnaya. This is a cafe with service and a poor menu, a good
third of which are chebureks, including sweet ones. In terms of
their taste, they are inferior to fatty chebureks with lamb
somewhere in the railway station eatery, and experiments with
unusual fillings can hardly be called successful: chebureks turn out
dry, they need to be eaten with sauce. However, if you want to have
a bite to eat in a pleasant environment, "Brynza" is quite suitable
for this. In 2014, she already has 10 branches in St. Petersburg.
All cafes are open until late and offer good free Wi-Fi. Pasties
cost 100-150 rubles, hot dishes 200-300 rubles (2014).
SPb - the
main specialization is a beer bar, but you can also eat there.
Pizza Hut is an international chain of pizzerias.
Carls Junior is
an American chain of fast food restaurants. The menu includes
hamburgers, potatoes, soft drinks without limitation (fee per
glass). Sale of beer. There is a promotion that is not written in
the menu: a hamburger and 0.5 l of beer for 110 rubles.
Sbarro is
an international chain of pizzerias. There are restaurants in many
cities of Russia.
Tokyo-City is a network institution that has
spread widely throughout St. Petersburg and its suburbs. It
positions itself as a restaurant, but by the nature of the menu,
which presents well-known dishes of Russian, European and Asian
cuisine, it is more of a cafe with service. There is a children's
room, Wi-Fi, an English menu, vegetarian and children's dishes. The
waiting time for an order is usually short, but on weekends,
holidays, or at points near the metro or places of festivities,
there may not be free tables, and you will have to wait more than
half an hour for an order.
Expensive
IL Patio is an
international chain of pizzerias.
Tolstoy Fraer is a Petersburg
chain of bars. A distinctive feature is the interior, decorated in
the style of the USSR of the 70s: propaganda posters, inscriptions
corresponding to that time, signs, stands “Our foremost workers” and
“Vasya was here”. In addition to beer, the menu has an assortment of
various dishes of national cuisine. For the first mug of 0.5 liters
of beer, a small plate with a snack (crackers, cheese, straws, fish)
is brought free of charge.
Book accommodation using online services, there are options for every taste and budget.
Stationary telephones in St. Petersburg have seven-digit numbers, in
the international format - +7 (812) XXX-XX-XX, where 812 is the code
of St. Petersburg.
All major Russian operators operate in the
city: Megafon, Beeline, MTS, Tele2, Yota. Virtually throughout the
city, Internet access services are provided via 4G networks. Megafon
has a wider coverage area in the Leningrad region. In the subway,
there is communication at all stations, while Megafon, Yota and MTS
have communication in the tunnels between the central stations.
There are several networks of free Internet access via Wi-Fi,
the most famous of them is Maxima-Telecom, aka MT-Free, operating in
the subway and a significant part of land transport. In such
networks, it is most often necessary to log in using a mobile phone
number (often the system refuses to recognize numbers from outside
Russia), after which several commercials will be shown to you to
“pay” for access. Alas, for 2022, the quality of networks leaves
much to be desired: signal breaks are frequent (especially in the
subway), the channel has a low bandwidth, and advertising time in
the MT-Free network, for example, can reach one stage between
stations.
Russian Post offices are located throughout the
city. At the post office you can send and receive a letter, a
parcel, a parcel, buy envelopes, postcards, postage stamps.
Additional services include telephone communication, money transfer
services, Internet access, photocopying services, etc.
Main
Post Office, Post Office Street, 9. ☎ +7 (812) 312-19-83, +7 (812)
312-23-60. 24/7.
At night, you should be careful in areas such as Kupchino in the south of the city, Rzhevka, Vesyoliy Poselok on the right bank, Grazhdanka and the metro area Prospekt Prosveshcheniya in the north. It would not be a good idea to arrange an independent night tour of the courtyards-wells of St. Petersburg. They are usually poorly lit and often become a haven for drug addicts, homeless people and criminal elements.
It is located in the north-west of the Russian Federation, within the Neva lowland. Occupying the coast of the Neva Bay of the Gulf of Finland adjacent to the mouth of the Neva River and numerous islands of the Neva Delta, the city stretches from northwest to southeast for 90 km. The height of the city above sea level by districts: center: 1–5 m, north: 5–30 m, south and southwest: 5–22 m. m. On the territory of the city there is a zero mark of the height and depth reference system, which serves as a starting point for the leveling networks of several states. Until the beginning of the 20th century, the meridian passing through the observatory located in the city was used as a zero for counting geographic longitude on the maps of the Russian Empire. Saint-Petersburg is located in the MSK (Moscow time) time zone. The offset of the applicable time from UTC is +3:00.
The total length of all watercourses on the territory of St.
Petersburg reaches 282 km, and their water surface is about 7% of
the entire area of the city. During the existence of the city, the
hydrological network has undergone significant changes. Its
construction in a low swampy place required the construction of
canals and ponds for drainage. The excavated earth was used to raise
the surface. At the end of the 19th century, the Neva River delta
consisted of 48 rivers and canals, forming 101 islands. Over time
(as the city was built), many reservoirs lost their original
meaning, became polluted and filled up. In the 20th century, as a
result of the backfilling of channels, channels and branches, the
number of islands was reduced to 42.
The main waterway of the
city is the Neva River, which flows into the Neva Bay of the Gulf of
Finland, which belongs to the Baltic Sea. The most significant
branches of the delta are: Bolshaya and Malaya Neva, Bolshaya,
Srednyaya and Malaya Nevka, Fontanka, Moika, Yekateringofka,
Krestovka, Karpovka, Zhdanovka, Smolenka, Pryazhka, Kronverk Strait;
channels: Sea Canal, Obvodny Canal, Griboyedov Canal, Kryukov Canal.
The main tributaries of the Neva within the city: on the left:
Izhora, Slavyanka, Murzinka, on the right: Okhta, Black River. The
largest islands in the Neva delta: Vasilyevsky, Petrogradsky,
Krestovsky, Dekabristov. The largest island in the Gulf of Finland:
Kotlin. About 800 bridges have been thrown across the city's water
bodies (excluding bridges on the territories of industrial
enterprises), including 218 pedestrian and 22 drawbridges. Of this
number, a part is located in places that were once suburbs of St.
Petersburg: in Kronstadt - five, in Pushkin - 54, Peterhof - 51,
Pavlovsk - 16, Lomonosov - seven bridges. The longest bridge: the
Bolshoy Obukhovsky (cable-stayed) bridge over the Neva River (total
length of the bridge crossing is 2824 m), the widest bridge: the
Blue Bridge on the Moika River (99.5 m).
A significant part
of the city (islands of the Neva delta, a wide strip between the
Gulf of Finland and the line of the Baltic railway, the left bank to
the Fontanka, etc.) is located at heights not exceeding 1.2 - 3 m
above sea level. These areas are at risk of flooding, mainly due to
wind surge in the eastern part of the Gulf of Finland. The floods
were catastrophic in nature on November 7 (19), 1824 (water level
rise above the ordinary by 4.21 m) and on September 23, 1924 (3.69
m). At the time of this flood, about 70 km² of the city was flooded.
For more than three hundred years of history of St. Petersburg,
according to various sources, about 300 floods have been registered.
The last dangerous flood (the water rose to 187 cm from the
Kronstadt trough stock) was on November 16, 2010, very dangerous
(220 cm) - on January 10, 2007. In August 2011, a complex of
protective structures of St. Petersburg from floods (the so-called
"Dam") in the Neva Bay of the Gulf of Finland came into operation.
For the first time, it was fully activated during the flood on
December 28, 2011. If the dam had not been closed, then, according
to experts, the water in the Neva this time would have risen to 281
cm (the flood would have been in the top five largest in the entire
history of observations), a fifth of the city could have gone under
water. Thus, damage was prevented, which could amount to about 25
billion rubles. During the first 10 years of operation of the dam,
26 floods were prevented with potential damage in the amount of 120
billion rubles (with a total construction cost of the entire complex
of 106 billion rubles).
The climate is temperate, transitional from temperate continental to
temperate maritime. This type of climate is explained by the
geographical location and atmospheric circulation, which is typical
for the Leningrad region. This is due to the relatively small amount
of solar heat entering the earth's surface and into the atmosphere.
It is classified as humid continental by the Köppen climate
classification. The influence of the Baltic Sea cyclones results in
warm, humid, and short summers and long, cold, wet winters.
The total influx of solar radiation here is 1.5 times less than in
the south of Ukraine, and half as much as in Central Asia. The city
has an average of 62 sunny days per year. Therefore, during most of
the year, days with cloudy overcast weather and diffused lighting
predominate. The length of the day varies from 5 hours 51 minutes on
December 22 to 18 hours 50 minutes on June 22. The so-called White
Nights are observed in the city (it is generally accepted that they
begin on May 25-26 and end on July 16-17), when the sun drops below
the horizon by no more than 9 ° and the evening twilight practically
merges with the morning. In total, the duration of the white nights
is more than 50 days. The annual amplitude of the sums of direct
solar radiation on a horizontal surface with a clear sky is from 25
MJ/m² in December to 686 MJ/m² in June. Cloudiness reduces on
average per year the arrival of total solar radiation by 21%, and
direct solar radiation by 60%. The average annual total radiation is
3156 MJ/m².
A frequent change of air masses is
characteristic, which is largely due to cyclonic activity. In
summer, western and north-western winds prevail, in winter - western
and south-western ones. Petersburg weather stations have data since
1722. The highest temperature recorded in St. Petersburg for the
entire observation period: +37.1 °C, and the lowest: -35.9 °C.
Before the emergence of the city, the soils along the rivers were
formed mainly under the vegetation of water meadows and coastal
willows, and spruce-pine-birch forests with an admixture of alder
dominated the territory in the immediate surroundings.
Green
spaces in St. Petersburg and its suburbs, together with the water
surface, occupy about 40% of the urban area (according to 2002
data). By 2000, there were about 65 m² of plantings per inhabitant
of the city. The total area of green spaces exceeds 31 thousand
hectares, including 68 parks, 166 gardens, 730 squares, 232
boulevards, 750 green streets. The parks of the city are located in
different landscape conditions: on the lower and upper terraces of
the coast of the Gulf of Finland (parks of Strelna, Peterhof and
Lomonosov), the moraine plain (parks of the city of Pushkin), kame
hills (Shuvalovsky Park, Aspen Grove). The basis of a number of
parks are natural forests, which still retain their species
composition (Sosnovka, Specific Park). Many parks created in the
post-war years are divided into areas where there was virtually no
tree vegetation (Moscow Victory Park, Primorsky Victory Park). On
the outskirts of the city, forests remained from the subzone of the
southern taiga: Yuntolovsky forest dacha, Rzhevsky forest park,
forest islands along the Okhta River, Tallinn Highway, between the
Neva River and the railway to Moscow.
There are seven
specially protected natural areas in the city: three state nature
reserves (“Yuntolovsky”, “Gladyshevsky”, “Northern coast of the Neva
Bay”) and four natural monuments (“Dudergof heights”, “Komarovsky
coast”, “Strelninsky coast”, “ Sergievka Park). The master plan for
the development of St. Petersburg plans the appearance of five more
reserves and two natural monuments.
According to the Ministry of Natural Resources and Ecology of the
Russian Federation, in the environmental rating of large Russian
cities in 2011, St. Petersburg took second place. There are 21
automatic atmospheric air monitoring stations in the city. Air
emissions in 2009 amounted to 625.3 thousand tons. The amount of
emissions of harmful substances per capita is 135.9 kg per year, per
unit area - 434.5 tons per km². 91.9% of all emissions come from
transport. In 2009, compared to the previous year, emissions from
transport increased by 1%, from stationary sources - by 9.8%.
The ecological state of the Neva River, the Neva Bay and the
Gulf of Finland is unsatisfactory. Within the limits of the city,
the Neva is polluted with industrial effluents; waste from hundreds
of industrial enterprises is poured into it. Oil products are
actively transported along the Neva. More than 80 thousand tons of
pollutants enter the river every year. Each year, the St. Petersburg
Committee for Natural Resources registers an average of more than
forty oil spills in the Neva. In 2022, the Rospotrebnadzor of St.
Petersburg recognized only two out of 24 beaches in the city as
suitable for swimming. In 2009, 8 million m³ of municipal solid
waste was generated in the city. Industry is a source of various
production wastes, a significant part of which poses a serious
danger to the environment. Until 2014, wastes of classes I-III were
brought for the disposal of toxic waste, products of chemical,
medical, industrial enterprises to the Krasny Bor landfill (30 km
south of the city in the Tosnensky district of the Leningrad
region).
In connection with the commissioning of structures
to protect St. Petersburg from floods, the water exchange between
the Neva Bay and the eastern part of the Gulf of Finland decreased
by 10-20%, which additionally increased the concentration of
nutrients in the Neva Bay. The unfortunate choice of the release
sites of the northern and southwestern treatment facilities and the
high contamination of soils in some areas of the Neva Bay also
contribute to this. The concern is caused by the gradual swamping of
the shallow parts of the Gulf of Finland between the city and the
dam and the associated decay of plant remains, which over time can
lead to additional eutrophication of the reservoir and the exclusion
from the water area of vast sections of the Neva Bay, in the soils
of which, moreover, a significant amount of harmful pests will be
buried. connections. Problems may also arise in connection with the
creation of new large alluvial territories in the water area of the
Neva Bay from the side of Vasilyevsky Island. According to
Roshydromet, this may create a risk of flooding in the city when the
dam is closed due to a decrease in the time it takes to fill it.
According to the forecasts of the NIPTs General Plan of St.
Petersburg, by the middle of the 21st century, the city's climate
may change from the current humid continental to maritime with
average temperatures in January from -5 to +2 °C. The closest
similar region with maritime climate to St. Petersburg is in
Denmark.
The presence of a person on the territory of modern St. Petersburg
can be traced from the time of the last melting of the glacier that
covered this territory. Approximately 12 thousand years ago, the ice
receded, and people followed it. Information about the Slavs (Ilmen
Slovenes and Krivichi) has been known since the 8th-9th centuries.
They were engaged in slash-and-burn agriculture, cattle breeding,
hunting and fishing, and carried out armed raids on other peoples.
At the beginning of the 9th century, these lands became part of the
Old Russian state, forming part of the territory of Veliky Novgorod
called Vodskaya Pyatina, the area on the right along the Neva was
called Karelian land, on the left - Izhora land. In the 8th-13th
centuries, there was a waterway "from the Varangians to the Greeks"
from Scandinavia through Eastern Europe to Byzantium. During this
period, the Novgorod Republic was constantly at war with the Swedes.
On July 15, 1240, at the confluence of the Izhora River with the
Neva, a battle took place between the Novgorod militia under the
command of Prince Alexander Yaroslavich and the Swedish army. In
1300, the Swedes built the Landskrona fortress at the confluence of
the Okhta River with the Neva, but a year later it was taken by a
united squad of Novgorodians and local Karelians and razed to the
ground. On the site of the former fortress for a long time there was
a Novgorod marketplace "Nevsky Mouth", that is, a market. In the
15th century, Izhora land, as part of the Novgorod Republic, was
annexed to the Grand Duchy of Moscow. As a result of the defeat in
the war with Sweden under the Treaty of Stolbovsky in 1617, the
territories along the Neva River became part of the Swedish
Ingermanland, the commercial and administrative center of which was
the city of Nyen near the Nyenschanz fortress, built in 1611 on the
site of Landskrona.
As a result of the Northern War of
1700-1721, the Neva River Valley was recaptured from Sweden and
became part of the Russian Empire under the Nystadt Peace Treaty of
August 30 (September 10), 1721. On May 16 (27), 1703, at the mouth
of the Neva, not far from Nien, the city of St. Petersburg was
founded. This day dates from the laying of the Peter and Paul
Fortress by Tsar Peter I, the first building of the city, on Hare
Island. She was supposed to block the fairways of the two largest
branches of the river delta: the Neva and Bolshaya Nevka with gun
fire. In 1704, the Kronstadt fortress was founded on the island of
the Gulf of Finland, Kotlin, to protect Russia's maritime borders.
Peter I attached great strategic importance to the new city in
providing a waterway from Russia to Western Europe.
With the
beginning of the construction of St. Petersburg, the construction of
stone buildings was prohibited throughout Russia, and all masons
were sent to build a new city. Tsar Peter gave away plots of land to
those close to him, as well as to wealthy people, under the
obligation to build buildings of the following sizes on them: the
nobles, who had from 700 to 1000 households, had to build houses
with a facade size of at least 10 sazhens (21.3 m); the owners of
500-700 yards built houses for eight sazhens (17.1 m), the owners of
100-300 yards could build huts or wooden houses of any size. In the
first ten years of its existence, the main part was the City Island
(modern Petrogradsky Island), here were the Gostiny Dvor, the
Trinity Church, many office buildings, craft settlements and
military units. The first industrial enterprise was the Admiralty
Shipyard, opened in 1705 on the Admiralteyskaya Side (left bank of
the Neva), where the Galley Shipyard, the Winter and Summer Palaces
of Peter I with the Summer Garden were later built. In 1706, the
Admiralty Hospital was opened in St. Petersburg.
In 1712,
Peter I issued a decree on the creation of the General Plan of St.
Petersburg. Since that time, Vasilievsky Island, which was chosen as
the center of the city, the Vyborg side, began to be actively built
up, the construction of suburban palaces of Peterhof, Yekateringof,
Oranienbaum was launched. Since 1713, all persons serving the royal
court had to settle in the new capital. In 1713, the Governing
Senate moved to St. Petersburg and the city became the capital of
the Russian Empire; from that moment on, the phrase “The sovereign
is on a campaign” disappears from the documents, indicating that the
tsar is outside the walls of the Moscow Kremlin. On March 17, 1719,
an engineering school was opened in St. Petersburg (by decision of
Peter I in 1723, the engineering classes of the Moscow School of the
Pushkar Order were transferred to St. Petersburg, along with all the
teachers). In 1724, the Mint was transferred from Moscow to the
Trubetskoy bastion of the Peter and Paul Fortress. By 1725, the
Smolny Yard, the Foundry Yard, water saw mills, brick, wax, powder,
weapons, tapestry, leather and other factories, food enterprises
were built. In the same year, the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences
was founded, where the first Russian newspaper, St. Petersburg
Vedomosti, began to appear in 1728.
By the middle of the 18th
century, fires and floods led many buildings built in the time of
Peter the Great to a dilapidated state, and some were destroyed. So,
in the summer of 1736 and 1737, two fires broke out, the entire
wooden Marine settlement and a significant part of the Admiralty
Island burned out. In 1737, by decree of Empress Anna Ioannovna, a
commission was created on the St. Petersburg structure (P. M.
Eropkin headed the commission). According to this plan, the idea of
a three-beam development of St. Petersburg from the Admiralty, which
became the compositional center, was approved, and the role of the
main highway was assigned to Nevsky Prospekt. St. Petersburg has
become one of the largest scientific centers in Russia. A number of
educational institutions have been created: the Smolny Institute for
Noble Maidens, the Imperial Academy of Arts, the Mining School, the
Main Public School for the Training of Teachers, and others. On
August 30 (September 10), 1756, a decree was issued on the creation
of the first state theater in the country. In 1762, the previous
commission was replaced by the commission on the stone structure of
St. Petersburg and Moscow, which regulated the development of
embankments of small rivers and canals, the formation of
architectural ensembles of central squares. The construction of
granite embankments of the Neva, Fontanka, and then other rivers and
canals of the city center began. By the end of the 18th century, the
population of the city amounted to 220 thousand people and overtook
Moscow in numbers, more than 60 Orthodox and 15 non-Christian
churches operated in it. According to the data for 1780, there were
more than 1200 streets and lanes, 3.3 thousand houses, the entire
central part was completely paved with cobblestones and covered with
transverse boards. After 1785, a body was created that "managed the
affairs of the all-estate urban population and was formed through
all-estate elections" - the city duma.
In 1809, the Institute of the Corps of Railway Engineers was opened,
in 1810 a higher engineering education was born, in the Main
Engineering School founded in 1806, in 1811 the Tsarskoye Selo
Lyceum was founded. On November 7 (19), 1824, the most significant
and destructive flood in the history of St. Petersburg occurred, the
water rose 421 cm above the ordinary. As a result, according to
various estimates, from 400 to 4,000 people died, material damage
was estimated at many millions of rubles. On December 14 (26), 1825,
an unsuccessful attempt at a coup d'état was made on Senate Square,
the purpose of which was the abolition of autocracy. In the first
half of the 19th century, the design of the architectural ensembles
of the Palace, Senate, Alexandrinskaya, Mikhailovskaya squares, the
Spit of Vasilyevsky Island was completed. K. I. Rossi worked on
their creation, as well as on other architectural monuments
(Anichkov Palace (reconstruction), Yelagin Palace, the building of
the Senate and Synod, Mikhailovsky Palace, the building of the
Alexandrinsky Theater), G. Quarenghi (Smolny Institute), A. D
Zakharov (building project of Vasilievsky Island in 1803-1804,
Admiralty), J. Thomas de Thomon (stock exchange building with
rostral columns), A. N. Voronikhin (Kazan Cathedral, house of the
State Treasury), O. Montferrand (Alexander Column, St. Isaac's
Cathedral) and many others. By the mid-1830s, about 300 factories
and plants were operating in St. Petersburg, by the mid-1870s, 25
banks, and by the end of the century, more than 500 enterprises.
Large factories were built on the outskirts of St. Petersburg:
Putilovsky, Obukhovsky, Baltiysky. Industrial and residential areas
are growing on the Vyborg side, behind the Narva, Moscow, Nevskaya
outposts, dense multi-storey buildings are being formed with
numerous tenement houses in the city center. In 1800, the first
steam engine was put into operation at the Admiralty Plants, in 1815
the first Russian steamship "Elizaveta" was launched, in 1843 the
production of rolling stock for the railway began at the Alexander
iron foundry, and in 1845 the first domestic steam locomotive was
produced. An important event was the construction in 1836 of the
first railway between St. Petersburg and Tsarskoye Selo. On August
18, 1851, the first train left St. Petersburg for Moscow, and soon
communication between the two cities became regular. In 1837, the
Tsarskoselsky railway station was built, in the 1850s, the
Nikolaevsky, Warsaw, Baltic stations, and in 1870, the Finland
station. In 1885, the construction of the 32-kilometer Sea Canal and
the seaport on Gutuevsky Island was completed. Since 1863, a water
supply system has been laid in the central districts of the city to
supply the population with water, and since 1876 - on Vasilievsky
Island, Petersburg and Vyborg sides. In 1882, the first city
telephone exchange appeared, and since 1897, the production of
telephone sets began at the Erickson plant. In St. Petersburg, a
tram appeared later than in other cities of the Russian Empire. In
1839, the Pulkovo Observatory was opened, in 1845, the Russian
Geographical Society. By the mid-1890s, more than twenty higher
educational institutions operated in the city.
According to
the results of the 1897 census, the population of the city was
1,265,000 inhabitants, and by the beginning of the First World War
it exceeded 2 million (3rd place in Europe after London and Paris).
The result of the Russian Revolution of 1905-1907, which began on
Bloody Sunday on January 9, was the creation of the first parliament
in the history of Russia - the State Duma. By 1913, the volume of
industrial production in St. Petersburg reached 632 million rubles,
242.6 thousand people were employed at 1012 enterprises. The capital
provided 12% of Russia's industrial output, including 70% of
electrical products, 50% of chemical products, 25% of machinery, and
17% of textiles. There were 567 banks operating in the city. The
energy supply of the capital's industry was provided by 294
electrical installations and three thermal power plants. By 1914,
about 40 thousand students were studying in 60 higher educational
institutions of St. Petersburg.
The First World War greatly influenced the fate of St. Petersburg.
In August 1914, on the wave of anti-German sentiments, by decree of
Nicholas II, the city was renamed Petrograd. At the same time, the
meaning of the name of the city changed: it began to be called not
in honor of the saint, but in honor of its founder. By 1917, there
were supply problems, and queues became common. The unrest of
February 23-27 (March 12), 1917 and other events of the February
Revolution ended with the abdication of Emperor Nicholas II, the
fall of the monarchy and the formation of the Provisional
Government. On October 25 (November 7), 1917, during the October
Socialist Revolution, power in the city passed into the hands of the
Bolsheviks, and the Russian Soviet Republic was created with its
capital in Petrograd. During the Civil War, due to the proximity of
the front to the German army, the government of V. I. Lenin moved to
Moscow, the city lost its capital status on March 5, 1918.
On
January 26, 1924, after the death of V. I. Lenin, the II All-Union
Congress of Soviets of the USSR granted the request of the
Petrosoviet and renamed Petrograd to Leningrad by its resolution.
After the revolutionary events of 1917-1919, the population of the
city decreased, by 1920 it was only 722 thousand people. About
300,000 people were resettled from the workers' suburbs to the
central regions. In 1919, a council was created to regulate the plan
for Petrograd and its outskirts. In 1923, housing construction began
in the city (Zhilmassivov). In the 1930s, Yelagin and Krestovsky
Islands were landscaped with access to the Gulf of Finland. On
September 23, 1924, the second largest flood in the history of the
city occurred, the water rose 380 cm above the ordinary. In 1931,
the two largest cities of the RSFSR - Moscow (June 16) and Leningrad
(December 3) were separated into separate administrative units -
cities of republican subordination of the RSFSR. In 1933, at the
western tip of Krestovsky Island, the construction of the S. M.
Kirov Stadium began. In 1935-1937, the first general plan of
Leningrad was developed, which provided for development in a
southerly direction with borders in the Pulkovo Heights area. The
center was to be the square at the intersection of International
Avenue and the Central Arc Highway (now Moscow Square) with the
House of Soviets and other administrative buildings. By 1939, a new
version of the master plan was developed, which was never approved,
but in accordance with it, the construction of residential areas on
Malaya Okhta, Ivanovskaya Street, Avtova and Mezhdunarodnyy Prospekt
began. Palaces of culture were built throughout the city; by the
mid-1930s, they were available in all industrial areas. In 1932, the
first Leningrad Pulkovo airport was opened. On December 1, 1934, the
first secretary of the Leningrad Regional Committee and the City
Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, a member
of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist
Party of Bolsheviks, S. M. Kirov, became the victim of the murder.
This event will mark the beginning of the Kirov Stream and the Great
Terror, to be replaced by A. A. Zhdanov.
The heroism and
steadfastness of Leningraders manifested itself during the Great
Patriotic War. On September 8, 1941, the enemy reached Lake Ladoga,
captured Shlisselburg, taking control of the source of the Neva, and
blocked Leningrad from land. This day is considered to be the
beginning of the blockade of the city by the troops of Nazi Germany
from the south and Finland from the north. For almost 900 days and
nights, under conditions of a complete blockade, the inhabitants not
only held the city, but also rendered great assistance to the front.
During the years of the blockade, according to various sources, from
600 thousand to 1.5 million people died. So, at the Nuremberg
trials, the number of 632 thousand people appeared. Only 3% of them
died from bombing and shelling; the remaining 97% starved to death.
On the other hand, in the encyclopedia "The Great Patriotic War of
1941-1945", published by the military publishing house of the
Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation in 2011-2015, these
figures are recognized as significantly underestimated, since
"unidentified blockade fighters who died within the city were not
taken into account , and Leningraders who died of starvation in the
process of evacuation. As a result of the oncoming offensive of the
Leningrad and Volkhov fronts on January 18, 1943, the blockade ring
was broken, but only on January 27, 1944, the blockade was
completely lifted. After its removal, only 560 thousand inhabitants
remained in Leningrad.
Immediately after these events, the
restoration of the city began. In September 1945, the academic year
began and the concert season opened in the Great Hall of the
Philharmonic. In 1950, the Kirov Stadium was put into operation. In
1951, a new general plan for the development of Leningrad was
adopted, according to which it was proposed to develop the territory
of the city around the historical center in all directions
approximately equally. In the 1950s, new architectural ensembles
were created: Lenin Square, Kalinin Square, Komsomolskaya Square;
Moskovsky Prospekt, Engels Prospect, Stachek Prospect,
Sredneokhtinsky Prospekt, Primorsky Prospekt acquired a complete
architectural appearance. In 1951, the first air terminal was
launched in Pulkovo (a new building was built in 1973). On November
15, 1955, the first stage of the Leningrad metro was put into
operation. In 1957, the tradition of a midday cannon shot from the
Naryshkin bastion of the Peter and Paul Fortress (interrupted in
1934) was resumed, and the first official Eternal Flame in the
country was lit on the Field of Mars. In the same year, the world's
first nuclear-powered icebreaker "Lenin" was launched from the
shipyards of the A. Marty Shipbuilding Plant, and in 1962, the
production of Kirovets tractors began at the Kirov Plant. In 1960,
the Memorial to the Victims of the Blockade was opened at the
Piskarevsky cemetery and the construction of a new building of the
Finland Station was completed. In 1962, a 316-meter television tower
was erected on Aptekarsky Island and a new television center was
built. With the construction in the early 1960s of several large
house-building plants, the mass construction of the city began with
Khrushchev houses, and since the 1970s with “ship houses”. On May 6,
1965, the city of Leningrad was awarded the title of Hero City (for
the first time it was so named in the order of the Supreme Commander
of the Armed Forces of the USSR I. V. Stalin dated May 1, 1945). In
1966, the last Soviet master plan for Leningrad was approved. In
accordance with it, in the 1960s, mass building of the western part
of Vasilevsky Island began on the alluvial territories, along
Novoizmailovsky Prospekt, Yuri Gagarin Prospekt, and Kosmonavtov
Prospekt. Kupchino, Avtovo, Ulyanka, Dachnoye, Grazhdanka,
Polyustrovo, Okhta are becoming new large residential areas. By the
anniversary of October, in 1967, the Yubileiny Sports Palace and the
Oktyabrsky Grand Concert Hall were built. In the 1970s, Uritsk,
Sosnovaya Polyana, Vesely Poselok, the area north of Murinsky Creek,
the territory of the former Komendantsky airfield, the southern part
of Kupchin, Shuvalovo and Ozerki, the South-West, Rzhevka and
Porokhovye were built up. In 1979, the construction of a dam began
in the Gulf of Finland, which protected the city from floods. In
1982, the Marine Station was built in the Harbor on Vasilyevsky
Island. In 1988, the 5 millionth resident of Leningrad was born. In
1990, the historic center of the city was included in the list of
UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
In 1991, according to the results of a referendum, 54% of the
townspeople voted for the return of the original name of the city of
St. Petersburg. On September 6, 1991, by decree of the Presidium of
the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR, it was returned, and on April 21,
1992, it was introduced into the Constitution of the RSFSR by the
Congress of People's Deputies of the Russian Federation. On December
25, 1993, the Constitution of the Russian Federation, adopted at a
popular vote, came into force, which confirmed the name of St.
Petersburg. On June 12, 1991, Anatoly Sobchak was elected mayor of
the city, on March 13, 1996, executive power was transferred to the
administration of St. Petersburg, which is formed by the governor of
St. Petersburg, the position of mayor was abolished.
In 1993,
as part of the All-Russian referendum on April 25 in St. Petersburg,
an additional question was raised about its republican status, for
which 75% of the inhabitants voted - however, St. Petersburg never
received republican status.
The 1994 Goodwill Games were an
important event. As a result of the accident in 1995, train traffic
was stopped on the section of the subway between the Lesnaya and
Ploshchad Muzhestva stations (it was resumed in 2004). In 1991-2007,
many monuments were erected, the Konstantinovsky Palace, the Church
of the Savior on Spilled Blood and many others were restored and
restored. For the first time on May 25, 1991, after a long break, a
church service was held in the Kazan Cathedral. In 2000, the Ice
Palace was built, in which the Ice Hockey World Championship was
held that same year. In 1998-2011, a ring road around St. Petersburg
was built. On May 27 - June 1, 2003, the 300th anniversary of St.
Petersburg was magnificently celebrated. On December 15, 2004, the
Bolshoi Obukhovsky Bridge (known as the "Vantovy Bridge") was
opened. In 2005, the city's Legislative Assembly adopted a new
master plan for St. Petersburg, which determined the future
development of the city until 2025.
Since 1997, the annual
economic summit St. Petersburg International Economic Forum has been
held, an important international economic and political event,
unofficially called "Russian Davos". In 2006, the forum changed its
format, becoming an event with the participation of the heads of the
largest Russian and foreign companies, heads of state and political
leaders, prime ministers, vice-premiers, ministers, governors (in
2017: more than 14 thousand people from more than 143 countries).
From 15 to 17 July 2006, the G-8 summit took place at the
Konstantinovsky Palace in Strelna. On August 31, 2011, Georgy
Poltavchenko was appointed governor of St. Petersburg. On September
8, 2019, Alexander Beglov was elected Governor (acting on October 3,
2018).
In 2017, the Krestovsky stadium hosted group stage
football matches and the final of the FIFA Confederations Cup. In
2018, the city hosted matches of the 2018 FIFA World Cup. The
matches of the group stage, ⅛ finals, semi-finals and the match for
third place were played here. All games were played at the stadium
on Krestovsky Island.
Since 2017, in accordance with the
decree of the President of Russia, the tradition of holding the Main
Naval Parade on the Neva on the Day of the Navy has been restored in
St. Petersburg. On July 25, 2021, 39 ships, 7 submarines, 48
aircraft and over 4,000 military personnel took part in the next
parade.
St. Petersburg (from German - "city of St. Peter"), as well as the
original (Dutch) form of the official name Sankt Pieter Burch (San
(k) tpiterburh) from the day the city was founded on May 16 (27),
1703 to 18 (31) August 1914; in honor of the Apostle Peter, the
heavenly patron of Peter I. Initially, this was the name of the
fortress, founded in mid-May 1703 on Hare Island, and soon the name
spread to the whole city. Since no special act establishing the
official name of the city was adopted, and the foreign-language
environment of Peter used German, Swedish, Dutch, English (as well
as the Russian associates of the emperor, who to some extent spoke
these languages), in the sources of the first quarter of the 18th
century there is a huge discrepancy in the naming of the city (more
than 30 options are noted). At the same time, the inconsistency
concerned all components of the name: Saint, Sant and San; Peter and
Peter (often in the genitive case: Peter, Peter); burg, burk and
burh. The toponym itself could be written in one, two or three
words. So, among the options found in the letters of Peter I
himself, there are the following options: St. Petersburg
(20.VII.1703), St. Petersburg (20.IX.1703), Piterburh (17.V.1706),
St. Petersburg (20.XI.1710 ), St. Petersburg-Burg (28.IV. 1714), St.
Petersburg (13.1.1720). In the Vedomosti newspaper, the name was
mentioned in such forms as St. Petersburg (XII. 1703), St.
Petersburg (I. 1704), St. Petersburg and St. Petersburk (V, VI.
1711), but more often - St. Petersburg, and only starting from July
1724 " Vedomosti ”instead of -Peter, they begin to constantly use
the spelling -Peter. This allows us to consider that the unofficial
name of the city "Peter", which is still widely used at the present
time, became widespread until 1724. The purely German form of
writing “St. Petersburg”, which was established after the death of
Peter I, was used until 1914. In informal usage, the city was called
Petersburg, and colloquially, Peter.
On August 18 (31), 1914,
after Russia's entry into the First World War, Emperor Nicholas II
announced the highest announcement of the change of the name of the
city from the foreign St. Petersburg to Petrograd, as more patriotic
and in order to avoid any undesirable associations. Now the name of
the capital no longer correlated with the Holy Apostle Peter, only
with its founder, Emperor Peter I. Previously, it was found both in
fiction (A.S. Pushkin) and in the names of some institutions
(Petrograd Old Believer Diocese). Nevertheless, in everyday life the
name took root very poorly, and even in the early 1920s, in everyday
speech, many continued to call the city Petersburg.
On
January 26, 1924, the II All-Union Congress of Soviets of the USSR
granted the request of the Petrograd Soviet (initiative of Grigory
Zinoviev) and renamed Petrograd to Leningrad in honor of V. I.
Lenin, one of the organizers of the October Revolution of 1917, the
founder and leader of the Soviet state (RSFSR, USSR) who had died
five days earlier.
In the course of a survey conducted on
June 12, 1991, 54.86% of the townspeople participating in it spoke
in favor of returning the city to its original name. By Decree of
the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the RSFSR dated September 6,
1991 No. 1643-I, the name of St. Petersburg was returned to the
city. However, until February 1992, a number of educational
institutions continued to be called Leningrad. On April 21, 1992,
the Congress of People's Deputies of the Russian Federation
introduced the returned name of the city into Art. 71 of the
Constitution of the RSFSR. This amendment came into force from the
moment of its publication in Rossiyskaya Gazeta on May 16, 1992. The
main initiator, who played a decisive role in returning the city to
its original name, was the mayor of the city A. A. Sobchak, who
later considered this case his most significant political
achievement, which is immortalized on a monument to him erected in
2006. He hoped that his city would become a new banking, trade,
tourist and cultural center in the Baltic, he was optimistic about
the possibility of transferring the capital of the new Russia to St.
Petersburg.
Throughout the 1990s and at the beginning of the
21st century, the name Leningrad continues to appear in the speech
of some people of the older generation. At the same time, this name
is found among young people with communist and pro-Soviet views, and
is also mentioned in culture (for example, in the name of the
Leningrad group). The former name was preserved in the names of some
organizations (Leningrad Zoo, Lenenergo, etc.).
The northern capital (or the Second Capital of Russia), St.
Petersburg is often called this way, recalling its pre-revolutionary
status and taking into account the current status of a city of
federal significance;
SPb. - by abbreviation, the official
bibliographic abbreviation of the name of the city;
cultural
capital;
City on the Neva;
City of white nights;
Peter is
an abbreviated name for St. Petersburg, one of the oldest unofficial
names of the city;
Northern Venice - a figurative comparison with
Venice, due to the large number of rivers and canals, as well as
architecture;
Northern Palmyra - a poetic comparison with
Palmyra, a city of legendary beauty;
City of Lenin - a
semi-official name in Soviet times (found, in particular, on posters
from the Great Patriotic War);
Cradle (city) of three revolutions
- semi-official, associated with the key role of the city in the
revolutionary events of 1905-1907 and 1917;
Petropolis is a
poetic trope, a Hellenized form of the name Petersburg (Greek
Πετρούπολης), first used by M. V. Lomonosov;
Nevograd is the name
of the city among the Old Believers, starting from the moment the
Old Believers settled St. Petersburg in the 18th century. Now, on
some periodicals, the place of publication is not St. Petersburg,
but Nevograd (Notification of the Russian Council of the Old
Orthodox Pomeranian Church. - Nevograd, 1991). Also, the local
Pomeranian Old Believer community is unofficially called Nevsky. In
1991, Alexander Solzhenitsyn proposed this name for the city
renaming project;
A window on Europe, this epithet became popular
after Alexander Pushkin used it in the introduction to the poem The
Bronze Horseman (1833). Pushkin himself, however, borrowed this
image from the Italian philosopher and critic Francesco Algarotti;
The criminal capital is the name that came into use after the
release of the series "Gangster Petersburg" on television. Also,
this name is mentioned in several episodes of the television series
Streets of Broken Lanterns.
The asteroid (830) Petropolitana,
discovered in 1916 by Russian astronomer Grigory Neuimin at the
Simeiz Observatory, is named after St. Petersburg.
There are
five variants of the name of the townspeople, depending on the name
of the city. From the toponym Petrograd in 1914-1924, the
inhabitants of the city were called: Petrogradians, Petrogradets,
Petrogradka. From the toponym Leningrad in 1924-1991: Leningraders,
Leningrader, Leningradka. From the toponym Petersburg:
Petersburgers, Petersburger, Petersburger. From the toponym St.
Petersburg: St. Petersburgers, St. Petersburger. From the unofficial
name Peter: St. Petersburg, St. Petersburg. According to surveys,
residents of a modern city identify themselves with the concepts:
Leningrader (36% of respondents), Petersburger (32%), and both
(21%).
The title of Hero City was awarded on May 1, 1945 by order of the
Supreme Commander-in-Chief I.V. Stalin No. 20 dated May 1, 1945. The
Gold Star medal was awarded on May 8, 1965 "for outstanding services
to the Motherland, courage and heroism shown by the working people
of Leningrad in the fight against the Nazi invaders in the difficult
conditions of a long enemy blockade, and in commemoration of the
20th anniversary of the victory of the Soviet people in the Great
Patriotic War of 1941-1945.
Order of Lenin (January 26, 1945)
"for the outstanding services of the working people of Leningrad to
the Motherland, for the courage and heroism, discipline and
steadfastness shown in the fight against the German invaders in the
difficult conditions of the enemy blockade."
Order of Lenin (June
21, 1957) "for the outstanding services of the working people of
Leningrad to the Motherland, for the courage and heroism they showed
during the days of the Great October Socialist Revolution and in the
struggle against the Nazi invaders in the Great Patriotic War, for
the successes achieved in the development of industry and culture,
in the development and mastering of new technology, in connection
with the 250th anniversary of the city of Leningrad.
Order of the
October Revolution (November 4, 1967) "for the outstanding services
of the working people of Leningrad in the revolutionary movement, in
the Great October Socialist Revolution and the great contribution to
the formation and strengthening of Soviet power, for the courage and
heroism shown in battles with the enemies of the Soviet state, for
success in building communism.
Order of the Red Banner of the
RSFSR (December 5, 1919) "for the heroism and selflessness of the
Petrograd proletariat, for the defense of Petrograd during the Civil
War."
Winner of the World Travel Awards for Best European City
Destination in 2015, 2016 and 2017
State power in the city is exercised on the basis of the Charter,
which was adopted by the Legislative Assembly on January 14, 1998.
The highest official is the governor, elected by citizens of the
Russian Federation residing in the territory of St. Petersburg and
possessing active suffrage in accordance with federal law, on the
basis of universal, equal and direct suffrage by secret ballot for a
term of 5 years. Since September 2019, Alexander Beglov has been
elected governor of St. Petersburg. Executive power in the city is
exercised by the Government, headed by the governor, and other
executive bodies of state power of St. Petersburg, which make up the
system of executive bodies of state power of the city - the
Administration of the city of St. Petersburg. The government is
located in the building of the Smolny Institute.
Legislative
power in the city is exercised by the Legislative Assembly, which
consists of 50 deputies elected by the inhabitants of the city under
a proportional system for a term of 5 years. In September 2021, the
Legislative Assembly of the seventh convocation was formed, in which
there are six factions: United Russia (29 seats (was 36)), Communist
Party of the Russian Federation (7 (3)), Just Russia (5 (3)), LDPR (
3 (3)), New people (3 (0)), Yabloko (2 (2)) and 1 self-nominated.
The Chairman of the Legislative Assembly is Alexander Belsky (since
September 2021). It is located in the Mariinsky Palace. To organize
and exercise control over the execution of the city budget, the
expenditure of extra-budgetary funds, the Chamber of Control and
Accounts of the city of St. Petersburg was created. Judicial power
is exercised by the Statutory Court of the city of St. Petersburg
and justices of the peace.
There are also councils of
deputies of municipalities, elections for which took place in 2014
and 2019.
The main revenue sources of the St. Petersburg budget include: corporate income tax (26%), personal income tax (45.7%), excises (4.4%), corporate property tax (6.9%) , income from the use of state and municipal property (3.6%). Main expenditure items: national economy (24.61%), education (24.07%), healthcare (16.34%), social policy (12.48%), housing and communal services (10.21%), national questions (4.86%), culture and cinematography (3.80%), physical culture and sports (1.37%). The state debt of St. Petersburg as of March 1, 2021 is 85 billion rubles.
The city has consulates general of 35 countries, three honorary general consulates, 25 honorary consulates, representative offices of international organizations: the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly of the CIS Member States, a representative office of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, a branch of the Eurasian Development Bank, the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly of the Eurasian Economic Community; representative offices of 28 subjects of the Russian Federation; registered 17 national-cultural autonomies, 51 national-cultural associations, 20 communities.
The historical coat of arms of St. Petersburg, approved in 1730,
confirmed in 1780, supplemented in 1857, never canceled and
re-introduced in 1991, is the oldest and main official symbol of the
city. The modern flag was adopted on June 8, 1992 and entered into
the State Heraldic Register of the Russian Federation with
registration number 49. The emblem and flag of St. Petersburg depict
a scepter as a symbol of the capital and imperial power, a sea
anchor as a symbol of a sea port and a river anchor as a symbol of a
river port . The emblem of the Vatican, as the city of St. Peter,
served as a prototype. The flag of St. Petersburg is the official
symbol of the constituent entity of the Russian Federation, denoting
its constitutional and legal status, the unity of the inhabitants of
St. Petersburg, and the cultural heritage of St. Petersburg. Adopted
on June 8, 1992, nine months after the release of the relevant
decision.
The anthem of St. Petersburg is one of the symbols
of the city (music: "Hymn to the Great City" from the ballet "The
Bronze Horseman" by Reinhold Gliere, revised by Grigory Korchmar,
lyrics by Oleg Chuprov). It was fully approved on May 13, 2003.
According to Article 7 of the Charter of St. Petersburg, the
historical symbols of the city are the ship on the spire of the
Admiralty, the monument "The Bronze Horseman", an angel on the spire
of the Peter and Paul Cathedral. According to Article 8 of the
Charter of St. Petersburg, the tradition is the midday cannon shot
of a signal gun from the Naryshkin bastion of the Peter and Paul
Fortress.
In addition to all-Russian and international holidays, the following
city holidays and memorable dates are celebrated in St. Petersburg:
January 14 - Day of the Charter of St. Petersburg (adopted in 1998);
January 18 - Day of breaking the blockade of Leningrad (in 1943);
January 27 - Day of the complete liberation of Leningrad from the
fascist blockade (in 1944);
February 10 - Memorial Day of
Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin (the day the poet died in 1837);
May
27 - City Day - Day of the foundation of St. Petersburg (in 1703);
June 5 - Day of breaking through the naval mine blockade of
Leningrad (in 1946; celebrated since 2006);
June 9 - Birthday of
Peter the Great (in 1672);
June 14 - Memorial Day of the Holy
Righteous John of Kronstadt;
June 20th - Holiday of graduates of
St. Petersburg schools "Scarlet Sails" (celebrated from 1968 to 1979
and since 2005);
July 1 - Restorer's Day (celebrated since 2006);
July 12 - Day of the Holy Primate Apostles Peter and Paul;
August
15 - Day of Ladoga, the first capital of Rus', the predecessor of
St. Petersburg (founded in 753);
September 8 - Day of Remembrance
of the Victims of the Blockade (the beginning of the blockade of
Leningrad in 1941);
September 10 - Day of St. Petersburg Industry
(celebrated since 2016);
September 12 - Day of the transfer of
the relics of the holy noble prince Alexander Nevsky to St.
Petersburg (1724) - the day of the Nishtad peace (1721);
October
30 - Shipbuilder's Day (celebrated since 2014).
Population: 5,598,486 (2023) people St. Petersburg is the second
most populated city in Russia and the fourth city in Europe; as well
as the second largest city in Europe (after Istanbul) in terms of
population, which is not the capital of the state, the center of the
St. Petersburg urban agglomeration. It is the northernmost
millionaire city in the world. According to preliminary data from
the 2020-2021 All-Russian Population Census, as of October 1, 2021,
the population of St. Petersburg was about 5.6 million inhabitants.
At the same time, the Committee on Labor and Employment of St.
Petersburg made an estimate of the resident population based on big
data technologies, this estimate for October 2021 amounted to about
7 million people.
In 1990, the population of the city
exceeded 5 million people, but from the early 1990s to 2007, there
was a steady depopulation. In 2007, the population was only
4,568,047. Since 2009, there has been an increase in population, but
until 2012 it was noted due to the excess of migration growth over
natural decline. As a result, from 2002 to 2010, the population
growth amounted to slightly more than 4% (from 4661.2 to 4879.6
thousand). According to the Federal State Statistics Service of the
Russian Federation for 2010, the birth rate was 12.0 per thousand,
the death rate: 14.2 per thousand. According to the results of the
All-Russian census of 2010, the population was 4,879,566 people, of
which 45.6% were men and 54.4% were women (i.e., there are 1,194
women per 1,000 men).
The first place among the districts of
the city in terms of population is occupied by the Primorsky
district: 507.2 thousand people. The life expectancy of
Petersburgers in 2007 was 64 years for men and 75 years for women
(these figures are one year higher than in 2006). As of 2008, 1
million 100 thousand out of 4 million 571 thousand of the total
population of the city are pensioners (of which 55% are disabled).
At that time, the city had 139,000 residents aged 80 to 90, 13,400
residents aged 90 and over, and 188 residents over 100 years old.
According to the 2021 All-Russian Population Census,
representatives of more than 170 nationalities and nationalities
live in St. Petersburg: Russians - 3 million 949 thousand people
(92% of the total population that indicated their nationality),
Ukrainians - 87 thousand people (2%), Belarusians - 54 thousand
people (1.27%), Jews - 37 thousand people (0.85%), Tatars - 36
thousand people (0.83%), Armenians - 19 thousand people (0.45%),
Azerbaijanis - 16.6 thousand people (0.39%), Georgians - 10.1
thousand people (0.24%), Chuvash - 6 thousand people (0.14%), Poles
- 4.5 thousand people (0.10%), Finns - 4 thousand people (0.09%),
Koreans - 3.9 thousand people (0.09%), Germans - 3.8 thousand people
(0.09%). There are 1,218 women per 1,000 men in the city, 60.2% of
the total population are of working age (972 women per 1,000 men),
13.9% are younger than the disabled (953 women per 1,000 men), and
25.9 are older than the disabled. % (per 1,000 men - 2,482 women).
For every 1,000 people of working age, there are 660 people of
non-working age. 34% of the population of the city, over 15 years
old and who indicated their education, have higher education (of
which 3% are candidates of science and 0.69% are doctors of
science), 11.8% have secondary education, 1.2% have no education ,
828 people are illiterate. The registered unemployment rate in July
2022 was 1.4% of the labor force. The average nominal salary accrued
in March 2022 amounted to 89,679 rubles. The subsistence minimum per
capita for 2022, established by the Decree of the Government of St.
Petersburg of December 19, 2022, amounted to 16,160.2 rubles.
As of 2022, 49 residents of the city were awarded the title of
Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg, two of them posthumously. The
Mariinsky Palace houses a portrait gallery of honorary citizens of
the city.
According to various sociological surveys, more than half of the
residents of St. Petersburg "believe in God" (up to 67% according to
VTsIOM data for 2002). Among believers, the vast majority are
Orthodox (57%), the second largest are Muslims, followed by
Protestants and Catholics. Of the non-Abrahamic religions, Buddhists
and a few others are represented. In total, there are 268
communities of confessions and religious associations in the city:
the Russian Orthodox Church (131 associations), Evangelical
Christians (23 associations), the Evangelical Lutheran Church (19
associations), Evangelical Baptist Christians (13 associations), as
well as Old Believers, Roman -Catholic Church, Armenian Apostolic
Church, Seventh Day Adventist Church, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim,
Baha'i and others.
In total, 229 religious buildings in the
city are owned or run by religious associations. Among them are
architectural monuments of federal significance: St. Isaac's
Cathedral, Kazan Cathedral, Sampson Cathedral, Smolny Cathedral,
Peter and Paul Cathedral, Nikolo-Bogoyavlensky Naval Cathedral, St.
Vladimir Cathedral, St. Sophia Cathedral, Trinity-Izmailovsky
Cathedral, Feodorovsky (Sovereign) Cathedral, Cathedral of the
Savior on Spilled Blood, Trinity Cathedral of the Alexander Nevsky
Lavra, Orthodox monasteries (Alexander Nevsky Lavra, Ioannovsky
Stauropegial Convent, Resurrection Novodevichy Monastery, Holy
Trinity St. Sergius Seaside Hermitage), Armenian Apostolic Church of
St. Catherine, Catholic Church of St. Catherine of Alexandria,
Catholic Monastery of St. Anthony the Wonderworker, Lutheran Church
of Saints Peter and Paul, Dutch Reformed Church, Cathedral and
Cathedral Mosque, Great Choral Synagogue, Buddhist datsan and
others. The oldest church in the city is the Peter and Paul
Cathedral (1733), and the largest is the Kazan Cathedral (1811).
The St. Petersburg Theological Academy and the St. Petersburg
Theological Seminary of the Russian Orthodox Church, the Catholic
Higher Theological Seminary "Mary - Queen of the Apostles" operate
in the city. The relics of Saints Alexander Nevsky, John of
Kronstadt, Xenia of Petersburg are kept in St. Petersburg.
St. Petersburg is one of the most important economic centers of the
Russian Federation.
The gross regional product (GRP) of the city
in 2015, according to Rosstat, amounted to 3.024 trillion rubles (in
2013 - 2.491 trillion rubles). The main types of economic activity
are (in brackets - the share in GRP for 2014):
wholesale and
retail trade, repair of motor vehicles, motorcycles, household and
personal items (21.5%);
manufacturing industries (19.9%);
operations with real estate, rent and provision of services (19.3%);
transport and communications (11.8%);
health and social services
(6%)
The financial market of the city is the second largest
regional financial market in Russia. The St. Petersburg Currency
Exchange, St. Petersburg Commodity Exchange, PJSC St. Petersburg
Exchange, St. Petersburg International Commodity and Raw Materials
Exchange operate in the city. 31 banks are registered in the city
(the largest ones are VTB, Rossiya, St. Petersburg, Tavrichesky,
Baltinvestbank) and representative offices of more than 100 banks in
other regions.
According to Mercer, in 2017 St. Petersburg ranks
176th out of 231 in the world ranking of the quality of life in
cities.
About 2.8 trillion rubles were attracted to the
economy of St. Petersburg in 2012-2017. Now there are 2.5 thousand
investment projects in the city at one stage or another.
According to the results of the first half of 2021, St. Petersburg
ranked 445th in the ranking of the most expensive cities in the
world to live in according to the Numbeo consulting agency, and in
2022 - 279th, thus overtaking Moscow, which took 287th place.
The industry is based on over 700 large and medium-sized
enterprises, as well as over 20,000 small enterprises. In 2016, the
volume of shipped products by the city's industry amounted to
2,340.5 billion rubles, which is 6.9% higher than the previous year.
In the structure of shipped products, 30% are vehicles, machines and
various types of equipment, 15.7% are food products, including
drinks, and tobacco, 5.7% are metallurgy products and finished metal
products.
The basis of industry: heavy industry. The city has
such shipbuilding enterprises as Admiralty Shipyards (ships for the
Navy, tankers, submarines), Sredne-Nevsky Shipyard (boats,
minesweepers for the Navy), Baltiysky Zavod (vessels for the
Morflot, icebreakers), Severnaya Verf (ships for the Navy and
Morflot). Mechanical engineering enterprises operate: Compressor
(compressor equipment, oil and gas equipment), Leningrad Metal Plant
(steam, gas and hydraulic turbines), Electrosila (electric machines,
generators), Electropult plant (electrical equipment), Sevkabel
(power cables, copper rolling), Kirovsky Zavod (tractors, metal
products, agricultural machinery), Arsenal (space satellites,
artillery installations, compressor stations), Izhora Plants
(rolling equipment, special equipment, nuclear reactors), "Leninets"
(equipment for aviation and weapons, radio-electronic equipment),
"Svetlana" (X-ray tubes, radio-electronic equipment, components),
LOMO (optical devices) and others. Transport engineering is
developed: Vagonmash (passenger cars for railways and electric cars
for the subway), automobile plants of Ford, Toyota, General Motors,
Scania, Nissan, Hyundai Motor and MAN. For 9 months of 2016, 25% of
new cars sold in Russia were assembled in the city. A significant
volume of industrial production is formed by enterprises in the
armaments industry. The city has developed ferrous (Izhora pipe
plant of the Severstal company) and non-ferrous metallurgy (Krasny
Vyborzhets), chemical industry (VMP-Neva), light industry, printing
industry.
Among the largest enterprises in the food industry:
the plant of the Baltika brewing company (beer, soft drinks, mineral
waters), the Heineken brewery, the Stepan Razin Brewery, the Moscow
District Bakery (bakery, farinaceous confectionery products, owned
by Fazer), the Krupskaya Factory ( sweets and chocolate), Parnas-M
meat processing plant (sausages, canned meat and semi-finished
products), Kirov's Mill (cereals, flour), Petmol dairy plant (owned
by Danone), Polyustrovo mineral water plant, meat processing plants,
enterprises for the production of confectionery, fish products and
many others.
The number of employees of industrial
enterprises according to operational statistical reporting for 2018
amounted to 346.9 thousand people (99.8% compared to 2017), the
average monthly wage of workers in industry was 65.4 thousand rubles
(109.7% compared to 2017 ).
The retail trade turnover in 2016 amounted to 1215.6 billion rubles,
which is 1.5% less than in the previous year. In the structure of
turnover, food products (including drinks and tobacco products) in
2016 accounted for 36%, non-food products - 64%. In 2016, paid
services were provided to the population for 417 billion rubles. The
consumer market of St. Petersburg provides employment for one fifth
of the population employed in the urban economy and accounts for one
fifth of the gross domestic product. It includes about 15.9 thousand
retail trade enterprises (including more than 6.5 thousand trade
enterprises selling everyday food products to the population), 6.8
thousand - public catering, more than 8.5 thousand - consumer
services. The city has 171 small retail trade complexes, 22 markets
(of which 16 are specialized in the sale of agricultural products).
Retail chains are represented in St. Petersburg: international
(Auchan, K-Ruoka, Spar, Metro, Prisma), federal (OK, Lenta, Dixy,
Magnit, as well as Pyaterochka, Karusel and Perekrestok, owned by X5
Retail Group), interregional (7I family, True, Norma, Idea, Net,
Azbuka Vkusa, Polushka), local (Season, Lime, Land, RioMag, Smart,
Real) and others. The share of large retail chains in retail
turnover is 76%.
St. Petersburg is one of the cities that
determine the development of the country's media space; the print
market of the Northern capital is characterized by high quantitative
and qualitative indicators. More than 100 newspapers (one-time
circulation of about 10 million copies) and 150 magazines (over 7
million copies) are published here. The approximate annual volume of
sales of periodicals in the city is 185 million copies: 132 million
copies are sold at retail and 53 million by subscription. The head
office of the federal television Channel Five is located in St.
Petersburg. In addition, regional TV channels "Channel 78", "St.
Petersburg" broadcast in the city. There are also a number of
regional television studios: the Leningrad Regional Television
Company, NTV-Petersburg, STS-Petersburg, TNT-Petersburg.
In 2016, construction work in the amount of 409.3 billion rubles was
completed in the city, 3116.3 thousand m² of housing was put into
operation.
In 2016, the volume of investments in fixed assets
amounted to 582.3 billion rubles. The credit rating of St.
Petersburg is: Long-term credit rating on the international scale in
foreign currency Fitch Ratings: ВВВ- (stable) (date of the last
rating change October 2016), Moody's Investors Service rating
agency: Ва1 (stable) (February 2017 ). The largest investor
countries in St. Petersburg in 2013 were Germany, Kazakhstan, the
Republic of Korea, the Virgin Islands, Sweden, Cyprus, Austria, the
Netherlands, Great Britain, Finland, Switzerland, Belarus.
In
2012, St. Petersburg took 2nd place in the urban environment quality
rating compiled by the Ministry of Regional Development of the
Russian Federation, the Russian Union of Engineers, the Federal
Agency for Construction and Housing and Communal Services, the
Federal Service for Supervision of Consumer Rights Protection and
Human Welfare, as well as Moscow State University. M. V. Lomonosov.
A significant role in the economy is played by the tourism business
associated with the reception of guests from Russia and foreign
countries, as well as the related economic activity in the service
sector. The city has a significant historical and cultural heritage
for the formation of a tourist product, for the transformation of
tourism into the basic branch of the city's economy. According to
the results of 2012, St. Petersburg took the 10th place (in 2010 -
the 7th place) among the most visited and popular among tourists
cities in Europe.
In 2018, about 8.5 million tourists visited
St. Petersburg (in 2017 - 7.5 million), including Russian tourists -
5.5 million people, foreign tourists - 4.9 million people. In 2016,
there were 6.9 million tourists (the number of foreign citizens who
arrived in the city through the checkpoints of the Northwestern
Federal District in 2016 amounted to 2847.2 thousand people, mainly
tourists from Finland, Germany, the USA, Sweden and France) . The
city has more than 260 large and small hotels with 27,000 rooms
(including the Grand Hotel Europe, Astoria, Corinthia St.
Petersburg, Pribaltiyskaya, Pulkovskaya, St. Moscow”, “Russia”,
“Oktyabrskaya”, “Azimut Hotel St. Petersburg” and others), boarding
houses. With the commissioning of a new sea passenger port in the
west of Vasilyevsky Island and the abolition of the visa regime for
short-term visits of tourists, the city becomes one of the centers
of cruise tourism in Europe. In 2016, the northern capital was
visited by 457 thousand cruise tourists (209 ship calls).
In
December 2016, St. Petersburg received the prestigious World Travel
Awards in the World’s Leading Cultural City Destination 2016
nomination, which was called the “Tourist Capital of the World” in
Russian-language sources.
The enterprise engaged in water supply and sewerage in the city is
the State Unitary Enterprise Vodokanal of St. Petersburg. The main
source of water supply is the Neva River. More than 96% of the water
is taken from it, which is processed at the 5 largest waterworks:
the Main, Northern, Southern, Volkovskaya waterworks, water
treatment facilities of the city of Kolpino. On June 26, 2009, St.
Petersburg became the first metropolis in which all drinking water
is treated with ultraviolet light and which completely abandoned the
use of liquid chlorine for water disinfection. There are 21 sewage
treatment plants in the city, the largest of them are the Central
and Northern aeration stations, as well as the South-Western
treatment facilities, and there are three sewage sludge
incinerators. Waste water has been treated since 1979. By the end of
2008, St. Petersburg cleans 91.7% of wastewater. In October 2013,
with the commissioning of the Main Sewer Collector in the northern
part of the city, 98.4% of the city's wastewater is treated (93% in
2010). In 2016, the average daily supply of drinking water to
consumers amounted to 1,597 thousand m³, costs and losses during
water transportation - 12%, the average daily volume of wastewater
treated at sewage treatment plants amounted to 2.2 million m³ / day.
The heat supply system includes 8 TGC-1 CHPPs, 3 departmental
CHPPs, 377 boiler houses of TEK SPb, 48 boiler houses of
Lenteplosnab, 140 boiler houses of Peterburgteploenergo, 28 boiler
houses of Peterburgenergosbyt, 179 departmental boiler houses. The
length of heating networks is more than 6000 km. The city has 118
high-voltage substations with a total capacity of more than 15,000
megawatts. The main type of boiler and furnace fuel in the municipal
economy is natural gas (its share is 94%), the rest is fuel oil and
coal. The largest heat and power generating enterprises of the city
are owned by TGC-1: Central CHPP, Pravoberezhnaya CHPP No. 5,
Vyborgskaya CHPP No. 17, Severnaya CHPP No. 21, Pervomayskaya CHPP
No. 14, Yuzhnaya CHPP No. 22, Avtovskaya CHPP No. 15
As of January 2012, the system of preschool education consisted of
1,054 kindergartens and nurseries. Almost all of them, with the
exception of a few private establishments, are on the balance sheet
of the municipality. There are 690 general educational institutions
in the city, of which 609 schools, including 135 with in-depth study
of subjects, 72 gymnasiums, 45 lyceums, 21 evening schools, 40
correctional schools, 8 boarding schools, 19 special schools, 58
institutions of additional education for children, 48 institutions
primary and secondary vocational education. Among them, we note the
Academy of Russian Ballet. A. Ya. Vaganova, the St. Petersburg
Musical College named after M. P. Mussorgsky, from military
institutions the St. Petersburg Suvorov Military School, the
Nakhimov Naval School, the Military Space Cadet Corps of Peter the
Great, the Naval Cadet Corps and others are known.
56 public
and 45 private higher educational institutions are based in St.
Petersburg, including such well-known ones as St. Petersburg State
University, St. Petersburg State University of Architecture and
Civil Engineering, St. Petersburg State Medical University named
after academician I. P. Pavlov, St. Emperor Alexander I State
University of Communications, St. Petersburg State Marine Technical
University, St. Petersburg State University of Telecommunications
named after Professor M.A. Bonch-Bruevich, St. Petersburg State
Polytechnic University, St. Petersburg State Technological Institute
(Technical University), St. Petersburg State Electrotechnical
University, St. Petersburg State University of Economics, St.
Petersburg State Mining Institute, St. Petersburg National Research
University of Information Technologies, Mechanics and Optics,
Russian State Pedagogical University named after A. I. Herzen, St.
Petersburg State Forestry Engineering University, St. Petersburg
State Institute of Cinema and Television and others. A number of
military higher educational institutions operate in the city: A. F.
Mozhaisky Military Space Academy, S. M. Kirov Military Medical
Academy, Mikhailovskaya Military Artillery Academy, St. Petersburg
Naval Institute, Military Engineering and Technical University , St.
Petersburg Higher Military School of Radio Electronics, St.
Petersburg Institute of the FSB of Russia and others.
St.
Petersburg is one of the largest scientific and educational centers
in Russia, where more than 10% of the country's scientific potential
is located: more than 350 scientific organizations, including 70
organizations of the Russian Academy of Sciences and other state
academies, employing 170 thousand researchers, including 9 thousand
doctors of science and 26 thousand candidates of science. In terms
of the number of people employed in the scientific and educational
sphere as part of the total population of the city, the city ranks
second in the Russian Federation. It houses the St. Petersburg
Scientific Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which unites
over 60 academic institutes and other research institutions;
numerous research institutes. On the southern outskirts is the Main
(Pulkovo) Astronomical Observatory of the Russian Academy of
Sciences.
Most healthcare institutions in St. Petersburg are part of the
system of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation and are
divided into four groups: subordinate to the Committee on Health of
St. Petersburg, federal institutions of the Ministry of Health of
the Russian Federation, federal institutions of the FMBA and
institutions of the Leningrad Region located within the city. The
Health Committee of the Government of St. Petersburg is the
executive body of state power for the implementation of the city's
health policy. In addition to the institutions included in the
system of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation, the city
has health care institutions of other departments, as well as
non-state institutions.
There are 106 outpatient clinics, 33
dental clinics, 44 dispensaries of various profiles, 83 inpatient
medical institutions, 24 hospitals, 57 ambulance stations in the
city. Among them, the Military Medical Academy named after S. M.
Kirov, the Alexander Hospital, the hospital for war veterans, the
city psychiatric hospitals named after Kashchenko, St. Nicholas the
Wonderworker, the Botkin Clinical Infectious Diseases Hospital, the
Research Institute of Influenza, the Ott Research Institute of
Obstetrics and Gynecology, the Children's Hospital named after
Rauhfus, Children's Clinical Hospital named after Filatov and
others. Since 2005, the national priority project "Health" has been
implemented, which provides for the modernization of the urban
healthcare system.
As of 2015, the level of healthcare in the
city remains the best in Russia in a number of indicators, and it
also has the lowest mortality rate in the country. Since 2012, there
has been an active modernization of medical equipment and a program
to improve the quality of medical examinations of the population, a
program to improve the living conditions of medical workers.
In 2011, the crime rate in St. Petersburg was 1,218 registered
crimes per 100,000 inhabitants (122nd place among Russian cities), a
decrease of 13.6% compared to 2010. In 2021, the crime detection
rate was 41% and its share has been declining in recent years. The
number of grave and especially grave crimes is decreasing, their
share in the total number of registered crimes was 31.8%. The level
of street crime is decreasing (16.9%), the proportion of crimes
related to drug trafficking is decreasing (12%). The share of thefts
from dwellings and objects of various forms of ownership is
decreasing (36.4% of the total number of crimes in the city). Among
other registered crimes in the city: fraud - 49%, with growth rates
of up to 200% for some articles and very low detection, sometimes up
to 20%. The highest percentage of detection (more than 90%) for
banditry, murder, rape, causing serious harm, bribery, robbery, the
lowest (less than 10%) - fraud. According to the results of surveys
of city residents, the general unsatisfactory assessment of the work
of law enforcement agencies remains.
On the territory of the
city there are 4 detention centers (including the famous "Crosses"),
4 correctional colonies and 1 educational colony (Kolpino).
Saint-Petersburg is a cultural center of world importance, it is
often called the "Cultural Capital" of Russia. The city has 8464
objects of cultural heritage (monuments of history and culture),
including 4213 objects of cultural heritage of federal significance,
which is almost 10% of all monuments protected by the state on the
territory of the Russian Federation.
There are more than 200
museums (see Museums of St. Petersburg) and their branches
(including the Hermitage (about three million works of art and
monuments of world culture), the Russian Museum (the largest museum
of Russian art), the Central Naval Museum, the Museum of the Academy
of Arts of Russia, Museum of Urban Sculpture, Museum of the History
of St. Petersburg, Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography named
after Peter the Great (Kunstkamera), "Museum-Institute of the
Roerich Family", palace and park museums-reserves of Peterhof,
Oranienbaum, Tsarskoye Selo, Pavlovsk, Art Center "Pushkinskaya,
10", the Erarta Museum of Contemporary Art, the All-Russian Museum
of A. S. Pushkin, the Museum of Defense and Siege of Leningrad and
others); exhibition complex "Lenexpo"; more than 70 theaters
(including the Mariinsky Theatre, the Alexandrinsky Theatre, the
Mikhailovsky Theatre, the Bolshoi Drama Theater named after G. A.
Tovstonogov, the St. Petersburg Academic Comedy Theater named after
N. P. Akimov, the Maly Drama Theater (Theater of Europe), the St.
Petersburg Academic the Lensoviet Theatre, the Baltic House, the
Academic Drama Theater named after V. F. Komissarzhevskaya, the
clownery theater Litsedei, the Great St. Petersburg State Circus and
many others); 1,100 libraries (the largest among them are the
Russian National Library (Public), the Library of the Russian
Academy of Sciences, the B. N. Yeltsin Presidential Library); more
than 50 cultural and leisure institutions; more than 50 cinemas.
There are several creative universities in St. Petersburg: the St.
Petersburg Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory, the Vaganova Academy of
Russian Ballet, the Russian State Institute of Performing Arts, the
Repin St. Petersburg Institute of Painting, Sculpture and
Architecture, the St. Stieglitz Industrial Academy, St. Petersburg
Roerich Art School, St. Petersburg State Film and Television
Institute.
There are about 10 film studios in the city, among
them, the oldest "Lenfilm", "Lennauchfilm".
In 2011, almost
1000 exhibitions, more than 120 premieres, almost 300 festivals were
held in St. Petersburg, among them: the Mariinsky International
Ballet Festival, the Stars of the White Nights International Arts
Festival, the Arts Square International Winter Festival,
International Ballet Festival "Dance Open", International Music
Festival "Palaces of St. Petersburg", International Jazz Festival
"White Night Swing", International Festival of Arts "From the
Avant-Garde to the Present Day", International Film Festival
"Festival of Festivals", International Biker Festival in Olgino ,
the international theater festival "Baltic House", the international
competition-festival of children's and youth creativity "Childhood
Holiday".
From 1981 to the early 1990s, the Leningrad Rock
Club operated in Leningrad, which marked the beginning of the
legalization of the city's rock bands. The groups "Picnic",
"Aquarium", "Zoo", "Myths" participated in the organization of the
club, and later the groups "Auktyon", "Kino", "Alisa",
"Pop-mechanics", "DDT" took part in its work , "Zero" and many
others. Now the club-museum of Viktor Tsoi "Kamchatka" operates in
the city, the singer's grave at the Theological Cemetery is a place
of pilgrimage for his admirers.
On May 26, 2013, during the
celebration of the 310th anniversary of the founding of the city, a
mass performance of songs about St. Petersburg took place. 4335
people on St. Isaac's Square, accompanied by a symphony orchestra,
sang 14 songs for an hour. The event may enter the Guinness Book of
Records.
In 1990, the historical center of St. Petersburg and the palace and
park ensembles of the suburbs were included in the list of UNESCO
World Heritage Sites. About 8 thousand architectural monuments are
under state protection. In 2005, the St. Petersburg Strategy for the
Preservation of Cultural Heritage was adopted. The majestic
appearance of the city is determined by architectural ensembles,
strict straight streets, spacious squares, gardens and parks, rivers
and numerous canals, embankments, bridges, patterned fences,
monumental and decorative sculptures. Architectural ensembles of the
18th-20th centuries: the Peter and Paul Fortress, the Alexander
Nevsky Lavra, the Smolny Institute, Palace Square with the Winter
Palace, the Admiralty, Nevsky Prospekt, the Spit of Vasilevsky
Island with the Exchange building, Senate Square with a monument to
Peter I, Architect Rossi Street and Ostrovsky Square, Arts Square,
St. Isaac's Square and, formed in the 20th century, Vosstaniya
Square.
The rapid development of St. Petersburg has become a
challenge to the traditional idea of a city with a long history,
which grows and develops slowly. Peter I conceived the city on the
model of Venice and Amsterdam: instead of streets paved with stone,
the city was to be covered with a network of canals along which
residents would move on light ships. Although Peter's dream was not
destined to come true, it was foreign experience that formed the
basis for further development. The author of the first master plan
of the city in 1716 was the Italian architect Domenico Trezzini:
straight perpendicular streets, wide "avenues" became a
characteristic feature of the new capital. Such a layout is visible
on the example of Vasilyevsky Island and the "trident": Admiralty -
Nevsky Prospekt, Gorokhovaya Street, Voznesensky Prospekt. Almost
all the buildings in the central part of the city appeared later,
but geometrically defined squares and streets have determined the
appearance of the city to this day. The decisive role in this was
played by the personality of Peter I, he personally chose the site
of Nevsky Prospekt, the Admiralty, the Peter and Paul Fortress, and
introduced strict urban planning discipline. All buildings,
according to his decree, were to be built of stone (at the same
time, in all other cities of Russia it was forbidden to use stone as
the main building material). In those days, the Petrine Baroque
style became widespread, represented by the Italians D. Trezzini, J.
M. Fontana, N. Michetti, the Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Leblon, the
Germans A. Schluter, G. Mattarnovi, and the Russian M. Zemtsov. The
city has preserved several buildings built in this style: the Peter
and Paul Fortress with the Peter and Paul Cathedral, the Summer
Palace, the Kunstkamera, the building of the Twelve Colleges, the
Menshikov Palace. In the middle of the 18th century, the Elizabethan
Baroque style, represented by the architects F. B. Rastrelli (Winter
Palace, Smolny Monastery, Great Peterhof Palace in Peterhof, Great
Catherine Palace in Tsarskoye Selo) and S. I. Chevakinsky (St.
Nicholas Naval Cathedral) began to prevail.
In 1844, Emperor
Nicholas I issued a decree prohibiting the construction of civil
buildings in the city above the eaves of the Winter Palace. Since
the second half of the 18th century, classicism has become
predominant in the architecture of the city. The main architects of
this style: V.I. Bazhenov (Mikhailovsky Castle), J.-B.
Vallin-Delamot (the building of the Academy of Arts, the Great
Gostiny Dvor), A. Rinaldi (Marble Palace), I. E. Starov (Tauride
Palace, Trinity Cathedral of the Alexander Nevsky Lavra), G.
Quarenghi (building of the Smolny Institute, Alexander Palace in
Tsarskoe Sele), C. Cameron (Pavlovsk Palace); and later (from the
beginning of the 19th century) its variety, the Russian Empire
style: A. N. Voronikhin (Kazan Cathedral), A. D. Zakharov (Main
Admiralty), J. Thomas de Thomon (Spit of Vasilyevsky Island), K. I
Rossi (Mikhailovsky Palace, the building of the General Staff, the
Alexandrinsky Theater, the building of the Senate and the Synod), V.
P. Stasov (The Transfiguration Cathedral, the Trinity-Izmailovsky
Cathedral), O. Montferrand (St. Isaac's Cathedral). In the middle of
the 19th century, eclecticism began to prevail in architecture: A.
I. Shtakenshneider (Mariinsky Palace, the Beloselsky-Belozersky
Palace), A. P. Bryullov (Lutheran Church of Saints Peter and Paul),
K. A. Ton (the building of the Moscow Station), A. A. Parland
(Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood). From the middle of the
century, the construction of new embankments and bridges began, and
a large construction of tenement houses was going on. It was during
this period that Liteiny, Vladimirsky and Zagorodny avenues were
formed.
At the beginning of the 20th century, buildings in
the Art Nouveau style appeared in the city, including the house of
the Singer company, the Eliseevsky store, the Astoria hotel, and the
Vitebsk railway station. During this period, the decoration of
tenement houses, private mansions and public buildings with
stained-glass windows became widespread. Next came the neoclassical
style (“House with towers” on Lev Tolstoy Square), which was
replaced from the 1920s by constructivism (A. Stachek Avenue,
Kalinin Square, the station of the first stage of the Leningrad
Metro). Since 1923, housing construction began in new areas on the
principle of integrated development (“Zhilmassivy”). From the
beginning of the 1960s, the mass construction of "Khrushchev" began,
and from the 1970s, "house-ships". At the same time, buildings built
according to individual projects appeared: the Yubileiny Sports
Palace, the Victory Square Ensemble, the Pribaltiyskaya Hotel, the
sports and concert complex named after. V. I. Lenin, the building of
Pulkovo airport.
Recently, buildings in the historical center
have been demolished: the barracks of the Preobrazhensky Regiment
(one of the oldest in Russia) and the engineer battalion (Kirochnaya
Street), 5 houses on Nevsky Prospekt, an 18th-century building and
the interiors of the Chicherin House, several houses on Vosstaniya
Street and Liteiny Prospekt, a house on Voznesensky Prospekt, a
number of buildings on the Petrograd side and more. Some of the
demolished houses had the official status of architectural
monuments. In 2008, changes in legislation came into force, which
lifted the ban on the privatization of monuments of federal
significance, which had been in force in Russia since 2002. This
list of privatization may include about 650 buildings of the city,
which are still on the federal list of protection.
In the era of classicism, the Russian Empire promoted the solemn,
major image of St. Petersburg as an ideal city, born against the
elements in accordance with the rational plans of the enlighteners.
In Europe, Catherine II gained the reputation of Northern Semiramis,
while St. Petersburg was called the Northern Palmyra. Court poets
sang it in odes, landscape painters of the circle of Fyodor Alekseev
created vedus with views of endless avenues and squares, where staff
figures of people are lost against the backdrop of grandiose
buildings.
A. S. Pushkin in The Bronze Horseman (1833)
created the image of St. Petersburg as a speculatively constructed
space, the fruit of the rationalism of the Enlightenment, erected in
the swamps at the behest of the monarch at the cost of countless
human lives and therefore hostile to the feelings and happiness of
“little people”. In Gogol's Petersburg Tales, "everything is wet,
smooth, even, pale, grey, foggy"; the author paints the capital of
the empire with impressionistic strokes as “a place of revelry of
diabolical forces hostile to man, under which unsteady soil always
moves, threatening to suck in majestic, but cold buildings, and
soulless government departments, and filling them with many
unfortunate little officials” (S. Volkov ).
In addition to
Gogol, his Slavophile friends of Moscow origin took up arms against
Petersburg: “The first condition for freeing the captive feeling of
nationality in oneself is to hate Petersburg with all one’s heart
and all one’s thoughts,” wrote, for example, I. S. Aksakov. The
heroes of N. A. Nekrasov and F. M. Dostoevsky sent their curses to
the stone masses of the royal capital - a labyrinth of front
entrances and tenement houses not intended for life behind a veil of
unhealthy fumes and eternal fogs. The hero of his novel "The
Teenager" argues:
A hundred times in the midst of this fog, a
strange, but haunting dream was asked to me: “What, how will this
fog scatter and go up, will not this whole rotten, slimy city go
away with it, rise with the fog and disappear like smoke, and the
former Finnish swamp, and in the middle of it, perhaps, for beauty,
a bronze rider on a hot-breathing, driven horse?
Predictions
of the imminent death of this chilling giant, if not by flood then
by fire, were further developed in the literature of the Silver Age,
especially as the factory suburbs grew. According to the diary entry
of M. Kuzmin, St. Petersburg intellectuals looked "at the dark
factories with such a gloomy and frightened look, as if from the
city tower a guard was looking at the Huns near the walls of the
city." Researchers find something commemorative in the way
Petersburg is described by P. I. Tchaikovsky in The Queen of Spades.
M. Dobuzhinsky's sketches, A. Blok's urban poems, and A. Bely's
novel "Petersburg" reveal the infernal, otherworldly aura of the
imperial capital. These works constitute a kind of requiem, where
Petersburg is shown “already doomed to perish, but still beautiful
with dying, ghostly beauty” (E. I. Zamyatin).
In defense of
St. Petersburg from such myth-making, the artists of the World of
Art, led by A. Benois, spoke from the positions of neoclassicism,
who complained: “It seems that there is no city in the whole world
that would be less sympathetic than St. Petersburg.” In watercolors
from the history of the 18th century and in a series of enlightening
articles (“Picturesque Petersburg”, “The Beauty of Petersburg”,
etc.), Benois notes the heroic structure and the peculiar poetic
charm of the old city: “Amazingly deep and wonderful musicality
reigns throughout Petersburg.” These nostalgic motifs were later
picked up in the work of A. Akhmatova. With the move of the capital
to Moscow (1918), Russian culture turned from an accuser into a
“mourner and defender” of the city on the Neva, which until recently
seemed inhuman. In Akhmatov's poem "Requiem" the city is seen as a
sufferer, because by the middle of the 20th century
Leningrad
ceased to be a symbol of oppression and alienation, becoming the
personification of the age-old spiritual values of Russian society,
doomed to destruction by a ruthless totalitarian regime.
— S.
Volkov
The Petersburg text, as a collection of various
literary (prose and poetic, artistic and documentary journalistic,
etc.) works that create a multifaceted and complex image of the city
on the Neva, has become one of the most interesting and largest
phenomena of Russian culture. Formed by works created in the era
when St. Petersburg was the capital of the Russian Empire, the St.
Petersburg text was subsequently expanded by the creative efforts of
Soviet and post-Soviet authors. In an expanded sense, the Petersburg
/ Leningrad text includes not only literary works, but also works of
other genres, in particular films and television films, musical
works dedicated to and / or associated with the city. The Petersburg
text is the foundation of the symbolic capital of St. Petersburg,
which ensures the enduring interest in the city both on the part of
Petersburgers and residents of other cities and countries.
Both amateur and professional sports are developed in St.
Petersburg. The city has 1649 sports halls, 118 swimming pools, 18
ski bases, 17 indoor facilities with artificial ice, 13 stadiums
with more than 1500 seats, 11 rowing bases and canals, 10 sports
palaces, a cycle track. Among them are the Gazprom Arena and
Petrovsky stadiums, the Yubileiny Sports Palace, the Ice Palace, the
Winter Stadium, the Petersburgsky sports and concert complex
(demolished, reconstruction is planned), Sibur Arena, and the SKA
swimming pool. Lesgaft University is an important center of sports
culture.
Professional clubs based in the city:
Football:
Zenit is one of the strongest clubs in the Premier League of the
Russian Championship, winner of the UEFA Cup (2007/08), UEFA Super
Cup (2008); Dynamo, Zenit-2 and Zvezda play in the West zone of the
FNL-2 championship; Women's football club "Zenit" is the strongest
team in the Higher Division of the Russian Women's Football
Championship.
Hockey: SKA is one of the strongest clubs in the
KHL, winner of the Gagarin Cup (2014/2015, 2016/2017); SKA-Neva and
HC Dynamo St. Petersburg - in the VHL; SKA-1946, SKA-Silver Lions
and MHC Dynamo St. Petersburg in the MHL Championship; ZhHK "Dynamo
St. Petersburg" - in the ZhKhL.
Basketball: Zenit plays in the
VTB United League, Spartak plays in amateur competitions since 2014;
Dynamo (existed in 2004-2006).
Volleyball: "Avtomobilist" - plays
in the Major League B of the championship of Russia, "Zenith" -
plays in the Super League; "Leningradka" - plays in the Super League
of the championship of Russia.
Beach soccer: Kristall is one of
the strongest clubs in the Russian championship in recent years, the
winner of the European Champions Cup in beach soccer in 2014, 2015,
2020, 2021. The Zvezda women's beach soccer team (founded in 2013)
is a five-time champion of Russia (2015, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020), as
well as the winner of the European Champions Cup in 2018.
Futsal:
"Polytech", playing in the Super League; "Aurora" (women's
mini-football club).
Handball: Zenit (until 2022, Lesgaft
University - Neva) is one of the strongest clubs in the Super League
of the Russian Championship among men.
Field hockey: Metrostroy
(women's hockey club).
American Football: The Griffins are the
2015 American Football Champions of Russia and have been playing in
the Premier Division since 2016; The Northern Legion has been
playing in the North division since 2016; The Valkyries have been
playing in the Finnish Premier League since 2016.