A Notorious Spot on the Left Bank of the Neva
The area on the left bank of the Neva, where the approach structures of the Alexander Nevsky Bridge are now located, had a notorious reputation among the townsfolk in the early 20th century, as noted by Boris Ivanovich Antonov in his book Bridges of St. Petersburg. The area was poorly lit, and in the twilight, solitary passersby were often attacked by robbers who lived in the cemeteries of the Holy Trinity Alexander Nevsky Monastery. However, perhaps an even greater danger—for both pedestrians and horse-drawn carriages—was posed by the rats that infested the grain warehouses along the shore. Every day, hordes of these rodents would first head to the Neva for a drink of water and then return to the warehouses. To particularly impressionable witnesses, it seemed as if the very ground was moving. During these eerie promenades, traffic in the area came to a halt, with cars and trams stopping at a respectful distance from the rat hordes. A chilling story was passed down about how, one day (allegedly in the 1920s), an unfortunate cab driver tried to dash through the stream of rats, and by morning, only two gnawed skeletons were found: one human, the other equine.
The construction of the Alexander Nevsky Bridge (which took place from 1960 to 1965) led to significant redevelopment of this riverside area. The old warehouses, storage facilities, and some residential buildings were demolished. This transformation greatly altered the appearance of Alexander Nevsky Square and its surroundings. Subsequently, new structures were added: on November 3, 1967, a metro station opened, and in the 1970s, its ground-level pavilion was integrated into the building of the Hotel Moscow. Meanwhile, on Sinopskaya Embankment, an automated long-distance telephone exchange station was commissioned, and the architectural ensemble of the monastery was freed from the obstructing warehouses along the Neva. Today, only five warehouses on the northern bank of the Obvodny Canal remain, their ends facing the canal. Built for the monastery in the 1840s, they are recognized as a monument of regional significance.
The bread-related history of this corner of our city is also remembered through Ambar Street, which runs from Alexander Nevsky Square to Kherson Street. The street’s name, which had disappeared for almost half a century (as it was merged into Sinopskaya Embankment on January 26, 1970), was resurrected by a resolution of the Government of St. Petersburg on January 31, 2017.
The embankment now known as Sinopskaya was once a major center of the bread trade. It was home to the famous Kalashnikovskaya Pier, where grain and flour from various regions of Russia were brought. The pier was named after the Kalashnikov family, who were grain merchants. In 1871, the name of this pier was transferred to a nearby avenue, which in 1918 was renamed Bakunin Avenue. Interestingly, the aforementioned embankment was also called Kalashnikovskaya from 1887 to 1952, named after the Kalashnikov Brewery and Mead Factory. Not far from this location was the Kalashnikov Grain Exchange, which opened in 1895.
A Test of Strength
The Alexander Nevsky Bridge was built using the latest (at the time) technical solutions, which required particularly thorough testing of its behavior under load. Shortly before it was opened for traffic, engineers subjected the bridge to a rigorous test with the help of the military. On November 1, 1965, heavy tanks drove onto the bridge's roadway. They moved from one span to another, stopping at specific points designated by the testers. Instruments recorded all deflections of the bridge, measuring the stresses that arose in its structures. The bridge passed this test with flying colors, and traffic was opened on November 5.
Interestingly, on October 30, the same tanks tested the new Tuchkov Bridge, which was opened on November 6.
History of the Location
1959
A closed competition was announced for the best design of a bridge across the Neva River that would connect the central part of Leningrad and Malaya Okhta.
1960-1965
In 1960, construction of the bridge began. On May 15, 1965 it was officially named Alexander Nevsky Bridge, on November 1 it was tested with heavy machinery, and on November 5 it was put into operation.
1966-1967
56 corroded cables burst in the bridge's structures and traffic was restricted.
Alexander Nevsky Bridge
The idea of building a bridge across the Neva River near the Holy Trinity Alexander Nevsky Monastery emerged long before it was realized. This can be easily confirmed by documents. The first General Development Plan of Leningrad, developed (and revised) in the 1930s, already included the construction of this bridge. The bridge was also present in the 1939 General Plan of the city, developed by the Architectural and Planning Department (APO) of the Leningrad City Council. The bridge route is even marked on the 1940 Leningrad map. The bridge was supposed to connect the city center with Malaya Okhta, where Soviet construction began in the 1930s, starting with the riverside area. (Here, the famous Block No. 26 emerged, about which you can learn more by referring to the article about the "Malo-Ohtinskaya" library.) Notably, the trapezoidal square (Cheluskintsev/Papanintsev) created here was designed as a pre-bridge area. The bridge might have been built earlier, but the implementation of urban planning was interrupted by the Great Patriotic War, which began in 1941.
Judging by the General Plans of Leningrad from 1941 and 1948, as well as the General Development Plan for the city from 1956-1965, which was developed in 1955, the idea of building a bridge to Malaya Okhta was not abandoned. However, serious work on its implementation began only in the late 1950s. In previous years, as noted by Mikhail Samoylovich Bunin in his book "Bridges of Leningrad. Essays on the History and Architecture of the Bridges of St. Petersburg – Petrograd – Leningrad," the design of such structures was usually entrusted to a single organization. This time, they did things differently. In 1959, the Leningrad City Executive Committee announced a closed competition, as Bunin describes it, "for solving an urban planning task of special importance, namely the design of a bridge across the Neva River in the area of Alexander Nevsky Square."
The most well-known bridge design organizations from Leningrad and Moscow were invited to participate in this competition. Nine projects were submitted, one of which was non-competitive. In the end, the jury concluded that none of them was worthy of first prize. The second prize, according to the unanimous opinion of the jury members, was awarded to the first version of the project developed by the institute "Lengiprotransmost." (The successor of this institute is the joint-stock company "Transmost." According to the official website of the company, it was called "Lentransmostproekt" from 1937 and was renamed "Lengiprotransmost" only in 1962.) This institution was entrusted with subsequent stages of design; its engineers developed the design assignment and working drawings, according to which construction was later carried out.
It should be understood that the Alexander Nevsky Bridge is the collective work of a large group of designers. The bridge itself, that is, its structure, was designed by engineers K. P. Klochkoff, G. M. Stepanov, and A. S. Evdonin, who led this process. The architectural solution was developed by architects A. V. Zhuk, S. G. Mayofis, and Y. I. Sinitsa. The design of the approaches to the bridge and the two-level traffic interchanges was apparently handled by a group of engineers from the "Lengiproinzhproekt" institute, including Y. P. Boyko, A. D. Gutsait, G. S. Osokina, and E. K. Sprogis. Additionally, in connection with the construction of the Alexander Nevsky Bridge, new reinforced concrete bridges were built over the Monastyrka River: the Obukhov Defense Bridge and the Monastery Bridge. These were commissioned in 1964.
The seven-span bridge, originally named "Staro-Nevsky" (so-called after the section of Nevsky Prospect from Vosstaniya Square to Alexander Nevsky Square), was extended across the main river of our city along Zanevsky Prospect (hence another name for the bridge during the design phase – "Zanevsky"). It is noteworthy that unlike the name of the future bridge, its route had been definitively determined from the very beginning, that is, from the 1930s. However, the highway on the right bank of the Neva, now known as Zanevsky Prospect, was only outlined then and was referred to in the project documentation as 1st Proriska until December 26, 1940.
The bridge's layout is symmetrical relative to the central, movable span. The movable span is double-leafed with a fixed axis of rotation. It is distinguished by the greater thickness of its piers, which house the mechanisms for raising the span, control panels for the mechanisms and navigation signals, as well as other operational devices. The raising of the bridge is carried out using a hydraulic drive and takes only two to three minutes.
The wings of the central span are made of steel. The spans on either side of it, including those over the embankments, are covered with pre-stressed reinforced concrete structures, where the reinforcement consists of steel cables – tendons. These structures form two long span constructions. The basis of each is made up of two three-span continuous beams of variable height, with the space between them covered by a system of transverse and longitudinal beams. The main beams of the bridge are hollow, box-shaped. They are equipped with hatches through which maintenance personnel can enter to inspect their condition or tighten the tendons. The diameter of these high-quality steel cables is 70 millimeters. Mikhail Bunin describes such a cable as a bundle of wires where the central bunch is twisted in one direction, and the peripheral part in the opposite direction. The tension of the cables running through the bridge's structures is monitored by special devices that take into account the air temperature. In cold weather, the tension is loosened, and in hot weather, it is tightened using special winches/jacks. This is similar to how a musician tightens the strings on their instrument, tuning it. Communication, lighting, and signaling cables also run inside the structures.
The main beams of the bridge were assembled from individual blocks, manufactured onshore. At the same time, the arches were segmented not along the axes of the piers, but in the center. Thus, V-shaped elements – half-arches with a support platform at the lower belt – were prepared for assembly. Due to their long protrusions, these enormous blocks resembled giant birds with outstretched wings, which is why the builders called them "birds." The weight of these reinforced concrete "birds" reached nearly five thousand tons!
The assembly of the main beams was carried out on the water; the blocks were delivered to the intermediate piers on special pontoons – in the same way, reinforced concrete arched trusses of the first Volodarsky Bridge were transported along the Neva in the 1930s. At that time, the work was carried out under the guidance of the outstanding shipbuilder and mathematician A. N. Krylov, who also designed the pontoons. In our case, the transportation and installation of the blocks were overseen by the young engineer Y. R. Kozhukhovsky.
The operation of placing the first "bird" in its proper position, which began on July 12, 1964, is wonderfully described by Andrey Lvovich Punin in his book "The Tale of the Bridges of Leningrad." Under the "bird," which had frozen at the very edge of the pier, a powerful floating system of pontoons was placed. Pumps pumped water out of them, and the raised floating system took the block onto itself. Two sea tugs carefully moved it away from the shore. They were assisted by winches installed onshore and on the piers of the future bridge. According to Punin, the "bird" was not so much transported as it was pulled towards the piers, since "the tugboat screws were mainly fighting the Neva's current, keeping the floating system in the right position." There was no rush, so the "bird" reached the installation site only on the second day, although it had to cover only about 500 meters. Then water was pumped into the pontoons, and the "bird" moved from the submerged floating system onto the pier. This happened on July 14. The entire operation to transport and install the block, which required precision akin to jewelry-making, took nearly 50 hours. The second "bird" was managed in 36 hours, and the fourth, the last, in 18.
As already mentioned, the main beams of the bridge have a variable height: near the piers, it increases (up to eight meters), and in the middle of the span, it decreases (to three meters). The curvilinear outlines of the lower belt make the silhouette of the bridge more graceful and lightweight.
The intermediate piers of the bridge, located closer to the shores (between the long spans), are not as massive as the piers of the movable span. These piers are rigidly connected to the main beams resting on them. By the way, all the river (channel) piers of the bridge consist of two separate half-piers – one under each three-span beam. The foundations of the river piers are large-diameter (from two to three meters) reinforced concrete shell piles, driven into the riverbed to a depth of nearly 35 meters.
Together with the bridge, granite-clad embankments (more precisely, sections of embankments) were built on both banks of the Neva. Staircases were constructed on four sides of the bridge. Interestingly, the ramps have spaces allocated for public toilets, although initially, they were not used as intended. The staircases and lower-level spaces were used to house the Bridge Operational Services, which were based there.
The roadway on the Alexander Nevsky Bridge was paved with asphalt. The pavement of the sidewalks, at least originally, was made of granite slabs. The approaches to the bridge were lit by artistic lanterns, designed by architect Vladimir Stepanovich Vasilkovsky (these lanterns can also be seen near the former Warsaw Station). The road on the bridge was illuminated by lamps installed on lighting masts placed in the central strip. These masts replaced the high (ten meters) pylons with lanterns on the upper platform, designed by architect Alexander Konstantinovich Poryadin and originally included in the project. They were equipped with parapet lamps (for lighting the sidewalks), special directional searchlights (for ships navigating under the bridge), and a traffic light (to control ship movement). The platform at the top of the pylons also served as an observation deck. However, according to Punin, the decision to abandon them was made before the pylons were installed.
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