In August 1914, the Russian Empire, through the efforts of the royal family, managed to get into the disassembly of the Europeans. Cousin Willy quarreled with cousins Nikki and instead of solving the problem like normal men - to fill each other's faces, and then roll 0.5 ... both decided to play a war that cost both the crown and the lives of millions of subjects ... But this lyrics. Let's return to our Arctic.
The Slavs began to actively develop the Kola Peninsula since the 11th - 12th centuries, when the Novgorod merchants and ushkuyniki turned their eyes to the North and moved for furs. The few tribes of indigenous peoples who lived there began to pay dues and buy various kinds of products of Novgorod artisans. Almost simultaneously with the Novgorodians, the Scandinavians appeared on the Kola Peninsula, who had their own alternative point of view on the belonging of the northern lands. The Novgorodians repeatedly concluded various agreements with their neighbors on the delimitation of the disputed territory, but the Kola Peninsula finally fell to the Russians only in the middle of the 13th century, after the defeat of the European crusaders and the curtailment of the Northern Crusades.
Until the end of the 19th century, the Kola lands were not of particular interest to the authorities - they were far away, but with the advent of railways and the development of science, plans began to appear for the development of distant lands.
The first project for the construction of the northern highway was presented to the government of the Russian Empire in the 1870s. But, due to the high cost of implementation, construction was constantly postponed. With the outbreak of the First World War, due to the great strategic importance, lack of weapons, ammunition and other military equipment, in December 1914, the Council of Ministers of the Russian Empire decided to urgently build a railway linking Petrozavodsk and the projected port in the Kola Bay (Murman). The strategic importance of the road was to ensure the transportation of military cargo from the Allies to the ports of the White and Barents Seas - Soroka, Kandalaksha and Semyonovsky.
After the approval on January 1, 1915 by Emperor Nicholas II of the construction of the Murmansk railway at the expense of the treasury, the Special Construction Directorate of the Murmansk Railway was created under the general supervision of engineer V.V. Goryachkovsky. On the Petrozavodsk-Soroka section of the road, engineer V. L. Lebedev supervised the construction work, and on the Soroka-Murman section, engineer P. E. Solovyov.
The average monthly number of workers employed in construction was more than 70 thousand people. In total, up to 170 thousand people were employed at different stages of construction, among which more than 100 thousand were otkhodnik peasants, more than 40 thousand were prisoners of war of the Austro-Hungarian and German armies, and more than 2 thousand were soldiers of railway battalions. 10,000 Chinese from Manchuria and 2,000 Kazakhs from the Semipalatinsk region, as well as about 500 Canadians, were recruited for the construction. The workers liable for military service were granted a deferment from being called up to the front. On the road construction route, 14 medical centers for 616 beds were opened, each of which had a doctor and 2-3 paramedics. By August 1916, more than 10 thousand sick workers were evacuated from the route, more than 600 people died from illnesses and injuries in medical centers.
During the construction of the road (1053 km), more than 260 km of swamps, over 110 km of rocky outcrops were overcome, more than 1100 artificial structures were built.
On November 3 (16), 1916, on the stretch between the Boyarskaya station and the Ambarny stretch, where two parties of stackers met, walking towards each other from the north and south, a solemn ceremony was held to drive the last "golden crutch" of the Murmansk railway, the northernmost railway in the world .
The Murmansk railway ended with the northernmost railway station at that time - Murmansk, which was built simultaneously with the construction of the Murmansk railway and the Murmansk port, in 1915 (on October 4, 1916, the city of Romanov-on-Murman was founded in its place).
The official Act of Acceptance for Temporary Operation of the Murmansk Railway was signed on November 15, 1916. In the future, it was necessary to replace temporary wooden bridges with metal and reinforced concrete ones, build station workshops, provide stations with a constant water supply, and strengthen the railway track in some sections. The capacity of the road was 60-90 wagons per day, the average speed of trains was 11-12 km/h.
The completion work was completed in full after the end of the Civil War in Russia.
In March 1917, the Petrozavodsk station of the private Olonets railway was transferred to the Murmansk Railway.
On April 1, 1917, the private Olonets railway (line station Zvanka - station Petrozavodsk) was attached to the Murmansk railway, bought out by the state.
Temporary goods traffic has been open since January 1, 1917; since April 1, 1917, the Murmansk Railway has been included in direct communication with Russian railways.
On September 15, 1917, regular passenger traffic began, along the entire section of the road from Zvanka to Murmansk, a passenger train No. 3/4 passed.
In 1917, the number of permanent workers and employees of the Murmansk railway was about 16.5 thousand people. 
M U R M A N C A
The issue of building a railway to Murman was raised repeatedly, but did not budge until the First World War broke out. The road to the non-freezing Barents Sea became absolutely necessary.
The total cost of building the Murmansk railway with a length of 987 versts (1054 km) was determined at 180 million rubles. According to the design outlines, with the completion of construction in the fall of 1916, the Murmansk Railway was supposed to ensure the daily delivery of about 470 thousand pounds of ammunition, medicines and any other equipment and achieve a turning point in the war.
The area where the railway was to be built was deserted. Only a telegraph thread, and postal stations, which were served by the inhabitants of these places - the Sami, reminded of civilization. Now, through the rocky mountains, forests, tundras and swamps, it was necessary to lay the railroad track, build stations, sidings, bridges and other structures. All this had to be done quickly, but before proceeding with the construction of the embankment, it was necessary to deliver a huge amount of cargo to the construction site, provide workers with housing and food. According to the calculations of engineers, the Kandalaksha-Kola line alone required 20,000 workers. In the spring of 1915, the leaders of Murmanstroy ordered rolling stock and laying material from the United States.
Part of the building materials agreed to be supplied to Murman by England. Something was also purchased in France and Norway. Items for personal consumption (food, clothing, footwear, shag, etc.) were procured in an economic way in the interior regions of Russia and transported to the city of Arkhangelsk, to the central warehouse of Murmanstroy. The first batch of builders arrived on the Kola Peninsula in May 1915. By the beginning of June, there were 1,450 workers in Kola and Semyonovskaya Bay, and a little over 3,000 in the Kandalaksha area. In view of the acute shortage of labor, the construction management demanded that prisoners of war be sent, and in the second half of the summer of 1915, 2,100 of them arrived on the Kola Peninsula. Already by August 7, 1915, it was possible to complete the laying of the track from Kandalaksha to the Zasheek pier, which made it possible to start work in the inner part of the Kola Peninsula.
Using Lake Imandra, which stretched along the route for 100 kilometers, it was possible to carry out construction from several points at once. But in order to transport batches of workers and construction cargo by water, it was necessary to deliver the necessary floating equipment to the lake. The builders of the road brilliantly solved this problem. In the Kandalaksha port, a rail track was laid along the seabed to the shore, onto which railway platforms were driven at low tide. At sea tide, the water level in the Kandalaksha Bay rises to 5.5 meters. At such a time, a towing steamer and several barges were installed above the platforms, which, as the water subsided. descending, they sat on the platforms, were fixed on them and delivered to the Zasheek pier without much difficulty. Here the ships were launched on the slipway.
The steam locomotive and platforms on which the ships had just been brought to the lake, as well as rails and tools, were loaded onto the barges, and the towing steamer pulled them all to the northern end of the lake. Thanks to this combination, the construction of the road was greatly accelerated.
According to the construction schedule, the laying of the track from Kandalaksha to Murman should have been completed by December 31, 1915, after which it was supposed to immediately begin transporting military cargo. In winter, they were to be delivered from Kandalaksha on horseback to the Finnish Railway (via Kuolajärvi to the Rovaniemi station), and with the opening of navigation on the White Sea, by ships to Soroka, and further along the newly built railway to Petrograd. Therefore, construction managers did everything to quickly open traffic along the Murman-Kandalaksha line. The rails on the way were laid directly on the ground, wooden bridges were built. Technical standards were not observed when constructing the canvas - the rises reached 15 meters per kilometer (instead of the permissible 6 meters). The road was built, so to speak, in rough outline. And yet, on November 15, 1916, the Murmansk railway was put into temporary operation.
Back in the summer of 1916, the Minister of Railways A.F. Trepov submitted a report to the tsar, in which he petitioned for "the transformation of the railway settlement near the Murman station into an urban settlement." The name of the future city was also proposed - Romanov-on-Murman. The development plan for the city of Romanov, drawn up by engineer B. V. Sabanin, provided for the creation of a large number of avenues and streets, squares and squares. The central highway on the city plan was called Nikolaevsky Prospekt; to the south of it - Alexandrovsky, Mikhailovsky, Alekseevsky avenues, Vladimirskaya and Olginskaya streets - all in honor of members of the imperial family.
Torgovaya, Bishops, Banking, Engineering, Dumskaya, Morskaya and others radiated from the main square like a fan.
|
Three variants of the route were proposed: from Rovaniemi station, from Nurmes station and from Petrozavodsk. |
- When did the construction of the Murmansk railway begin?
— Plans for the construction of a large port and railway station on the Kola Peninsula arose in the 19th century. But the real impetus for the construction was the First World War. To deliver military supplies from the allies, it was necessary to build a city, an ice-free port and a railway on the Kola Peninsula. During the First World War, the Baltic and the Black Sea were blocked, Arkhangelsk froze in winter. The Kola Bay, thanks to the warm Gulf Stream, could receive ships all year round.
On September 1, 1915, the Swedish steamship Drott entered this bay, delivering the first cargo in the history of the future capital of the Arctic. They were rails and turnout laying kits that had arrived from New York. Thus, we can say that the history of Murmansk began with a rail-sleeper grid, and the first inhabitants of the new city were precisely the railway workers - the very ones who laid and serviced these rails. The Murmansk railway was divided into three large sections, the construction of which was carried out in parallel. Petrozavodsk - Soroca Bay (356 miles), Soroca Bay - Kandalaksha (376 miles) and Kandalaksha - Murmansk (260 miles).
Most of the work took place in autumn and winter, when the temperature dropped to 30 degrees below zero. Despite this, due to the extreme urgency of the work, a strict uninterrupted work regime was established throughout the polar night. Workplaces were lit with torches, because the lanterns went out with constant wind and snowstorms. As a result of the heroic efforts of the builders, in April 1916, a section of the Kandalaksha-Murmansk road was opened for traffic. And on November 16, 1916, on the stretch of Boyarskaya - Ambarny, there was a docking of tracks stretching from the south and north. It was from that day that the through traffic on the railway began.
— What difficulties accompanied the construction?
- The incredible speed with which the new railway was built, the difficult natural conditions, the difficulties in delivering materials for construction - all this could not but affect the quality of the constructed track. Compared to the original project, about 40% of the work remained unfulfilled. In many sections, it was necessary to strengthen the railway track, bring the track profile to the main type, replace temporary wooden bridges with metal and reinforced concrete ones, and workshops had to be organized at the stations. As a result, the capacity of the road was only 60-90 wagons per day. By modern standards, the track would be considered an emergency, and the passage of trains along it would be prohibited. However, in the conditions of the First World War, the road was of strategic importance for Russia, and military cargo arriving at the port began to be sent via the Murmansk railway, despite all the shortcomings.
— Can you tell us about some interesting episode that happened during the construction of the road?
- In June 1915, the laying of the track began on the Kandalaksha - Murmansk section. The site was divided into three parts, construction on this site was planned to be completed by January 13, 1916. However, it was not possible to meet the deadlines due to the fact that the tsarist government attracted the English construction company of Lord French to carry out work on the northernmost part of the site. It would seem that several hundred experienced builders and engineers from the British Empire - the ancestor of the railways - had to show class to ordinary Russian peasants. However, despite the fact that the British were well supplied and paid good money, the results of their work were more than modest, or rather, a failure.
By January 1, 1916, they built only 13 kilometers of track from Murmansk to the mouth of the Kola River, while our builders on two other sections from Kandalaksha to the north laid about 100 kilometers of track in the same time. Of course, to endure such a mockery, given the importance of the construction site, was simply unacceptable, and they decided to terminate the contract. Despite the outright wrecking on the part of the British and the just indignation of Russian engineers about this, when the contract was terminated, England was paid a significant forfeit in gold, and the official reason for terminating the contract sounded like “non-compliance with the terms of the contract by the Russian side.”
This was done for political reasons. The owner of the company was a relative of John French, Commander-in-Chief of the British Forces in France, and the Russian side took the blame for the early termination of the contract, allegedly not creating the necessary conditions for work. After the removal of the British, it turned out that even the site they had already built was no good, and all the work for them had to be redone. Moreover, a section of 80 kilometers remained unfinished, which had to be built in the dead of winter, in severe frosts. As a result, having shown real heroism, the Russian builders built the railway on this site instead of the British, whose participation in the project turned out to be only a waste of money, nerves and time.
What role did the railroad play in World War I, the 1917 revolution and the Civil War?
- In the first year of operation alone, 26,000 Maxim machine guns and millions of shells were transported along the Murmansk Railway - over 100,000 tons of military cargo in total. For warring Russia, these were, no doubt, transportations of strategic importance. And even though the speed of trains was limited to 12 km / h on the road built in extreme conditions and in a terrible hurry, the railway workers did not allow a single accident with trains that carried military cargo.
The head of the Provisional Government, Alexander Kerensky, was sent to Murmansk along this railroad to secretly, in the form of a Serbian officer, board a ship and escape from Russia forever. During the First World War, the Murmansk Railway saw the troops of the British and French, as well as the Entente allies - the Serbs and Poles. At first, foreign military contingents were present in the region as allies - to protect the Murmansk railway from possible German attacks, then - as interventionists who fought against the Soviet authorities on the side of the white movement. Until now, the old English cemetery, preserved within the city of Murmansk, reminds of the invaders.
- On January 27, 1935, the Murmansk Railway was renamed the Kirov Railway in honor of Sergei Kirov, who did a lot (up to his tragic death) for the development of industry and transport in the Arctic. What was the function of the railroad during the interwar period?
- In the summer of 1921, at the direction of the People's Commissar of Railways Felix Dzerzhinsky, the state of the Murmansk Railway was studied by a special commission. Experts recognized the condition of the road as disastrous and calculated that about 40 million rubles should be invested to bring it into a more or less satisfactory technical condition. The young Soviet state did not have such money for these purposes, the question arose of temporarily closing the road. In that emergency condition, she was simply not capable of passing trains. The issue of lack of finances was overcome in a rather unexpected way - they allowed the railway to solve its own material problems by granting the so-called colonization rights. In fact, railroad workers received the right for 10 years to develop and exploit for their own benefit forests, subsoil, water and other natural resources in the areas where the road passed, and repair tracks and build bridges with the proceeds.
Railway subdivisions appeared with unusual names like Zhelles, Zhelryba or Zhelslyuda, which were engaged in the harvesting and sale of timber, fish, and fossils. Already the first year of work on the system of colonization gave an impressive result. During this period, the railway in the Arctic became, in fact, the backbone enterprise in the region. For example, the first stone building in Murmansk was built in 1927 thanks to her. The railway workers not only spent the funds received from the rights of colonization for current needs and improvement, but also implemented projects aimed at the future, into the future. It was at the expense of the railway in the Murmansk region that work was carried out to search for minerals. In particular, it was the railway that organized and paid for the expedition of Academician Fersman, which resulted in the discovery of various mineral deposits of amazing volumes, such as the Monchegorsk copper-nickel deposit and the Khibiny apatite deposit. Mines, combines, cities and new sections of the railway leading to the deposits began to be built.
- It is known that at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, goods were delivered under Lend-Lease along this road to the European part of the USSR. How did it happen?
- With the arrival in the Murmansk port of the first ships with military cargo from the allies of the USSR in the anti-Hitler coalition, the question arose of their speedy unloading. To speed up the process, the railroad used the “ship-wagon” scheme for transshipment of goods, in which the cargo was transferred to the wagon directly from the ship. To do this, it was necessary to bring the rails close to the side of the ship. The railroad workers were tasked with laying several absolutely new access roads in the port as soon as possible. But there was nowhere to take rails, sleepers and bolts, which were in short supply at that time. Then it was decided to dismantle part of the station tracks, first of all - rarely used dead ends. The problem was solved, but the rush construction of the tracks without serious engineering calculations was a big risk, especially due to the dangerous nature of the cargo, such as explosives and ammunition, that had to pass through these temporary tracks on a daily basis.
However, the temporary route did not fail, and there were no emergencies and failures in unloading ships from allied convoys due to the fault of the railway workers. Vasily Goltsov, head of the freight yard of the station, supervised the work at the Murmansk station. The work at the station under the bombing was so hard, exhausting and dangerous that he literally rushed to the front, but they did not let him go.
- What happened to the railway directly during the hostilities? It is known that the Nazis regularly bombed the road. It's true? Which areas were attacked more often than others? And how was the defense organized?
- Nazi planes subjected the railway junction and the road along its entire length to frequent and fierce air raids. The front line passed nearby, and from the nearest German airfields, planes could fly to Murmansk in just 10-20 minutes. According to a memorandum from the chief of staff of the local air defense of Murmansk dated December 10, 1941, only at the Murmansk station since the beginning of the war there have been "20 cases of destruction of the railway track from 15 to 30 meters each." And this is only for the first six months of the war! In total, during the war years, 97 raids were made on the Murmansk railway junction, 757 high-explosive and 42 thousand incendiary bombs were dropped. 24 turnouts and 2 bridges were destroyed. Throughout the Murmansk region, during the raids, locomotives received 216 damage, cars - about 1300 damage. During the war years, 82 Murmansk railway workers died at their workplaces.
- It is known that electric locomotives were also used on the Murmansk railway during the war. Is it really true?
- Yes. The Murmansk section of the railway is perhaps the only one in the world where electric locomotives were used under the conditions of hostilities, under continuous bombing. Since the 1930s (for the first time in Soviet Russia), VL-19 electric locomotives have appeared on the Murmansk-Kandalaksha section. During the war years, they demonstrated their invulnerability. An ordinary steam locomotive was put out of action by a couple of bullet holes in the boiler: the pressure dropped and the train could not go. And the electric locomotive easily survived dozens of bullet hits. In addition, enemy pilots simply could not detect electric locomotives - unlike steam locomotives, they did not unmask themselves with smoke from the chimney.
How did the railroad function after the end of the war?
“The war is over, and the north has begun to recover. And then the construction of new sections of the railway began on an unprecedented scale. New branches were laid to mining and processing plants, mines, and factories. In 1956, the Pinozero-Kovdor section was built, in 1961, the Kola-Pechenga section, and in 1968, the Zapolyarnaya-Nikel section was completed. New sections of the road were electrified, second tracks were laid, new technologies and new equipment were mastered.
It is interesting, for example, that for the leader of the Cuban revolution, Fidel Castro, acquaintance with the USSR began, oddly enough, precisely from the Murmansk railway. In April 1963, a plane landed at the airfield near the Olenya station in the Murmansk region, delivering Cuban leader Fidel Castro to the USSR. The leader of the Cuban Revolution crossed the first kilometers across the territory of the USSR along the railway tracks served by the Murmansk track distance. From the Olenya station (now Olenegorsk), a special train delivered him to Murmansk. A solemn rally in honor of the distinguished guest took place right on the station square, where literally the whole city gathered, even schoolchildren had their classes canceled that day. The tribune was installed directly at the station building. The Cuban leader was not immediately able to get into the car. In April of that year, it was very cold in Murmansk, there was snow. Fidel was so shocked by the snow, which he had never seen before, that he wallowed in it for a long time and played with it like a child. At first, by the way, he was also dressed out of season, so right at the airfield he was given a warm uniform jacket with fur and a hat with earflaps from army stocks. It was in them that he was captured during his visit in many photographs.
What role does the railroad play today?
— The potential of the northern part of the road was most fully revealed in the new economic conditions, when in 2003 the Russian Railways company was established on the basis of the Ministry of Railways of the Russian Federation. Unprecedented results were achieved on the most important production indicators. Thus, coal unloading this summer was a record 600 wagons per day. At the same time, the newest, by far the most powerful locomotives in the world, Yermak, were put into operation. Largely thanks to the efforts of the railroad workers of the Murmansk region, the Oktyabrskaya Railway was able to become the winner of the industry competition this year and was recognized as the best of the entire network of Russian railways.
Edward Epstein
Construction of the Murmansk railway. Early 20th century
From IOCM funds
MURMANSK RAILWAY, (Kirovskaya railway from 1935, Murmansk branch of the Oktyabrskaya railway from 1959), a railway line from Murmansk to St. Petersburg, 987 versts (1044 km). For the first time, the question of its construction was considered in 1894 by a commission headed by Comrade (Deputy) Minister of Railways, Lieutenant General Petrov. Arkhangelsk Governor A.P. Engelgardt was an active supporter of its construction. Funds for preparatory work were already allocated for 1903-1904, but the outbreak of the Russian-Japanese war prevented. The final decision on construction was made on 01/01/1915. Survey work completed in 3 months. Construction began in March 1915, on the northern section - in early June. The road was built by peasants recruited from central Russia and from the Far East, the Chinese, as well as prisoners of war of the First World War (thousands of Hungarians, Germans, Slovaks, Czechs). The labor of a total of about 70 thousand people was used. (according to other sources - up to 100 thousand people). Many traveled due to off-road through Finland, Norway and Sweden, for this the Scandinavian countries provided special transit trains. Construction was carried out on 3 sections simultaneously: Petrozavodsk-Soroka, Soroka-Kandalaksha, Kandalaksha-Murmansk. The mountainous and swampy terrain complicated the work. About 1100 bridges were built from Petrozavodsk to Murmansk alone. The laying of rails began in August 1915. The village near the Semenovskaya Bay of the Kola Bay was chosen as the final station. On April 23, 1916, the northern section of the road - Kandalaksha-Murmansk was opened, and through traffic began on November 3, 1916. On this day, after a prayer service was performed near the village of Poyakonda, the last crutch was hammered at the junction of the continuous rail track Petrozavodsk-Romanov-on-Murman. This was done by Major General Prince Bagration-Mukhransky, specially sent by Emperor Nicholas II. The head of the construction, engineer Goryachkovsky, sent a telegram to the Emperor: “We are happy to please you, Sovereign, and Russia, that this November 3 at 12 noon, at 537 miles from Petrozavodsk, I closed the line of the Great Northern Route, leading Russia to the primordially Russian lands, to the expanse of the free ocean ... »
It was planned to spend 180 million gold rubles on the construction of the road, but actually amounted to 350 million. But the country got access to a seaport that did not freeze all year round and, without knowing it at that time, to huge mineral reserves. By the decision of the Provisional Government on April 18, 1917, the Olonets railway was attached to the Murmansk road. By the autumn of 1917, the road did not even have 25% of its design capacity. During the Civil War, about 80% of steam locomotives, 60% of wagons and a significant part of the way M. Zh. etc. were destroyed. 06/02/1920 V. I. Lenin signed a resolution of the Council of Labor and Defense on the operation and completion of M. Zh. 05/25/1923 STO announced the colonization, economic development of the Kola region, which was entrusted to the railway (Colonization of the Karelian-Murmansk region).
The management of the road at different times was in Petrozavodsk, Petrograd, Belomorsk. The station in Murmansk was opened on 03/23/1923. Trains from the North to Leningrad went in the summer of 1924. Everything that had been lost by the end of the 1920s was restored. In 1929, they began to build a railway line to the future city of Kirovsk.
By order of the People's Commissariat of Railways dated January 27, 1935, the Murmansk Railway was renamed the Kirov Railway.
The road was badly damaged in 1941–1944. German aviation made 2800 raids on it. More than 90 thousand bombs were dropped. 1126 railway buildings and structures were destroyed, over 500 locomotives and 4950 wagons were damaged. But the road operated all the years of the Second World War (due to the capture of Petrozavodsk and the section of the road from Maselga to Svir by Finnish troops, trains went along the specially urgently erected Sorokskaya-Obozerskaya rocade road). From Murmansk, 1246 thousand tons of military equipment and military materials, equipment and food received from lend-lease allies were sent into the interior of the country.
In the 1950s railway lines Murmashi-Nikel were put into operation, and then to the village. Revda, Kovdor. There are no railway access roads to 2 regional centers - with. Lovozero and the village. Umba.
In 1959 the Kirov railway was attached to the Oktyabrskaya railway (Murmansk branch).
In the 1990s 8 stations were closed, including Kilpyavr, Pechenga, Safonovo, and so on. the Murmansk-Vaenga, Pyaive-Kilpyavr, Karelian Brooks - Alakurtti sections ceased operation.
Lit .: Murmansk railway. A brief outline of the construction of the railway on Murman with a description of its area. - Petrograd, 1916; Surozhsky P. How the Murmansk railway was built // Chronicle. 1917. No. 7–8; Griner D. A. From the history of Murman and the Murmansk railway // Chronicle of the North. - M.-L., 1949. T. 1; Kharitonov SV The Story of the Great Northern Way. - Petrozavodsk, 1984; Khabarov V.A. Magistral. - Murmansk, 1986; Yudkov S. On the tundra, on the railway // Murmansk Bulletin. 2012. September 22.
In the Murmansk region, the construction of a railway to the future port terminal "Lavna" is underway. The new branch will start at the station of the Oktyabrskaya Railway and end on the left bank of the Kola Bay. It is planned to build Lavna station and port terminals there. Today it is one of the largest railway construction projects in Russia.
1. Bridge across the Tuloma River near the village of Murmashi.
The length of the railway will be 45 kilometers. It will pass through a sparsely populated, rocky and swampy area covered with light forests.
2. Map of the construction of the railway on the right bank of the Tuloma River.
On the map above, the railroad under construction is highlighted in red, the existing railroad is highlighted in blue, and the embankment of the demolished railroad is highlighted in black.
3. View from the Dozornaya hill to the south, towards Murmashy.
On the right bank of the Tuloma River, the railway is being built parallel to the pre-existing Vykhodnoy-Murmashi line. But unlike it, the new sections will no longer have such serious slopes and curves.
4. View from the Dozornaya hill to the north, towards Kola and Murmansk.
Instead of the old dismantled branch, a section of the Kola-Murmashi railway is now used.
The most interesting object of the site under construction is the high railway bridge across the Tuloma. Let's start the inspection from it and move north, towards the Vykhodnoy station.
5. Construction of supports on the right bank of the Tuloma. View from the existing railroad.
The railway bridge over the Tuloma River was designed taking into account the complex geology and topography on both banks. The width of the floodplain at the intersection is 1370 meters. The old railway will pass under the bridge under construction.
6. View from the right bank to the supports of the future bridge and the technological embankment.
The total length of the bridge crossing will be 1570 meters. On the straight part of the bridge, standard railway trusses with a length of 110 meters with a ride below will be used.
7. Construction of supports on the left bank.
On curved trestle sections, typical 34.2-meter beam spans with a ride on top will be used. The span structures will be based on prefabricated monolithic supports.
8. General plan back towards the construction of the bridge.
With the pace of construction and financing of the project is not a good story. Now the Ministry of Transport wants to redirect 306 million rubles of public funds from the port project to the construction of this railway. The ministry refers to the fact that without additional funding, the railway will not be built on time - before 2020. Previously, the work was scheduled to be completed in 2018.
The ministry also says that investors do not go to the port without a railway. Concession schemes are frustrated.
9. In general, the old road runs much lower than the one under construction.
10. But not everywhere, there are places where the height difference is not so significant.
Two stations are planned to be built on the left bank - Murmashi-2 and Intermediate.
11. On the site along the right bank, the slopes and embankment of the future railway are already clearly visible.
According to Kommersant's estimates, the total cost of construction of the branch will be 46.5 billion rubles.
12. And in the distance Murmansk.
By rail, I managed to take a walk during a trip to. This is one of the largest railway construction projects in the country, and I completely forgot about it.
I went to take a couple of shots of the station at Murmashi station, then for landscapes to the Tuloma floodplain. And then bam - I see the bridge. And so turn after turn went all the way to Cola.
13. The view from the train window will be simply excellent. Initially, passenger traffic was not planned here. But not so long ago, the governor of the Murmansk region, Marina Kovtun, announced that they were planning to launch electric trains here. I'm not very clear where.
I was no longer going to publish these photos, after all, almost four months had passed. But recently I came across fresh photos of construction. And you know, almost nothing has changed there.
14. General view to the south from the Dozornaya hill.
15. Perhaps this is the most impressive place on the site along the right bank of the Tuloma.
16. Rocky soil, which is obtained as a result of preparation for construction, is used to fill the embankment in other areas.
17. The old railway, which runs below, was damaged by an explosion of rock. It was restored ... most likely more than once.
18. View from the Dozornaya hill.
