Waterways of the Tsars: Moscow Metro (10/9/2019)

Wednesday, October 9, 2019
We had free time this morning to allow for jet lag (what jet lag?!), so we headed out.

Северный Речной Вокзал/Severnyy Rechnoy Vokzal/Northern River Station
(1937, in Stalinist Gothic style) is being restored; meant to look like a ship

The River Station spire is missing the red star that once topped Spasskaya Tower of the Moscow Kremlin.

Waterway statue of woman holding
a "model of a yacht"

Used an underground passage to cross the Leningrad "Highway" to Парк Дружбы/Park Druzhby/Friendship Park.

Friendship Monument (1976) for "eternal
Hungarian-Soviet friendship" after 1945 liberation;
its twin in Budapest has since been dismantled

Articulated buses at the Rechnoy Voksal Metro station

We did our own tour of the Moscow Metro, which handles the most passengers out of all the metro/subway systems in the world. It consists of 14 lines and 212 stations and has more than 360 km/223 miles of tracks. Construction began in 1931 (and continues today) and it opened in 1935. During World War II, many stations were used as air-raid shelters.

Dark Green #2 Line Belorusskaya Station (1938, by
Ivan Taranov and Nadezhda Bykova)
with bust (c 1956) of Lenin

In the corridor connecting the #2 and #5 lines,
the Belarusian Partisans of 1941-1945 (by Sergey
Mikhailovich Orlov, S M Rabinovich, and Ilya A Slonim)

Brown #5 Line Belorusskaya Station (1952, by Ivan Taranov,
Z Abramova, A Markova, and Ya Tatarzhinskaya) with marble flooring
in a traditional pattern of Belarusian rugs

A dozen ceiling mosaics celebrate culture, economy,
and history of the country of Belarus

The challenge of travel in Russia is deciphering Cyrillic script!
(Belorusskaya)

The Brown #5 Line is a ring route; the rumor is that it was never a part of the initial Metro design, but that Stalin put a coffee mug on the provisional plans that left a  mark in the shape and location of the current ring line, and that it was then constructed because nobody then dared to oppose the Leader...

Novoslobodskaya Metro Station (1952, by Alexey
Dushkin), has 32 Art Nouveau stained glass panels

Six of the panels show an "intellectual" profession
such as the engineer here; also architect, geographer,
agronomist, musician, and ... (KSS)

... artist (stained glass by Latvian artists
E Veylandan, E Krests, and M Ryskin)

Peace Throughout the World (by Pavel Korin) mosaic
replaced a portrait of Stalin

Prospekt Mira Metro Station (1952, by
Vladimir Gelfreykh and Mikhail Minkus) with white
porcelain reliefs (by G Motovilov) relating to the nearby
Moscow State Botanical/Apothecary Garden

White porcelain relief (KSS)

White porcelain relief of a botanist? (KSS)

Komsomolskaya Metro Station (1952 by Aleksey Shchusev)
has such a huge hall that we turned around ...

... for a look to the other end of the station

Yep, a bust of Lenin under a hammer & sickle

One of eight large mosaics (by Pavel Korin) with
Alexander Nevsky who was victorious over
German-Estonian and Swedish invaders

The subjects of the mosaics were inspired by Stalin's speech at the Moscow Parade of 1941, where he encouraged the soldiers amid the catastrophic losses in the early period of World War II to remember the heroics of their Russian forefathers, such as Alexander Nevsky, Kuzma Minin and Dmitry Pozharsky (against the Polish), and Mikhail Kutuzov (War of 1812).

Not a coat of arms, just military weapons?

Escalators between the Brown #5 Line and Red #1 Line
Komsomolskaya Stations

Red #1 Line Komsomolskaya Station (1933-1935) has limestone
columns topped by the emblem of the Komsomol, the
All-Union Leninist Young Communist League

The Komsomol (up to age 28) was the third and final step of Communist youth organizations after the Young Pioneers (up to age 14) and the Little Octobrists (up to age 9). Members of the Komsomol helped construct the first Metro line in Moscow.

L side of majolica-tile panel (1935, by Yevgeniy Lanseray)
showing the Komsomol volunteers hard at work 

R side of the majolica-tile panel

Krasnye Vorota Metro Station (1932-1935, by
Ivan Fomin and N Andrikanis) where we were
directed to see the "ground building," the Red Gate
Skyscraper (1947-1953, by Alexey Dushkin)

Высотное здание на площади Красных Ворот/High-rise building on Red Gate Square is one of seven Stalinist skyscrapers designed by Alexey Dushkin. This building was the headquarters of the Ministry of Construction of Heavy Industry, including Transport Construction. Plaques along one wall honor Mikhail Lemontov (Romantic poet), Yevgeny Fedorovich Kozhevnikov (Minister of Transport Construction) and his successor Ivan Dmitiyevich Sosnov, and Boris Petrovich Chirkov (Soviet actor). Quite a collection!

Trompe l'oeil across from the Red Gate Building

The newer Metro trains have USB charging!

Red #1 Line Vorobyovy Gory Metro Station (1958, by M P Bubnov,
A S Markelov, M. F. Markovsky, A K Ryzhkov, and B I Tkhor)
is unique as it is on a bridge over the Moscow River and
is the only Moscow Metro station with windows

Brown #5 Line Park Kultury Metro Station (1950, by Igor Rozhin)
has 26 white marble reliefs (by Iosif or Isaak Rabinovich) of recreational
activities that can be enjoyed at nearby Gorky Park

White marble relief of ice skating

White marble relief of playing chess

Relief of Lenin

Brown #5 Line Kievskaya Metro Station (1954, by E I Katonin, V K Skugarev,
and G E Golubev) has mosaics (by A V Myzin) depicting relations between
Russia and Ukraine from the time of the Pereyaslav Rada in 1654 (when the
Cossacks swore an oath to the Russian Tsar) to the October Revolution in 1917

Mosaic of the Competition between
metalworkers of the Urals and the Donbass (KSS)

There is surely a Lenin in every Metro station

Dark Blue #3 Line Kievskaya Metro Station (1953, by
L V Lile, V A Litvinov, M F Markovsky, and V M Dobrokovsky)
with fresco panels depicting various aspects of life in the Ukraine

One of the frescoes; note the Kievian-style
ornamental frieze below

Mural (1937) celebrating 300 years of Ukrainian-Russian cooperation

There is a third Kievskaya Metro Station for the Light Blue #4 Line.

Warning about pickpocketing

Dark Blue #3 Line Park Pobedy Metro Station
(2003, by Nataliya Shurygina and Nikolay Shumakov)

Park Pobedy is the deepest station in Moscow and the
fourth deepest station in the world

It has the longest escalators in Europe at 126 m/413' long
with 740 steps; the ride takes approximately three minutes

Dark Blue #3 Line Arbatskaya Metro Station (1953 to replace
station bombed by Nazis in 1941, by Leonid Polyakov,
Valentin Pelevin and Yury Zenkevich)

Being the second longest station in Moscow, this is a view in the other
direction; larger and deeper stations were being built to double as
shelters in the event of a nuclear attack

The Arbatskaya station is known for its red marble
and stucco ornamentation

Dark Blue #3 Line Ploshchad Revolyutsii/Revolution Square
Metro Station (1938, by Alexey Dushkin) is an underground
sculpture gallery with 76 bronze sculptures by Matvey Manizer

Pairs of sculptures sit under the arches, including soldiers and
sailors, miners, engineers, agricultural workers, students, and athletes

Kent rubs the border guard's dog's nose for luck

From Moscow Metro Superstitions: "If you rub the nose of the shepherd sitting next to the border guard, your day will go well. To enhance the effect, enthusiasts recommend rubbing the noses of all four bronze dogs that live at the station. For an even bigger effect (people refer to the dog by the name Mukhtar) rub his paw and a knee of a soldier next to the pooch.

Apparently there are several statues that provide luck, depending on the circumstances: A statue of a woman with a rooster is in charge of finances. To solve money problems, it is enough to pat the rooster on its comb. The student girl statue solves unrequited love troubles, and to bring happiness to your personal life you should rub her shoe.

Head over to the revolutionary sailor with a revolver and touch his handgun if you want to leave a boring job. Before graduates defend their thesis, they should rub the bronze scientist's pencil. A sailor signalman is responsible for exciting journeys; a harsh bronze worker helps quit smoking — just rub his grenade; and a young mother is in charge of marriage and childbearing — you have to pat her on the knee."

A miner

Dark Green #2 Line Mayakovskaya Metro Station (1938,
by Alexey Dushkin) is in Art Deco style inspired by
Vladimir Mayakovsky, a Soviet poet and proponent of Futurism
(rejecting the past and advocating modernization)

One of 34 ceiling mosaics (by Alexander Deyneka)
depicting "24 Hours in the Land of the Soviets"

Many of the mosaics have aviation subjects, which
may go along with the station being used as a command
post for Moscow's anti-aircraft regiment during
World War II, as well as an air-raid shelter

It is said that Stalin took up residence in this station during World War II.

We ran out of time and headed back to to the Viking Truvor and lunch.

Next: Moscow Up Close.