Egyptian Bridge (Saint Petersburg)

 interesting place, road bridge, listed building / architectural heritage, 1955_construction

The Egyptian Bridge spans the Fontanka River in the alignment of Lermontovsky Prospekt and connects Pokrovsky and Nameless Islands. This is a single-span metal structure with a length of 53.3 meters (length along the rear faces of the abutments) and a width of 27.6 meters.

The route of the bridge crosses the river diagonally, its longitudinal axis relative to the Fontanka embankment deviates from the perpendicular by 20 °.

The abutments of the bridge are massive reinforced concrete on a pile foundation, lined with granite. At the junction of the postcards with the embankments on granite pedestals there are sculptures of sphinxes that decorated the Egyptian chain bridge.

Obelisks serving as floor lamps for hexagonal lanterns are installed at the entrances on granite pedestals. The obelisks are made of reinforced concrete with artistic cast iron cladding. The decor uses gilded rosettes — symbols of the sun god Ra. The railing is made of cast iron gratings of artistic casting.

Egyptian Bridge (former New Chain Bridge: since 1828, Egyptian Chain Bridge: 1836-1882, Temporary Egyptian Bridge: 1917) is a bridge over the Fontanka River in the Admiralteysky district of St. Petersburg. The name of the bridge comes from its peculiar design.

The Egyptian Bridge was one of the first chain transport bridges built in the 20s of the XIX century. The author of the project were engineers V. von Tretter and V.A. Khristianovich. The bridge was built in 1825-1826 . The architecture of the bridge reflected the increased interest in the art of ancient Egypt characteristic of the XIX century. Portals, columns, as well as the cornice and other parts of the bridge were decorated with hieroglyphic ornaments, and cast-iron figures of sphinxes were installed at the entrances on both sides of the bridge (sculptor P.P. Sokolov). The sculptures of sphinxes were cast at the Byrd factory. They were painted yellow. The metal parts of the bridge were decorated in brown, bronze. The abutments are made of rubble masonry on a wooden pile base, lined with granite. The architectural details of the sphinxes and lattices were gilded.

The roadway is wooden, it was suspended on 3 metal chains, two at the edges, and one in the middle of the bridge. The sidewalks are arranged on consoles outside the extreme chains, and the chains barely touched the middle of the flooring. The Egyptian chain bridge has served for 79 years, during which repeated repairs were carried out.

On January 20, 1905, the existence of the Egyptian Chain Bridge ended — it collapsed. Only the sphinxes remained. According to eyewitnesses, on this day a squadron of the Horse Guards Regiment passed over the bridge in one direction, and in the opposite direction — 11 sledges with drivers. The reason for the collapse was the sensitivity of chain bridges to dynamic loads and the lack of high-quality steels for the manufacture of chains at that time. After the disaster, a nine-span wooden beam bridge was temporarily constructed near Usachev Lane (now Lane Makarenko), which was repeatedly repaired and existed until the construction of the new Egyptian bridge.

In 1954-1955, a single-span metal bridge of a double-hinged frame system was built according to the project of engineer of the Leningrad Engineering Project V.V. Demchenko and architects P.A. Areshev and V.S. Vasilkovsky. The "legs" of the frame are reinforced concrete, and the crossbar is a metal beam of variable height. The abutments are massive, concrete on a pile foundation, lined with granite.

The roadway — reinforced concrete slabs laid on a metal crossbar, is included in the joint work with the crossbar. The abutments and "legs" of the frame are lined with granite.

Granite obelisks with lanterns are installed at the entrances to the bridge. The railing is made of cast iron gratings of artistic casting.

In 1979, a reinforced concrete parapet fence of the roadway was installed, in 1988. it has been replaced with granite. In 2002-2004, 4 lanterns were restored. In 2006, the facade decoration elements were coated with gold paint, and three sphinxes were restored.

From September to December 2022, the sphinxes of the Egyptian Bridge were under restoration. Prior to that, the specialists of the Museum of Urban Sculpture conducted a survey of them and found numerous pockets of metal corrosion, loss of gilding of decorative elements, damage to the paint coating. On September 10, the sculptures were dismantled and taken to the museum's restoration workshop. The updated Sphinxes returned to their pedestals on December 19, 2022.

Interestingly, when the figures of sphinxes were cast at the Byrd factory in 1825, two trial copies were also made. At the beginning of the XX century, they were acquired by the merchant Galaktionov, who was engaged in the metal trade, and installed at his house. In the 1960s, on the initiative of P.P. Stepnov, chief engineer of Lenmosttrest (now St. Petersburg GBU Mostotrest), the sphinxes were restored and in 1971 installed on the stairway of the Malaya Nevka embankment near the Kamennoostrovsky Bridge.

en.mostotrest-spb.ru/bridges/egipetskij