Palace Bridge (Saint Petersburg)

 moveable bridge, road bridge, UNESCO World Heritage Site, listed building / architectural heritage, 1916_construction, bascule bridge, object of cultural heritage of federal importance (Russia)

It is thrown across the Bolshaya Neva River between the Palace Square and the spit of Vasilievsky Island.

The Palace Bridge is a five—span bridge. The draw span is double-winged with a width of 56.5 meters, one of the largest in the world. The weight of metal superstructures is 4868 tons, counterweights — 2800 tons.

The bridge is being built using a modern hydraulic system. When wiring, the counterweights are lowered into the pits to a depth of up to 2 meters below the ordinary. The entire wiring cycle takes 5 minutes, during the same time the bridge is reduced.

The Palace Bridge is illuminated by 28 lanterns mounted on 16 pillars. The grid consists of 156 sections, each of them weighs 280 kilograms.

The bridge is considered one of the most complex structures not only in Russia, but also abroad.

The first bridge appeared here in 1727. The floating St. Isaac's Bridge was located downstream, between the Senate and Synod buildings and the Menshikov Palace. It consisted of wooden barges and was temporary: the bridge was built during navigation, and in winter they crossed the Neva ice.

In 1850, the first permanent bridge across the Neva was opened — Blagoveshchensky. At the request of the townspeople, the floating bridge was moved to the Winter Palace, where a boat transfer has been operating since then. The Plashkout Palace Bridge was open all year round. In 1863, the horse-drawn railway opened. Rails were laid across the bridge. The tram and then the tram ran on the Palace Bridge until 1997.

By the end of the XIX century, the old flatcuts began to leak and sink. The authorities of St. Petersburg decided to build a permanent bridge. In 1901, a competition was announced for the best bridge design, but none of the proposed 27 projects was accepted. Among the participants of the competition was the French firm "Batignol", which designed the Trinity Bridge. Her project was also rejected, and the commission announced a new competition.

The results were summed up in 1909. The project of engineer Andrey Pshenitsky and architect Robert-Friedrich Meltzer was recognized as the winner. The contract was concluded with the "Society of Kolomna Plants". According to the contract, only Russian specialists worked at the construction site and only domestic materials were used.

The construction of the Palace Bridge began in October 1911, and the opening was planned for November 1913. However, the construction was delayed. In April 1914, the flood prevented the work, then the First World War began.

The bridge was built by the end of 1916. In mid-December, the structures were checked for reliability: 34 trucks with a load of 600 pounds (9600 kg) each simultaneously drove onto the bridge and occupied all the spans. The bridge survived. The first carriage passed over the Palace Bridge on December 23, 1916. This date is considered the official birthday of the Palace Bridge.

The celebration of the opening turned out to be modest — there was a war. Neither representatives of the royal family came, nor the mayor, who granted the right to cut the ribbon to his deputy.

Because of the war, the bridge was commissioned without architectural decoration, although according to the project it was planned to be very magnificent. Railings, lanterns, control pavilions — all this was done already under Soviet rule. So, a cast-iron lattice with stars and banners appeared only in 1939. The authors of the lattice are sculptor Igor Krestovsky and architect Lev Noskov.

From 1918 to 1952, the bridge was named Republican.

During the Great Patriotic War, only urgent repairs were carried out on the bridge: damage from shelling and bombing was repaired. In January 1943, an aerial bomb exploded near the left-bank support of the draw span, which caused great destruction.

In 1957, granite parapets were installed on abutments and intermediate supports. Until the end of the 1970s, some elements of the construction of the Palace Bridge were wooden. In 1978, during the overhaul, the supports of the draw span were completed, the wooden flooring was replaced with an orthotropic plate.

In 1997, a new repair was carried out: the tram rails were removed from the bridge, and at the same time the bridge received night illumination. In honor of this event, on November 14, 1997, the festival "Palace Bridge lights up the lights" was held. The lighting was turned on under the cannon salvo of the Peter and Paul Fortress, fireworks and ballroom dancing took place on the bridge in old costumes.

The draw mechanism from the opening of the bridge until the reconstruction of 2012-2013 was electromechanical. Huge solid-cast gears were driven by an electric motor.

At the beginning of the XXI century, the Palace Bridge has exhausted its resource. The overhaul began on October 21, 2012, and ended on October 19, 2013. During the reconstruction, traffic on the bridge did not stop. During the repair, the movable part underwent a complete modernization. The adjustable mechanism was equipped with a modern hydraulic system. At the same time, rivets have been preserved on the inseparable parts of the Palace Bridge since tsarist times.

The Palace Bridge is built and repaired about 400 times a year — usually twice a day. During the night, up to 25 ships pass under the wings of the divorced bridge. A team of six people is working on the wiring.

During some summer film festivals, the bridge turns into a huge open-air cinema. The wing of the divorced Palace Bridge on the Hermitage side plays the role of a screen with an area of more than 400 square meters.

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