Memories of Days Gone By

Memories of Days Gone By

St. Petersburg’s Central Railroad Museum is the oldest railroad museum in the world. It was established in 1809, 28 years before the first Russian train and is one of the over 130 museums that draw visitors to St. Petersburg region from all over the world.

Located in St Petersburg’s historic center, and immediately adjacent to the Yusupov Palace and Gardens, the small (15,000 square feet) museum bursts at the seams with over 50,000 exhibits, only a few of which can be on display in its eleven halls at any one time.

One of the notable features of the museum is an extensive collection of models of historic railroad bridges, made by the same engineers that built the real ones. Quite a few of the bridges on the Trans-Siberian line can be found in miniature, along with details of their construction and (if they are moveable) their operation. These are a surprisingly interesting series of exhibits.

Other working displays include demonstrations of signaling and telegraph equipment, and freight shunting yards as well as exhibits of experimental futuristic trains and huge (1:4) scale models of older steam locomotives and luxurious royal carriages.

Galina Zakrevskaya, the museum’s Director for the last 26 years, tells of the institution’s plans for the future “Our biggest problem is that we need more space for our exhibits. We hope to convert the city’s centrally-located Varshavsky Train Station–which is planned to discontinue train service—into a working museum. This will also enable us to display some of our full-sized locomotives and carriages, currently held in storage at Tsarskoe Selo, and perhaps even to provide short train rides.” The museum’s proposal competes with a proposal for the space by a local group of artists, and of course is subject to the uncertainty of obtaining necessary funding.

This museum should not be confused with an unrelated railroad museum in suburban St. Petersburg. This latter has a collection of locomotives and carriages and is located 20 minutes by elektrichka from Vitebsky Station, at the Paravoz Muzei stop. This depressing place with once fascinating items is now quietly rusting away, its historic treasures unprotected in the harsh outdoors. What is more, the ailing museum does not seem to welcome visitors, and doesn’t operate the equipment they own, instead arranging for a private company to do this for them—one can only speculate at the murky financial reasons for this. Their director declined to be interviewed, and a photo request was met with a requirement to “sponsor” the museum.

Central Railroad Museum, 50 Sadovaya St., St. Petersburg. Nearest Metro: Sadovaya/Sennaya Ploschad. Open Sunday thru Thursday (including holidays), 11am - 5pm. Closed on the last Thursday of each month. Admission is free, but there is a fee to take photos/video. Guides are available for $2 per person for a 50 minute tour. Few guides (who are working curators of the museum) speak English and all signage is in Russian—visitors are recommended to bring their own interpreter/guide with them.