Vintage railways. Cemetery of old trains near Yekaterinburg (28 photos)

The first station in Khovrino was small and wooden; it was built in 1870 at the expense of the industrialist E.V. Molchanov, who purchased an estate nearby. In 1908–1910, the station began to be used to connect the Nikolaevskaya Railway with the newly built Moscow Circular Railway, and it was decided to replace the station. The new station was inaugurated on July 15, 1910. A station building with a high platform and two residential buildings appeared there. The station was built according to a typical scheme: the main vestibule with exits to the city and to the platform was located along the central axis, on either side of it there were two waiting rooms. One was designed for passengers of I and II classes, and the other for III class. This division was observed even at small stations. The required premises also included the station master's office and the telegraph operator's room.The one-story building, lined with decorative brick, was built in the traditions of industrial architecture and decorated with cornices and pilasters.The floor was covered metlakh tiles, part of which still survives. The ceilings were decorated with stucco cornices. The station was heated by stoves in the basement, the smoke came out through the ducts, warming the walls. The project architect is unknown.

During the electrification of the Moscow - Kryukovo section, new passenger platforms were built in Khovrino, the station remained away from the main traffic. Later it was cut off from the station by new railway lines, and the old building housed a school for passenger carriage conductors, then it was used as workshops. Now the station is empty. Residential buildings at the station still belong to the railway - workers live there.

• How to get there Art. Khovrino - can be reached from Leningradsky Station

Platform Workers' Village

Photo: Wikipedia

The Work Village platform of the Belarusian direction appeared in 1951 during the electrification of the Belarusian direction from Moscow to Odintsovo. After the war, on part of the territory of the former Kuntsevo military camp, German prisoners built residential areas according to a single architectural plan with good landscaping. The architecture of the houses was a simplified version of the Stalinist Empire style, with balconies, bay windows, and figured pediments. The brickwork was completely plastered and supplemented with stucco elements, rods, and cornices. The smooth field of walls was covered with bright lemon yellow paint, all architectural details were white. This color scheme of the microdistrict has not changed for many years, and for this unusual coloring the entire area was called country Limonia. Some of the houses have survived to this day, reminding us of the existence of this city toponym for more than fifty years.

The platform pavilion was built as an entrance gate to Kuntsevo. It consists of a central capital part and two open summer verandas on the side. In the center there is a small waiting room, ticket offices and a technical room. Entrance is possible only from the passenger platform, but previously there was also a front portal with a stone porch from the side of the station square, currently walled up. Now this is one of the last surviving pavilions of the Stalinist Empire era in the country, and Russian Railways is going to demolish it during the construction of new stations to launch express trains to Skolkovo.“Arkhnadzor” believes that the pavilion does not interfere with reconstruction, and if the historical entrance from the side of the square is restored, in the place of which one of the new paths will be laid, then it can be successfully used.

• How to get there Art. Workers' village - can be reached from Belorussky railway station

Train station Kuntsevo-1

Photo: Wikipedia

The station of the town of Kuntsevo near Moscow, which was incorporated into Moscow in 1960, was built according to the design of the architect Strukov. He worked on the Moscow-Brest Railway in 1891–1910 and became the author of the Brest - now Belorussky - station.

Kuntsevo-1 station is neo-Gothic, reminiscent of a small castle. An asymmetrical composition with a high tower in one of the corners, lancet windows, and a parapet like a battlemented fortress wall running along the perimeter of the roof enhance the similarity. On the city side, the house is crowned by a tower with a pediment and a pointed roof. Initially, the main area of ​​the walls was not plastered: against the background of dark red brick, white overhead details stood out - lancet platbands, buttresses, decorative turrets. The entire area around is closed by a low fence, symbolizing a fortress wall. Now the station is completely plastered and painted in the corporate gray-red colors of Russian Railways.

• How to get there Art. Kuntsevo-1 - can be reached from Belorussky railway station

Fili station

Photo: yamskoyepole.ru

At the Fili station of the Belarusian direction there is a unique ensemble made in the style of constructivism - there are no analogues to this complex at any railway station within the capital.The station appeared in 1870 as a small stop on the Moscow-Smolensk Railway. At the beginning of the twentieth century, it was transformed into a full-fledged station, and at the same time the first station building appeared, about which there is practically no reliable information.

Since 1916 it began nearby development of industrial enterprises, due to which passenger traffic increased, Fili was expanded. Already in the 1930s, a small constructivist station and a centralization point for switches and signals were built for passengers, which made it possible to assemble all control in one building. The station was a symmetrical one-story building with a raised central part - there was a waiting room - and side wings. In accordance with the principles of constructivism, the station has no decor - the walls are smooth. To illuminate the waiting room and interior spaces, large windows with continuous glazing were made to cover almost the entire height. The only decoration of the facade is the name of the Fili station, written in a font characteristic of constructivism. The gable roof is hidden behind the extensions of the facade walls - it is not visible from the ground.The centralization post was built in a similar style - a multi-tiered tower with windows. Some of the corners were rounded so that the perpendicular load-bearing walls seemed to flow into one another.

• How to get there Art. Fili - can be reached from Belorussky Station

Water towers at Podsolnechnaya station

Photo: liveinternet.ru/community/1809964

Water towers at the Podsolnechnaya station appeared back in the 40s of the 19th century - simultaneously with the construction of the St. Petersburg - Moscow railway line according to the exemplary design of the architect Rudolf Zhelyazevich, who created most of the buildings on the Nikolaevskaya Mainline. And the chief architect of the St. Petersburg-Moscow Railway was Konstantin Ton, the author of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior.

Such towers were built at all stations of III and IV classes at passenger platforms where steam locomotives stopped. The road was immediately made double-track, and each tower served its own path, so the towers were built in pairs - one opposite the other. The station complex had a clearly defined center of symmetry; not only towers, but also passenger platforms, wooden stations, and tracks for loading and unloading freight cars were built relative to it. The towers themselves served as a kind of front gate, framing the entrance. Inside them, on the second floor, there was a water tank, and on the first floor, water-lifting pumps and steam engines were installed. From the tank, water was supplied by gravity to the locomotive's tender through a special wall tap. The ceiling between the first and second floors was arranged in the form of a vault with a central support. Very soon, this arrangement of the towers was recognized as unjustified, since each track had to build its own building, and in order to refuel the locomotives with water, it was necessary to go to the main tracks and occupy them while refueling. Therefore, later they began to construct one tower for the entire station, and water was poured through special outlets through columns at the places where the locomotives stopped.

To this day, only two pairs of towers of the Nikolaev Railway have survived - at the Podsolnechnaya station in the Moscow region and on the Ridges on the Chudovo - Malaya Vishera section. In addition, several single towers at Akademicheskaya and Burga stations survived.

• How to get there Art. Podsolnechnaya - you can get there from Leningradsky railway station

Pavshino station

This station in Krasnogorsk was built 22 km from the Vindavsky, that is, Rizhsky, station in 1901 - it was part of the Moscow-Vindavsky railway. The following year it was expanded, since cargo for Moscow arrived here, They built a station, which has not survived to this day, and service houses for employees. All the buildings were wooden, andOnly the employees' house survived. His actual address is1st Railway Dead End, 6.It is an H-shaped wooden structure. The house is still residential, it has retained the entire original structure, and in some places decorative details have survived: cladding made of profile carriage boards of two types, platbands, roof decorations, paneled doors, window frames, stoves.

The building is a valuable example of residential development and deserves to be given the status of a cultural heritage site of regional significance. However, just last week the house was demolished to create a new residential area. Local residents are unhappy with these plans and are collecting signatures against the new construction.

• How to get there Art. Pavshino - can be reached from Rizhsky railway station

Station house in Pokrovsky-Streshnevo

Photo: logoworks.narod.ru

The station on the Moscow-Vindava Railway was opened in 1901, and in the same year the first railway stations in the same style began to be built along the way. The station in Pokrovsky-Streshnevo was built in 1908. It was erected according to the design of Stanislav Brzozovsky, who specialized in railway topics. The architecture of this station echoes the buildings of the Pokrovskoye-Streshnevo estate, located nearby. For example, the corner turret repeats the appearance and proportions of the towers in the manor fence. The facades of the brick part were decorated with majolica, and the roof was supported by figured metal brackets. The wooden canopy rested on carved wooden columns and had a complex shaped roof ending in a high spire. In addition to the station, three brick residential buildings for employees were built at the siding; one house stood next to the station and two more on the opposite side of the tracks.

In 1945, the section of the road from the Rizhsky station to Nakhabino was electrified; instead of steam-powered trains, electric trains came, for which a new platform was built. Over time, the connecting branch from the Pokrovskoye-Streshnevo junction to the Okruzhnaya Railway turned out to be unnecessary. The station was adapted into a warehouse for railroad equipment. In the 1990s, the wooden canopy fell into disrepair - it was dismantled, and the majolica on the building was covered over. Around the same time, two of the three residential buildings located on the siding opposite the station disappeared. Since 2011, the station house has been considered an architectural monument of regional significance. In the spring of 2014, Russian Railways unexpectedly put the station up for auction, and the building ended up being privately owned by Firm Anika LLC. However, already in May the company put the monument up for sale -“for a sauna or a bike club” . The house needs restoration.

Podmoskovnaya station

Photo: advis.ru

Another station of the Moscow-Vindavskaya Railway, Podmoskovnaya, was the main destination for goods sent to Moscow along the new line. There was a locomotive depot, a village for employees and a wooden station. Due to a delay in the construction of the Vindavsky station for several months in 1901, Podmoskovnaya was the final station for all trains coming to Moscow, and its wooden station served as the capital's station. It was located at a considerable distance from the depot, was one-story, heated by five stoves of various sizes. The building was decorated with many carved details - brackets, platbands, decorative beams like half-timbered . Above the right wing there was an elegant carved turret.

The station was used for its intended purpose until 1945. From this year, commuter trains began to stop at the newly built Krasny Baltiets platform, which exists today, and the station turned into a railway telephone exchange, providing communication between all points from Moscow to Nakhabino.

In 2001, the telephone center closed - the station stood abandoned and burned several times. However, the building has never been rebuilt or overhauled and has retained its historical layout and many original details. In 2008 it received the status of a cultural heritage site. The depot with administrative buildings opened after restoration in July 2015 - now there is a Railway Museum and repair of existing steam locomotives. However, the station itself remains unrestored.

• How to get there Art. Podmoskovnaya - you can get there from Rizhsky station

Kalanchevskaya platform

Photo: dic.academic.ru

Imperial pavilions are small station buildings intended for official meetings of members of the imperial family or their short stays during stops along the way. One of these pavilions has been preserved near the Kalanchevskaya platform. It was built in 1896 according to the design of Heinrich Voynevich for the meeting of Nicholas II, who arrived in Moscow for the coronation, with a delegation of Moscow officials and representatives of the nobility. It is a square red brick building with white details, a dome over the entrance and a flagpole over the central part. Adjacent to it was a wide platform about a hundred meters long, covered with a “carved roof of elegant design.” Inside the pavilion there was furniture for the royal family and massive oak benches with monograms for the rest of the public. Inside the portico, above the entrance, there was an image of a double-headed eagle, which in some incomprehensible way was preserved throughout the Soviet years and has come down to our time.

However, shortly before the coronation, the ceremony of the emperor's entry into Moscow was changed and the royal train arrived at the Brest - now Belorussky - station. This was due to the large number of people greeting them: on Kalanchevskaya and Myasnitskaya streets there would simply have been traffic jams of people wanting to see the imperial family. L In the summer of 1896, Nikolai nevertheless stopped in this pavilion on his way to the Nizhny Novgorod exhibition.

After the February Revolution, the Imperial Pavilion was occupied by the Council of Workers' Deputies of the Zheleznodorozhny District of Moscow. Subsequently, the station was adapted to serve passengers by opening a waiting room and suburban ticket offices.

• How to get there Art. Moscow-Kalanchevskaya - walk from the square of three stations (Yaroslavsky, Leningradsky and Kazansky) and the Komsomolskaya metro station

Paveletskaya-Tovarnaya platform

Photo: watertowers.ru

The Paveletskaya direction was one of the last to come to Moscow - its construction began in 1897. It was considered extremely profitable; grain cargoes from the black earth regions were supposed to be transported through it to the central regions of the country. After After the railway station, on previously empty lands, many industrial enterprises grew up, connected to the railway by access roads, and the station itself became a major transshipment point.

Not far from the station, first named Saratovsky and then Paveletsky, a “radical locomotive depot with thirteen stalls” of a fan type was built. The remains of the buildings remain to this day near the Tovarnaya platform, used as workshops or utility rooms and clearly visible from passing trains.

To supply water to the locomotives and the depot itself, a water tower was built at the edge of the station in 1889–1899. Structurally, it is a hollow brick cylinder, conventionally divided by cornices into four floors, although there are no interfloor ceilings inside. At the level of the third floor, a riveted metal tank for water rests on a ring of external walls, from which it dispersed through a pipeline system to the station buildings. Another water tank is located at the fourth floor level of the tower.The building is now unused and abandoned. The entrance to it is blocked.

• How to get there Art. Moscow-Paveletskaya-Tovarnaya - walk from Paveletsky railway station and Paveletskaya metro station

Train station at Potylikha station

Photo: ruspics.livejournal.com

Potylikha is a stop station of the Moscow Circular Railway, built in 1905–1908 to relieve congestion at the Moscow railway junction and streamline the movement of transit cargo. The name comes from the surrounding area - really the rear of the then Moscow. Potylikha Station is the tallest station building in Moscow: it has five floors. Built in 1905–1907 according to the design of Alexander Pomerantsev and engineer Lavr Proskuryakov.

The railway passes through the Moscow region of Potylikha along a high embankment, so such a high building was required for convenient monitoring of trains and lifting passengers onto the platform. It included premises for the telegraph, signalmen and switchmen, and service apartments for employees. Access to the platform was from the fourth floor through a balcony and an elegant metal bridge spanning the railway embankment (the bridge has not survived). Passengers could climb the stairs to the platform exit or use an electric elevator - this is probably the first time a station was equipped with an elevator on domestic railways. The top floor of the station was occupied by a switch and signal control post with large arched windows and a separate balcony for the attendant. Through the windows or from the balcony, the duty officer observed the situation at the stop and adjacent connecting branches.

After the cessation of passenger traffic along the Ring Road, the station was turned over to housing. In the 1990s, it stood abandoned, and in the mid-2000s the station was removed from the housing stock and turned over to offices. At the same timerestored, but with errors and without understanding the functional purpose. The façade facing the railway tracks was especially damaged. The restored building is still not in use.

• How to get there Potylikha stop - located on the street. Potylikha, near the Kutuzovskaya metro station

Kanatchikovo station

Photo: Wikipedia

If you walk along Kanatchikovsky Proezd, and then go down a few steps to the railway tracks, you can find yourself in the beginning of the twentieth century. A small elegant station, benches on the platform, neatly trimmed bushes, flower beds, beautiful cast-iron lanterns skillfully woven into a forged metal fence.

The station in a style of classical architecture unusual for the Okrug was designed by the chief architect of the road, Alexander Pomerantsev. Arched windows with molded frames, half-columns on the facade of a two-story building, and even two lion heads guarding the main entrance - all this looks more like a noble estate than a public building. Inside there were waiting rooms of three classes: in the first there were soft sofas and an iconostasis, in the second passengers were offered to sit on wooden benches, and in the third class there were no seats at all.

Across the road, two typical residential buildings for station employees have been preserved. One of them (3 Kanatchikovsky Ave.) is pure modern, and the second (1 Kanatchikovsky Ave., building 1) is almost impossible to recognize due to the huge number of reconstructions and the late plastic facade. A little closer to Vavilova Street there is a heavily rebuilt central control post for the switches and signals of the Kanatchikovo station (Vavilova, 5b) with characteristic arched windows on the second floor, through which the attendant could see the approaching train in advance, and a now built-up balcony, upon going out onto which one could see the correctness of the route prepared for the reception or departure of this train.On a fenced and heavily overgrown industrial area (Kanatchikovsky Prospekt, 9b) there is a dilapidated track barracks No. 53, in which track brigades lived.About ten years ago there was also a guard house, but it was demolished and a new building took its place.

In front of the station, a passenger platform with a warehouse and lamps from 1908 has been preserved. There are lanterns that seem to be ancient at many stations on the Ring Road, but there the supports for awnings located above the exits to the trains are used as lanterns. And only at Kanatchikovo station are the lanterns real.

• How to get there Kanatchikovo station - located in Kanatchikovsky Proezd, it can be reached on foot from the Leninsky Prospekt metro station

From Yandex Photos, I’ll post another portion of rare photos from there. For example, this. Photo of the tracks of the Kievsky railway station in Moscow in 1936. Shot from “the very skies,” the Photographer climbed onto the lacy trusses supporting the glass roof above the station platform and took this memorable photo. I wonder if there are any stairs leading there, or if the author of the photo used climbing equipment.

Gakkel diesel locomotive GE1 (Shchel1), one of the world's first mainline diesel locomotives, built in 1924 in Leningrad. Who's on the bandwagon? Isn't it its designer Yakov Modestovich Gakkel himself? Here, there is a photo where the same person was taken in the very center of a group of comrades standing in front of a diesel locomotive. Most likely this is him, and the photo was taken in November 1924, immediately after testing of the diesel locomotive began

The Russo-Balt car, adapted for travel by rail. Under the tsar, railway authorities rode these on inspection trips.

A group of comrades, filmed against the backdrop of C10-12, Suramsky Italian in the early 30s in Georgia. There is no caption under the photo and we can only guess who they are, these people, and what they have to do with the locomotive standing behind them.

Hungarian diesel train DP (three-car) in Sukhumi, 1950. Photo from the magazine "Ogonyok". I remember how amazed I was by the sight of this train when I first saw it in old newsreels from the early 50s. It was filmed in Abkhazia and drove along the road right along the Black Sea coast.

Railway workers against the backdrop of the only Soviet passenger electric locomotive PB21. Clearly taken after the war (judging by the shoulder straps). But where - Georgia or Perm?

Most likely Georgia. Here is a photo of the same people, but against a background of more exotic vegetation than we have in the Urals. The PB21 electric locomotive was sent to Georgia in 1952, which means both photos were taken in the early 50s.

And this is Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev himself on the step of an electric locomotive of the "F" series. The photo was taken during Khrushchev’s visit to France in 1960. The General Secretary decided to personally “accept” the electric locomotives made by Alstom for the USSR. By the way, isn’t this electric locomotive the same one that now stands in the museum at the Finlyandsky Station? That one is designated Fk07, and this one in the photograph is Fp07. But, as we know, the letter “k” appeared in the name of the locomotive only after its modernization in the USSR. So it is quite possible that the only F-series electric locomotive preserved in Russia is the one on which Khrushchev set foot.

This photo was most likely taken there and at the same time. Only at the door of the electric locomotive is General de Gaulle. Unfortunately, the Soviet comrades did not save the electric locomotive on board which the President of France set foot.

We will not talk about the Circular Railway; it deserves a separate topic. We are talking about an abandoned (at first glance) railway line, laid through the thicket of Losiny Ostrov by who knows when. It is located quite far from us. We go out onto the Abramtsevo clearing and stomp along it to the left, towards the main entrance of the Kremlin. We pass by it and go further along the fence, which after 500 meters turns right, but we are not on the same path. We continue to stomp straight ahead. Abramtsevo clearing crosses Bumazhny Prosek, and goes further, briefly becomes asphalt, then turns into dirt again, flies up a hill, dives down, climbs again, and a sharp descent to the railway line! And the clearing goes further and after 500 meters it ends at the Belokamennaya station, but we don’t need to go there (yet).

We are studying the find. It starts half a kilometer south, right from the Ring Railway. The traffic lights are almost always red. Making a smooth turn to the north, the railway dives into the forest:

About five hundred meters later it intersects with the Abramtsevo clearing. There is a crossing made of longitudinal sleepers, so you don’t even have to get off your bike. Straight as an arrow, the railway goes further into the thicket of the forest:

The rails are brown with age, the sleepers are wooden, and there are bushes close to the tracks. At first glance, it seems that no one has been here for a long time. We take a closer look: there is a strip of fresh knurling on the rails, the sleepers smell of tar - that means something is moving here after all. Next comes gravel and sleepers. The year of manufacture is indicated on them - 85th. On others 83 and 84. Thus, the last renovation was carried out almost 20 years ago. On both sides of the railway there are ditches for water drainage. In addition, there are hundreds of old sleepers lying there. Half are stone, dated 1967, the rest are apparently even older. It turns out that the road is at least 35 years old. But judging by the completely rotten wooden sleepers, she may be even older. But how much more? Judging by old maps of Moscow from 1931, this railway line was already in operation at the beginning of the 30s of the 20th century (see red arrow), but then it was removed from the maps. It turns out that our branch is neither more nor less, but 3/4 of a century old!!!

About two hundred meters later we get another proof that the road is not abandoned - trees that fell across the tracks during the 2001 hurricane. At first glance, the terrain on both sides of the road is very ordinary, a thicket of forest, with paths on either side of the road. But again, only at first glance. And on the second - it’s already more interesting. There is an old one to the left of the road. At its base there is a box for equipment, which is, of course, empty. There are no wires going to the pole and, judging by the shape, there never were, except perhaps underground. (According to Mufizal) this is nothing more than an old traffic light before the crossing on the Abramtsevo clearing, which (as we learn later) was previously guarded by sentries. Nowadays the forest is getting closer and closer to the tracks, and the traffic light has been standing among the trees for a long time. And on the contrary, to the right of the road, the first 200-300 meters from the intersection with the Abramtsevo clearing, here and there numerous remains of old brick buildings are scattered. Judging by the degree of destruction, maybe even pre-war. Only one house remained more or less “intact”, something like a station building, or a guard house, or something similar, and the rest were almost completely destroyed and overgrown so that they are difficult to distinguish from the landscape. Here and there you come across islands densely overgrown with tall, impenetrable bushes, as usually happens on the site of buildings that have been demolished or collapsed due to age.

In addition, next to the Abramtsevo clearing there are powerful gas taps sticking straight out of the ground. There’s a forest all around, it’s unclear who needs (was) gas here? What was this all about? One possible answer is old summer cottages. A long time ago, even before the war, in the early 30s, Losinoostrovskaya Street was built, and the areas to the north of it were then allocated for summer cottages. This can be seen on the old map of Moscow from 1929, shown on the page dedicated to the history of Metrogorodok. Perhaps we are dealing with the remnants of former dacha luxury. After the war, Losiny Island was declared a nature reserve, and the construction of summer cottages on its territory was prohibited.

We continue to stomp along the sleepers, there is no one around, silence, and only the birds singing in different voices. How cool it is... Suddenly a powerful locomotive whistle is heard from behind! We smooth the hair standing on end, take the heart out of the heels and turn around. Behind us, slowly parting the bushes, a shunting diesel locomotive rolls along and buzzes, effectively warning of its arrival. It pulls 2 freight cars behind it. Rumbling with a powerful diesel engine, the procession slowly floats past and drives off into the forest:

Initially, a switchman was provided here, and they even built it for it, but then apparently they decided that a switchman was not needed, and the house still stands, it’s beautiful on the outside, but completely shabby, although strangely enough, there’s not much trash there, and that really surprised me - on the floor, almost alone, lay a yellowed page from the magazine “Youth” of 1995. It lay there intact for eight years and no one even touched it!

Although the railway bifurcates, both branches have the same destination, the gate of which is no more than 500 meters away. This object is still famous for its secrecy. Rumor has it that this is a warehouse of weapons or harmful substances. Others say the facility has something to do with the production of equipment for submarines. But no one knows for sure, and those who know are silent. On the Internet you can find information according to which the object is an ordinary Voentorgbaza, which means that our railway line serves to deliver goods there. It looks like the truth, but... security! There is a triple fence with barbed wire around the facility and machine gunners on towers. There are even rumors that the Metro-2 line approaches it underground. A high hangar and several other lower buildings can be seen on the territory. If you compare a photograph from space and an aerial photograph of our area, you will notice that this military facility is thoroughly “covered up.” (According to Phontom) once on TV there was a program about the only warehouse of confiscated weapons in Moscow, in the footage of which it was easy to recognize our area. One way or another, the train approached the closed gates on the right branch, sounded a sad whistle, the gates opened, and the train disappeared behind them for half an hour. The locomotive drove back without the carriages, stood for a while at the switch and drove off through the forest on its own. He did not use the left branch. Each of them leads to its own gate, and the left ones, oddly enough, were wide open (but only the outer ones):

So our journey along the “abandoned” railway line ended, which in fact turned out to be not abandoned at all. But the story doesn't end there. There are two stories ahead of you. The first concerns the secret facility mentioned above, and the second contains interesting information about the past of our railway line.

Thus, this military facility has been hiding in our forest for more than 150 years! But the entrance there was from the Yaroslavl highway. The branch line from the Circular Railway was built already in our century, as follows from the maps - in the early 30s of the 20th century. And one of the readers of the site - Sergei K. - had a chance to meet a man who was able to tell a lot of interesting things about history himself O th railway. I present Sergei’s story almost unchanged:

I received this information by chance, having once met a man who was lost there in the forest. It turned out that he also grew up in these parts, grew up all over Losiny Ostrov as a boy, immigrated to Israel in the 80s, and in the 90s, when the opportunity arose to come to Russia, he comes here every year for a month to visit his relatives and does not forget the old places . Obviously, his long absence from his homeland took its toll, which is why he got lost. According to him, this railway line was built before the War (1941-1945). It led to the military unit where the arsenal was located. As boys, in the summer they went swimming in ponds, which were also guarded by the military. Now, according to him, these ponds have not survived. Obviously these were some kind of fire reservoirs. Sometimes they were caught, and then they suffered greatly. Perhaps we are talking about those located next to the shooting range. There were towers with machine gunners already at that time. Unfortunately, from the conversation it was not possible to understand the exact location of these ponds, but they are definitely not related to the reservoir near the MGSU dormitory. During the war, this branch acquired strategic importance, and its security increased. The locomotive pulled carriages with weapons, and along the entire line at certain intervals there were sentries with machine guns. The crossing where the branch crosses the Abramtsevo clearing was especially heavily guarded. Here, to this day, old buildings have been preserved, where, obviously, the main guard guarding the branch was located. He also told us about the present day of this mysterious branch. It still functions, but diesel locomotives with trailers almost always enter the right gate. There really is a military trading base there. In general, this was never a special secret - along the former route of bus 75k, where it turned from Bumazhny Prosek to the right towards Kremlyovka, there used to be a small wooden house like a gazebo and there were signs near it: an arrow straight with the inscription “GUTMO Base” " and an arrow to the right with the inscription "Possession No....". The first sign was intended for service buses and trucks, which constantly ran to and from the base, poisoning the fresh air and disturbing cyclists, forcing them to press to the side of the road every now and then. The second sign is for vehicles carrying construction materials for the new Kremlyovka building. Obviously, the abbreviation GUTMO is the Main Directorate of Trade of the Ministry of Defense. Fortunately, in the early 90s, Bumazhny Prosek was closed to vehicle traffic, and cars began to approach the base exclusively from the Yaroslavskoye Highway. At the same time, it was necessary to “declassify” part of the military unit behind the pond near the MGSU dormitory - behind the preserved high but leaky fence with barbed wire, where machine gunners used to stand on towers, now there are private garages and free access to the trading base. I assume that the left gate leads directly to the territory of the military unit, or rather, what is left of it. And at one time it occupied a huge territory and went directly onto the Yaroslavl highway. To this day, a gate and a fence with characteristic “Stalinist” architecture have been preserved there, but behind the gate a block of modern houses has now been built, and you still need to walk to the buildings of the military unit. As far as I know, at present the protected zone with towers remains only in the area of ​​​​the Babushkinsky cemetery, but there are no machine gunners there.

Along the sleepers - above the water

All lovers of the aesthetics of the worlds of the Strugatsky brothers will appreciate this location in the Losiny Ostrov park. An abandoned railway line, flooded in places, lost in the thick of the forest and forked, seems long forgotten.

Finding it turned out to be not very difficult - it originates not far from the Belokamennaya MCC station. By the way, the station even preserves a historical building built at the beginning of the 20th century. There are almost no people here - it seems that you have already left far from Moscow and now got off at the old stop.

Directly behind the platform is a fenced area. A lone guard says that there are not very many people who want to see the road, and points the way.

If you are traveling by car, you can safely enter the Abramtsevo clearing into your navigator: there the rails intersect with the road. However, to watch the line from the very beginning, you will have to go to the above-mentioned station.

For the first 500 meters the railway line runs almost parallel to the MCC line. The tracks are blocked with sleepers, the new LED traffic light is red. Here the rails seem less abandoned - we even have an idea that the road is still sometimes used. However, we quickly became convinced of the opposite, as soon as we went a little into the forest after the “piece of iron”.

Near the clearing, the road winds in a lowland, so after the rains the rails were under water. You can't drive through it, but it looks more than picturesque.

You have to walk parallel to the rails for about 200 meters because the water reaches almost to your knees. Tree branches converge over the road like a dome - it turns out to be a railway straight into a fairy-tale forest. On the side of the road stands a destroyed house, abandoned, apparently, for quite some time. It is quite possible that this could have been a building for railway workers. If you go a little away from the road, you will find the foundations of several more buildings heavily overgrown with grass and moss. A pole was discovered near the crossing - most likely, a traffic light was once attached to it.

Finally, you can go down and walk along the sleepers. Here, on the road, the consequences of the hurricane are clearly visible - fallen trees everywhere. In some places it is impossible to climb over them - you have to go around them. The rails are brown with rust - it’s clear that no one has ridden on them for a long time.

It seems that the road has not been used since the sleepers were changed, but along the slopes of the road there are cut down trees, to put it mildly, not the freshest. Most likely, they have been lying here since the hurricane in the early 2000s. They are neatly cut, suggesting that this road was still in use at the beginning of the century.

Sleepers deserve a separate discussion. Among them there are both concrete and wooden ones. If you look closely, you can see on the concrete sleepers the years of their replacement - from 1983 to 1985. That is, the road has not seen repairs for more than 30 years. Going deeper into the thicket, you can find old sleepers in ditches for water drainage. Most of the concrete ones date from 1967. It seemed that this was all, but under them there were also wooden ones that had been replaced earlier. Thus, in the mid-80s there was at least a third road repair.

As it turned out a little later, the road was indicated on maps of Moscow in the early 30s, that is, these same wooden sleepers could have been laid even when laying the “piece of iron”. She disappeared from the maps much later.

Meanwhile, we climbed over another fallen tree along the slope and came out into a relatively open space. Somewhere in the tall grass the rails are completely lost, and you can only navigate by the sleepers. The open space is a whole clearing of fallen trees and wet, squishing earth underfoot. It is impossible to go deep without the risk of falling into a swamp.

The trees lie on the rails in a dense layer, so you can walk without fear.

In the meantime, our path again went into the wilderness. Here, surprisingly, the road was less damaged by the hurricane, but in some places puddles still spoil the walk. The total length of this branch is about 4 kilometers, and, judging by the map, it should split somewhere. We deliberately did not look where the road led - we decided that it would be more interesting.

Old maps of Losiny Island actually show dacha plots. However, no matter how we wandered around the vicinity of the road, we did not find anything except one foundation. Somewhere in the distance birds are singing. It seems that no trains ever ran here, and the rails were simply laid by mistake...

Finally, we came across a switchman's booth. You could try to move the needle, but it was already very rusty and wouldn’t budge. The booth practically collapsed. Having rummaged through old records, we find that the switchman has been gone for a really long time, and often, while the branch was functioning, the driver himself had to stop and move the switch. Judging by the observations of local residents, trains ran here back in 2003.

But the forking branch confused us. We were fully confident that it would lead to different objects, but it turned out that the branches converged at one destination. There is barbed wire, and behind it there are obviously some warehouses - you can’t go any further, and you can only look at them from afar.

The Moscow Railway reported to MK that the railway line from the Belokamennaya MCC station, located on the territory of the Losiny Ostrov National Park, was built to a military unit and is currently not in use. In the future, it is planned to dismantle this line - the railway workers have already sent a corresponding proposal to the design organization.

However, we became interested: what kind of military unit is this? Having rummaged through the sources, we see that Losiny Island was used by artillerymen somewhere in the middle of the 19th century. At that time there was still no talk of a holiday village, much less a city, but there was a small farm here. It was precisely this that was chosen by the Artillery Directorate.

But if the warehouses appeared in the 19th century, then the branch is clearly younger. According to some reports, it appeared around the 1930s of the last century. Since the object was strategically important, the branch was heavily guarded. Apparently, over time, the guard booths, which, according to some sources, stood along the roadsides, finally collapsed.

The road acquired particular importance during the war. Several trains passed along it every day, and the crossing at the Abramtsevo clearing was especially carefully guarded. After the war, the reinforced security was removed, but those same destroyed buildings near the clearing, which we initially mistook for old dachas, turned out to be guard houses.

Judging by the maps of the 30s, somewhere near the warehouses there were two ponds, which, however, have now been filled up.

Until the line was laid, access was from the Yaroslavskoye Highway through Bumazhny Prosek. Back in the 70s there was a sign to the GUTMO base. This abbreviation means the Main Directorate of Trade of the Ministry of Defense.

Marginal routes of communication

By the way, such an object is not the only one in Moscow. A great place for a walk can be found not far from the Elektrozavod (or Moscow Electric Lamp Plant) - there the line runs parallel to the Moscow Railway. Its length is approximately 4 kilometers. The tracks were built back in the 20s of the last century and connect several industries at once. The road is half-dismantled, numerous switches have been dismantled, but it is quite possible to find surrounding locations here. In general, after the liquidation of the ZIL branch, this industrial railway became the longest unused in Moscow.

There are a total of 4 crossings on the branch, and it itself is strongly curved. It seems as if she is going around some invisible obstacle. And indeed, it turns out that the Khapilovka River used to flow here. Now it has been hidden in a sewer, but the curvature of the road itself remains. Moving, apparently, no longer works.

Most often, such roads were built by enterprises in order to facilitate logistics routes around the city and not create traffic jams. These roads were on their balance sheet, but now, due to the fact that production is being moved out of Moscow, there is no longer a need for such branches.

The press service of the Moscow Railway told us that there were indeed many such objects, but the official department has nothing to do with them. “There are branches on the territory of the city that do not belong to or are not maintained by Russian Railways. These railway tracks are on the balance sheet of various enterprises. We have no information about how many there are, where they are located, etc. The fate of these branches is in the hands of the owners.”

The walk itself takes about two hours. It is best to walk in such places in comfortable shoes, because after the Moscow rains the slopes of the roads are washed away. The road itself also looks very picturesque, surrounded by lush greenery - there doesn’t seem to be a feeling that there will be, as they said on the Internet, “syringes crunching like snow under your feet.” Sometimes it even seems that a locomotive whistle is about to be heard behind you...

In general, there is no impression of complete desolation, as in “Elk Island”. It seems that sometimes the road is even used. The Ministry of Railways confirmed to us, however, that they have nothing to do with this road and do not service it. “The railway line from the Lokomotiv MCC station, located in the capital’s Preobrazhenskoye district, does not belong to and is not maintained by Russian Railways OJSC. These are access roads that are on the balance sheet of a third-party organization,” the department reported.

This branch once had strategic knowledge. During the war, strategically important products and shells were produced at the factories to which the rails were laid. Now, most of the factory buildings are given over to offices, and at the once huge electric lamp plant you can rent a photo studio...

After vacant lots, very urban, heavily littered, at some point we find ourselves almost in the forest. The bright greenery contrasts strongly with the brown rails, which already seem to be a continuation of the trees - large thick roots.

Here and there you come across abandoned buildings - most likely, switchmen's booths or other outbuildings.

By the way, to walk along this line in comfort, you can even book an excursion.

“You shouldn’t go to places like this alone.”

Such locations attract both photography enthusiasts and other seekers of unusual places to walk.

However, in order to ensure that walks and photo sessions are not overshadowed by unpleasant meetings and other surprises, we decided to draw up a small set of rules for those who want to visit such places. Roman Vaseykin, a photographer and tourist with many years of experience, gave several recommendations.

“Any walk through such places should begin with collecting information. You need to clearly understand where you are going, what could threaten you there,” says Roman. In his opinion, in the case of the Electric Plant, the real danger is people. “As far as I remember, it was a rather marginal neighborhood, and the residents there were appropriate. You shouldn't go to such places alone. Even if you are confident in your abilities.”

In the case of Elk Island, people are likely the least dangerous. But it is quite possible to get injured and not get help. And here one more person is precisely the guarantee that qualified people will come to your aid. In general, you always need to calculate the worst-case scenario and be prepared for it.

Among other things, you need to be attentive to hanging wires - after all, for example, at the Elektrozavod the entire branch was electrified. And broken wires are also a reality of such places.

If we talk about photo shoots, then it’s better to just take all the uncomfortable, but appropriate clothes with you, and go in what’s most comfortable.

Maxim Khaldeyev, a mountain tourism instructor, generally does not recommend visiting such places. But if a person decides to take such a walk for himself, then he agrees with his colleague: first you need to collect information. Then decide what you need to take with you. “Of course, no one says that you need to pack for a hike, but it’s worth thinking about what to wear and what’s good to take with you. Someone takes some kind of self-defense means, someone constantly carries a first aid kit with them - all this is not superfluous.