Description of the attraction
One of the oldest bridges in St. Petersburg is the Obukhovsky Bridge across the Fontanka River along Moskovsky Prospekt (Saarskaya prospect, formerly Tsarskoselsky Prospekt). The name of this bridge gave rise to the name of Obukhovsky Avenue, which in the 19th century was part of Sennaya Square. It is interesting that in 1837 F. M. Dostoevsky, who came to enter the engineering school.
Almost until the middle of the 18th century, this bridge did not have an official name. The name "Obukhovsky" or "Obukhov" arose among the townspeople by the name of the person who built it - Obukhov. The commission in charge of buildings in St. Petersburg, officially in the documents began to call the bridge "Obukhovsky" in 1738. However, it did not really take root, and to our time, St. Petersburgers call the bridge Obukhov in memory of the construction contractor.
On the site of the modern Moskovsky Prospekt, the first wooden bridge was thrown across the Fontanka in 1717. Across the bridge, a full-width opening (about 70 cm) was provided specifically for the masts of ships passing along the river. During the day, it was covered with boards. The crossing was rebuilt in 1738. In 1785, a stone bridge was erected here to replace the one that had fallen into disrepair. It was built according to one of seven standard designs of 3-span bridges across the Fontanka.
There are several official sources that indicate an engineer from France Zh-R as the architect of the Obukhov bridge. Perrone. True, there is no documentary evidence for this.
The stone bridge was three-span with side arches and a drawbridge. Opened granite towers decorated with domes stood above the pillars of the bridge in the river. They contained the mechanical components of the drawbridge.
In 1865, the wooden drawbridge was replaced with a brick vault, and the granite towers were dismantled. The reconstruction project was developed by engineer Mikhailov. The design remained practically the same - the bridge was three-span. The stone vaults above the spans reached a height of 9 to 14 meters. The overlap of the side spans was granite in the form of box-shaped vaults with a height of 2.30 m. The thickness of the vaults was 85 cm, at the heels it varied from 95 to 120 centimeters. The middle span was built of bricks and faced with granite. The boom of ascent of the middle span was 1, 52 m. Coastal and river supports and abutments were stone with granite facing. The railing was made of metal in the form of rods, the original decoration of which was the rings above and below. The longitudinal axis of the Obukhovsky bridge relative to the edges of the supports was 67 °.
In the 20th century, towards the end of the 30s, the bridge had to be rebuilt, because of its width, there were problems with traffic along the International Avenue. The width of the bridge was a little more than 16 meters, and the avenue was more than 30 meters. In addition, subsidence began in the brickwork of the central span. Cracks in the seams reached 25 mm.
The authors of the project of the new Obukhovsky bridge were the employees of the branch of the office for the operation of bridges, engineers L. A. Noskov and V. V. Demchenko, which began work in 1937. The work continued for 2 years, and in 1939 the bridge was opened.
Obukhovsky bridge after the restructuring remained 3-span. Double-hinged parabolic vaults are solid. The exterior is made of granite. The longitudinal axis of the bridge in relation to the faces of the supports is rotated by 60 °. The width of the Obukhovsky bridge between the railings is 30, 88 m, the size of the roadway is 24.6 m, the sidewalk is 3 m. On wooden piles (there are 1,600 of them, the length of each is 11 meters), river stops and coastal abutments made of reinforced concrete are installed. The sidewalks are covered with granite, the carriageway is covered with asphalt concrete. There was once a line of the Leningrad gas pipeline under the upper sidewalk.
In 1950 it exploded and some of the granite slabs were destroyed. After this incident, gas pipelines were closed on all bridges in the city. The railings are solid parapets made of granite. On the abutments there are granite obelisks with glass lanterns.
Obukhovsky Bridge in St. Petersburg is included in the list of cultural heritage of the Russian Federation.
