Kievsky Rail Terminal as seen from the Moskva River embankment.

Kievsky Rail Terminal, from north-west

Shukhov's steel-and-glass roof of Kievsky Railway Station

Eastern facade, lit at night

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Kievsky Railway Station

The Kiyevsky Rail Terminal is one of the nine rail terminals of Moscow, Russia. It is the only railway station in Moscow to have a frontage on the Moskva River.

As the name suggests there are regular services to Kiev as well as Belgrade, Zagreb, Istanbul, Bucharest, Sofia, Athens, Budapest, Prague, Vienna and Rome. The terminal is served by the Kievskaya-Koltsevaya, Kievskaya (Filyovskaya) and Kievskaya (Arbatsko-Pokrovskaya) stations of Moscow Metro.

[edit] History and design

The station was built between 1914 and 1918 in the Byzantine Revival style pronounced in the 51 m (167 ft) high clocktower. Originally named the Bryansk Rail Terminal, it was designed by Ivan Rerberg and Vladimir Shukhov, it is considered an important landmark of architecture and engineering of the time.

The station's building is flanked by a gigantic landing platform which is distinguished by its simplicity and constructive boldness. The platforms are covered by a massive glassed arch structures (length 321 metres (1,053 ft), width 47.9 metres (157 ft), height 30 m (98 ft), weight of the structures is over 1250 ton) in the form of a parabola. Open-work steel trusses are clearly visible, and they demonstrate the elegance of the grandiose building.

[edit] References

(English)

• Elizabeth Cooper English, “Arkhitektura i mnimosti”: The origins of Soviet avant-garde rationalist architecture in the Russian mystical-philosophical and mathematical intellectual tradition”, a dissertation in architecture, 264 p., University of Pennsylvania, 2000.

(German)

• Rainer Graefe, “Vladimir G. Suchov 1853-1939. Die Kunst der sparsamen Konstruktion”, 192 S., Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart, 1990, ISBN 3-421-02984-9.

(Italian)

• Fausto Giovannardi,"Vladimir G. Shukhov e la leggerezza dell’acciaio", Borgo San Lorenzo, 2007.

(Russian)

• Е. М. Шухова, «Владимир Григорьевич Шухов. Первый инженер России.», 368 стр., МГТУ, Москва, 2003, ISBN 5-7038-2295-5.

The station is also featured in the 2004 spy thriller film 'The Bourne Supremacy' starring Matt Damon. In the final act of the movie Matt Damon's character, Jason Bourne disembarks from a train at the station and walks through the main entrance to the car park outside.

[edit] See also

• Square of Europe

[edit] External links

• V. G. Shukhov
• Station Image

Coordinates: 55°44′33″N 37°33′56″E / 55.7425°N 37.56556°E / 55.7425; 37.56556