#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. Steam locomotives transported not only technological goods for production, but also carried out passenger transportation. Therefore, the railway tracks were in close proximity to residential buildings. And this concerned the development of not only the Old town, but also its new part – Gorstroy. Moreover, in some places, the railway track was laid directly on the territory of current residential areas and even closely neighbored them for some time.
The most famous passenger station was located in the area of the town’s main entrance. In the 1950-60s, it was the southern direction, the highway from the Old town, which flowed into the ceremonial Octyabrskaya square. The railway tracks were adjacent to it, and there was also a station there, also called Octyabrskaya.
This dead-end branch from the main railway line was laid in the early 1960s. At that time, suburban passenger trains were replacing buses on many routes. And the city railway station, together with the Norilsk-Sortirovochnaya station, were located far from residential areas. On April 29, 1961, the movement of Norilsk trains was extended to the Ploshchad Octyabrskaya station. The following year, 1962, a neat wooden pavilion was built on the square – a mini-station, where there was a waiting room? tickets were sold. And a wooden boarding platform was nearby.
The resulting section of the route was about one and a half kilometers long from the Zub-Gora station to the front gate of Norilsk – Octyabrskaya square, and from there the first direct passenger trains to Kayerkan went.
Later, trains began to arrive to the new station from the new airport in Alykel.
All these decades the city rejoiced at the surprise of its guests, when they were unexpectedly greeted by the ceremonial palace architecture, which you would not expect to see in the Arctic.
Here in the summer mushroom pickers boarded the health trains, and pioneer trains left from Octyabrskaya square to Dudinka port. Every year about 12 thousand schoolchildren went along the Yenisey to the Tayezhny pioneer camp to spend summer vacations.
The electric train arrived at the Octyabrskaya square station until the early 1990s, when construction began on the even side of 50 Let Octyabrya street. In 1992, a nine-story building began to be built next to the pavilion on 50 Let Octyabrya street, 2. In connection with this, the station was removed, and soon all passenger rail transportation in Norilsk was closed.
The railway tracks passed through city blocks and in the area of Kirov, Pavlov and Talnahskaya streets. The fact is that back in 1936, a narrow-gauge railway to Valyok hydro port was laid along this site. At that time, no one suspected that it crossed future city blocks. In 1949, the narrow-gauge line to Valyok was dismantled as unnecessary, but the rails still went through the city: to the first brick factories, to the sand and clay quarries. In the 1950s, the line was straightened so that it did not touch the city blocks under construction. But it nevertheless ran straight along the roadway of today’s Talnahskaya street – from its beginning to the current house No. 30.
In the early 1960s, a new railway line was laid along the old narrow-gauge embankment to Norilka, to the bridge under construction, and further to Talnah. Not far from the place where supermarket № 3 would be built in the future, the Gorodskaya station appeared. All trains on the right bank departed from there. Travel time from Gorodskaya station to Talnah was 50 minutes.
In the mid-1970s, as Norilsk was being built up, a larger passenger station, Golikovo (named after the director of Norilskproekt, Valery Golikov), appeared nearby. And it began to receive and send trains to Talnah, bypassing the city blocks.
In the History spot’s previous publication, we talked about the history and geography of the Polar Drama theater.
Follow us on Telegram, VKontakte.
Text: Svetlana Ferapontova, Photo: Olga Zaderyaka, Norilsk residents and Nornickel Polar Division’s archives
