Station "Park of Culture": Metro and Moscow around it

The metro station "Park Kultury" (Koltsevaya Line) is located in the very center of Moscow. As among the native Muscovites, and among people who are in the capital episodically, it is difficult to find those to whom she is not familiar. This is not surprising, since it is a question of one of the oldest stations of the Moscow Metro, which came into operation along with the Ring Line. But we should not forget that from the station "Park Kultury" metro began in Moscow . It opened in the distant 1935 as the terminal station of the Sokolnicheskaya Line.

Symbol of its time

The name for the station was chosen from several options, such as "Crimean", "Crimean Bridge" and "Chudovka". But the decisive factor was the Park of Culture located on the opposite bank of the Moscow River . The metro is at a considerable distance from it, but it was believed that the main stream of passengers would be directed to this object. For a long time the station was called "Gorky Park of Culture". Basic changes in the metro scheme took place in 1950, with the commissioning of the Ring Line of the Metro, one of the stations of which is the "Park of Culture". The metro received a whole network of interchange nodes, located along the entire Garden Ring. And the station "Park of Culture" became a transfer station, connecting the Ring and Sokolnicheskaya metro lines. Now there are many complaints about such a scheme, its irrationality, but at that time such a decision was fully justified.

Architecturally the station is an excellent example of its era and stands in one stylistic series with other stations of the Ring Line. It was such an effective imperial magnificence, according to Stalin's plan, that Moscow should have been different. Metro "Park of Culture" gives a very clear idea of this style. This is a pylon three-vaulted station of deep laying. Very successfully solved the combination of two stations of different lines, radial and circular. They do not contradict each other, despite the 15 years separating them. The decoration uses contrasting varieties of marble and sculptured marble bas-reliefs in the style of socialist realism on the theme of rest workers in the park. It is interesting to note that the complete denial of this style, and the absurd attempts to imitate success did not have. In the Moscow metro, especially in its peripheral part, there is much to prove. Apparently, the era can not be repeated.

On the surface of the earth

Metro station "Park Kultury" has long and organically blended into the Moscow reality. Its vestibules will take us to the Crimean Square and Zubovsky Boulevard, nearby is the old Ostozhenka Street with the most expensive real estate in the center of Moscow. In this place is always crowded, as in the vestibules and transitions, and on the surface of the earth. An endless stream of passengers is sent to different points of the city through the interchange station and to the city center by Ostozhenka. A lot of people are moving through the Crimean bridge to the historic Cultural Park. The metro performs the task for which it was built in the thirties of the last century.