Why is there only one station in the Omsk metro and what happens inside

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Anyone who first came to Omsk and does not know anything about this city, having seen the entrance to the metro with the corresponding logo, the letter "M", will certainly want to ride in the subway. However, despite the endless stream of people (some come in, others come out), there is no subway here. The fact is that only one metro station was built in Omsk, while the rest did not have time to open. To date, there are no plans to complete the subway. Therefore, the metro station "Biblioteka imeni Pushkin" is used by the townspeople as an ordinary underground passage.

Metropolitan, which does not exist

The idea to launch a metro in the city of Omsk appeared in the early 1960s. It was connected with the fact that the city has a great length, in addition, due to the insufficient width of the streets, it was impossible to use land transport at full capacity.

It was planned that the metro would connect the city center with the industrial area, and it would also be possible to get from one bank of the Irtysh River to the other. According to the original idea, the subway in Omsk was supposed to consist of four lines.

Finally, in 1986, a competition was announced in the USSR to design the first six stations on the very first metro line in Omsk.

The construction of the subway began in the early 1990s - a very difficult time for the country and for the region. Nevertheless, the work was very active at first. At the beginning of the 2000s, a two-level bridge was even erected, on one "floor" of which vehicles were allowed to move in 2005, and the other was intended for trains of the future metro. The bridge connected the two banks of the Irtysh River.

The launch date of the first branch was postponed several times. Initially, the opening was scheduled for 1997, then for 2008, 2021, 2015. Finally, it was expected for the 300th anniversary of Omsk, which was celebrated five years ago, but even for the anniversary of the city, the metro was never launched. The reasons for the slowdown in construction were named different - these are underground waters, and lack of finance, and even uncertainty among the state authorities as to which ministry should allocate money for construction.

They managed to build only one metro station - the Pushkin Library. Moreover, it was opened ten years ago.

In 2018, they decided to freeze the construction of the subway. The already dug pits of several stations - to fill up, all construction sites - to liquidate. More than 12.9 billion rubles had to be spent on the mothballing of the metro.

First station. She is the last

The only station opened in the city - "The Pushkin Library" - received this name due to the proximity of the scientific library of the same name. By the way, initially, according to the project, they wanted to call this metro station "Red Path" - in honor of the street of the same name located nearby.

The exits are located on the right bank of the river, near the road junction above the station. There are many city offices and residential buildings nearby.

The single-vaulted station has a reserve for the second vestibule, the possibility of extending the tunnels is provided, and the necessary ventilation structures have been erected. By 2008, the construction of the station was almost completed, and its finishing work was underway. Three years later, an underground passage and a vestibule were opened, but the Pushkin Library was not introduced as a station, since the trains had nowhere to go from it.

In addition to the fact that the constructed metro object has been used by the townspeople for all these years as an ordinary pedestrian crossing, exhibitions have recently begun to be held in this space. They are organized by local artists as part of Project M. The expositions tell about the history of Omsk and its especially respected inhabitants - researchers, creators, creators. Here you can see not only paintings and art works, but also explications and text with cognitive information.

Omsk activists are implementing their ideas with the support of the Vladimir Potanin Foundation, which has allocated a grant to the artists within the framework of the Museum - the Power of Place project. At the end of June, Project M opened another exhibition, which became a landmark cultural event for the city.

The metro has practically no chance

In May of this year, the Omsk-Inform agency reported that they were clearly not planning to finish building the subway in the city. At a meeting with the President of Russia, Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin said that building a metro for cities with a population of over one million is inexpedient and that it is necessary to rely on railway communication. Several years ago, according to the agency, the issue of launching a city train was raised in Omsk, but the matter has not gone further than talk.

According to the latest data, the already existing metro facilities in the city are planned to be used for the development of ground transport - in particular, the tram network. One of the metro lines will be flooded. As for the underground passage of the station that has already been built, it will, of course, be left behind.

Completing the construction of the metro in Omsk is really not profitable. According to rough estimates of experts, 34.5 billion rubles are needed to complete the construction of the first stage. Neither the city nor even the region has that kind of money.

It is always sad to watch projects in which the state has invested billions die. It doesn't matter if it's a metro or a whole city. But if it is much more expensive to maintain what you started than to quit, there is no other way out. Sad as it is. An example story about how the city of Vorkuta is rapidly disappearing.