Alla Dorozhkina (Grade 11)

Leaders:

A.M. fool

V.F. Kuznetsova

Our work is devoted to the study of narrow-gauge railways (UZhD) of the South-West Nizhny Novgorod region. Identification of their features, study of the history of their development, distribution, functioning and reasons for decommissioning.

Targets and goals:

In the course of the work, we want to find out which narrow-gauge railways functioned in the South-West of the Nizhny Novgorod region. By whom and for what purpose they were built, where they led, why no one needed them and were closed.

Work tasks:

To identify materials on the history of the Ural Railways of our region, including cartographic ones;

Make a picture of the evolution of this UZhD (emergence, development, decline, closure);

Describe a number of expeditions carried out by the children's tourist club along the UZhD recently;

Consider the possibilities of preserving (restoring) the UZhD of the South-West of the Nizhny Novgorod region.

What is UZD?

For the first time, steam traction was used by the Englishman D. Stephenson in the mines to facilitate the work of workers, and the first railway common use was built in 1825 in England. In Russia, the first steam-powered railway was built by talented serf mechanics - father and son E.A. and M.E. Cherepanov - at the Nizhny Tagil plant in 1834.

As we can see, railways appeared for the first time in production to facilitate the work of people. Since the first railway appeared: in England - in mines, and in Russia - at a factory, it can be assumed that they were narrow-gauge.

The first public railway in Russia was built and opened for traffic in 1837 - between St. Petersburg and Tsarskoye Selo with a continuation to Pavlovsk (27 km). In 1851, the construction of the St. Petersburg - Moscow (now Oktyabrskaya) railway was completed, at that time the longest in the world (644 km).

Railway track - a track formed by two rail threads rigidly fixed on sleepers at a precise distance from one another. This distance, called the track gauge, is measured between vertical planes tangent to the inner edges of the railheads in a straight section (on curves, the track gauge is increased to reduce rolling stock resistance). Railway gauge in Russia is 1,524 mm (5 ft). Abroad, the most widely used railway gauge is 1435 mm, but there are also narrower ones, for example, in the range from 1397 to 1016 mm there are 17, and from 1000 to 750 - 18 different sizes of the railway gauge, and wider than in Russia (which are used very rarely).

Narrow gauge railway - a railway with a less than normal gauge. Initially, the gauge was chosen arbitrarily for each narrow gauge railway, with the result that there are now over 60 different narrow gauges, from 1397 mm to 187 mm.

By 1950 for ground narrow gauge railways, a gauge of 750 mm became the standard. In the USSR, narrow-gauge railways in 1931. accounted for only 2% of total number railways. The total length of narrow-gauge public railways throughout the world in 1890 was 65,000 km. (10% of the entire railway network), in 1912 it was already 185,000 km. (17%), and in 1922 - 255,000 km (21.5%). 60% of the entire African and 89% of the entire Australian railway network are narrow gauge.

As you can see, there were significantly fewer narrow gauge railways in our country than in other countries.

Advantages of the narrow gauge railway:

1. Ease of construction and operation.
2. Lower financial costs for construction and operation.
3. Great maneuverability.

1) Narrow gauge railways are simpler and easier to build and use, so they can be built on time. There are even portable narrow gauge railways.

2) The construction of a narrow gauge railway uses less material and less labor, and if necessary, the railway can be moved to another location, so that no funds or materials are lost.

3) The track is narrower, and therefore the radius of curvature decreases to 40 m. At the same time, a narrow-gauge train can overcome a steeper slope - from 0.02 to 0.045, and even 0.08 with electric traction. The entire structure of the narrow gauge railway, along with the trains, is much lighter.

4) The load on the rails from the axis of the rolling stock is much less than on broad-gauge railways, and ranges from 4 to 9 tons for locomotives.

From our own experience of hiking in the places of the former narrow gauge railway, we can add that the narrow gauge railway is a much more environmentally friendly mode of transport than the road. The width of a modern asphalt highway is 2-3 times greater than the tracks of the UZhD; accordingly, it is required to cut down less forest to lay a narrow-gauge railway (if, for example, the road goes through the forest, as in the case of the Vyksa UZhD).

The disadvantages of narrow-gauge railways include lower productivity compared to broad-gauge roads. All its advantages are for local use. Narrow gauge railways are bad because when transporting goods over long distances, they need to be transshipped onto broad gauge trains.

Why we are interested in the history of narrow-gauge railways in the South-West of the Nizhny Novgorod Region

This topic also interested us because Sarov also once had a narrow-gauge railway, which was later replaced by a broad-gauge railway. In many small towns and towns, in factories and logging operations, narrow-gauge railways played an important role. There are many abandoned narrow gauge railways in our area, it is very interesting to find out what they served for, where they led and why they were abandoned. It would also be interesting to know, maybe even now, in our time, it would be beneficial to use this type of transport, because it has many advantages.

In some books about the Nizhny Novgorod region, we managed to find references to the narrow-gauge railway of interest to us.

From the book by L.L. We learned through the tube "Our cities" that in 1954 the total length of the railways of the Vyksa region, which occupied an area of ​​​​about 2000 km 2, was more than 400 km. Narrow-gauge railways belonged to the Vyksa Forest and Peat Administration (LTU). The extraction of timber and peat was carried out by this enterprise not only in the territory of the Vyksa region, but also in the Voznesensky region of the Nizhny Novgorod region and the Ermishinsky region of the Ryazan region. The railway network consisted not only of permanent tracks, but also of wild (temporary) tracks that led directly to the cutting areas.

Passenger traffic was also carried out along the narrow-gauge railways of the south-west of the Nizhny Novgorod region. Before the advent of paved roads, the only connection to outlying villages and towns was the narrow gauge railway. Residents of the Voznesensky district called it "the road of life".

History of the Vyksa Railway

The main railway went from Vyksa to Sarma station. For a long time, this road was the main thoroughfare connecting Kuriha with the outside world.

Initially, the railway belonged to the Vyksa Metallurgical Plant. Its width was 630mm. Factory owners in 1894 built narrow-gauge horse-drawn railways. This gave great savings, reducing the cost of transportation by half compared to horse-drawn ones. The length of these horse-drawn narrow-gauge roads was 60 km.

The laying of the Vyksa-Kurikha narrow-gauge railway began even before the revolution. Steam locomotives appeared in 1912. In 1917-1918 the road was altered to 750 mm, that is, to the standard width. In 1922, the construction of the railway was brought to the Sarma station.

In the 1930s, the metallurgical plant experienced a rebirth. Simultaneously with the construction, the railway transport is being reconstructed. The third stage of the reconstruction of railway transport in Vyksa falls on the late 50s - early 60s. Until this period, the work of steam locomotives operating on wide and narrow gauges was on wood and coal. The rise of economic development in Kurikha falls precisely on the 50s - 60s, because. the railway was the only reliable connection to other cities at that time.

In 1960, the Vyksa plant no longer needed firewood and abandoned the railway. The railway was taken over by the Vyksa timber industry enterprise.

In 1976, the asphalt road Voznesenskoye - Kurikha was laid. From that moment on, the gradual decline of the Vyksa UKRW began. Prior to this, the village of Kurikha (Sarma station) was the transport center of the entire region. Now it has become the village of Voznesenskoye, the administrative center of the district.

In 1996, the forest plot was closed due to remoteness and a decrease in the volume of timber removal. After the logging site was closed, the railroad began to be dismantled. In the 1970s the passenger train Vyksa - Dimara - Kurikha ran several times a day and consisted of 10-12 passenger cars.

According to the schedule of the Vyksa UZD for 1985, it can be seen that trains ran from Vyksa: to Dimara - 1 time per day, to Sarma - 1 time, to Kirpichny - 4 times, 5 times to Vereya, to Inner - 2 times. We can note that the train ran quite often.

In 1999, passenger traffic on the road was closed. The depot in Vyksa closed in 2003.

At present, only embankments and glades at the sites of stations and sidings remain from the railway. Wooden bridges across the rivers are destroyed. Unfortunately, such a fate befell most of the country's narrow-gauge railways; they could not compete with road transport.

Geography of the Vyksa narrow-gauge railway

We had at our disposal several maps belonging to different years.

The oldest of the images of the Vyksa narrow-gauge railway found by us on the maps is, apparently, the “Map of access roads of the Prioksky mountain district”. Unfortunately, the year is not indicated on it. But, since the Priorksky mining district existed from 1920 to 1928, apparently the state of the road is indicated for this period.

Map of access roads of the Prioksky Mining District

The sections of the road on this map are shown, apparently, rather conditionally. For example, the villages of Kochgar and Vladimirovka are in reality several kilometers away from the UZD line, and looking at the map, you might think that the road passed right through them. It can also be seen that many branches led to peat extraction.

The second time map is a map of our area, no later than the 1940s. This map, in comparison with the previous one, more clearly ties the UZhD to the terrain. At the same time, it can be seen that the state of the UZhD on it is indicated approximately the same.

1940s map

We also have at our disposal several geographical maps of the 1964-2004 edition, on which sections of the Vyksa narrow-gauge railway are marked. An analysis of these maps shows that, unfortunately, they cannot be used as a reliable source for analyzing how this road developed. There are many contradictions in the maps, for example, on later maps sections of the narrow gauge railway are indicated, while it is known that in those years they no longer existed. We used these maps to compile a general map of the railway, on which we indicated all the sections that fell on the maps, but without indicating the time of their existence. Such a general map, compiled by us, is shown in the figure.

General route map compiled from various sources

It should be noted that, while traveling on a narrow gauge railway, we met several sections of the road that were not marked on any of the maps available to us. On the general map, these areas are marked in brown. This can be explained by the fact that there were sections of the road that operated for a short time, so they did not have time to get on any of the maps.

From the analysis of the maps, it can be concluded that the Vyksa narrow-gauge railway reached its greatest development in the 1960s-1970s.

Expeditions on UZhD

The first acquaintance with UZhD took place in 2002. Then, during a hike near the village of Ilev, tourists examined the remains of a railway bridge over the Ilevka River. Immediately after this expedition, questions arose before us: What kind of road is this, from where and where did it lead, why did it exist, when it was dismantled. It was decided to collect materials about the railway and make expeditions in which we reconnoitered and surveyed this road.

In the period from 2004-2008 there were 6 expeditions by tourists from the CVR clubs. In total, more than 80 km were covered along the former railway tracks in the territory of the Voznesensky and Vyksa districts of the Nizhny Novgorod region and the Ermishinsky district of the Ryazan region.

First expedition

Route: Kurikha – Ilev – Three Ravines

Time: 2004

Passed along the railway: 15 km

Number of participants: 20 people

Expedition results: We found out that the UZhD ends not in the Ilev region, but 5 km to the east of it (in the forest towards Three Ravines). At the end, the road forks into several branches, which, apparently, each went to its own cutting area. During the expedition, the remains of rolling stock, rails, and crutches were found.

Beginning south of Kurikha, Prudki tract. Passed 3 wooden bridges, two of which can be walked on foot (through the rivers Ulchadma and Ilevka). In the place where the Pokrovskaya branch departs, a large clearing remains, where the “6 km” siding was. There we saw the doors of the wagons and other fragments of the railway.

Wagon doors

Bridge over Ilevka. Photo 2005

Bridge over the river Ulchadma

Expedition members at rest

Second expedition

Route: crossing of UZhD and highway Voznesensk - Vyksa - Kurikha

Passed along the railway: 10 km

Number of participants: 15

Expedition results: we found an unknown technological site. We assume that this could be a place for refueling steam locomotives with water. A large clearing remained at the site of the former Alvaneisky junction.

Map of the area of ​​the Second Expedition

The narrow gauge railway went through the forest

This is how the remains of the UZhD that went through the field near Kurikha look like

Bridge over the Sarma in Kurikha

Group of participants of the Second Expedition

Third expedition

Route: crossing of UZhD and highway Voznesensk - Vyksa - Dimara

Passed along the railway: 14 km

Number of participants: 25 people

Results: the beginning of the expedition took place on a high embankment. The first overnight stay was near two bridges across the river. Barnabas and R. Sun. At the site of the Razdolisty junction, we found the remains of concrete structures. From this place to the village of Dimara, the UZD section is used for the removal of timber by road. In Dimar itself, we found several trailers, station buildings, and the remains of rails.

Map of the area of ​​the Third Expedition

Remains of the railway bridge across Barnabas

Remains of a bridge across the Sun River

In some places the embankment is quite high

Turn of the road

Visible remains of the UZhD

Passage Razdolysty

Fork in the road

Dimara station

Remaining rails are being disposed of

Fourth expedition

Route: Razdolisty - Dimara - Novy Lashman - Lesomashinny - Uglipechi

Traveled: 25 km

Number of participants: 3 people

Results: In Novy Lashman, they examined the cemetery of the Vlasovites, who worked at the logging site. Between Dimara and the new Lashman, local residents pulled out and collected crutches from the sleepers. In Uglipechi we met an old-timer who told Interesting Facts how he was engaged in charcoal burning with his parents as a child. I also remember that in some places the roofs of UZhD cars were used instead of bridges across the rivers (Luktos River).

Remains of UZhD trailers

Remains of a destroyed bridge across the river

Fifth expedition

Route: Combat - Vilya

Traveled: 16 km

Number of participants: 10 people

Results: Tourists found a trailer near the Battlefield. At Domiki station there are remains of wooden buildings, we assume that these were station houses. There are several residential buildings at the Kirpichny junction. The dam of the Vilsky Pond, along which the UZhD ran, has been preserved.

Area of ​​the Fifth Expedition

The car near the Combat

Former station Domiki

Passage Brick

The road passed along the dam of the Wilskoye Pond

Group of participants of the Fifth Expedition

Sixth expedition

Route: Prudki spring - Kurikha (we went around many neighborhoods of Kurikha, but we only passed a small section along the UZD itself)

Passed along the railway: 3 km

Number of participants: 13 people

Results: Two bridges were crossed over the Luktos River and a nameless stream.

Surroundings of the village Kurikha (Sarma)

Bridge over the Luktos river

Bridge over the stream

The road approaches Sarma station (Kurikha village)

This place was the station station Sarma

Group of participants of the Sixth Expedition

Summary of all expeditions

As a result of six expeditions, about 85 km were traveled along the UZhD, of which we traveled about 60 km along the main Vyksa-Ilev highway. The length of all tracks of the Vyksa UZhD was 362 km. Consequently, for all these expeditions we covered about a quarter of the UZhD. We found the remains of 10 wooden bridges. Several abandoned wagons were found.

We came to the conclusion that laying tourist routes along the track of the former UZD is very convenient. Since these areas are not swampy, not completely overgrown, they are straight, drawn on old maps, it is easier to navigate them. Some sections of the UZhD are now used as automobile (timber) roads. But soon, this operation will be impossible because the road will be broken by these cars, because it is not prepared for such vehicles.

Most of the settlements at sidings and stations ceased to exist. Only the largest ones remained, which managed to switch to other activities.

The driest place for tents is on the railway embankment (May 2006)

Lunch is also more convenient to cook on the road (August 2006)

Opportunities for the revival of UR

We decided to devote a separate chapter of our work to considering the possibilities of restoring the narrow gauge railway.

We know of several places where the narrow gauge railway is used as a tourist attraction. For example: Guam gorge in the mountainous Adygea, Pereslavl-Zalessky. There are many positives to this. First of all, the preservation of historical sites, in addition, riding a narrow gauge railway turns into an exciting attraction. We believe that the restoration of the narrow gauge railway from Vyksa station to Sarma station (this was the main section) will attract many tourists. Of course, the restoration of UZhD will not do without the creation of a tourist infrastructure: the construction of hotels, museums, and entertainment centers. This option is proposed in the work of Anna Mironova "". A restored URW would be a good addition to this project.

The trip, according to our plan, can be made according to the type of the Circum-Baikal Railway. That is, to arrange several green stops along the route, there is an opportunity to swim in Baikal, sunbathe, just enjoy the fabulous nature. In our case, we offer to swim in the pond near Vili, and you can enjoy the natural beauty of the surrounding world during the entire trip. At Sarma station, you can create a museum, similar to the one that exists in Pereslavl-Zalessky. It would be possible to keep samples of wagons, locomotives that used to move along the UZhD.

We are not the only ones interested in this topic. In September 2006, No. 36 in the newspaper Arguments and Facts, an article was published, from which the following quote was taken: “It is planned to turn 65 km of the narrow-gauge railway in the Shatura region into a living museum. For this, two passenger cars and a motor locomotive have been allocated. Previously, the region had an extensive network of narrow-gauge railways, used both to deliver peat from mining sites and to transport passengers. Now passenger traffic remains only between the village of Baksheevo and the village of Ostrov. Currently, work is underway to extend this branch to the Kerva microdistrict and the city of Shatura.

Shatura is a city located in Meshchera near Moscow, next to a system of lakes, 124 km east of Moscow.

Guam Gorge

AT this moment in Alapaevsk (Sverdlovsk region) there is a railway, and it is used not as an object of tourist attention, but as a means of transport.

Literature

1 Large Soviet Encyclopedia, Moscow, 1952, vol. 15, p. 626

2 Small Soviet Encyclopedia, vol. 9, 1931, p. 109

3 Big Encyclopedia, St. Petersburg, 1904, Partnership "Enlightenment", vol. 18, p. 761

4 Great Soviet Encyclopedia, Moscow, 1952, vol. 15, p. 618

5 L.L. Trube "Our cities", 1954, Gorky book publishing house, p. 178

6 Loginov V. "Fatherland", Nizhny Novgorod, Nizhny Novgorod Humanitarian Center, 1994, p. 25

7 Website “Younger brother. Encyclopedia of domestic narrow-gauge railways. Railway of the Nizhny Novgorod region

8 Yushkova A., Golubin D. History of the Vyksa-Kurikha-Ilev railway.

VIII open scientific and practical conference of young ecologists, local historians and tourists of the CVR "Opening native land". Sarov, 2005.

10 Bormotov I.V. Adygea tourist. Mining and recreational nature management. Maykop: JSC "Polygraphizdat" Adygeya ", 2008

11 Newspaper "Arguments and Facts" No. 36 2006, September

The photographs of A.Yu. Soboleva, A.G. Stepanova, O.B. Shevtsova, as well as the authors

The work was presented at the regional local history conference in Nizhny Novgorod in 2010 year

A narrow gauge railway is the same railway track, but with a gauge that is less than standard. The standard railway gauge in Russia is 1520 mm. So it is not suitable for transport with normal railways due to technical features. The center distance of transport of such tracks varies from 1200 to 600 mm. There is a track already, but it is called differently - a micro-track.

There are two types: single track and double track, the difference is in capacity. In the first case, the movement in both directions is carried out along the same rails, and in the second, for the direct and return paths, their own canvas.

Advantages and disadvantages of narrow gauge railways

If we talk about UZhD, then we should emphasize the simplicity and cost-effectiveness of their arrangement. The builders needed much less time and materials for its laying. If rails were laid on uneven terrain, where there were mountains and hills, then digging tunnels and punching them into the rock took less time. The narrow gauge railway involved the use of lighter material than is the case with conventional railways, with smaller dimensions. As a result, the roadway can withstand relatively small loads. Narrow gauge does not need an embankment, it can be laid even in swampy terrain, which is characterized by soft, unstable soil.

Narrow gauge road in a remote area

Not to mention the advantage of being able to use steep curves, which makes single-track railways with smaller center distances more suitable for mountainous terrain.

However, in addition to the advantages, such roads have a number of significant disadvantages, including:

• The impossibility of transporting a large volume of heavy cargo, even in the case of double-track transport. This is due not only to the small size of the cars, but also to the limited traction power of the locomotive and the fact that the canvas on which the rails are installed simply cannot withstand a lot of weight.
• Decreased stability when moving with a load. So trains cannot develop high speed, as well as quickly overcome difficult sections, where they slow down even more. If this is not done, then equipment breakdown, track damage and even an accident are almost inevitable.
• Small extent, isolation and alienation of networks. The fact is that in most cases narrow-gauge railways were equipped by industrial enterprises to perform certain tasks, most often to transport small volumes of goods. In this case, no one thought about creating a large-scale network of such roads. There are exceptions: small sections of roads that are laid in hard-to-reach areas, used for passenger and freight traffic, but this does not change the overall picture.

The historical purpose of narrow gauge railways

As mentioned above, the main purpose of narrow gauge railways was the transportation of goods to ensure industrial production. There are a number of industries where such a road was actively used until recently or is still being used today:

• Places of extraction of wood and peat. An example of such a road is Shaturskaya, which received a work permit in 1918, and completed work as early as 2008, although the order to dismantle it was issued back in 1994. The movement of freight transport did not stop. It transported peat to the local power plant. The narrow gauge railway was closed after the station was switched to a different type of fuel. In 2009, the dismantling of the rails began.
• Closed mines and coal mines. The Yamal railway is such a narrow-gauge railway.
• Virgin land during development. The fact is that the virgin lands at one time represented a deserted area. There was no need to talk about any infrastructure during the development of this territory. The low costs and high speed of construction of the UZhD made it possible to establish communication between the settlements. However, over time, ordinary railways were built and automobile roads were laid, so that narrow gauge railways were dismantled as unnecessary.

Narrow gauge railway at the enterprise

Of particular importance were for the functioning of industrial enterprises that produced and repaired complex mechanisms that were large in size.

However, it is worth mentioning here that in most cases the center distance was less than 600 millimeters, since the road was laid directly on the floor of the assembly shops. With the help of UZhD, it was possible to move products quickly and without problems both during the assembly process and when the finished product was shipped to the warehouse. In addition, the narrow-gauge railway could be used for passenger transportation, namely, workers were delivered to the enterprise along it. AT modern conditions mobile forklifts are used to assemble large-sized products.

Note! Speaking of narrow-gauge railways, it is impossible not to talk about their invaluable contribution to the fight against fascist invaders during the Great Patriotic War. Such paths were easily and quickly erected (often a ready-made road surface became the substrate for them, even a dirt road was suitable) in places where defensive fortifications were built. Transport, tirelessly walking on them, delivered materials, equipment and people. Also, along the narrow gauge railway, soldiers, food and weapons were delivered to the places of military battles, and the wounded were quickly taken out along them. The length of the UZhD during the war could reach 100 kilometers.

Gauge of narrow gauge roads

According to the standards developed during the Soviet era, the distance between the rails of such a road was 750 mm. This indicator was applied to 90% of all roads. So the width of narrow gauge railways in Russia is in most cases standard. This greatly simplified the maintenance of such a road and its rolling stock, as well as the manufacture of wagons and diesel locomotives.

The first road with such an indicator of the distance between the rails is the Irinovskaya railway. It was built back in 1882 and owes its construction to a major industrialist of that time, Corfu. He needed large volumes of peat to support his production. Later, even before the revolution, passenger transportation was carried out along it. The speed of traffic along Irinovskaya was low, so people could easily jump into the car right on the go, which was very popular with the residents of the surrounding area. During the Leningrad blockade, it was part of the famous and extremely important "road of life."

Sakhalin Railway

In addition to the standard of 750 mm, there were exceptions. Most often it is 600, 900 and 1000 mm. The widest are the tracks with a width of 1067, which were laid on Sakhalin Island. In addition to their gauge, they are also notable for the fact that such a road was built at a time when half of the island was the territory of Japan. In addition to the most unique canvas, the transport that was assembled for this track was also preserved. At the beginning of the new century, there were disputes about the future of the Sakhalin UZD, as a result of which it was decided to remake the tracks for standard parameters, as well as re-equip the rolling stock for new conditions.

The fate of some narrow-gauge railways in Russia

Today, many of the preserved narrow-gauge railways are in the center of attention not only of enthusiasts and lovers of rare equipment, but also of world-class organizations as a cultural asset. An example of such attention is the Kudemskaya UZhD, which operates to this day. This road was put into operation in 1949. The actual length of the rail is 108 kilometers, but only 38 of them are in operation. Passengers are still being transported through it. In 2013, a new wagon VP750 was even purchased for the transportation of people, which made it possible to make the journey more comfortable.

The situation is completely different with the Beloretsk UZhD, along which the first trains went in 1909. At the beginning of this century, its history was completed. Unique rolling stock and architectural monuments, encountered along the way, were of great cultural importance for the region, but the decision about the unsatisfactory condition of the canvas and the lack of funding sources put an end to everything. Today, only the steam locomotive GR-231, which once ran along it, and old maps with its image remind of this road. This monument can be seen in Beloretsk.

Important! In addition to industrial and passenger narrow-gauge railways, there are also so-called Children's Railways (Children's Railways), which have a gauge of 500 mm. They represent an isolated area with a small extent from 1 to 11 kilometers. Such track sections are used for practical training of children and adolescents in railway specialties. The working conditions of the ChRW are close to the functioning of a real railway. Such sections do not belong to UR, despite the general parameters.

The beginning of the third millennium put an end to many narrow-gauge railways in the Russian Federation. The list of those that have gone down in history also includes Visimo-Utkinskaya in the Sverdlovsk region, which was built at the end of the 19th century. During its existence, it has experienced a large number of reconstructions and repairs; during one of these, its track gauge decreased from 884 to 750 mm. The road functioned until 2006, and already in 2008 its dismantling was completed. At the same time, in addition to the tracks themselves, all the rolling stock, the architecture of the stations and even the railway bridge, thrown over the river called the Landmark Duck, disappeared.

Narrow gauge railways have lost their relevance, despite all their advantages. Now they are rather monuments of cultural significance, which can still be useful. The example of the Kudemskaya UZhD proves this. Russia is not the only country where narrow-gauge railways have been preserved; the same railways can be found in Europe, China and the USA.

Narrow gauge railway (narrow gauge) - a railway with a gauge less than standard; the rolling stock of such roads is incompatible in a number of ways with normal gauge roads (that is, the technical problems are not limited to the rearrangement of bogies). Usually narrow-gauge railways are called railways with a gauge of 600-1200 mm; roads with a smaller gauge are called micro-gauges, as well as decavils, which is not always correct. Decavile gauge is a track with a width of 500 mm.

Characteristic

Narrow gauge railways are cheaper to build and operate than standard gauge railways. Smaller locomotives and wagons allow lighter bridges to be built; when laying tunnels for narrow-gauge railways, it is required to extract a smaller volume of soil. In addition, narrow-gauge railways allow steeper curves than conventional railways, which has made them popular in mountainous areas.

The disadvantages of narrow-gauge railways are: smaller size and weight of transported goods, less stability and lower maximum allowable speed. However, the most important disadvantage of narrow-gauge railways is that, as a rule, they do not form a single network. Often such roads are built by enterprises for one specific purpose (for example, for the transport of peat).

In addition to industrial narrow-gauge railways, there were also supply lines that connected ordinary railways with those areas where it was unprofitable to build standard gauge railways. Such narrow-gauge railways were subsequently “re-made” to a standard gauge or disappeared, unable to withstand competition with motor transport, since all their advantages were offset by a big drawback: transshipment of goods from one railway to another was a long and laborious process.

Areas of application for narrow gauge railways

Industrial and national economic use

Narrow-gauge railways were built to serve peat extraction, logging sites, mines, mines, individual industrial enterprises or groups of several related enterprises, areas of virgin lands at the time of their development.

Micro-gauge railways were built inside workshops or across the territory of large enterprises to move large workpieces, large quantities of materials, machine tools, export large-sized finished products from workshops, and sometimes to transport workers to remote workshops. Currently, forklifts and electric cars are used for these purposes.

Military use

During wars, in preparation for major military battles or when creating border fortifications, narrow-gauge military field roads were built to ensure the transfer of troops and military cargo. For laying such roads, existing roads with dirt or asphalt concrete pavement were often used. The length of the roads ranged from several to a hundred kilometers.

In addition, separate narrow-gauge railway lines were built inside the fortifications. Such roads were used to transport ammunition with large dimensions.

Children's Railways

Other

Separate railway lines were built as narrow gauge, this was done to save money. In the future, with an increase in freight traffic, such lines were changed to a normal gauge. An example of such an approach is the Pokrovskaya Sloboda - Ershov - Uralsk and Urbakh - Krasny Kut - Aleksandrov Gai lines of the Ryazan-Ural Railway. On the Odessa-Kishinev road there was a whole department of a narrow gauge - Gayvoronskoye.

Gauge of narrow gauge roads

Among micro gauges, the narrowest gauge (only 260 mm) is used in the UK by the Wells and Walsingham Light Railway. Most micro gauge railways are 381 mm or 15 inches wide, which is the unwritten standard. Widths of 500 mm, 457 mm, 400 mm are also common.

Rolling stock of narrow gauge roads

Locomotives, railcars and locomotives

Snow plows and other special equipment

• Construction and repair train manufactured by: KMZ

Passenger and freight cars

• Passenger cars for narrow gauge railways were supplied by PAFAWAG (Poland)
• Demikhov Carriage Works (cars PV-38, PV-40, PV-40T)
• Passenger cars VP750 produced by: KMZ

Among the republics of the former USSR, there is not a single surviving narrow-gauge railway only in Azerbaijan(after the closure of the Baku ChRW) and Moldova. The most dense operating narrow-gauge railways is Belarus. Narrow-gauge railways are being actively built and developed there, new locomotives and wagons are being built for them.

Narrow-gauge railway of the Smoky peat enterprise Narrow-gauge railway of the Otvor peat enterprise

Narrow-gauge railway of the Pishchal Peat Plant Narrow-gauge railway of the Altsevo peat enterprise Narrow-gauge railway of the Mokeikha-Zybinsky peat enterprise Narrow-gauge railway of the Gorohovsky peat enterprise Narrow-gauge railway of the Meshchersky peat enterprise

Russia

Narrow gauge railways are also common in many countries in Africa and South America, and there are a huge number of gauge options, ranging from 600 mm to the Cape gauge.

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Notes

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wide gauge narrow gauge micro gauge

An excerpt characterizing the narrow gauge railway

After Nikolai's departure, the Rostovs' house became sadder than ever. The Countess became ill from a mental disorder.
Sonya was sad both from separation from Nikolai and even more from that hostile tone with which the countess could not but treat her. The count was more than ever preoccupied with the bad state of affairs, which required some kind of drastic measures. It was necessary to sell the Moscow house and the suburban one, and to sell the house it was necessary to go to Moscow. But the health of the countess forced her to postpone her departure from day to day.
Natasha, who easily and even cheerfully endured the first time of separation from her fiancé, now every day became more agitated and impatient. The thought that so, for nothing, her best time wasted for no one, which she would have used to love him, relentlessly tormented her. Most of his letters annoyed her. It was insulting to her to think that while she lives only by the thought of him, he lives a real life, sees new places, new people who are of interest to him. The more entertaining his letters were, the more annoyed she was. Her letters to him not only did not bring her consolation, but seemed to be a boring and false duty. She did not know how to write, because she could not comprehend the possibility of expressing in a letter truthfully at least one thousandth of what she was accustomed to express in her voice, smile and look. She wrote him classically monotonous, dry letters, to which she herself did not ascribe any significance and in which, according to bruillons, the countess corrected her spelling errors.
The health of the countess did not improve; but it was no longer possible to postpone the trip to Moscow. It was necessary to make a dowry, it was necessary to sell the house, and, moreover, Prince Andrei was expected first to Moscow, where Prince Nikolai Andreevich lived that winter, and Natasha was sure that he had already arrived.
The countess remained in the village, and the count, taking Sonya and Natasha with him, went to Moscow at the end of January.

Pierre, after the courtship of Prince Andrei and Natasha, for no obvious reason, suddenly felt the impossibility of continuing his former life. No matter how firmly he was convinced of the truths revealed to him by his benefactor, no matter how joyful he was that first time inner work self-improvement, which he indulged in with such fervor, after the engagement of Prince Andrei with Natasha and after the death of Joseph Alekseevich, about which he received news almost at the same time, all the charm of this former life suddenly disappeared for him. There was only one skeleton of life left: his house with a brilliant wife, who now enjoyed the favors of one important person, acquaintance with all of Petersburg and service with boring formalities. And this former life suddenly presented itself to Pierre with unexpected abomination. He stopped writing his diary, avoided the company of his brothers, began to go to the club again, began to drink heavily again, again became close to single companies and began to lead such a life that Countess Elena Vasilyevna considered it necessary to make him a strict reprimand. Pierre, feeling that she was right, and in order not to compromise his wife, left for Moscow.
In Moscow, as soon as he drove into his huge house with withered and withering princesses, with huge domestics, as soon as he saw - driving through the city - this Iberian chapel with countless candle lights in front of golden robes, this Kremlin Square with snow that had not been driven, these cab drivers and the shacks of Sivtsev Vrazhka, saw the old men of Moscow, wanting nothing and slowly living their lives nowhere, saw old women, Moscow ladies, Moscow balls and the Moscow English Club - he felt at home, in a quiet haven. He felt calm, warm, familiar and dirty in Moscow, as in an old dressing gown.
Moscow society, everything from old women to children, accepted Pierre as their long-awaited guest, whose place was always ready and not occupied. For the Moscow world, Pierre was the sweetest, kindest, smartest, cheerful, generous eccentric, absent-minded and sincere, Russian, of the old cut, master. His wallet was always empty, because it was open to everyone.
Benefit performances, bad pictures, statues, charitable societies, gypsies, schools, signature dinners, revels, masons, churches, books - no one and nothing was refused, and if not for his two friends, who borrowed a lot of money from him and took him under their guardianship, he would give everything away. There was no dinner in the club, no evening without him. As soon as he leaned back in his place on the sofa after two bottles of Margot, he was surrounded, and rumors, disputes, jokes began. Where they quarreled, he - with his kind smile and by the way said joke, reconciled. Masonic dining lodges were dull and sluggish if he wasn't there.
When, after a single supper, he, with a kind and sweet smile, surrendering to the requests of a cheerful company, got up to go with them, joyful, solemn cries were heard among the youth. At the balls he danced, if he did not get a gentleman. Young ladies and young ladies loved him because, without courting anyone, he was equally kind to everyone, especially after dinner. “Il est charmant, il n "a pas de sehe", [He is very nice, but has no gender,] they talked about him.
Pierre was that retired chamberlain, good-naturedly living out his life in Moscow, of which there were hundreds.
How horrified he would have been if seven years ago, when he had just arrived from abroad, someone would have told him that he did not need to look for and invent anything, that his track had long been broken, determined eternally, and that, no matter how he turn around, he will be what everyone in his position was. He couldn't believe it! Didn't he, with all his heart, wish now to produce a republic in Russia, now to be Napoleon himself, now a philosopher, now a tactician, the conqueror of Napoleon? Didn't he see the opportunity and passionately desire to regenerate the vicious human race and bring himself to the highest degree of perfection? Didn't he establish both schools and hospitals and set his peasants free?
And instead of all this, here he is, the rich husband of an unfaithful wife, a retired chamberlain who loves to eat, drink and, unbuttoned, easily scold the government, a member of the Moscow English club and everyone's favorite member of Moscow society. For a long time he could not reconcile himself to the idea that he was that same retired Moscow chamberlain, whose type he so deeply despised seven years ago.
Sometimes he comforted himself with the thought that this was the only way, for the time being, he was leading this life; but then he was horrified by another thought, that for the time being, so many people had already entered this life and this club with all their teeth and hair, like him, and left without one tooth and hair.
In moments of pride, when he thought about his position, it seemed to him that he was completely different, special from those retired chamberlains whom he had despised before, that they were vulgar and stupid, pleased and reassured by their position, “and even now I am still dissatisfied I still want to do something for humanity,” he said to himself in moments of pride. “And maybe all those comrades of mine, just like me, fought, looked for some new, their own path in life, and just like me, by the force of the situation, society, breed, that elemental force against which there is no powerful man, they were brought to the same place as I, ”he said to himself in moments of modesty, and after living in Moscow for some time, he no longer despised, but began to love, respect and pity, as well as himself, his comrades by fate .
On Pierre, as before, they did not find moments of despair, blues and disgust for life; but the same illness, which had previously expressed itself in sharp attacks, was driven inside and did not leave him for a moment. "For what? What for? What is going on in the world?” he asked himself in bewilderment several times a day, involuntarily beginning to ponder the meaning of the phenomena of life; but knowing by experience that there were no answers to these questions, he hurriedly tried to turn away from them, took up a book, or hurried to the club, or to Apollon Nikolaevich to chat about city gossip.
“Elena Vasilievna, who never loved anything except her body and one of the most stupid women in the world,” thought Pierre, “appears to people as the height of intelligence and refinement, and they bow before her. Napoleon Bonaparte was despised by everyone as long as he was great, and since he became a miserable comedian, Emperor Franz has been trying to offer him his daughter as an illegitimate wife. The Spaniards send prayers to God through the Catholic clergy in gratitude for having defeated the French on June 14th, and the French send prayers through the same Catholic clergy that they defeated the Spaniards on June 14th. My brother Masons swear by their blood that they are ready to sacrifice everything for their neighbor, and do not pay one ruble each for the collection of the poor and intrigue Astraeus against the Seekers of Manna, and fuss about a real Scottish carpet and about an act, the meaning of which does not know even the one who wrote it, and which no one needs. We all profess the Christian law of forgiveness of offenses and love for our neighbor - the law as a result of which we erected forty forty churches in Moscow, and yesterday we whipped a man who had run away with a whip, and the minister of the same law of love and forgiveness, the priest, gave the soldier a cross to kiss before execution " . So thought Pierre, and this whole, common, universally recognized lie, no matter how he got used to it, as if something new, every time amazed him. I understand the lies and confusion, he thought, but how can I tell them everything I understand? I tried and always found that they, in the depths of their souls, understand the same thing as I do, but they just try not to see her. It has become so necessary! But me, where do I go?” thought Pierre. He tested the unfortunate ability of many, especially Russian people, the ability to see and believe in the possibility of good and truth, and to see the evil and lies of life too clearly in order to be able to take a serious part in it. Every field of labor in his eyes was connected with evil and deceit. Whatever he tried to be, whatever he undertook, evil and lies repelled him and blocked all the paths of his activity. And meanwhile it was necessary to live, it was necessary to be busy. It was too terrible to be under the yoke of these insoluble questions of life, and he gave himself up to his first hobbies, only to forget them. He went to all sorts of societies, drank a lot, bought paintings and built, and most importantly read.
He read and read everything that came to hand, and read so that when he arrived home, when the lackeys were still undressing him, he, having already taken a book, read - and from reading he went to sleep, and from sleep to chatter in the drawing rooms and the club, from chatter to revelry and women, from revelry back to chatter, reading and wine. Drinking wine for him became more and more of a physical and at the same time a moral need. Despite the fact that the doctors told him that with his corpulence, wine was dangerous for him, he drank a lot. He felt completely well only when, without noticing how, having knocked several glasses of wine into his big mouth, he experienced pleasant warmth in his body, tenderness for all his neighbors and the readiness of his mind to superficially respond to every thought, without delving into its essence. Only after drinking a bottle and two wines did he vaguely realize that that intricate, terrible knot of life that had terrified him before was not as terrible as he thought. With a noise in his head, chatting, listening to conversations or reading after lunch and dinner, he constantly saw this knot, some side of it. But only under the influence of wine did he say to himself: “This is nothing. I will unravel this - here I have an explanation ready. But now there’s no time—I’ll think it over later!” But that never came after.
On an empty stomach, in the morning, all the previous questions seemed just as insoluble and terrible, and Pierre hurriedly grabbed a book and rejoiced when someone came to him.
Sometimes Pierre recalled a story he had heard about how soldiers in the war, being under fire in cover, when they had nothing to do, diligently find an occupation for themselves in order to more easily endure the danger. And to Pierre, all people seemed to be such soldiers fleeing life: some with ambition, some with cards, some with writing laws, some with women, some with toys, some with horses, some with politics, some with hunting, some with wine, some with state affairs. “There is nothing insignificant or important, it doesn’t matter: if only I can save myself from it as best I can!” thought Pierre. - "If only not to see her, this terrible her."

At the beginning of winter, Prince Nikolai Andreevich Bolkonsky and his daughter arrived in Moscow. In his past, in his intelligence and originality, especially in the weakening at that time of enthusiasm for the reign of Emperor Alexander, and in that anti-French and patriotic trend that reigned at that time in Moscow, Prince Nikolai Andreevich immediately became an object of special reverence for Muscovites and the center of the Moscow opposition to the government.
The prince has grown very old this year. Sharp signs of old age appeared in him: unexpected falling asleep, forgetfulness of the nearest events and memory of long-standing ones, and the childish vanity with which he assumed the role of the head of the Moscow opposition. Despite the fact that when the old man, especially in the evenings, went out to tea in his fur coat and powdered wig, and, touched by someone, began his abrupt stories about the past, or even more abrupt and sharp judgments about the present, he aroused in all his guests the same sense of respect. For visitors, this whole old house with huge dressing tables, pre-revolutionary furniture, these lackeys in powder, and the last century himself, a tough and smart old man with his meek daughter and pretty Frenchwoman, who were in awe of him, represented a majestically pleasant sight. But the visitors did not think that in addition to these two or three hours, during which they saw the owners, there were another 22 hours a day, during which the secret inner life of the house went on.
Recently in Moscow, this inner life has become very difficult for Princess Marya. She was deprived in Moscow of those of her best joys - conversations with God's people and solitude - which refreshed her in the Bald Mountains, and did not have any benefits and joys of metropolitan life. She did not go out into the world; everyone knew that her father would not let her go without him, and he himself could not travel due to ill health, and she was no longer invited to dinners and evenings. Princess Marya completely abandoned hope for marriage. She saw the coldness and bitterness with which Prince Nikolai Andreevich received and sent away young people who could be suitors, who sometimes came to their house. Princess Marya had no friends: on this visit to Moscow, she was disappointed in her two closest people. M lle Bourienne, with whom she could not be completely frank before, now became unpleasant to her and for some reason she began to move away from her. Julie, who was in Moscow and to whom Princess Mary wrote for five years in a row, turned out to be a complete stranger to her when Princess Mary again met with her personally. Julie at this time, on the occasion of the death of her brothers, having become one of the richest brides in Moscow, was in the midst of social pleasures. She was surrounded by young people who, she thought, suddenly appreciated her virtues. Julie was in that period of an aging socialite who feels that her last chance of marriage has come, and now or never her fate must be decided. Princess Mary, with a sad smile, recalled on Thursdays that now she had no one to write to, since Julie, Julie, from whose presence she had no joy, was here and saw her every week. She, like an old emigrant who refused to marry the lady with whom he spent his evenings for several years, regretted that Julie was here and she had no one to write to. Princess Mary in Moscow had no one to talk to, no one to believe her grief, and much new grief has been added during this time. The deadline for the return of Prince Andrei and his marriage was approaching, and his order to prepare his father for that was not only not fulfilled, but, on the contrary, the matter seemed to be completely spoiled, and the reminder of Countess Rostova pissed off the old prince, who had already been out of sorts for most of the time. . A new grief that has recently been added for Princess Marya was the lessons that she gave to her six-year-old nephew. In her relations with Nikolushka, she recognized with horror in herself the quality of her father's irritability. How many times she told herself that she should not allow herself to get excited while teaching her nephew, almost every time she sat down with a pointer at the French alphabet, she so wanted to quickly, easily pour her knowledge out of herself into a child who was already afraid that here was her aunt she would be angry that, at the slightest inattention on the part of the boy, she shuddered, hurried, got excited, raised her voice, sometimes pulled his hand and put him in a corner. Putting him in a corner, she herself began to weep over her evil, bad nature, and Nikolushka, imitating her sobs, would leave the corner without permission, come up to her and pull her wet hands away from her face, and console her. But more, more than anything else, the princess was distressed by her father's irritability, which was always directed against her daughter and had recently reached the point of cruelty. If he had forced her to bow down all night, if he had beaten her, forced her to carry firewood and water, it would never have occurred to her that her situation was difficult; but this loving tormentor, the most cruel because he loved and for that he tormented himself and her, deliberately knew how not only to insult and humiliate her, but also to prove to her that she was always and in everything to blame. Recently, a new trait appeared in him, which tormented Princess Mary most of all - it was his closer rapprochement with m lle Bourienne. The thought that came to him, in the first minute after receiving the news of his son’s intention, was the joke that if Andrei marries, then he himself marries Bourienne, apparently liked him, and with stubbornness lately (as it seemed to Princess Mary) only in order to insult her, he showed a special kindness to m lle Bourienne and showed his displeasure to his daughter by showing love to Bourienne.
Once in Moscow, in the presence of Princess Marya (it seemed to her that her father had done this on purpose in her presence), the old prince kissed m lle Bourienne's hand and, drawing her to him, hugged her caressingly. Princess Mary flushed and ran out of the room. A few minutes later, m lle Bourienne entered Princess Mary, smiling and telling something cheerfully in her pleasant voice. Princess Mary hurriedly wiped away her tears, with resolute steps approached Bourienne and, apparently not knowing it herself, with angry haste and outbursts of her voice, began to shout at the Frenchwoman: “It is disgusting, low, inhuman to take advantage of weakness ...” She did not finish. "Get out of my room," she screamed and sobbed.
The next day the prince did not say a word to his daughter; but she noticed that at dinner he ordered the food to be served, beginning with m lle Bourienne. At the end of dinner, when the barman, according to his old habit, again served coffee, starting with the princess, the prince suddenly became furious, threw a crutch at Philip and immediately made an order to give him to the soldiers. “They don’t hear ... they said it twice! ... they don’t hear!”
“She is the first person in this house; she is mine best friend' shouted the prince. “And if you allow yourself,” he shouted in anger, addressing Princess Marya for the first time, “once again, as you dared yesterday ... to forget yourself in front of her, then I will show you who is the boss in the house. Out! so that I do not see you; ask her for forgiveness!
Princess Mary asked for forgiveness from Amalya Evgenievna and from her father for herself and for Philip the barman, who asked for spades.
At such moments, a feeling akin to the pride of the victim gathered in the soul of Princess Marya. And suddenly, at such moments, in her presence, this father, whom she condemned, either looked for glasses, feeling around them and not seeing, or forgot what was happening just now, or made a wrong step with weakened legs and looked around to see if anyone had seen him weakness, or, worst of all, at dinner, when there were no guests to excite him, he would suddenly doze off, letting go of his napkin, and leaning over the plate, his head shaking. “He is old and weak, and I dare to condemn him!” she thought with self-loathing at such moments.

In 1811, a French doctor, who quickly became fashionable, lived in Moscow, huge in stature, handsome, amiable, like a Frenchman and, as everyone in Moscow said, a doctor of extraordinary art - Metivier. He was received in the homes of high society not as a doctor, but as an equal.
Prince Nikolai Andreevich, who laughed at medicine, recently, on the advice of m lle Bourienne, allowed this doctor to visit him and got used to him. Metivier visited the prince twice a week.

On some sites you can download schemes of the Elektrogorsk narrow-gauge railway. I downloaded them and tried to layer them on the real geographical map in order to identify all the routes of the now non-existent track, but was puzzled, since the schemes turned out to be very conditional and did not fit on the map at all on any scale. It also turned out that they are very simplified and sometimes erroneous. It was then that I began to look for old maps of the vicinity of Elektrogorsk and save all the designations of the UZhD there, which made it possible to make a new scheme of the Elektrogorsk UZHD in real proportions based not on conjectures and verbal descriptions, but on the actual maps. Of course, this scheme cannot be considered complete, and as other maps are found that indicate unaccounted for branches, I will update this scheme.

It should be noted that some difficulty in studying this area is due to the fact that it is located on the border of regions, so the maps have to be studied cropped and of very different information content (since there are more old detailed maps for the Moscow region than for, say, for Vladimir region.

It should also be understood that this is a reflection of the UR routes for the entire time of its existence, and not a diagram of a real-life railway at any particular point in time. In fact, the railway in this form never existed for the reason that as the peat areas were developed, some of the tracks were removed and the tracks were rebuilt to new areas. That is, the scheme of peat extraction routes has changed dozens of times. The main long-lived lines can be considered the following:

Early years (30-50s):
Elektrogorsk - swamps in the southeast of the Far - Timkovo - Noginsk.
Elektrogorsk - the territory of Novo-Ozerny - the territory of Sopovo - the Red Corner.

Later years (50-70s):
Elektrogorsk - Novo-Ozernaya - Far - Timkovo - Noginsk.
Elektrogorsk - Novo-Ozernaya - Sopovo - Red Corner - Melezhi.
Elektrogorsk - Lyapino - Zheludevo.

Recent years (70-90s):
Elektrogorsk - Novo-Ozernaya (- Far).
Elektrogorsk - Novo-Ozernaya (- Sopovo).
Elektrogorsk - Lyapino (- Zheludevo).

Ideally, it would be necessary to make not one diagram, but a series of diagrams showing changes on the ground every 10-20 years, but detailed maps are not enough for this, and even those that exist did not always keep up with real changes on the ground.

In order for the reader to have an understanding of how the development (and at the end - degradation) of the Elektrogorsk narrow-gauge railway took place, I made a short digression into history, based on a study of more than a dozen maps over different years.

Early 20th century.

Aerial photography for the purpose of cartography became widely used only from the First World War. Prior to this, the maps were not so attentive to small details. Of the available maps of that time, the Strelbitsky map is the most interesting, since it is considered military.

1921, 1937 Map of Strelbitsky, 1:420000.

There are three versions of the sheet with the Moscow region on the Internet - 1872, 1921 and 1937 (only the last two versions are of interest for our study). The version of 1921 in the region of the Elektrogorsk swamps does not differ much from the version of 1872, it does not even indicate Power transmission. On the map of 1937 there is an inscription that the railways are coordinated with the official index of the NKPS for 1937. However, even on it we will not find Elektrogorsk narrow-gauge railways, although the Electric Transmission is marked, and there is a railway route to it from the Gorky direction. Other civilian maps of the time are even less informative.

1922-25 Map of the General Staff of the Red Army, first edition 1929, 1:100000.

On some sites, this map is incorrectly issued for the year 1940. The reason for this lies in the fact that some of these maps were indeed printed in the forties, and they are distributed as a set of General Staff kilometers of 1941, but this particular sheet N-37-6 is signed as I indicated. In the upper right corner is written “1922-25. First edition 1929”, at the bottom there is an inscription “The map is redrawn according to 1:50000 survey of the GGU 1922-25”. I couldn't get the top sheet.

This is the earliest of the maps I have, where the Elektrogorsk UZD system is drawn in detail (if you have earlier ones - link in the comments). The main paths at that time already exist:
Noginsk - Far.
Dalnaya - Power transmission (future Elektrogorsk).
Power transmission - towards the Red Corner. *
Surroundings of Dalnaya, lakes White, Gray.
West of Ivankovo ​​(Lake Chernoye).
To the west of the Power Transmission, everything is dug up and generously lined with paths.
Interestingly, the path to Pavlovsky Posad is marked by a narrow track.

*Note. The place Red Corner itself is not visible on the map, since the corresponding map sheet has not yet been obtained. For the first time, the “fork” in Krasny Ugol is found on the map of the Red Army in 1941, however, I will suggest that the branch from Elektrogorsk to the north was originally built to Krasnoy Ugol, since it would be unreasonable to assume that the railway ended at the junction of map sheets, while while the length of the track section above this junction is only about five kilometers. Therefore, I still attribute this fork to the period of construction discussed here. I restored the route on the missing sheet of the map and the fork on my diagram according to a later map in the sizes indicated on the map of the Red Army of 1941 (in subsequent years it will lengthen, and then completely disappear - there will be only one way to Melezhi). For the sake of objectivity, I am ready to make changes to the diagram if someone finds maps of this period, on which the path to the north is, but this fork is not.

1925-1928 Map of the outskirts of Moscow, German edition of 1940, 1:50000.

At the bottom of the map sheet it is written: The map was compiled in the "Goskartogeodezii" at the Research Institute of Geodesy and Cartography based on topographic surveys of the Production Department. G.G.K. produced in 1922-28. on a scale of 1:25,000 and 1:50,000 and based on survey materials from 1925-28. M.Reg.ZU on a scale of 1:10000. Map scale 1:50000. Reprinted by the German General Staff in November 1940, judging by the inscription in the lower right corner. In the upper left corner, after the names of the sheets used on the map, the year 1932 is indicated (probably the relevance of the map from the point of view of the Fritz). German names are applied over the Russian names. Added some new roads that appeared by 1940. Sheet 5 is missing from the collection (just where the Red Corner and Melezh are).

The railways on this map are fully consistent with the previous map, but the path to Pavlovsky Posad is marked with a wide gauge. The path from Zagornovo to Noginsk is shown as a narrow gauge.

1928 Map of the Moscow region GURKKA, 1:500000.

Completely repeats the image on the previous map, but on a less interesting scale. The path to Pavlovsky Posad is shown as a wide track.

1941 Map of the General Staff of the Red Army 1:500000.

Unfortunately, I did not find a normal kilometer sheet of the map of the General Staff of this area during the war times; under its guise, the first map of 1929 in this list is being distributed. This five-kilometer map repeats the previous maps of the late 1920s in terms of the main routes, but with the omission of numerous branches in the peat extraction areas. This can be explained not only by the laziness of cartographers or the five-kilometer scale of the map. Here is what Valentin Kovrigin writes:

“In 1932, the whole city was in smoke, the peat extraction sites were on fire. Near the plots were reservoirs. At first, peat workers fled the fire in these pools. Then the management of the sites decided to evacuate the peat and members of the families to the Power Transmission. They sent me by train, put me in boxes - that's what my sister told me. The narrow-gauge railway was bulk, the locomotive failed on the burning field, the train stopped, the passengers began to jump into the burning peat - there were many victims ... ".

About the failed steam locomotive - this is not fiction - in memory of this event in Sopovo there is a monument to those who died in large fires at peat extraction in 1932 and 1972. Thus, the reason for the "impoverishment" of the track network, most likely, is precisely the fire of 1932, and not dismantling. The line to the north ends on this map west of the village of Pesyane in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe place, which will later be called Red Corner, and bifurcates to the west, but, above, I already suggested that it was like that before (it’s just the first appearance of this section on the available me cards).

1941 German map Osteuropa, 1:300000.

Part railway tracks presented in a modified form: a ring appears between Vasyutino and Alekseevo (hereinafter referred to as simply “ring”). Regarding this ring, I periodically have doubts, since on more detailed maps of other periods there is a semblance of a ring, but the paths in the southwestern part are not closed, although they come close. If the map is moved away, it seems that the paths are closed in a ring. But maps of this scale often have the feature of smoothing and simplifying. The same closed ring is depicted on Russian three-kilometer and four-kilometer maps of 46-47. More detailed maps (alas, for other years) do not confirm the presence of a closed ring, although this does not mean that it did not exist. Be that as it may, from this ring there is a new branch to the southwest. Many branches have disappeared, in particular, to the east of the village of Dalnyaya and to the west of Elekotoperedachi. But they built a path from Dalnaya to a place that would later be called Sopovo, thereby making a passage to the Elektrogorsk - Red Corner branch.

Lyrical digression.

When examining "enemy" maps, it must be remembered that cartographers could, looking at not always high-quality photographs taken by spy planes, simply confuse some railway tracks with ordinary roads and embankments. They could not send Vanka to the swamps to find out if there was a railway line there or not. Therefore, the "priority of trust" to such cards is less than to the Soviet ones. At the same time, any map is interesting for history, especially if there are no updated Russian maps reflecting that period. As a lyrical digression, I propose to consider German aerial photographs of the city of Orekhovo-Zuyevo and find the narrow-gauge railways of the Orekhovo-Zuevsky peat enterprise. As you can see, if there is a train on the tracks, the railway track is easy to distinguish from the road, but if there is no train, problems begin ...

The second picture is interesting because it has been preserved for history. unique photo cable car cableway, which was used to reload peat from the narrow-gauge station Torfyanaya through the Moscow-Vladimir broad gauge tracks. The Fritz kindly outlined and signed everything, although they did not think that in 75 years someone would study it ... In general, the Orekhovo-Zuevskaya narrow-gauge railway deserves a separate historical investigation, therefore, let's return to Elektrogorskaya for now.

1942-43(?) American map of the USSR in 1955, 1:250000.

I placed this 1955 map between the 1942 and 1946 maps for the reasons below. This is a very informative map. New branches are visible from the main routes in the area of ​​the Power Transmission and between the lakes Svetloe and Beloe, north of the village of Dalnyaya. The Dalnyaya-Sopovo path is depicted in a strange way. It starts in Dalnaya, but ends about 670 meters south of the actual location (if, for example, compared with other maps), although it repeats the bends in exactly the same way, so on my diagram it is recreated according to a more accurate two-kilometer line of the 59th year, where this the path is already shown as dismantled (and corresponds in location to modern satellite imagery - now there is a dacha road there). It can, of course, be assumed that the first path fell into the swamp, and a new one had to be built to the north, but this is unlikely. If there are other accurate maps, this issue can be returned and corrected. The path from Krasny Ugl is extended to Melezha and has a small branch to the northwest shortly before the end of the main path.

But again, since the map is “enemy”, there is some possibility that in some places, due to the low quality of photographs, cartographers could mistake ordinary roads or embankments for a railway track. The disclaimer at the bottom of the map clearly states this:

In short, the map was concocted by American soldiers in 1953 from the Soviet kilometers of the Red Army General Staff of 1925-1941. The accuracy of the map has been verified from aerial photographs. The classification of roads should be treated with caution. The width and existence of some roads is questionable. And so on.

What makes me think that the Americans had a hand in drawing the roads on the above-mentioned maps of the General Staff 1925-1941 already after the year 41 is that on these maps of the General Staff the northern route ends at Krasnoy Ugol, and on the American map it goes to Melezh, as on Russian maps of 1946 and 1947. In one of the forums I came across unverified information that "Planimetry revised from 1942-43 aerial photography". If we assume that this was the case, then we will have to accept as a fact the existence of a path to Melezhi already in the war years.

One thing is incomprehensible: if in 1942 the network was “simplified” (according to the German map), and in 1946 it remained approximately the same (the ring was supposedly already closed), then how could such a global construction take place between these years offshoots that disappeared rather quickly? And we do not see a closed ring on the American map. If the edits were made between the 46th and 55th year (which seems less likely to me), then on the map we see the period when the ring was already being dismantled. Perhaps the Americans did not go into much detail, outlining aerial photographs, which embankments had paths and which did not. Therefore, as they themselves wrote, "the classification of roads should be treated with caution" - this map should not be taken as a 100% correct reflection of the real railway system of that time. You have yet to read about the quality of American cards below.

1946 Map of the Vladimir region, 1:400000.

The map confirms the appearance of the ring between Vasyutino and Alekseevo, indicated on the German map of 1941. In general, the map is four kilometers long, and cartographers could simplify it by ignoring small branches. But if we accept the map as accurate, then the following changes have occurred. The dismantling of branches to the west of Power Transmission and in the area of ​​the village of Dalnyaya has been completed. The Elektrogorsk-Krasny Angle line runs to Melezha, but the short exit to the northwest shown on the American map is missing. The exit to the road to Pavlovsky Posad was made along the western outskirts of the Power Transmission (previously it was a little to the east).

1947 Map of the Moscow region, 1:300000.

The power transmission is renamed on the map as Elektrogorsk (actually April 25, 1946). The ring loses its southern part, but a branch appears to the north from the northeastern part of the ring. Pay attention to this detail. Presumably in the mid-forties, a kind of “snake” appeared on the section of the path between the Red Corner and Melezh (on my diagram there are yellow-green alternating dots). The straight path is shown on this map and on the American map (yellow dots on my diagram), the snake is shown on the map of the Vladimir Region of the 46th and all subsequent ones, and in place of the direct path they began to depict an ordinary road. Whether this was the case, I do not presume to say, since no final conclusions can be drawn from 3-4 km maps, and I have not yet seen the km maps of these years. Otherwise, everything on this map is the same as on the map of the Vladimir region of 1946.

1956 No map.

Just a useful quote for understanding what is happening at this moment in time (from mosenergo-museum.ru):

Thanks to the re-extraction of peat in the former quarries of hydropeat at GRES-3 im. Klassona received hundreds of thousands of tons of cheap local fuel. The staff of the peat enterprise creatively worked on the prospect of further work of the enterprise. New areas for the extraction of milled peat were discovered and developed. New peat tracts have been found in the Pokrovsky district of the Vladimir region and a new peat area, Lyapino, has been organized. During these years, the Peat Enterprise carried out a significant mechanization of the extraction of milled peat with the creation and use of various machines: milling drums, edge cutters, stump collectors, rooters, peat harvesters from rolls to stacks. The number of employees at the Peat Enterprise was declining at a faster rate than at the power plant.

1959 Topographic map of the Moscow region, 1:200000.

Enough detailed map, but, alas, ends with the borders of the Moscow region and does not display the entire area occupied by the tracks. On the map we see the following changes.

Dismantling of all branches in the area of ​​Dalnyaya village and Beloe lake. Final dismantling of all branches in the north-west of Elektrogorsk. There was one line left towards Alekseevo, but several new short branches were attached to it. The ring was canceled, there is no more travel to Dalnaya here. The direct route from Dalnaya to Sopovo was also dismantled. Instead of these two dismantled tracks connecting Elektrogorsk with Dalnaya, a new track was now built from Dalnaya to the east, towards Golovino. In general, two-thirds of this path has already been built and is visible on maps from 1928 to 1942 inclusive, but it was not drawn on the maps of 1946 and 1947 (maybe the scale was not assumed). In any case, this track has now been rebuilt or restored, and extended to the Elektrogorsk-Melezhi branch, to a station that would later be called Novo-Ozernaya. Thus, the Elektrogorsk - Novo-Ozerny - Dalnaya branch was born, the remaining the only way from Elektrogorsk to Noginsk. Also, from the Elektrogorsk-Melezhi branch, new short branches were made to the northeast near the villages of Golovino, Krasny Ugol and Melezhi. Also, from the side of Vasyutino, the laying of a branch to the East has begun, which should go towards Lyapino, but I still don’t know how far it was laid, since the map is cut off to the district concrete (according to the quote above, in 1956 the Lyapino section was already known). The map is also interesting in that it shows several dismantled sections that were known to us only from the “doubtful” American map.

Lyrical digression.

Now let's mention the big fire of 1972 again. Surely, some damage was done to the railway network, but, between 1959 and the beginning of the 80s, an unpleasant information gap formed - there are no normal maps. As a lyrical digression, consider two American cards (they are the same):

1984 American, 1:250000. Compiled in 1984. Revised May 1997.

1989 American, 1:250000. Compiled September 1989. Revised May 1997.
U.S. National Imagery and Mapping Agency

I placed them in front of the General Staff map of 1979, since they are much earlier in content, although I do not presume to guess which period they correspond to. At the General Staff of the 79th year, the branch to Zheludevo (Zheludyevo) was completely built, and here it is only being selected. On the General Staff of the 84th year, only the Far - Novoozernaya - Elektrogorsk remains from the northern branch, the same map shows great prosperity: the Noginsk - Dalnaya and Novoozernaya - Krasny Ogorok branches still exist (moreover, the Krasny Ogorok shows a “tail”, which was cut off no later than 1959, if you believe the corresponding map. Here, for some reason, the long-worked-out swamps west of Elektrogorsk again acquire rails that were long dismantled no later than 1959. And the “tails” cut off at the Far East in the thirties and forties, grow back again True, we guessed that the Dalnyaya-Sopovo route turned into an ordinary road, and thanks for that. And look at the Elektrogorsk - Pavlovsky Posad route, it is marked as a narrow gauge, although even on the map of 1928 it was already marked with a broad gauge ( what it is now).Looking at this map, the thought does not leave that it was drawn by stupid idiots absolutely thoughtlessly.During the Second World War, it was still excusable, because if you didn’t steal secret General Staff maps - there is nothing to check, but 1997 is the time when great country already collapsed and it’s clearly not a problem to get Russian maps, well, either send someone to Moscow, buy fresh civilian maps at the Soyuzpechat kiosk, or click on satellite images in high resolution, but no, it’s not a shame for them to disgrace themselves and publish such garbage. In short, this map cannot be attributed to any period - it is a hodgepodge of all years, plus the fantasies and conjectures of the authors. This map does not show any new railway lines, except for a dubious short branch up in the middle of the Dalnyaya-Nov.Ozerny track. I didn't add it to my chart. Both on the map of the 59th and on the General Staff of the 80s there is a swamp with peat extraction, without any roads at all. Now there is a dacha settlement, and this offshoot is one of the dacha roads. I leave this map only as a demonstration of how Americans make maps. And it's called "Revised May 1997", despite the fact that the railway was completely dismantled in the early nineties!!!

Late 1970s - early 80s General Staff, 1:200000.

Regarding the date, 1990 is given by the authors of the retromap site where I found it. The note says that it is made up of maps from the 80s. But the sheet with Elektrogorsk is clearly striking. Obviously, this sheet is older, since it still shows the last remnants of minor tracks in the north-west of Elektrogorsk, which will no longer be on the maps of the mid-80s. It is noteworthy that only on this map there is a second road from Elektrogorsk to Dalnaya. Its southern part was already visible on the map of 1959. On the GSh maps marked in the mid-80s, this path will also not be. Also, the path still goes to Sopovo, but the top sheet is more recent, and there, instead of the railway, an ordinary one is shown. And this is the only map I have that shows a branch south of Bynino. I hope that this map can be found in the original dated and with all the sheets, then I will correct this fragment.

1979 GSH, 1:100000.

During this year, only a sheet was found showing the eastern fragment of the railway (Zheludevskaya "fork") completed.

1985 GSH, 1:100000 (various sheets come across, mostly 1984-86).

West of Elektrogorsk, all roads were destroyed. One way goes along the route Elektrogorsk - Novy Ozerny (non-residential) - Far. From Dalnaya to Noginsk, the path has been dismantled. Another route branches off in the Vasyutino area and goes east, through Lyapino, then crosses the district railway in the Kilekshino area and goes northeast, soon branching into two small tracks in the Zheludevo area (“fork”).

1990 Unknown provenance, 1:350000.

The map is historical nonsense. The map is taken from the website of S. Bolashenko. How did he sign it? “Narrow gauge railway on a 1:350,000 topographic map published in 1990. The state of the terrain in the "northern" part of the narrow-gauge railway (the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe settlements of Krasny Ugol and Dubki) - for the 1970s. The southern part is reminiscent of the late 80s. Northern - probably the 70s, but not later than the early 80s. The path from Kirzhach is incorrectly shown as a narrow gauge (in fact, until the 90s there was a wide gauge). It is noteworthy that on this map the fork in Zheludyevo was not shown, there was only one way left.

Further consideration of the maps does not make much sense, since the memories of eyewitnesses are still fresh, which, oddly enough, are more accurate than maps.

Nevertheless, to show that maps can not always be trusted, I propose for consideration two maps issued approximately 10 years after the final dismantling.

2001 Topographic maps of FSUE "Gosgiscenter", 1:100000 (according to other sources, 2007-2010).

The section Elektrogorsk-Nov.Ozerny and the branch to Zheludyevo are shown in full. The map, of course, is outdated, but it is shocking in detail, you can even see how narrow-gauge tracks passed in Elektrogorsk itself.

2004 Map of unknown origin.

A fragment of the route from Elektrogorsk to Novy Ozerny is shown, with a branch to the east, to the district railway.

Map of the Vladimir region, year unknown.

And one more cartographic incident. The year of the map is unknown. I downloaded this map of the Vladimir region for Ozik already in ready-made cut and glued form back in 2005. It is noteworthy that the Moscow region was completely cleared of the remnants of the narrow gauge railway, but not the Vladimir region. This is how the paths begin on the border of the Moscow and Vladimir regions, in the dense wilderness, and go nowhere ...

As a bonus.

Here is the chronology of the dismantling of the tracks, compiled according to information from the site narrow.parovoz.com

• The Red Corner - Ileikino line existed around 1940-50. Dismantled a long time ago [between 1959 and 1985 according to maps - approx. tol], even fragments of sleepers have not survived to this day, sometimes there are remains of rails sticking out of the ground.
• The line from Dalnaya to Noginsk was dismantled in 1969.
• On the Sopovo-Krasny Ugol-Melezhy section, the road was finally closed in 1982.
• The line through the peat fields was dismantled in 1987 [??? the southern road Dalnyaya - Elektrogorsk, is shown as an ordinary country road already on the map of the 85th year - approx. tol].
• Line to vil. Zheludevo was dismantled in 1993, but in the 90th there was still movement at least to the account. Lyapino.
• The main line was dismantled in 1993 by the very last.
• Bridge over the river Sheredar destroyed in winter 2004

And here is the scheme for the destruction of paths from Evgeny Ermakov (I cannot agree with the accuracy of the scheme).

Doubtful paths and other legends.

Kirzhachskaya narrow-gauge railway.

The Kirzhach narrow-gauge railway and the section of the track from Kirzhach to Melezha is probably the topic that is overgrown with the greatest number of fictions and misconceptions due to the lack of sufficient information. Some I have outlined on a separate page.

Bridge to Filippovskoye.

Many already perceive it as a fact that the train traveled on a narrow gauge for some reason from Elektrogorsk to Filippovskoye, passing over the bridge over the Sherna. I saw the remains of this bridge and the embankment at the beginning of the 2000s. But at the time of writing this article, I was looking for evidence that there were trains running there, and I did not find any. It's one thing if peat carts ride around the places of peat extraction, it's another thing if they ride around ancient residential areas, which, most likely, had nothing to do with peat. Filippovskoye is a very ancient village, and not some temporary settlement of peat miners like Novy Ozerny. People there need a connection with the regional center (post office, police and other matters), and this bridge is the main route from Filippovsky to Kirzhach. In addition, this bridge was part of the famous old Stromynskaya road (“Stromynki”), which existed already in the 12th century. It began in Moscow, passed from Stromyn to Kirzhach just through Filippovskoye (the village itself has been known from written sources since the 13th century), and further, to Yuryev-Polsky, Suzdal and Vladimir. Although this road lost its commercial significance with the advent of the Vladimirsky tract (around the 16th century), it still has local significance up to the present day as the most direct route from Moscow to Kirzhach, Kolchugino and beyond.

Yevgeny Ermakov's scheme contains an even bolder assumption that the train traveled through Filippovskoye to Zakharovo. But on all the old maps that I have seen, these roads (together with the bridge) are clearly marked as road, not rail. Scroll up and see the maps of the General Staff on the 41st, the Vladimir Region on the 46th, the Moscow Region on the 59th. It is especially colorfully highlighted on the German map of the 41st. It was later, presumably in the 60s, during the construction of a large concrete block, a new bridge was built to the north, and cars began to drive there, and before that there was only one bridge in Filippovsky (just the one that is now destroyed), they drove cars and were walking. Here is a map of the roads before the appearance of the concrete road (blue) and after (red).

Who even thought it was a railroad bridge? Even if, after the construction of the new bridge, this bridge was given to narrow-gauge workers, it is still doubtful, because the time was approaching when the line to Melezhi began to be dismantled. At best, at some point in time, trains could travel along this embankment to the river for water, but I have not seen evidence of that either (if someone is in those places, try to find at least one half-rotten sleeper on this embankment). But on the American map of the 55th, next to the turn to the bridge, there is a short branch of the railway, and on the map of the General Staff of the 80s, an embankment (dam) is indicated in that place, going to the ditch. On the map of the year 1959, this place is marked as a peat extraction site. There was an embankment with an arrow turn and a dead end. That's where, most likely, the train went, and not on the bridge, beyond which there are no places marked by peat extraction. If someone has the facts that the train went to Filippovskoye - publish it in the comments, and I'm happy to correct / supplement the text, even if you just find a 100-year-old grandfather who testifies that he saw with his own eyes how the train drove along this bridge.

Branches in the District and Pesyan.

According to Yevgeny Ermakov's scheme, they were dismantled in the 67-79s, but I did not find confirmation of their existence on the maps. This does not mean that these branches did not exist, but some facts are needed to include them in the scheme. It is possible to assume their existence by examining modern high-resolution satellite images. Whoever finds maps with these paths, or at least books / magazines / eyewitness accounts where they are mentioned - write in the comments.

Research result.

Now it's time to sum up this study. Once again, this scheme does not claim to be absolute accuracy, but still a little more detailed than those that exist at the time of this article. Additions and corrections are welcome. As they arrive additional information, the scheme will be corrected, so if we decide to copy the scheme to our blog, it would be better for railway lovers to simply link to this page so as not to produce hundreds of different outdated versions of the same scheme on the Internet.

There are two options for the scheme. The SAT is more suitable for general familiarization with the size and layout of the narrow gauge network. GS will be of interest to those lovers of narrow-gauge railways who want to go to the vicinity of Elektrogorsk and find places where the tracks once ran.

I warn you right away - the scheme is still “raw”, there are still some inconsistencies in places. The "dampness" of this version of the scheme is due to the fact that the same roads from different maps do not always lie on top of each other, although this is almost invisible on such a scale. The reasons for the discrepancies are the insufficient detailing of the available maps; the liberties of cartographers and the tendency to round roads (especially starting from 2-3 kilometers, and for five kilometers this is the norm); physical distortions of the card itself, for example, if it was not scanned, but photographed with a distorted perspective; various precise binding problems. In many cases, a detailed satellite image helps out - where the route of the path was clearly visible, I took this option as the preferred one. But it was not always so. Many places where the tracks were laid were either built up, or distributed as summer cottages, or dug up during the re-extraction of peat in old sections, so it will no longer be possible to restore the original routes, looking at a modern image from space. Therefore, there are two types of points on the map: square ones are used for track sections, the exact location of which cannot be recognized from a satellite image, and round ones for track sections that are still visible from the sky. Some places of the paths from the maps of the 20-30s do not lay down neatly enough, although the maps themselves are quite accurate. Most likely, some sections of the path could lie next to the later ones, but I can’t find out without additional maps, since such places are often hidden, built up or simply overgrown for 80 years, and are not checked by satellite.

I used the colors for my own convenience, so as not to forget or confuse anything. For the curious, here's the breakdown:

Red - cards of the 20-30s.
Yellow - American map (either the beginning of the forties, or a little later).
Green - a card of the 59th year.
Pink is a 59-year map, the paths have already been taken apart.
Blue - late 70s and later (GSh and later).
Gray circles in a red frame - possible the route of the "ring" (barely visible from the satellite).
Black triangles in a white frame - wide-gauge access road to special facilities.
Black circles in a white frame - a wide track.

To avoid piling up points, only the early year point is used. For example, if the same route was both in the 30th year and in the 70th, then it will be marked in red. If the route appeared only in the 70s, it will be blue. Years should be taken not as years of construction, but as years of appearance on the maps I have. That is, the road could have been laid 20 years before the map was published, and a year before, but obviously not later. The years of dismantling of individual sections of the tracks are not yet marked on the diagram due to a lack of detailed information.

The remains of the Kirzhach narrow-gauge railway of the silk factory are preserved on the map of the Federal State Unitary Enterprise "Gosgiscenter" in full and the western fragment on the map of the 59th year. The entire route is viewed from the satellite quite well, and it was copied from it. Other urban Kirzha railways are shown as narrow-gauge railways, as they are shown as such on the maps of the General Staff of the 80s. Most likely, now a part has been dismantled, a part has been replaced by a wide gauge (I did not find out this question, I just looked at the satellite).

Additions, errors noticed - in the comments or on my soap in the "communication" section. Any map not mentioned here on a scale of 500m, 1km, 2km will greatly help in supplementing and correcting the scheme. For collection and for study, it would not hurt especially real sheet of the General Staff 1 km of the war years (and not obsolete for the 20s, which is issued everywhere for the 40s). I searched diligently for it, but did not find it. If someone has - write to the soap.

History of changes on the map:
170210: first version.
170211: some sections were corrected based on the information found, station designations were added, broad-gauge tracks were shown (I drew them by eye, without reconciliation with the satellite, since they are not the subject this study). Now there are two versions - satellite and general staff.

The first narrow-gauge railways in Russia

The first narrow-gauge public railway in Russia was the Verkhovye - Livny branch, which belonged to the Orlovo-Gryazskaya railway. By the way, what does "public use" mean? This means that this line was intended for regular (that is, on schedule) train traffic and is available for use by any citizen of the country (not to be confused with industrial, military, temporary, special railways). Previously, such roads belonged only to the department of the Ministry of Railways - the Ministry of Railways. The narrow-gauge railways belonging to the Ministry of Railways worked strictly according to the instructions that existed in this department.

The narrow-gauge railway Verkhovye - Livny was laid in 1871 (1067 mm gauge - that is, 3 feet 6 inches). This was preceded by a foreign visit of the Imperial Russian Technical Commission to the first Festignog narrow-gauge railway in the history of England. In the same place, the members of the commission saw the “push-pull” steam locomotive of the Ferli system in action (subsequently, steam locomotives of such a system worked on a wide gauge on the hardest Surami pass in Georgia). The advantages of narrow gauge and "push-pull" immediately made themselves felt. According to L. Moskalev, the author of the book “Our narrow-gauge steam locomotives”, L. Moskalev, for the Livny railway, steam locomotives were purchased in England and Belgium (there were no steam locomotive building capacities and experience in this area yet), including the same Ferli steam locomotives designed to work with heavy trains without a turn at the final point of the route (they had a driver's booth in the middle of the locomotive, as later on many European shunting diesel locomotives). On the Livenskaya narrow-gauge railway, steam locomotives received poetic names: “The Lyubovsha River”, “Russian Ford”, “Livny”, “Verkhovye”, “Robert Furley”. They were heated first with wood, and then with oil.

The "Livenskaya" passed through the rich grain-growing districts of the Oryol province and therefore did not suffer from a lack of cargo. During the harvest season, the flow of export grain abroad was such that even on this branch it was necessary to build elevators and warehouses for storing grain - there was never enough space for storing “bulk” grain. Livny is a city in Russia, formerly famous for bread and accordions. The merchants in it hosted an important one - they could afford to have their own cast iron. Although the road was allegedly built at public expense, it certainly could not have done without the involvement of merchant capital - merchants gave one and a half million, according to the legend. How great was the productive power of such small towns in the south of Russia that the railways were drawn to them - and on what a grand scale! According to the Narrow-gauge Railways website, a certain engineer-inventor Shubersky, a member of the Road Construction Administration, took part in the construction of the Livenskaya narrow-gauge railway. He applied a number of his own inventions: a safe system for coupling cars, a new type of five-ton freight car, special lubrication boxes, buffers, introduced sleeping cars (!) - and this is just on one narrow gauge railway. And how many such innovations were used throughout Russia!

Soon a similar narrow-gauge grain-carrying branch was laid from Okhochevka near Kursk to the large county town of Kolpny. Subsequently, English steam locomotives of the Furley system from the Livenskaya were transferred to it. Already in 1896, the Livny road was changed to a wide one due to the increased volumes of cargo shipments, and the Kolpenskaya - in 1943, during Battle of Kursk, for enhanced supply of troops. In 2006, life on these roads still somehow flickered.

Merchants were attracted by the simplicity and cheapness of building narrow-gauge railways with their relatively large transportation capacity - however, the reader sees that such savings, in a sense, went sideways, because many of these roads then had to be changed to a normal gauge. In May 1871, the Chudovo-Novgorod narrow-gauge railway (1067 mm) was opened, and then it was extended through Shimsk to Staraya Russa along the western shores of Lake Ilmen. The Chudovo-Novgorodsky section was changed to a normal gauge in 1916, and the line to Staraya Russa was decided not to be restored after the Great Patriotic War due to the small size of traffic. In 1872, a narrow-gauge railway was stretched from Urochya to Arkhangelsk with a length of 837 km (a whole line, a separate legend! - Powerful multi-cylinder steam locomotives “mallets” worked on it), which was changed to a wide gauge only by 1917. And in 1877, the Bryansk industrialist, a talented engineer-inventor and an outstanding public figure, Sergey Ivanovich Maltsov, designed and built an extended inter-factory narrow-gauge road at his factories with a three-foot gauge, which ran along the Kaluga and Bryansk regions in the Lyudinovsky industrial region. Moreover, the rolling stock for this narrow-gauge railway was built by the factories of the Maltsov partnership according to Sergey Ivanovich's own projects.

The first organization in Russia, engaged in the systematic construction of narrow-gauge public railways, was the so-called First Society of Access Lines (1898). The name of this organization clearly indicates the auxiliary nature of the activities of narrow-gauge railways. The society paved its first road in Ukraine from Rudnitsa to Olviopol, and it was vividly described by Sholom Aleichem in the collection “Railway Stories”.

When the society built the Vladimir-Ryazan narrow-gauge line in the Meshchersky region, it found its own poets. With one of the stations of the road - the current regional center of Spas-Klepiki - the early years of Sergei Yesenin are connected. By the way, in the color album of 1967, dedicated to his biography and work, a fragment of the poem "Sorokoust" ("Have you seen how he runs across the steppes, hiding in lake fogs ..") is illustrated with a frame from this narrow gauge railway. Perhaps it was made near the Gureevsky junction at the site of a branch to Golovanov Dacha. But this road gained real fame thanks to perhaps the best story by Konstantin Paustovsky "Meshcherskaya Side":

“For the first time I came to the Meshchersky region from the north, from Vladimir. Behind Gus-Khrustalny, at the quiet Tuma station, I changed to a narrow-gauge train. It was a Stephenson train. The locomotive, resembling a samovar, whistled like a child's falsetto. The locomotive had an offensive nickname: "gelding". He really looked like an old gelding. At the curves, he groaned and stopped. Passengers went out to smoke. Forest silence stood around the panting gelding. The smell of wild cloves, heated by the sun, filled the carriages.

Passengers with things sat on the platforms - things did not fit into the car. Occasionally, on the way, sacks, baskets, carpenter's saws began to fly out from the platform onto the canvas, and their owner, often a rather ancient old woman, jumped out for things. Inexperienced passengers were frightened, while experienced passengers, twisting the "goat's legs" and spitting, explained that this was the most convenient way to get off the train closer to their village.

The narrow-gauge railway in the Meshchersky forests is the slowest railway in the Union.

The stations are littered with resinous logs and smell of fresh felling and wild forest flowers…”

I especially want to talk about this narrow gauge railway. Because today it is the last narrow-gauge public railway in Russia. It has always been subordinate only to the department of the Ministry of Railways.

Meshchera is still a reserved kingdom on the Ryazan land with pristine forest nature, secluded monasteries and hermitages, springs and lakes, “village huts” ... Sung by Yesenin and Paustovsky, Meshcherskaya land is original. One of its symbols is this narrow gauge railway.

As usual, let's start with history. In the 90s of the 19th century, the eyes of energetic Ryazan and Vladimir industrialists increasingly turned towards the Meshcherskaya lowland - the primitively untouched space between the Klyazma and the Oka. The wilderness, frightening for a resident even of the then Russia, complete impassability, fabulous tracts and swamps - it would seem, what kind of railway can pass where even the goblin can easily get lost? However, the unfinished wealth of Meshchera - timber, resin (pine resin), peat, sand - prompted the true, "old" Russians to invest in the business: in 1897, Vladimir began to quickly build the Ryazan narrow-gauge railway, making his way with axes through a clearing in the thickets and bogged down with bast shoes in the swamps.

By the beginning of 1900, the construction of 213 kilometers of track was completed. All buildings and structures were built in the same style, in the noble spirit of wooden railway architecture. At Ryazan, the line began near the port on the Oka (the station was called Ryazan-Pristan), from Yesenin's Spas-Klepikov to Tu we went along the crowded and lively Kasimovsky tract, but basically to Vladimir itself it rested in forest silence. The frightened forest creatures saw for the first time the curls of steam hanging on the spruce paws, and heard the piercing whistle of a locomotive with a huge chimney, puffing rapidly on strips of rails as wide as a footpath.

And by the way - why did you choose a narrow (750 mm) gauge and not a wide (1524 mm) gauge? The flows of Meshchera cargo and passengers at first did not promise to be large - and when the gauge is twice as narrow as usual, then the costs of construction and operation are half as much. A narrow-gauge locomotive sawed birch round logs - it will be enough for him until Ryazan itself, and he can draw water from the bridge through a hanging sleeve from any river along the way. So, by the way, they did.

However, the Ministry of Railways is the Ministry of Railways - state order and supervision from above, regardless of the size of the track and dimensions. The steam locomotives and wagons of the society were painted according to the purpose and class with the application of sovereign eagles, signaling - kerosene, candle lanterns and a telegraph, each station agent dressed in uniform, in the waiting rooms there are stoves and wooden benches "MPS", there are timetables hanging - everything is as it should be.

In 1903, the company turned out to be in profit - 61,919 rubles of the time and 1 kopeck. They transported 139,497 people and 9.5 million pounds of cargo. The state tax in bulk did not exceed 13%, including 5% on profits: today there would be such financial freedom for the railways and for our entire economy! In 1904, the company turned out to be at a noble loss - they paid the due creditors, shareholders and reimbursed the bills. Things, therefore, were conducted honestly.

Along the line, puffing in smoke, there were undersized trains with hemp, wood, peat, cotton wool from Spas-Klepikov, glass from Gus-Khrustalny, with goods from Kasimov and Tum artisans, striking in their diversity of the modern Russian, tired of overseas goods. After the unseen economic development Meshchera neighborhood, which was the result of the opening of a narrow gauge railway (even new villages and settlements were born), the traffic increased so much that in 1924 the most stressful section of Tumskaya - Vladimir had to be changed to a broad gauge. This section is famous among lovers of old pieces of iron for the fact that until 1980 steam locomotives ran here and, if it were not for the Olympics-80 with its window dressing, they would still be like. Some major nomenklatura figure, unfortunately for retro lovers, on the eve of the Olympics, saw a live steam locomotive at the Vladimir station and burst into noble anger: “Do you know that Vladimir is a city of international tourism ?! What will foreigners think about our country when they see such samovars here ?! And instead of creating a unique steam-powered tourist road and collecting dollars, francs and guilders from these same tourists, the steam locomotive traffic on the Tumskaya branch was closed overnight.

... You read the eloquent royal statistics of past passenger traffic on the Vladimir-Tumskaya road, and you still imagine men and women jumping into Ryazan-Pristan from a small train and waiting, sitting on the grass-ant, for a steamer near the Oka ...

But all this is long in the past. Only one rusty rail, lying in the middle of a country road near the Oka shore, now reminds of what “was-died” ... The road began to fade back in the 1960s, for various reasons. In Ryazan, after all, there was no bridge across the Oka before, and the line to Shumashi itself was often flooded during the flood. When a road bridge across the Oka and an asphalt highway to Spas-Klepiki were built, the need for a passenger train immediately disappeared. Yes, and the former customers preferred to send wood and cotton wool by cars immediately to the place, without transshipment on a narrow gauge railway. AT last years in Spas-Klepiki, the wooden bridge over the Pru was completely dilapidated, and this finally decided the fate of the reserved road.

The leadership of the Gorky Railway (the legal owner of the narrow gauge railway) did not try to do anything to preserve the line, despite the uniqueness and memorial significance of the Ryazan section and the abundance of tourists in these parts. On the contrary, in the late 1990s, the rails were quickly sold as scrap to an outside cooperative, while regularly reporting to the Ministry of Railways about the road as if it were operational. The legendary Yesenin Solotcha, Barsky, Spas-Klepiki will never again hear the noise of the train that has been running here for 100 years ...

Today (2006) the last living narrow-gauge section remains here: Tumskaya - Golovanova Dacha. The statistics are as follows: one diesel locomotive TU7, two 30-seat cars, two conductors, four drivers, a road foreman and four railway workers for 32 km of track - that's all his economy. The train runs four times a week, twice a day. Finance? Revenues from transportation are 20 times less than expenses ... The administration of the Spas-Klepikovsky district compensates for this loss. Why? Yes, because just as there were no other roads to Golovanov Dacha under the tsar, there are none today. If the “narrow” is closed, the population of Kursha and Golovanovka will face a specific death.

... With a great enthusiast of the history of railways, locomotive engineer Konstantin Ivanov and the director of the only Pereslavl narrow-gauge museum in Russia, Vadim Mironov, went to Tumskaya in November 1997. The 953rd "narrow" left Tumskaya at 14.00, a ticket to Golovanova Dacha cost 4 rubles 20 kopecks in those days. Ride it with God!

Twitching and swaying, rattling chains of couplers and clanking buffers, as if 100 years ago, moving as if through force, stumbling like a peasant cart over bumps, a small, unusually comfortable train rides. First, through the fields to the Gureevsky junction, which miraculously preserved in its pristine houses all the ancient essence of the road, its hundred-year-old spirit, and then turns to Kursha, Golovanovka, into the forests ... they sometimes have to). Close branches of trees often stroke the car. Speed ​​- 15 km / h, and once the passenger walked here 80 km / h!

The everyday surroundings of the car, I remember, differed little from those described by Paustovsky in the Meshcherskaya side, from the times when the locomotive "had the offensive nickname" gelding "". The cars, when we were driving, were jam-packed, people even stood in cramped vestibules. I heard a lot of little things about the road, typical for the world of narrow-gauge railways. For example, that in Golovanova Dacha there is no connection with the outside world, except for the timber industry's walkie-talkie - telephone poles in the forest collapsed ... That sometimes there is no electricity for weeks. It is not known why the shop wagon was suddenly canceled and food is delivered to Golovanovka and Kursha from now on in shopping bags - whoever can. That in the summer, before the eyes of passengers and drivers, the station “on Kursha” burned down: a chimney collapsed behind its dilapidation, sparks scattered across the roof - and it started. The traveler, who lived in the station, was sleeping at that time, the brigade who arrived with the train woke him up when the house was already on fire. At first, he jumped out, but then rushed out the window for documents into the very smoke ...

While the diesel locomotive was maneuvering in Gureevsky, moving to the tail of the train to go in the opposite direction to Golovanovka, we learned from the road foreman that in order to get to work, he adapted a personal motorcycle to the railway trolley - and drove along the line like on an autobahn! And about how once in the winter they went after snowstorms to the line with a snowplow and got stuck with it in the most often in snowdrifts - for help in Tuma, the driver ran 10 miles on foot, fearing wolves.

Here is Golovanova Dacha - a dead-end station. On a large clearing in the forest there are huts, a boarded-up station with a royal ticket composter, a boarded-up grocery store, a boarded-up club. People, lined up in a row, meet the train. It's a tradition here. It is painful to think that when the train leaves, people will be left here alone... You can drive an UAZ along the winter road to Golovanovka in dry weather, and even then only from neighboring villages.

But earlier, before the war, it was not a dead end. Another mustache stretched from Golovanovka to a forced labor camp, where they were engaged in logging, which was supplied to ... Germany, to the Messerschmitt factory. The last shipment was made on June 22, 1941.

... We drove back to Tuma on a clear frosty night under garlands of stars, and the headlight of the diesel locomotive artistically highlighted the patterns of branches floating right at the window. In the darkness of the car with a single flashlight flashing like a firefly, the conductors moved as if in some kind of blissful timelessness ...

I recently found out from the patriot and local historian of these places Gennady Starostin in Tum: he says that this road is the same now. He lives like a divine being: if he needs it, he lives. Vadim Mironov said well about the Tumskaya narrow-gauge railway: “She is a match for Meshchera - a shy worker with discreet beauty and charm, which can only be appreciated with a leisurely glance.”

I am sure that this road must be kept alive at all costs. She is part of our history. Her death will become irreversible both for herself, the “shy toiler”, and for hundreds of people in the desolate space of Meshchera, in the depths of Russia ...

One of the reasons for the death of narrow-gauge railways is the reduction in peat extraction. It is no longer needed in the previous quantities - power plants everywhere have switched to gas or fuel oil. Valuable forests in Central Russia have already been cut down for the most part, so there is no purpose for narrow-gauge railways here either, especially since now wood is being transported directly from the clearings in autotrailers. The narrow gauges are leaving. There are fewer of them, and there will be very few - it was not for nothing that the production of PV-40 cars was stopped.

In the village of Talitsy, Pereslavsky district, Yaroslavl region, there is a unique museum of narrow-gauge railways. The impression of his visit with remarkable lyricism was expressed by a modern researcher of the history of locomotives, photographer and writer Leonid Makarov in a short essay entitled “An old narrow-gauge car”: “A passenger car that has served its purpose. Riveted trolleys, shabby sides and six narrow windows - all windows are lowered all the way down. Open areas. Get out on this one, lean on an iron forged handrail, look around, dream ... How such a car will sway, tremble weightily at the junctions of a weak track with its four axles. Light up if you smoke, but I'd rather drink a hundred grams and go to the site. The air there is amazingly fresh, smelling of forests and swamps, and our carriage is no longer standing still, but slowly floating ... From Vologda to Arkhangelsk? From Ryazan to Vladimir?

…How many hours will we drive? Or maybe a few days? But that car was rusty and the green paint had peeled off.

Timelessness.

Not! It's just a long parking lot...

Here they are - the five tracks of the half-asleep station. Rare pine trees, black huts lost between them. Dranochny roofs and red brick rough. Somewhere a dog is barking, a child is screaming, a cow is mooing. Grasshoppers crackle in the tall grass. In a narrow open window - very close, you can touch it with your hand - the sharp nose of a snowplow, unnecessary until next winter, and on the last journey, in a trembling sultry haze - two small abandoned steam locomotives buried in a dead end ...

... Grasshoppers crackle, flood, and butterflies fly from one open window to another. Parking for four hours… Four months… Forty years.

Where is that reserved forest side from my dreams? Where is the distant narrow-gauge railway with a long and low locomotive that has turned gray from old age? Will the old wagon answer me?

Maybe doze off in it under the light noise of pines, and then wake up - and here it is, that inaccessible region ...

Old wagon, do a miracle, take me with you!

Quiet. Only butterflies fly from one broken window into another."

Back in the early 2000s, the narrow-gauge railway museum in Pereslavl was connected to the network of the former P.Zh.D. - the industrial Pereslavl railway (750 mm gauge), once the most powerful transport network in this region, engaged in the transportation of passengers, peat and other goods. Dozens of locomotives worked here in the old days! The network stretched from Olkhovskaya through Kubrinsk with branches to Msharovo and Talitsy, where there was a depot (the building of the current museum), to Veksa, a large junction station, then after the junction of the Pereslavskaya branch, it went along the northern shore of Lake Pleshcheyevo through a dense forest to Beklemishevo station. There was a transshipment station where the narrow-gauge railway was docked with the main wide passage Moscow - Yaroslavl. There was an intersection with this narrow-gauge railway of the Yaroslavl highway in two places - in Pereslavl itself at the former bus station and on the Yaroslavl highway between Pereslavl and Petrovsk in the forest, near the village of Govyrino, where there was a guarded crossing with a barrier. Now there is no hint of these transfers.

The narrow gauge railway was finally closed in 2003. It's amazing - the trains from Pereslavl to Botik Petra were always full of tourists who were attracted by the originality of such a movement, but the administration of the Yaroslavl region nevertheless closed this road. It seems to me that one should try to preserve it, to include it in the Pereslavl reserve complex - well, let's say, to use it for tourism purposes, because nearby, in Talitsy, there is the only narrow-gauge museum in the country, not to mention ancient Pereslavl with its museums and temples. All over the world, narrow-gauge railways in such tourist places are a good business, and no less than on broad-gauge retrolines - after all, the cost of operating a narrow gauge is much less. Not to mention the fact that this narrow-gauge railway is simply a considerable memory for the region.

However, who cares about memory these days? Now is the time to forget...

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