Moscow Railway Station

Moscow Railway Station is the main railway station of Nizhny Novgorod and the passenger terminal of the Nizhny Novgorod-Moskovsky station of the Gorky Railway. It stands in the Kanavinsky District at 2A Revolution Square, next to the exit of the Moskovskaya metro station ^[1][2]. After the Sormovsky and Romodanovsky stations closed, it became the only operating railway station in the city ^[3]. The complex covers 10,888 square meters, is designed for 3,900 long-distance passengers and 1,200 suburban passengers, and handles about seven million people a year ^[4].

The Road to the Yarmarka

The station appeared here because one of the first major trunk lines in the country was being extended to the city. Construction of the railway from Moscow to MK in Nizhny Novgorod was approved by imperial decree on May 10, 1847, but work began only eleven years later: in the first half of May 1858 on the Moscow–Vladimir section, and in the spring of 1859 on the Vladimir–Nizhny Novgorod section. Traffic opened on the 177 versts from Moscow to Vladimir on June 14, 1861. The line was built by hired laborers and by peasants of the Nizhny Novgorod, Vladimir, and Ryazan Governorates conscripted into compulsory hire: they lived in hastily knocked-together barracks and dugouts and worked 12 to 14 hours a day ^[5].

On August 1, 1862, traffic opened along the entire length of the Moscow–Nizhny Novgorod Railway: 410 versts, 27 stations, and a station building and depot in Nizhny Novgorod. The festive day was marred by misfortune — the first train was wrecked near Kovrov. The line became the third railway in Russia, after the Tsarskoye Selo and Nikolayevskaya railways, and linked the European part of the country with the Volga Region, the Urals, and Siberia ^[5]. It was pushed through to the Nizhny Novgorod Yarmarka: waterways were no longer enough for trade, and the Yarmarka was the largest marketplace in the empire ^[5].

For its first thirty years the line remained single-track. From 1864, two pairs of passenger trains ran daily — Moscow–Vladimir and Moscow–Nizhny Novgorod; on Yarmarka days an extra train was scheduled. Innovations for the whole Russian railway network also began here: in the mid-1860s the Nizhny Novgorod line was the first to send its own cars onto another company's line, the Nikolayevskaya, and in 1877 a railroad tie impregnation plant was built in Kanavino — the first enterprise of its kind in Russia, which also served other railways ^[5].

On January 1, 1894, the government bought the Moscow–Nizhny Novgorod Railway into state ownership, and in the same year it was placed under joint management with the Moscow–Kursk Railway. This is why in pre-revolutionary photographs the Nizhny Novgorod station is captioned "station building of the Moscow–Kursk Railway" ^[5].

The First Building

The station of 1862 was long: three two-story buildings were linked by passages, with an enormous vestibule in the center and, attached to it, waiting rooms, a post office, a telegraph office, buffets, and restaurants. The facade acquired the "comb" typical of those years, the tower a monumental clock, and the hall a mosaic on heroic themes. The right wing housed rooms for receiving high-ranking guests: a large hall, the tsar's study, and the empress's salon ^[7].

The prerevolutionary station was quite different — cozy, original, resembling the Tsar's Pavilion that survives next to it ^[7]. Nothing remains of that building: in the 1960s it was rebuilt entirely, destroying the historic facade, and the prerevolutionary mosaics were replaced with Soviet ones ^[8].

The Tsar's Pavilion

To the right of the station stands a one-story red-and-white building with the coat of arms of the Russian Empire and the inscription "God Is with Us" on its pediment — the Imperial, or, as people in the city are used to calling it, the Tsar's Pavilion. Talk of building it began as early as 1886, under Alexander III; the undertaking was initiated by the Nizhny Novgorod merchants and the private company that owned the Moscow–Nizhny Novgorod line. At first it was to be an ordinary building with plain finishing costing around fifteen thousand rubles, but the project was postponed and grew more expensive: in 1890–1891 25 thousand was budgeted for it, and soon they were ready to allocate 58 thousand rubles, including landscaping of the grounds ^[9].

The design was commissioned from the Moscow architect Dmitry Nikolayevich Chichagov (1835–1894) — the author of the Moscow City Duma building, a founder of the Moscow Architectural Society, and the son of the architect Nikolay Chichagov, who worked on the Grand Kremlin Palace ^[10]. The merchant Mikhail Kutyrin was chosen as contractor. Construction began in late 1891 and was expected to finish by February 1893, but in the autumn of 1892 a cholera epidemic struck Nizhny Novgorod, and the building was completed only in 1894 ^[9].

The pavilion was conceived in the Russian style — to echo the Yarmarka buildings and the Blinovsky Passage — but was built in academic eclecticism with elements of Baroque and Rococo. Zinc coats of arms of the empire and the emblem of the Ministry of Railways were placed on the pediment. Inside there are eight rooms: a heated vestibule, a central hall with a carved white Italian marble fireplace and a mirror in a plaster frame, studies and lavatories for the imperial family with stoves of majolica tile, and rooms for the retinue. The ceilings and walls were decorated with Renaissance-style stucco work by Kutyrin's own Moscow workshop, and the furniture was made in Renaissance and Louis XV styles. The building had plumbing, and every honored guest was entitled to a separate water closet ^[9]. A telephone stood in the study-reception room, and Chichagov himself chose the fabric for the walls of the empress's room ^[10].

The pavilion's vestibules opened onto the square and onto the first platform — exactly where the first car of the train stops ^[10].

with flush tanks, all fixtures and the laying of faience pipes, and the finishing of the seats of two water closets in mahogany and one water closet in ash

The Pavilion After the Tsars

The little palace was first used for its intended purpose on July 17, 1896, when it received Nicholas II and his family, who had come for the All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition, which spread across the site of today's May 1 Park ^[9][11]. The emperor was met by Governor Nikolay Mikhailovich Baranov and Mayor Dmitry Nikolayevich Delvig. The royal family was received here a second and final time in 1913, during the celebrations of the tercentenary of the House of Romanov ^[10].

In 1905 the building found itself at the center of the revolutionary events: insurgent workers seized it and held it for some time, and after the street fighting the building was restored. After 1917 the pavilion housed the committee of the Kanavino Bolsheviks and the district extraordinary commission; the building then passed to the railway, which opened a clinic for railway workers there and, in the postwar years, an advance ticket office. Repairs and refits left almost nothing of the original decoration ^[10][9].

The railway decided to restore the pavilion's former role: according to some sources, it became a hall for deputies and official delegations in 1985, according to others, only in the 1990s ^[10][9]. In 1997 the building was repaired, with part of the interiors restored from photographs and a design found in the archive. A full restoration took place in 2005: the two vestibules, the central hall with its fireplace, the emperor's study, the empress's room, the lavatories, and the servants' room were returned to their original appearance. The design was prepared by the scientific and production enterprise Etnos, and the work was carried out by NTP Praktika under the direction of Sergey Konstantinovich Zabelin, at a cost of 8 million rubles. A portrait of Nicholas II by Yuri Vasilyevich Vasilyev was hung in the hall ^[10][9].

The pavilion is recognized as a cultural heritage site, belongs to the Gorky Railway, and is used as a hall for official delegations: negotiations, press conferences, and award ceremonies for railway workers are held there ^[10][12]. The building has never been rebuilt and has preserved its original appearance; there is no public access to it ^[9]. It is the only structure of the pre-revolutionary station complex to have survived to the present day: the original station building itself was demolished in the 1960s and never managed to receive protected status ^[4][8].

1960s Building

In 1963–1965 the old station was demolished, and a new building in the Soviet modernist style was erected on its site to a design by the architect M. A. Gotlib ^[4]. The structure was rebuilt completely — in the name of what was then called a "civic look": the historic facade was destroyed, the waiting rooms and other spaces were redesigned, and Soviet mosaics replaced the pre-revolutionary ones on the walls ^[8]. The complex consists of two interconnected wings; the facade facing the station square is divided by vertical pylons — a device that lends the building monumentality and spread across the country under the influence of the architecture of Moscow's Palace of Congresses.

The main decoration of the interior is the mosaic panel "Revolution" on the walls of the main hall. It was laid by five Nizhny Novgorod artists under the direction of the architect Valentin Lyubimov; the work took six years and was only finished in 1971 ^[13]. From the Soviet era, the building retains precisely two mosaic panels on the side walls — and nothing else ^[8].

In 1985, after the launch of the Metro, exits were built into the building leading to a long passage to Moskovskaya station ^[8].

The Chandelier Where People Met

In 1996, one of Nizhny Novgorod's entrepreneurs introduced Oleg Zykin, director of the Nizhny Novgorod Technical Company, to Omari Sharadze, the head of the Gorky Railway, who was then keenly interested in reconstructing the station building. Sharadze drew a "squiggle" in pencil on a sheet of paper and said: I want a chandelier like this. Specialists prepared a sketch and technical specification, the Dutch company Intalite manufactured the fixture, and installing it took a whole year: the installer would take four petals at a time, ride up with them on a hydraulic lift to the ceiling, fasten each element separately, and come back down for more. The chandelier, weighing 2.5 tons, consisted of several hundred elements and shocked Nizhny Novgorod residents with its sheer size ^[7].

Over twenty years it became the city's main landmark: people arranged to meet under the chandelier, killed time there before their trains, and conductors on through trains tried to step out for a minute in Nizhny Novgorod just to look at it ^[13]. During the 2017–2018 reconstruction the fixture was taken down, and each of its elements was numbered and packed; the freed-up space made it possible to enlarge the second floor ^[14]. The chandelier did not return to the station: the hall is lit by LED fixtures built into the ceiling ^[13][14].

The chandelier is stored disassembled in a warehouse of one of the Gorky Railway's divisions. No one sold it or gave it to anyone.

Reconstruction for the World Cup

Ahead of the 2018 FIFA World Cup, the station was rebuilt from scratch. Work began in June 2017, and the main building opened on April 28, 2018; about 2 billion rubles were invested in it ^[8][16]. In 2016 the building was granted the status of a cultural heritage site of regional significance, so its exterior had to retain its historic appearance, while the interior changed beyond recognition ^[14].

The station's floor area grew by a thousand square meters, and its capacity by 400 people. Security screening areas were moved outside the building, and elevators and an escalator were installed, along with ramps, tactile paving, and induction loops for the hard of hearing. The ticket hall was converted into an open-counter service hall with ticket terminals and an electronic queue system — there were only three of these in the country. A central information system displaying messages in two languages came into operation, a mother-and-child room opened, and the number of automatic luggage lockers was increased to two hundred ^[16][14].

The first thing people see when they arrive in Nizhny is the railway station. It is the true face of the city.

We treat the monument building with great care — we do not touch the panels on either wall of the main building.

Apart from the mosaic panel and the historic elements of the walls, everything here is new.

All Nizhny Novgorod residents can be congratulated on the commissioning of yet another World Cup 2018 heritage site.

Platforms, tracks, and "peculiar" numbering

The station has six passenger platforms. Platforms 2 through 6 are reached via pedestrian tunnels; elevators run from the central tunnel to platforms 2 and 3, the entrance from the side of the island platforms is also equipped with an elevator, and the platform edges are fitted with warning strips ^[1].

The numbering of tracks and platforms was long a puzzle, and Nizhny Novgorod residents complained about it: the track closest to the station building was labeled platform 1, although it is track 4; the next track was a through track with no boarding; after that came tracks 6 and 8 with platform 2, tracks 1 and 5 with platform 3, tracks 13 and 14 with platform 4, tracks 15 and 16 with platform 5, and tracks 17 and 18 with platform 6. Since the end of 2025, the signage has been made continuous — from the main building to the commuter train pavilion — and the platforms have been divided into sectors: platforms 2, 3, 4, and 6 into A and B, and platforms 1 and 5 into A, B, and C ^[17].

Suburban passengers are served by a separate suburban station with ticket offices and a waiting room, on the Moscow Highway side, building 2g ^[2]. City commuter trains link the station with Strigino station near Chkalov Airport: 17 suburban trains stop along the route, the fare from Moscow Railway Station to the airport is 37 rubles (35 rubles with the "Siticard" transport card), and an A-50 electric bus runs from the platform to the airport terminal ^[18].

On the first floor there is a business lounge with a meeting room, and next to the main entrance, thirty meters from the doors, is a parking lot for 67 cars, 12 of them for disabled drivers ^[2].

Trains

Nizhny Novgorod-Moskovsky station remains one of the most important junction stations on the network: a significant share of long-distance trains to Moscow, the Urals, and Siberia pass through the city. In the 2007 timetable, the trains passing through Nizhny Novgorod included the "Rossiya" (Vladivostok — Moscow), "Baykal," "Yenisey," "Sibiryak," "Kuzbass," "Tomich," "Yamal," "Yugra," "Rifey," "Kama," and "Vyatka" ^[19]. In the early 2000s, the longest-distance trains that had previously run from Moscow via Yaroslavl were transferred to the Gorky Railway: the railway repaired the track and cut two hours from their journey time ^[5].

The road east also led abroad — to Mongolia and China. The same 2007 timetable shows trains No. 3/4 Moscow — Beijing, No. 5/6 Moscow — Ulaanbaatar, and the "Vostok" No. 19/20 Moscow — Beijing, which ran via the Manzhouli — Zabaykalsk border crossing ^[19][20]. The Beijing train departed from Yaroslavsky Station twice a week, took about six days, and made 36 stops, among them Nizhny Novgorod and Semyonov ^[21]. In 2020, the pandemic interrupted passenger service with China: train No. 3/4, operated by China Railway, was canceled ^[22], and the "Vostok" was removed from the timetable at the same time ^[20]. In spring 2025, train No. 3/4 made a trial run along the Beijing — Ulaanbaatar — Moscow route and back: twelve Chinese-built cars, which had never before run on Russian railways, were accompanied by technical specialists from both countries, and it was to be decided on the basis of the results whether the train would run on a regular basis ^[21][22].

High-speed service to the capital began after the 2006–2010 infrastructure modernization: on July 30, 2010, the Sapsan was launched, covering the distance to Moscow in 3.5 hours ^[5]. From June 1, 2015, Spanish Strizh trains ran on the route, but on March 10, 2022, they were withdrawn — Talgo refused to provide technical maintenance, and five pairs of Lastochka trains took over the line ^[23]. The trains run in five- and ten-car configurations, and the consist is lengthened as demand grows ^[6].

Besides Moscow, the Lastochka trains connect Nizhny Novgorod with Kirov and Ivanovo. Since 2026, biometric boarding has been in use on these routes: the system recognizes the passenger's face and matches it against the ticket data, so there is no need to show a passport ^[24].

The scale of passenger traffic is visible across the whole railway: in January–March 2025, more than 8.6 million passengers departed from the stations and stops of the Gorky Railway — 2.8% more than in the same period of 2024 ^[6].

Today at the Nizhny Novgorod station I familiarized myself with how the system works. The whole procedure takes no more than ten seconds, and there is no need to show a passport.

How the station changed its name

The city was renamed in 1990, but the station remained Gorky for another twenty years: by a decree of the Russian Prime Minister dated March 30, 2010, the stations of the Gorky Railway Gorky-Moskovsky, Gorky-Avtozavod, and Gorky-Sortirovochny became Nizhny Novgorod-Moskovsky, Nizhny Novgorod-Avtozavod, and Nizhny Novgorod-Sortirovochny ^[25]. The station building itself was given the name "Nizhny Novgorod" in 2010 by order of Vladimir Yakunin, president of Russian Railways (RZD) ^[26].

The lettering on the building took four years to catch up with the paperwork. The sign "Moskovsky Station" over the main entrance was replaced with "Railway Station" only on April 17, 2014, when money for the new letters was finally found ^[26]. In the city, though, it is still called the Moscow Railway Station.

At the same time, the inscription "Nizhny Novgorod" appeared on the platform side. And now it has become possible to change the letters over the main entrance.

The Square in Front of the Station

The station forecourt is named Revolution Square and remains one of the busiest and most motley places in Kanavino. A monastery once occupied part of it — only photographs of it survive. There is no talk of unity of style here: standing side by side are the old Imperial Pavilion, miniature and elegant, the modern railway station, the high-rise metro building, the Constructivist Railway Worker's House-Commune of 1934, the pompous Stalinist Central Department Store, and the Respublika shopping center with its mirrored facade ^[27].

The square by the station has more than once been the site of vehicles striking pedestrians. In 2025, an employee of the regional government was killed here after getting out of a taxi and colliding with a bus; the bus driver was subsequently sentenced ^[28]. That same year, the city traffic management center prepared options for a new layout, which were discussed with the traffic police and Russian Railways, and in 2026 City Hall relocated and installed additional road signs, expanded the bus passenger drop-off zone near the Tsar's Pavilion by removing the old barriers, and organized a stopping area for private vehicles and taxis opposite the station's main entrance. The Transport Systems Development Center installed additional cameras there that record improper pick-ups and drop-offs; the authorities note a marked reduction in such violations ^[28].

Cameras near the station appeared earlier: by December 17, 2025, three photo-enforcement systems for stopping-rule violations were already operating on Revolution Square, and in December alone, a thousand drivers had received fines ^[29].

Moscow Railway Station is a place of heightened danger; stricter control over vehicles stopping in areas where it is prohibited is a key factor in bringing order to traffic.

Fire Rank No. 3

The railway station is automatically assigned fire rank three: the alarm summons the crews regardless of whether a fire has actually broken out or the alarm system has simply gone off. The layout here is simpler than at neighboring large facilities, and people can be evacuated through three exits, but the station has a feature that nothing else in the city has ^[8].

Because of it, a firefighting train is always ready to arrive at the station at the request of the fire-fighting commander — it takes ten minutes to coordinate and assemble the train, plus travel time ^[8].

In terms of firefighting, the station differs from other facilities in that trains with tank cars, which may contain flammable substances, stand on the tracks not far from it

Neighboring Stations

Moscow Station did not become the city's only railway station right away. The Sormovo branch, laid from the plant to Kanavino in 1872, received a station in 1904 on the initiative of Aleksey Meschersky, director of the Sormovo Plant; the station was first called Kanavino, then Sormovo Station, and in 1934 it became Stalinskaya. In the mid-1940s it was moved beyond the Sormovo Bend, and in the early 1960s it was closed and the tracks were dismantled, because the railway got in the way of mass housing construction ^[3].

Romodanovsky Station on Chernigovskaya connected the city with the Volga Region and changed its name three times — Romodanovsky, Arzamassky, Kazansky — although among the people it remained Romodanovsky to the end. In 1961 the Sartakovsky Bridge across the Oka was opened, and long-distance trains began running to Moscow Station; Romodanovsky still handled suburban traffic until a landslide blocked the tracks in 1974 and overturned a tram — after that the station was closed and the rails were removed ^[3]. In the collection of the Regional State Archival Service, the closure of Romodanovsky (Kazansky) Station is dated to 1961, when a railway bridge across the Oka was built in Gorky and the Kazan trunk line flowed into the city ^[5].

In winter, residents of the Zarechye side walked to Romodanovsky Station across the Oka on foot — it was faster that way ^[3]. Among the city's railway attractions, others live alongside Moscow Station as well: the children's railway, opened in 1939 and the largest in the Soviet Union, and the locomotive museum at the Nizhny Novgorod-Sortirovochny station, opened in 1996 on the initiative of Omari Sharadze — its collection includes a dozen and a half steam locomotives built in Russia, the USSR, Sweden, and Germany in the first half of the 20th century ^[5].

See also

• Gorky Railway
• Romodanovsky Station
• River Station
• Metro
• Revolution Square
• Railway Workers Square
• Kanavinsky Bridge
• The Lastochka Train

Sources

1. rzd.ru — Russian Railways (RZD) — accessibility map of the Nizhny Novgorod station — Nizhny Novgorod Station
2. nizhnijnovgorod.dzvr.ru — Russian Railways Directorate of Railway Stations — station reference page — Nizhny Novgorod Station (archive)
3. Nizhegorodskaya Pravda — on the Sormovsky and Romodanovsky stations — Sormovsky and Romodanovsky: how the fate of the old Nizhny Novgorod stations unfolded
4. web.archive.org — Delovoy Kvartal — station fact sheet: area, passenger traffic, architect of the 1965 building — Moscow Station in Nizhny Novgorod (archive)
5. web.archive.org — State Archival Service of Nizhny Novgorod Region — essay on the 150th anniversary of the railway — On the 150th Anniversary of the Opening of the Railway in Nizhny Novgorod (archive)
6. NIA Nizhny Novgorod — on the consist length of the Lastochka trains and traffic on the mainline — Lastochka lengthens its consist on the Nizhny Novgorod — Moscow route (archive)
7. book-hall.ru — Centralized Library System of Kanavinsky District — local history essay on the station — Moscow Station (archive)
8. 52.mchs.gov.ru — Nizhny Novgorod Region Main Directorate of the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations — firefighting plans for the city's landmark buildings — Fire Plan: How to Extinguish the Nizhny Novgorod Circus or the Moscow Station
9. NN.RU — history and interiors of the Tsar's Pavilion based on Gorky Railway materials — A Station for the Elite. What the Closed Tsar's Pavilion in Nizhny Novgorod Looks Like Inside (archive)
10. gttp.ru — Nikolay Morokhin — report on the Imperial Pavilion and the heritage of the Gorky Railway (archive)
11. book-hall.ru — Centralized Library System of Kanavinsky District — essay on the Imperial Pavilion — Imperial Pavilion (archive)
12. GIPERNN — GiperNN — on the 130th anniversary of the Tsar's Pavilion and its status — The History of the 130-Year-Old Tsar's Pavilion Told in Nizhny Novgorod (archive)
13. KP — Nizhny Novgorod — Komsomolskaya Pravda — Nizhny Novgorod: on the removed chandelier and the mosaic panel — Moscow Station in Nizhny Novgorod Reopened Without Its Unique Chandelier (archive)
14. nn.aif.ru — Argumenty i Fakty — Nizhny Novgorod: report from the station reconstruction — A New Life for Moscow Station. The Building and Platforms Will Be Renovated by Spring (archive)
15. Nizhegorodskaya Pravda — on the fate of the removed chandelier — The Fate of the Chandelier Removed During the Reconstruction of Moscow Station Revealed
16. nn.rbc.ru — RBC Nizhny Novgorod — reopening of the station after reconstruction — Station Complex in Nizhny Novgorod Reopens After Reconstruction (archive)
17. Nizhegorodskaya Pravda — on the numbering of tracks and platforms and the new signage — Quest Canceled: New Navigation System Introduced at Moscow Station in Nizhny Novgorod (archive)
18. vvppk.ru — Volgo-Vyatka Suburban Passenger Company — commuter trains to the airport — By Commuter Train to the Airport (archive)
19. KP — Nizhny Novgorod — Komsomolskaya Pravda — schedule of long-distance trains passing through Nizhny Novgorod — Schedule of Passenger Trains Passing Through Nizhny Novgorod (archive)
20. chita.ru — Chita.ru — on the withdrawal of train No. 19/20 Beijing — Moscow from the schedule — Zabaykalsk — Manzhouli Train: When It Launches, Schedule (archive)
21. NIA Nizhny Novgorod — on the Moscow — Beijing train with a stop in Nizhny Novgorod — Plans to Relaunch the "Moscow — Beijing" Train with a Stop in Nizhny Novgorod (archive)
22. transportrussia.ru — Transport of Russia — on the trial run of train No. 3/4 Beijing — Moscow — Beijing — Moscow Passenger Train Launched on a Trial Run (archive)
23. Kommersant (Privolzhye) — on the cancellation of the Strizh trains — Strizh Trains Withdrawn from the Nizhny Novgorod — Moscow Route (archive)
24. NIA Nizhny Novgorod — on biometric boarding at the Nizhny Novgorod station — Biometric Boarding to Be Introduced on Trains from Nizhny Novgorod to Kirov and Ivanovo (archive)
25. NNTV — on the renaming of Gorky Railway stations — Gorky-Moskovsky Station to Be Renamed Nizhny Novgorod-Moskovsky (archive)
26. Vremya N — on the change of the inscription on the station facade — "Moskovsky" Station in Nizhny Novgorod Renamed "Zheleznodorozhny" (archive)
27. book-hall.ru — Centralized Library System of Kanavinsky District — essay on the station square — Station Square (archive)
28. NN.RU — change to the traffic pattern near Moscow Station — Authorities Change Traffic Pattern Near Moscow Station, Where a Bus Struck and Killed an Employee of the Nizhny Novgorod Kremlin (archive)
29. Vremya N — photo-enforcement cameras near Moscow Station — Another Camera Installed Near Moscow Station to Combat Violators (archive)