Presidential Library illustrates the history of street lighting in St. Petersburg

On the eve of the New Year and Christmas holidays, a starry sky of bright garlands sparkled over St. Petersburg. Snowy fantasy lighting transformed the bridges of Northern Venice. Man-made sparkling frosty patterns, New Year's arches and huge Christmas tree balls, luminous fairy-tale figures and multi-colored lights decorated the city, creating a unique holiday atmosphere.

It’s hard to believe that electricity in St. Petersburg was first used for fashionable and spectacular physical experiments. They say that during the coronation of Alexander the Second, “10 electric suns were built”, and the first experiments in electric lighting were carried out in St. Petersburg in 1879 using the method of the Russian electrical engineer Pavel Yablochkov. The Palace Bridge was chosen as the place for the experiments, and then the square near the monument to Catherine the Second. Then the Alexander II Bridge (Liteiny) was illuminated in this way. And 240 years ago, in December 1883, the lighting of Nevsky Prospect with electricity began.

If we delve into history even further, it turns out that this year there is another important date associated with the lighting of the city - the three-hundredth anniversary of the external lighting of Nevsky Prospekt (a promising road), which appeared at the end of 1723. That is, St. Petersburg is the first city in Russia in which regular lighting appeared. The materials of the Presidential Library tell about how this innovation was introduced in the “most deliberate city.”

By the founding of St. Petersburg in 1703, street lighting existed only in Paris, Hamburg, Berlin, London, Hanover and a few other cities. For a long time, residents of European cities had to use hand-held lanterns. After Peter the Great’s first trip abroad, carrying lanterns became for some time the responsibility of St. Petersburg residents, and the architect Jean-Baptiste Leblond, invited from Paris, and put in charge of all construction work in the new capital by Peter, was ordered to draw up a project for installing street lamps.

By 1718, the project was awarded the highest approval, and the production of lanterns based on the sketches of the French architect began at the Yamburg factories of the Tsar’s associate Alexander Menshikov. The first lanterns were installed on Admiralty Island, near the Winter Palace and the Admiralty. Then Peter raised the question of finding funds to illuminate the whole of St. Petersburg.

It was planned to use hemp oil for lighting. The estimate also indicated that for every 15 lanterns a lamplighter was required with accessories - a ladder, a small hand-held lantern, a brush, a sponge, and a measure. At the end of December 1723, the Senate decided that in order to “form the amount required for lighting city streets, take a penny per square fathom in the First and Vasilyevskaya parts, one penny from the areas of St. Petersburg, Kazan and Spasskaya, and half a kopeck from Liteinaya and Vyborgskaya, Moreover, the sovereign’s artisans, masons, carpenters... and archers were exempt from the tax”. To maintain the lanterns, they decided to use other sources of city income: clamp fees, fees from inns, and others. Just 20 years after its founding, St. Petersburg received street lighting.

Throughout the 18th century, along with the expansion of urban areas, the number of lanterns increased. By 1770 there were already more than 2,200 of them. Empress Catherine the Second transferred responsibility for maintaining lighting to private hands, and the lighting season was extended from August 1 to April 22.

The appearance of the lanterns was taken seriously: they were not supposed to spoil, but rather decorate the capital.

In 1839, the first gas lamps began to appear on the streets of St. Petersburg. For the experiment, gas lamps are being installed in the city instead of the removed 215 oil lamps. Of course, the innovations concern fashionable places - 20 such lanterns are placed at the Alexander Column, on Gorokhovaya Street - 30, on Sadovaya - 23, most of them appear on Nevsky Prospekt - from the Admiralty to Liteiny - 84 lanterns.

When hopes of reducing the cost of street lighting using gas did not materialize, they tried using grain alcohol mixed with turpentine for lanterns. However, due to the loss of “materials” that inevitably occurred when refilling lanterns, it was decided to develop a new way to illuminate the city - using kerosene (in Russia they just learned to extract it from oil in 1860). Gradually, gas and kerosene lighting replaced oil and alcohol lamps. Even with the advent of electric lighting, kerosene and gas lamps continued to be used and disappeared from city streets only in the 1930s.

240 years ago, in 1883, on Nevsky Prospekt, “30 arc lights were installed from Morskaya to Anichkin Bridge”, mounted on poles on both sides of the street in a checkerboard pattern, “and temporarily, before laying underground cables, it was allowed to hang conductors on gas poles”, - says Semenovich. A place was allocated for the location of the power station behind the Kazan Cathedral, then it was decided to install the power station on a wooden barge on the Moika River. Thus, in December 1883, electric lighting of Nevsky Prospect, the most famous thoroughfare in St. Petersburg, began.