Moskva Metro stations

did we have a thread about this recently or did I read it somewhere else? They apparently have a very good public transit system. A funny thing they have - apparently a left-over from the communist era - is a guy that stands in a booth all day telling people to walk faster, squish together more, etc.

It's pretty much the same thing in Sankt Petersburg and only some of the stations look like that. Fucking communists used to spend money on anything but their people. As for public transit in Russia, it's ok... not anything revolutionary. I would say that the one in NYC or San Francisco is much better organized and much more efficient. From former USSR the best transit system is in Prague, you can get anywhere you want from any part of the city at any time and it's very cheap.

Some of the stations are truly spectacular. Just don't ask too many questions about the working conditions when the Metro was built.

I also agree that Prague has a very efficient Metro system - but it lacks the grandeur of the Moscow stations.

Yeah, definitely. It's always better not to ask questions about reliability of stuff in Russia... it makes your life easier. Mainly because there's hardly any maintenance being done on the older stuff and when it comes to new stuff, the quality is sub-par.

I have a book about Stalinist architecture where they talk about building those metro stations. Apparently some of the mosaics were done by the master craftsman--artisans if you will--left over from the Tsarist era.

Very high quality stuff, which is somewhat surprising considering the origins are Soviet.

LabelKing, would you mind sharing the title of the book?

http://www.amazon.com/Architecture-S...2032398&sr=8-1 I believe there is another one by the same authors as well.

Thank you.

very cool. I'm gonna check that out.

Russia never wanted for artists or artisans. The problem was that a lot of them were not appreciated under the Communist regime. The quality of art and architectural design was always high.

I think what surprises a lot of people is accepting that both shoddily made utilitarian goods and worldclass art, music, literature and so forth could co-exist under the Soviet regime.

Did you notice a) the thickness of the subway doors and
b) the depth of the subway underground?

The whole thing is a fallout shelter in case the Capitalists attack

Maybe the world class stuff existed because of the shoddy stuff

I haven't been to Moscow, but I've been to Saint Petersburg and rode the metro every day when I was there. There stations are much more impressive than the NYC subway (which I also rode every day for three years) in that they are much bigger and cleaner. This is basically part of the wholse communist philosophy of making things appear grand so that people think their country is prosperous.

The cool thing that they had that the NYC subway doesn't have is a little clock in each station telling you when the next train is going to come. The closest thing NYC has to that is a voice over the loudspeaker saying: "there is a northbound A train approaching the 34th street station."

But, on the other hand, the NYC subway has a lot more trains and a lot more stations, so travelling it is more convenient.

i can't believe you said, "stuff."

it's like i don't know you anymore.