The Most Unusual Bridge in St. Petersburg

The main thing about this strange object, called The Blue Bridge, is that it is really enormous. You would hardly guess that’s a bridge if you are not told this.

Just look at the picture at the top of the post. What do you see? Looks like a square or a wide street, doesn’t it? But this is a bridge! Its width is 97,3 meters, three times more than its length. Two pictures below let you see it from two opposite sides, left and right.

Built in the XVIIIth century as a narrow wooden bridge, it has been rebuilt a few times.  Now it looks like a part of the Isaac’s square, one of the most known squares in the city, hosting the famous luxury hotels Astoria and Angleter (Rocco Forte Hotels), the Mariinsky Palace, where the local parliament sits, and other buildings.

Why is it named the Blue Bridge? Here there is no link with its unprecedented width. In the old times, there were a few similarly looking bridges across the Moika-river, and residents were a bit confused. The authorities decided to paint them by different colours. The city got the Red, Blue, Yellow and Green bridges. The yellow one is now called The Singer’s Bridge, and it is also very large. It connects the embankment of the Moika river and the Palace square, and not very far from its blue “brother”.

By this link you will find a 360-grade-view of the Isaac’s square. A Cathedral you see on the photo is the Isaac’s Cathedral. “Turn” your “back” to it (by arrows) and you’ll see a big building in front of you (it’s also shown on the pictures 2 and 3 in this post, above). The Blue bridge is just before this building. Now you can imagine how wide it is.

Photo credit: www.most-spb.ru