"The old" bridge across the Volga

Photo of M. P Dmitriev. Tver, 1903. From the series .The Volga Collection., 1894-1904s. Original - GANO, copy - TSUM.

The right bank part of Tver had been connected with the Zavolzhye by a raft bridge for two hundred years. The first bridge was made by Peter I. A base for the construction consisted of a dozen of large barks which were settled with the help of % kg anchors across all the width of the river every Spring. According to modern city topography it went from balustrade of the City Garden to the monument to Afanasy Nikitin. Such a crossing served only till the colds came and during high water in Spring the parts of the city became isolated from each other for some time. The usage of the bridge was uncomfortable, exploitation of it was difficult and the city didn't maintain it. The service was given to tax-farmers and crossing the bridge cost money.
Lack of a constant bridge across the Volga was a trouble for Tver through all the XIX century. Only in 1895 the State Treasury agreed to take a part of expenses of building a bridge on its account. A project was made by an engineer-technologist Tochisky. By that time in Europe and in Russia was widely practised construction of metal bridges which combined technical values with attractive exterior: a girder of a bridge allowed to make large spans and at the same time it gave a note of romance to a city landscape. The most well-known example of such bridges is the Bridge of Franz-Ioseph in Budapest. Its Tver brother was splendidly constructed by engineer-builder L. Mashek. It was opened on September, 8,1900. Crossing the bridge was free of charge. The bridge was maintained on the account of the city's budget and provincial elective council (zemstvo). There was not stinginess in maintaining the bridge on the community account: a metal worker and three guards worked on the bridge, it was provided with 48 oil lamps for lighting, it was supposed to change wooden planking completely twice a year.
During the major reconstruction of the bridge in 1980s the thoroughfare was widened. As a result its proportions were broken, Gothic motifs are no longer sound loudly. Thus an outstanding monument of engineering art was saved due to the lack it artistic image.