Kaluzhskaya Square is one of many Moscow squares located on the Garden Ring. It is known to many residents and guests of the capital by the monument to Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, who with his hand indicates the direction towards Gorky Park and the Crimean Bridge. However, few people know that this place has a long history.
History of Kaluga Square
The origin of the place goes back to the distant 16th century, when the territory of the capital ended immediately behind the modern Garden Ring. The square was the southwestern borders of the capital of the city, the entrance to the Earthen City, from which Moscow began. On the north side was an earthen rampart with wooden gates, which were later replaced with stone ones. In the 17th century, it was here that Russian troops repulsed the assault of the combined Polish-Lithuanian troops.
A century later, the square becomes a trade, nevertheless retaining its military function. Trade rows stretched across the entire square, going all the way to the next one - Serpukhovskaya Zastava. Until the end of the 18th century, there was also a prison here, whose inhabitants later moved tothe famous Butyrka prison.
The shaft and the gate existed until the 19th century, when they were demolished to build residential buildings. At the same time, the square takes the form of a circle, for which it is often called a "frying pan". The houses built here were demolished a century later, when the square was waiting for new transformations.
In the 20th century, the square was renamed, and it was named Oktyabrskaya. This can be traced even today in the names of metro stations facing Kaluga Square. The last radical reconstruction of the square took place already in the 1970s, simultaneously with the reconstruction of the Garden Ring: a car tunnel now passes under the square, and massive buildings in the spirit of Brezhnev's brutalism surround it around the perimeter.
Modernity
Several streets flock to the square at once: Leninsky Prospekt originates here and Bolshaya Yakimanka ends, Mytnaya and Zhitnaya streets start from here, Zemlyanoy and Korovy ramparts adjoin the square.
The main attraction of Kaluga Square in Moscow is the monument to Lenin, erected in 1985. At the southern end is the Russian State Children's Library, and at the northern end is the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation.
How to get to Kaluga Square?
Since the square is right on the path of several large road arteries of the city at once, it is not difficult to get to it.
Throughthe area is passed by trolleybuses M4, 4 and 7, which then follow along Leninsky Prospekt. If the first one passes through Kaluga Square, then the second one has its final stop here. The same applies to buses: bus 111 of the route completes its journey here, while buses M1 and 144 pass through it. There is also a truncated route 144K, the final stop of which is at the very beginning of Leninsky Prospekt. Buses B and T10 run along the Garden Ring.
Several tram routes start from Kaluga Square at once: routes No. 14, 26, 47 and A - the famous "Annushka". The stop is located on Shabolovka Street, south of the square itself.
You can also get here by metro: exits from the Oktyabrskaya metro station of the circle line and the Kaluzhsko-Rizhskaya station of the same name are directed to the square.
