Kakhovskaya station to be overhauled in 2021

The Kakhovskaya metro station will be overhauled completely this year. Like the Kakhovskaya Line, the station will be part of the metro’s Big Circle Line.

According to Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, the Kakhovskaya Line was the shortest metro line, with just three stations. Service intervals were 5 minutes, and the line’s infrastructure was not designed to handle peak loads.

“We had to completely overhaul this line, including the Kakhovskaya station. This station is important because we are implementing an ambitious relocation programme in nearby residential areas. We will have to relocate residents living now in 180 residential buildings,” Mr Sobyanin noted, after assessing the pace of the project.

Three stations, Kakhovskaya, Varshavskaya and Kashirskaya, were opened as part of the metro’s Zamoskvoretskaya Line on 11 August 1969. In 1995, this was converted to a distinct connector line, the Kakhovskaya Line, just 3.3 kilometres long.

The Kakhovskaya Line’s comprehensive overhaul began in the spring of 2019. The two-stage project is necessary to use this line as part of the Big Circle Line that is now under construction.

There are plans to completely overhaul the Kakhovskaya station in 2021. It will become part of the Big Circle Line’s southern section between the Prospekt Vernadskogo and Kakhovskaya stations.

An access route will be built to the Zamoskvoretskoye train maintenance facility during the first stage. This facility now serves the Zamoskvoretskaya Line, and it will later service trains from the Big Circle Line.

“We are on schedule. All of the Kakhovskaya station’s structural elements have been completed. Experts are now working on architectural elements and adding the finishing touches, and they are also upgrading the tracks and the utility lines,” Mikhail Arbuzov, First Deputy Director General of the Moscow Metro Construction Administration, noted.

The Varshavskaya and Kashirskaya stations are to be overhauled in 2022. They will enter service together with the Big Circle Line’s eastern section between the Kashirskaya and Nizhegorodskaya stations.

Prior to this project, the Kakhovskaya Line was not in heavy use, moving only tens of thousands of people daily. This small line’s shorter trains operated at 5-minute service intervals.

As part of the Big Circle Line, the Kakhovskaya Line will provide 1 to 2 minute service intervals, and passengers will have easy access to many city districts.

The Kakhovskaya station before and after the overhaul

The Kakhovskaya station is located at the intersection of the Kakhovka and Azovskaya streets and Chongarsky Boulevard Street. The shallow station with columns has three sections with an island style platform. Change is available to the Sevastopolskaya station on the metro’s Serpukhovsko-Timiyazevskaya Line.

The station was built to a standard design dating to the 1960s and the 1970s. Octagonal columns were its main distinguishing feature.  Most other stations, built to this design, feature square columns.

The station’s walls are decorated with diecast bas-reliefs by sculptors Gorchakov and Soshinskaya commemorating the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922.

The rebuilding project began on 30 March 2019.   station’s historical appearance will be retained. The infrastructure will be upgraded, including utility lines, wall tiles and platforms, and the tracks themselves.

The station’s western end entrance will receive an additional hallway with a link to the metro’s Serpukhovsko-Timiryazevskaya Line.

Passengers with disabilities will find it easier to use the Kakhovskaya station. One of its hallways will have a lift linking the platform with the entrance hall and an exit at the intersection of the Azovskaya and Kakhovka streets.

Workers are currently upgrading the station’s architectural elements and adding finishing touches. They are also installing all the main hallway structures and building a new link to the Sevastopolskaya station. The station is 50 percent complete.

The pedestrian tunnels linking the Kakhovskaya station with the unfinished Zyuzino station on the Big Circle Line are also complete. Tunnel-boring machines are now operating between the Zyuzino and Kaluzhskaya stations.

Big Circle Line: A project conceived in 1985

Construction of the Big Circle Line is the most ambitious metro construction project in the world. The 70-km Big Circle Line will have 31 stations and three train maintenance facilities, including the current Kakhovskaya-Kashirskaya section. It will be the longest metro circle line in the world, longer than the Beijing Metro’s 57-km circle line.

The Big Circle Line will link current and future radial lines located up to ten km from the existing Circle Line. This will reduce congestion on the metro’s first interchange circuit inside the Circle Line and also on the current Circle Line, its second interchange circuit.

The Big Circle Line’s design will make it possible to add new radial metro lines, including:

• the Rublyovo-Arkhangelskaya Line at the Karamyshevskaya station;
• the Troitskaya Line at the Ulitsa Novatorov station;
• a future line towards Biryulyovo and Shcherbinka at the Klenovy Bulvar station.

The Big Circle Line’s stations will provide 23 transfer points to other metro lines, four changes to the Moscow Central Circle railway, six links to the Moscow Central Diameters routes (Odintsovo-Lobnya and Nakhabino-Podolsk) and 11 links to railway stations. The Delovoi Tsentr, Savyolovskaya, Nizhegorodskaya, Ulitsa Novatorov stations and others will become large transit hubs.

The Big Circle Line project was conceived in 1985, but construction did not begin for 25 years, due to a shortage of resources and other reasons.

Sergei Sobyanin decided to launch construction of the Big Circle Line.

The construction project was subdivided into the following sections:

• the northwestern section between the Delovoi Tsentr and Savyolovskaya stations. Its Delovoi Tsentr-Petrovsky Park stage admitted the first passengers on 26 February 2018, and the Petrovsky Park-Savyolovskaya stage opened on 30 December 2018;
• the northeastern section between the Savyolvskaya and Nizhegorodskaya stations. Its Nizhegorodskaya-Lefortovo stage opened on 27 March 2020, and the Lefortovo-Elektrozavodskaya and Elektrozavodskaya-Savyolovskaya stages remain to be completed;
• the western section between the Khoroshyovskaya and Kuntsevskaya stations includes the -Karamyshevskaya and the Karamyshevskaya-Kuntevskaya stages;
• the southwestern section between the Kuntsevskaya and Prospekt Vernadskogo stations. It includes the Aminyevskaya- Prospekt Vernadskogo and Kuntsevskaya-Aminyevskaya stages;
• the southern section between the Prospekt Vernadskogo and Kakhovskaya stations, including reconstruction of the Kashirskaya-Kakhovskaya section;
• the eastern section between the Kashirskaya and Nizhegorodskaya stations.

The Big Circle Line’s tunnels are 93 percent complete, and the entire line is 74 percent complete.

The expanding metro: Achievements of the past ten years

Since 2011, the city has opened 305 km of metro lines, 148 stations, three additional metro hallways, the MCC, two MCD routes and ten train maintenance facilities.

The Lyublinsko-Dmitrovskaya Line

• section between Maryino and Zyablikovo (three stations);
• section between Maryina Roshcha and Seligerskaya (six stations);
• the second hallway of the Maryina Roshcha station;
• the second hallway of the Petrovsko-Razumovskaya station.

The Kalininsko-Solntsevskaya Line

- section between Novogireyevo and Novokosino (one station);

- section between Delovoi Tsentr and Ramenki (five stations);

- section between Ramenki and Rasskazovka (seven stations).

The Zamoskvoreskaya Line

• section between Krasnogvardeiskaya and Alma-Atinskaya (one station;
• the Tekhnopark station;
• section between Rechnoi Vokzal and Khovrino (two stations).

The Arbatsko-Pokrovskaya Line

• section between Mitino and Pyatnitskoye Shosse (one station).

The Tagansko-Krasnopresnenskaya Line

- section between Vykhino and Kotelniki (three stations);

- the Spartak station.

The Butovskaya Line

• section between Ulitsa Starokachalovskaya and Bitsevsky Park (two stations).

The Sokolnicheskaya Line

- section between Yugo-Zapadnaya and Salaryevo (three stations);

- section between Salaryevo and Kommunarka (four stations).

The Nekrasovskaya Line

- section between Kosino and Nekrasovka (four stations);

- section between Aviamotornaya and Kosino (five stations).

The Big Circle Line

• section between Delovoi Tsentr and Savyolovskaya (six stations);
• section between Aviamotornaya and Lefortovo (one station);
• section between Lefortovo and Elektrozavodskaya (one station),

The Filyovskaya Line

• the second hallway in the Mezhdunarodnaya station.

The Moscow Central Circle has 31 stations

The Moscow Central Diameters (MCD-1 and MCD-2) have 60 stations, including 20 with links to metro lines, the MCC and MCDs.

Train maintenance facilities (including overhauls): Mitino, Brateyevo, Pechatniki, Vykhino, Planernoye, Nizhegorodskoye, Likhobory, Solntsevo, Vladykino and Rudnevo.

In 2020, the city opened 17.93 km of metro lines and seven new stations, including:

• the 11.33-km second section of the Nekrasovskaya Line between Aviamotornaya and Kosino (five stations: Aviamotornaya, Nizhegorodskaya, Stakhanovskaya, Okskaya and Yugo-Vostochnaya);
• the Big Circle Line’s 2.99-km northeastern section between Aviamotornaya and Lefortovo (Lefortovo station);
• the Big Circle Line’s 0.7-km northeastern section between Lefortovo and Elektrozavodskaya (Elektrozavodskaya station);
• 4-km of turnarounds after the Delovoi Tsentr station;
• 51 km of dead-end spur track on the Sokolnicheskaya Line’s section between the Salaryevo and Kommunarka stations;
• passengers can change from the Zamoskvoretskaya Line’s Dynamo station to the Big Circle Line’s Petrovsky Park station.