The Luzhniki Park complex is the leading Moscow facility for sports and was one of the main arenas for the 1980
Olympic Games. The Luzhniki Stadium is flanked by a smaller arena, a swimming pool, and the indoor Sports Palace. There are many stadiums and swimming pools in the area, including some heated open-air pools that are in use year-round. In addition, there are a large number of football fields, gymnasiums, and volleyball and basketball courts; most of these are attached to individual places of work or to sports clubs. Moscow has several first-division football teams that now have corporate sponsors but whose origins date from the 1920s, when they were affiliated with powerful institutions of communist society: Dynamo (tied to the KGB), CSKA (the army's team), Lokomotiv (representing railway workers), and the defiantly independent Spartak (once only loosely linked to a food producers' cooperative but now controlled by LUKOIL, a Russian oil giant).
Outside the Garden Ring, Moscow is well endowed with parks and open spaces. Gorky Central Park of Culture along the right bank of the Moscow River is the closest to the centre and, with its amusement park, is very popular. On the east side Izmaylovsky Park is a large green area, covering nearly 3,000 acres (1,200 hectares). To the north-east is the more formal Sokolniki Park, which leads to an extensive tract of forest called Losiny Ostrov ("Moose Island"). North of the city centre are the Botanical Gardens of the Academy of Sciences, one of several such gardens in the city, and the grounds of the Moscow K. A. Timiryazev Agricultural Academy. Bittsevsky Park, also of considerable size, has been established adjacent to the Ring Road south of the city centre. Moscow Zoo, one of the world's leading zoos, is a popular attraction west of the city centre. The Khimki Reservoir, just north-west of Moscow, is used for boating and aquatic sports, but even more popular are the other reservoirs to the north, just outside Greater Moscow.
The surrounding forest-park zone provides extensive space for recreation,
St Petersburg
St Petersburg is the second largest city of Russia and one of the world's major cities. It has played a vital role in Russian history since its founding in 1703 - for two centuries (1712-1918) it was the capital of the Russian empire. The city is remembered as the scene of the February and October Revolutions of 1917 and for its fierce defence while besieged during the Second World War. Architecturally, it ranks as one of the most splendid and congenial cities of Europe. Its historic district was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1990.
An important port, St Petersburg is situated in the extreme north-west of Russia, about 400 miles north-west of Moscow and only about 7 south of the Arctic Circle. Greater St Petersburg - the city itself with its satellite towns - forms a horseshoe shape around the head of the Gulf of Finland and includes the island of Kotlin in the gulf. Its population is about 4.5 million.
St Petersburg is rich in cultural, historical, and architectural landmarks. Founded by Peter I as Russia's "window on Europe", it bears the unofficial status of Russia's cultural capital and most European city, a distinction that it strives to retain in its perennial competition with Moscow. The city has three distinctive characteristics - first, its harmonious mix of western European and Russian architecture; second, its lack of an unequivocal city centre; and third, its many waterways. The short but full-flowing tributaries and canals of the Neva
River that stretch to the Baltic coast are inseparable from St Petersburg's panorama, and the bridges and natural canals of the river have earned the city the nickname "the Venice of the North". Because of St Petersburg's northerly location, the city enjoys the "white nights" from June 11 to July 2, when daylight extends to nearly nineteen hours - another of St Petersburg's most acclaimed characteristics, duly celebrated with a variety of festivals organized by the Mariinsky and Hermitage theatres and the Rimsky-Korsakov St Petersburg State Conservatory.
Climate
The mitigating effect of the Atlantic Ocean provides St Petersburg with a milder climate than might be expected for its far northern site. Nevertheless, winters are rather cold, with a mean January temperature of about 21 F (-6 C), a few degrees warmer than that for Moscow. Winter temperatures can drop below —40 F (-40 C), however. Snow cover lasts on average about 132 days. The Neva begins to freeze normally in about mid-November, and the ice is solid by the start of December; break-up begins in mid-April and is usually completed by the end of the month. Summers, the wettest period, are moderately warm, with an average temperature of 65 F (18 C) in July.
The city's low and originally marshy site has left it vulnerable to flooding, especially in the autumn, when strong cyclonic winds drive gulf waters upstream, and also at the time of the spring thaw. Exceptionally severe inundations occurred in 1777,1824, and 1924. To control the destructive floodwaters, the city built in the 1980s a dyke, 18 miles (29 km) long, across the Gulf of Finland. A number of canals have also been cut to assist drainage.
History
The area of the current city of St Petersburg was settled as early as the eighth century, but it was not until 1703 that Peter I laid the foundation stones for the Peter-Paul Fortress on Zayachy Island. This date is taken as the founding date of St Petersburg. In the spring of the following year, Peter established the fortress of Kronshlot (later Kronshtadt), on Kotlin Island in the Gulf of Finland, to protect the approaches to the delta. At the same time, he founded the Admiralty shipyard on the riverbank opposite the Peter-Paul Fortress.
Although the first dwellings were single-storied and made of wood, it was not long before stone buildings were erected. The city was planned as an imposing capital, on a regular street pattern, with spacious squares and broad avenues radiating out from the Admiralty. Architects, craftsmen, and artisans were brought from all over Russia and from many foreign countries to construct and embellish the new town.
The city's political and cultural importance swiftly rose in 1712 when it was established as the capital of Russia, in preference to Moscow, Forced immigration of the noble and merchant classes led to the building of private palaces and government buildings: among the earliest were the Exchange (now the Naval Museum), the Naval Customs House (now the Pushkin House, or Institute of Russian Literature), and marine hospital. In addition to the construction of a harbour - which led as early as 1726 to St Petersburg handling 90 per cent of Russia's foreign trade - work began on the Vyshnevolotsky Canal in the Valdai Hills, the first link in a chain that by 1709 gave the capital a direct water route to central Russia and all of the Volga River basin.
Within its grand architectural setting and as the permanent residence of the imperial court, cultural life developed and flourished. The University of St Petersburg was founded in 1724. In 1773 the Institute of Mines was established. Many of the most celebrated names in Russia in the spheres of learning, science, and the arts arc associated with the city: Mikhail V. Lomonosov, Dmitry Mendeleyev, Ivan Pavlov, Aleksandr Pushkin, Leo Tolstoy, and Fyodor Dostoyevsky, among others. Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment was set in the city, and the buildings described in the novel are a focus of tourism. As early as 1738 the first ballet school in Russia was opened in St Petersburg; in the nineteenth century, under Marius Petipa, the Russian ballet rose to worldwide renown and produced such dancers as Vaslav Nijinsky, Tamara Karsavina, and Anna Pavlova. In 1862 the first conservatory of music in Russia opened its doors, and there the premieres of works by Pyotr llyich Tchaikovsky, Nikolay Ritnsky-Korsakov, Sergey Rach- maninov, and other composers were performed.
The outbreak of the First World War in 1914 brought an upsurge of patriotic fervour centred on the tsar. The Germanic form of the city's name was changed to its Russian version, Petrograd. But with the fail of the imperial Romanov dynasty during the subsequent 1917 Revolution, the city's destiny was inevitably at stake, and Moscow became capital again the following year. In 1924, following Lenin's death, Petrograd was renamed Leningrad, as St Petersburg was known until 1991. Much of the initial burden of developing the national economy fell on Leningrad and its established industrial plant and workforce, which by 1939 was responsible for 11 per cent of all Soviet industrial output. Then, in the Second World War, came destruction. The city was one of the initial targets of the German invasion in 1941; by September of that year, German troops were on the outskirts of the city and had cut off communication with the rest of the Soviet Union, while Finnish troops advanced from the north. Many of the inhabitants and nearly three-fourths of the industrial plant were evacuated eastward ahead of the German advance. The remainder of the population and the garrison then began to endure what has become known as the 900-day siege; the German blockade in fact lasted 872 days, from September 8,1941, to January 27, 1944, Leningrad put up a desperate and courageous resistance in the face of many assaults, constant artillery and air bombardment, and appalling suffering from shortages of supplies. An estimated 660,000 people died, a very high proportion from scurvy and starvation. In particular, the exceptionally bitter winter of 1941-2, when temperatures fell to -40 F (^40 C), was one of extreme hardship and loss of life. Not until the 1960s did the city regain its pre-war size of 3 million inhabitants; by the 1980s the population had passed the 4 million mark.