Batraki
Either way, it turns out to be 1.5 versts in length, which makes it the longest such bridge in all of Europe, and it cost some seven million rubles to build. They started construction in 1876 and finished in 1880, or so said a man next to be on deck. Much of the rock came from the Zhigulev Hills, just upriver. That struck me. For a moment anyway. I read some kind of harmony between nature and man in that detail.
And then there is this: the Alexander-Suizran Bridge is the only thing the connects the rail lines of European Russia to those that lead to Turkestan, Siberia, and eventually to the Pacific coast. Is that not extraordinary?
