The Moscow Subway is not merely a series of trains and tunnels. Its stations are living museums, functional works of art that usher the busy Muscovites about their daily tasks. The system spans the entire city and has the capacity to host the entire population of Moscow (11 million) in the event of an attack. The Moscow Subway is made of marble and granite, each station displaying a different palace-like design. Visitors to Moscow are awed by the sophistication of something as simple as a transportation network.
Started in 1935, it has 182 stations and extends over 300 kms. It is the world’s second most heavily used network after Tokyo, averaging daily 6.6 million passengers.
The metro design’s emphasis on verticality was a reinforcement of Stalin's deification. He directed his architects to design structures which would encourage citizens to look up, admiring the station’s art (as if they were looking up to admire the sun and—by extension—him as a god. Another aspect of the apotheosis propaganda was the metro’s electrification; the Moscow Metro's chandeliers are one of the most beautiful and technologically-advanced aspects of the project.
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