Architectural Developments.—The city has a suburb, Vi borg, on the north of the Neva, but the main part lies on the left bank, and a bridge connects the two parts. The terminus of the railway to Finland lies on the north bank. The railway terminus for Moscow and Murmansk lies on the left bank, and the line crosses the river in a north-easterly direction. The Okhta bridge connects the left bank with the right bank Okhta suburb. The numerous islands Vasilyevskiy (Basil), Petrograd, the Apothecaries' island, Kamenniy, Krestovskiy and Elagin are all built over and are connected by stone, wooden, floating or boat bridges. Three main streets, with three great canals intersecting them, form the nucleus of the city, with numbers of smaller streets and canals parallel. The longest and most important street is the former Prospekt Nevskiy, now Prospekt of the 25th of October, which connects the centre of the city with the ter minus of the ancient highway to Moscow, now the site of the railway station for that town. The Admiralty buildings erected in 1703-4 became the centre of the city and the wide Prospekts or streets radiate outward from it in straight lines.
The Peter Paul fortress and the baroque Alexander Nevskiy cathedral were designed by Domenico Tresini. From 1741-61 bridges were built, swamps drained, streets paved and parks laid out, and the architect Rastrelli in the mid-eighteenth century designed a series of baroque buildings, including the Winter Pal ace and the Smolniy monastery. During the reign of Catherine II. there was much building activity and the transition style of Delamothe, Velton and Rinaldi and the classical style of Guar enghi, Starov and Bazhenov replaced the baroque, giving the city a strong, regular appearance reminiscent of ancient Palmyra. Embankments of the famous Finnish grey and pink granite were built along the Neva at that time.
The greatest architectural development was in the time of Alexander I. (1801-25), when "architectural landscapes" in which buildings supplemented one another as parts of a united whole were designed by Thomon, Zakharov, Voronikhin and Rossi. The Strelka on Basil island, the Castle (now Uritzky) place, Peter's (now Dekabrists') place and Theatre street (now Rossi street) are examples of this period.
Educational Institutions.—The educational institutions are of great importance. The Academy of Sciences (see ACADEMIES), opened in 1726, has been responsible for many surveys in Russia and its museums, Asiatic, anthropological, ethnographical, botanic, geological, mineralogical and zoological are justly famous, as are its publications. The recent researches of I. P. Pavlov, direc tor of the physiological laboratories of the Russian Academy of Sciences on "Conditioned Reflexes" are world famous, as is the soil survey of Glinka and Prasolov, carried out under the aus pices of the Dokuchaev Institute of Soils.
Among the numerous other museums are the Russian, with a particularly fine Buddhist section, the Hermitage, the Palace of Art, the Agricultural museum, the Court Stables museum, the Museum of People's Health and Children's Welfare, the Museum of Commercial Navigation, the Tolstoy museum, the Jewish museum, and the Museum of the Revolution. The work of the Geographical Society with branches in many parts of Russia, is widely known as is that of the Entomological Society.
Other educational institutions are the Leningrad State uni versity, the Communist university, the Communist University for National Minorities, the Polytechnical institute, the Estonian Pedagogical institute, the Institute of Modern Oriental Lan guages, the Academy of History of Material Culture, the Acad emy of Fine Arts, and medical, agricultural, forestry, mining and other places of technical instruction. The State Public library, founded in 1814, has a collection of three million books, including many priceless manuscripts. In 1917 it was enriched by books confiscated from private libraries, but in compliance with the Riga Peace Treaty of 1920, many valuable books were returned to Poland. Some rare manuscripts and books, including the Koran of the Caliph Osman, were returned to the Central Asiatic republics.
Many of the primary and secondary schools are well equipped and there is a Jewish High school. In 1926 a Faculty for North ern Nationalities was established, which has 200 students repre senting 31 nationalities, Samoyedes, Kamchadals, Golds, Tungus, Ostyaks, Lapps, Gilyaks, Chukchee, etc. A boarding house is run, the students taking turns for household tasks. Many hard ships have to be overcome by the students in their long journey over trackless marshy wastes to reach Leningrad, the journey sometimes occupying months. It is hoped that these students will return to their tribes and help to raise the standard of life there.
Several factories have classes for workers, and there are creches for the children of working mothers. There are homes for orphan children, the legacy of the 1914-20 period, but here, as elsewhere in Russia, homeless waifs still haunt the streets, partly because their terrible experiences have made them wild and determined to escape from control. The lessening of the prob lem of overcrowding, owing to the transference of the centre of government to Moscow in 1918 when the Germans advanced into the Baltic provinces, and the increased attention to child welfare have diminished the former high infant mortality rate. Tuberculosis and other lung diseases, partly engendered by the damp foundations of the city, still take a high toll of the popu lation.