Ulyanovsk (formerly Simbirsk) is a city located in the European part of the Russian Federation, having the status of an urban district and located on the Volga Upland, on the banks of the Kuibyshev reservoir, the Volga and Sviyaga rivers, closer to the confluence of the channels. The date of foundation of the settlement is 1648, today about 620 thousand people live in it.
Geographical and climatic features
The territory of the city is located on a hilly plain. Height above sea level - from 80 to 160 meters. In the right-hand part of the village, ups and downs are more common. The climate here is temperate continental, but slightly drier than in the center of the country. The average annual temperature is +5 degrees. The Ulyanovsk river port is located within the city. The average duration of navigation on the Volga is 195-200 days. The port is a link between other modes of transport: road and rail.
Appearance story
Even in pre-revolutionary Russia, the city was of strategic importance, being the center of the grain trade. All loading and unloading operations in the port at that time were carried out manually due to the high degree of steepness of the coast.
After the construction of the Volzhskaya Hydroelectric Power Station, which led to the deepening and expansion of the Volga riverbed, was completed, a construction site was erected on the territory of the port for the construction of a modern acceptance and departure river point. From 1952 to 1961, a dam and a dam 12 meters high were erected.
Already in the 60s of the last century the flowering of the river port of Ulyanovsk began, and they began to call it the port of five seas. The heyday of the enterprise came in the 80s, the volume of loading and unloading was constantly increasing (the calculation went to millions of tons). Like most enterprises, in the 90s, the port began to decline. The ships were written off, passengers were transported from time to time, but the enterprise continued to work.
In the early 2000s, the Ulyanovsk river port began to slowly come to life. Even resumed boat trips. In 2009, the motor ship OM-401 was repaired, put into operation, and plowed water open spaces under a new name - “Hero Yuri Em”. There are also walks on the ship "Moskovsky-20".
Tourist and walking routes
The port offers residents and guests of the city pleasure trips along the Kuibyshev reservoir. In 1.5 hours you can see two of the city’s legendary bridges - the Imperial (automobile and railway, built in 1916) and the Presidential (built in 2009)
For those who wish to relax in the "green parking" and the recreation center "Green Yar", a regular tourist flight is carried out, the journey time is 45 minutes.
Motor ships correspond to modern concepts of comfort; the cabin has an air conditioning and heat ventilation system.
On both ships there is the opportunity to hold festive events and receptions, including weddings. “Hero Yuri Em” can accommodate 108 people on board, and “Moskovsky-20” - 150 people.
Rechport Ulyanovsk, JSC offers ship freight for individual transportation both within the Kuibyshev reservoir and for longer flights. Tourist routes are handled by the Simbirsk Harbor company, which operates in the port.
Shipping company
The river port of Ulyanovsk is cargo and passenger berths. The territory has crane tracks and 11 gantry cranes (one of them with a lifting capacity of 100 tons). The company owns a warehouse area of 4500 square meters. m., of these areas 3 closed storage.
The port, like most enterprises in the country, was privatized in the 2000s. It cannot be said that the economic recovery at the enterprise immediately began, but there are still some improvements.
Compared with the 2000s, today the volume of freight and passenger traffic has still increased, from 8 thousand to 15 910 thousand tons. And passengers are transported already 2 times more, in the “zero” it was only 15 thousand, and now 30 thousand for the navigation season.
In 2000, the company had 5 towing units, in 2016 - already 10. The barges also became 2 times larger, previously there were only 7 working platforms, now 15.
Do not forget that most ports receive subsidies from the local budget, for example, 60 million rubles were allocated in Tatarstan, and 20 million in Samara. The Ulyanovsk River Port has not received a dime from the local or federal budget.
Contemporary issues
Not so long ago, the leadership of the port was stunned by the statement of the Governor of the Ulyanovsk Region Sergey Morozov. The official said that it is necessary to return the Ulyanovsk River Port to municipal ownership. In Ulyanovsk, everyone is indignant, including local residents, because this is a big risk that hundreds of employees will lose their jobs.
The port authorities are rightly outraged, because the local authorities do not help with absolutely nothing. The port independently supports the infrastructure, trains personnel in other cities. According to the administration, on the last request for resolving the issue of access roads, local authorities proposed to repair them at their own expense. The lack of access roads makes it impossible to cooperate with shippers, as a result, you can get from the port only to the "killed" road along Nagornaya street. And these are not the only problems that, I want to believe, the port will cope with.