Narrow Gauge Railway of Tesovsk Transport Administration

Tesovskaya Railways

Legend Fuel and lubricants warehouse Soviet street 49K-10 Dead end at the memorial Boiler room No. 1   to Pavlovsk Central Village   to Veliky Novgorod Boiler room No. 2 Peat briquette shop Depot Fuel and lubricants warehouse   on the Roguevka Wagon sludge park Wide gauge park Overload Sorting park Chyosovo-1 (Post No. 4) Post number 1 Soviet street 49K-10 st. 2nd line The museum Podgorny Park (Post No. 3) Boiler room No. 3 Kleptsi (Post No. 6) Rzd. Sneaky Post number 5 Post number 12 Post number 9 Rzd. Pyatilips Post number 11 Partisan Ilyushkin Island R. The trumpet Post number 10 Post number 7 Rzd. №10 Post number 13 Thoughtlessness Post number 16 R. Meadows Zabolotye (Post No. 17) Chyosovo-2 R. Meadows Rzd. Lubunits Rzd. Number 13 Rzd. Veleschi Novgorod region Leningrad region Ear cocks R. Popovka R. Birch Berezne (Post number 15) Rzd. Number 5 Rzd. Number 3 Tukhovezhskaya ditch 7th section Rzd. Walnut Baby diaper Podkhinovye Hinovino Post number 21 Rzd. Number 14 Tesovo-4 Depot Boiler room

In the 30s of the XX century in the north of the Novgorod region in the Priilmensky lowland in the marshy area that bore the name of Tesov, peat extraction began. In 1933, in the village. A narrow gauge railway was built for these purposes in Tyosovo-Netylsky for the purpose of which, by the beginning of the 1940s, it was about 20 kilometers, it was planned to deliver the extracted peat to GRES-8 in Nevdubstroy and CHPP-5 in Leningrad , but the Great Patriotic War began . During the war, a defense line passed here and most of the peat mining was occupied by the Wehrmacht armed forces ^{[1] [2]} .

After the war, the narrow gauge railway was restored as soon as possible to supply Leningrad with peat, as the peat minings near Siniavino near the city were severely destroyed during the fighting ^[1] .

As the number of peat extracted and the opening of new peat enterprises increased , the Tesovsk Transport Administration (TTU) was established in 1951 , which was engaged in the transshipment and transportation of peat along a narrow gauge railway. In the mid-1950s, construction began on the working villages of Tesovo-2 and Tesovo-4, in which typical depots were also built. At Tyosovo-1 station (also known as Tyosovo-Netylsky) a flyover was built for peat overloading, and a locomotive wagon depot . On the road, traffic lights were introduced, communication on locomotives. Passenger traffic to the village of Tesovo-2 was organized along a narrow gauge railway , steam locomotives formed the basis of the locomotive fleet. The project to create a peat enterprise Tesovo-3 east of Tesovo-Netylsky was not implemented ^{[1] [2]} .

By 1970, a full reconstruction of the narrow gauge railway was carried out - reinforced concrete sleepers were put in the way, electric drives were installed on the arrows. New track and peat mining machines were introduced on the road, a new rolling stock was developed at the local design bureau, diesel locomotives TU4 and TU7 appeared on a narrow gauge railway. Peat removal reached enormous proportions, peat enterprises worked around the clock, more than a dozen trains with peat of 30 or more wagons each were taken out of the fields, about 12 broad gauge trains left the Rogavka station . Throughout the TTU system, there were a total of more than 30 diesel locomotives and diesel locomotives ^{[1] [2]} .

Current status

After Perestroika, the Tesovskoye Technical University, like many enterprises in the country, was liquidated, and all property was transferred to several new peat enterprises . The year 1994 was a turning point for the life of the narrow gauge railway - the main consumers abandoned peat , its production fell to almost zero, it was exported only for the needs of village boiler houses. The rolling stock began to be sold or cut for scrap; an almost 200-kilometer narrow gauge system was also turned into scrap. The route to Tesovo-4 was dismantled, and in 1995 the movement to Tesovo-2 stopped. In 2002, the path itself was dismantled. After several years of isolated work, the peat enterprises Tesovo-2 and Tesovo-4 were liquidated ^[1] .

Now only the Tyosovo-1 peat enterprise operates. Nowadays, interest in peat has again begun to arise both as a fuel and for agriculture - and this is a chance for the preservation and development of the Tesovskaya narrow gauge railway ^[1] .

As of July 2017, the length of the main line of the narrow gauge road is about 16 km, while about 3 km in the area of ​​peat fields are abandoned and passable only at the “pioneers”, access roads, station tracks and dead ends - about 9 km. Peat is transported regularly during the heating season. From the surviving equipment: two TU6 A (one is under long-term repair), TU6P , two self-propelled power plants ESU2A, including one converted into a brush cleaner, track-laying train (only the first and last cars are operated, the rest are laid off and are located at the station).

Locomotives

• TU6P - No. 0050
• TU6A - No. 3723, is undergoing a long repair
• Locomotive TU6A- 2446 - repaired by the Museum, brought from the Ershov peat enterprise, was previously assigned to the depot "Tesovo-2".
• ESU2A - No. 179, 709 (equipped with a snow plow).

Wagons

• Tank wagons of various models, including four working VTs-20, two VTs-20 without wheelsets and three VTs-10, two of which are part of a fire train . ^[3]
• Platform wagons
• Gondola cars for peat form the basis of the URZD fleet; there are about 20 cars in working condition.
• Passenger cars PV40
• Transporter car for transportation of large-sized peat-mining equipment.

Track cars

• Snow plow
• Tracker PPR2MA

On August 20, 2014, a group of enthusiasts on the basis of TTU created the museum of the Tyosovskaya URD. The main mission of the museum is to preserve the memory of the narrow-gauge railways of the country, which were largely the basis for the recovery of the economy in Soviet times ^{[4] [5]} . The museum group owns a newly constructed section of the track with a length of about 200 meters ^{[6] [7]} .

Museum Activities

• Search, buyback and further restoration of narrow gauge equipment throughout the Russian Federation.
• Conducting excursions with an examination of the exposition and trips along the UR
• Since 2013 ^[8] - the holding of the festival of military-historical reconstruction "Forgotten Feat - Second Shock Army" ^{[9] [10]} , combined with an exhibition of narrow-gauge equipment, on the territory of the URZD. The event is held with the participation of military-historical clubs from all over the CIS ^{[11] [12]} .

Museum Collection

Locomotives

• Diesel locomotive with electric transmission TU2 -155 - presented by Oleg Sergeevich Valinsky, Vice President of Russian Railways. Previously operated on the Gorky Railway ^[13] .
• Diesel locomotive with hydraulic transmission TU4 -1030 - requires major repairs ^[14] .
• Diesel locomotive with hydraulic transmission TU4-2630
• TU6D, purchased in the winter of 2017 in a state of scrap metal, is in the process of recovery

Tractors and car

• Passenger car PD1 - delivered from a disassembled URZD in Repolka, recovered from scrap metal. ^[15]
• Motor -tires ТД-5у - 3 motor, 5 trailed, one of which is converted into a model of armored rubber for military-historical reconstructions . ^[sixteen]
• The TU6P diesel locomotive , restored from a completely inoperative state, was first involved in the reconstruction “Forgotten feat - Second Shock Army” after major repairs.
• Motorway AM1 -169 - delivered in August 2017 from the Anikinsk narrow-gauge railway.

Wagons

• Passenger cars PV40 ^[17] - 5 units, of which 4 cars were donated to the museum by the General Director of JSC Russian Railways O.V. Belozerov . The cars were built in 1989 at the Demikhovsky Engineering Plant and delivered to the children's railway in Rostov-on-Don . Until 2014, they were operated as part of the Ataman Platov branded train. Transferred to the museum on May 17, 2018. ^[18]
• Hopper batcher of model 42-074 .
• Dining car BC1-1756 based on PV40 ^[19] .
• Glacier car .
• Boxcar
• Tank wagons VTs-20 (restored and painted in the original color) and home-made on the basis of the platform of the Ust-Katavsky plant 1940 onwards
• Passenger carriage of the VEB Waggonbau Ammendorf factory. ^[20]
• The passenger cars of the Görlitz plant, taken out of the forest in a "shed" condition, are awaiting restoration.

Special rolling stock

• Non-self-propelled crane unit LT-110 No. 012 - purchased at the Ural Railway of the Nyubsky timber industry enterprise in February 2018.
• Tracker PPR2MA

The museum and the peat enterprise actively cooperate: peat enterprise equipment is exhibited at events held by the museum, museum workers and volunteers make ongoing minor repairs of rolling stock and railway facilities of the URZD.