Kyiv Metro

The Kyiv Metro (Kyivskyi metropoliten, ˈkɪjiu̯sjkɪj ˌmɛtropol(j)iˈtɛn) is a rapid transit system in Kyiv owned by the Kyiv City Council and operated by the city-owned company Kyivsky Metropoliten. It was initially opened on November 6th, 1960, as a single line with five stations. It was the first rapid transit system in Ukraine and the third in the Soviet Union, after the Moscow and St. Petersburg metros. Today, the system consists of three lines and 52 stations, located throughout Kyiv's ten raion (districts), and operates of routes, with used for revenue service and for non-revenue service. At below ground level, Arsenalna station on the Sviatoshynsko-Brovarska Line is the second deepest metro station in the world after Hongyancun station in Chongqing. In 2016, annual ridership for the metro was 484.56 million passengers, or about 1.32 million passengers daily. The metro accounted for 46.7% of Kyiv's public transport load in 2014. The first idea for an underground railway appeared in 1884. The project, which was given for analysis to the city council by the director of the Southwestern railways, Dmytro Andrievskiy, planned to create tunnels from Kyiv-Pasazhyrskyi railway station. The tunnel was expected to start near Poshtova square and finish near Bessarabka. A new railway station was to be built there, while the old railway station was to be converted into a freight railway station. The project was long discussed but eventually turned down by the city council. Kyiv was a pioneering city for Imperial Russian rapid transit, opening the first Russian tram system. In September 1916, businessmen of the Russo-American trading corporation attempted to collect funds to sponsor the construction of a metro in Kyiv. As a reason to construct it, the trading corporation wrote: The development has been lately going at a fast pace, not only when talking about population growth, but as well while talking about the development of trade and industry businesses.