page_title: Stanisław Kierbedź
section_title: Practical activities
hierarchical_section_title: Stanisław Kierbedź / Practical activities
caption_attribution_description: Polski: Warszawa, budowa mostu Kierbedzia, widok z Pragi
context_page_description: Stanisław Kierbedź was a Polish railway engineer. He designed and supervised the construction of dozens of bridges, railway lines, ports and other objects in Central and Eastern Europe. He served in the Imperial Russian Army with the rank of Lieutenant General.
context_section_description: Under his leadership, work on the St. Stanislaus's Catholic Church in St. Petersburg was performed. Kierbedź also worked at the time as an assistant to Professor Melnikov, who was Director of Railways.
  In 1842 he came up with the idea to build an iron bridge over the Neva River. The project was risky because of the construction conditions: a 12 meter deep river, with a strong current, ice floes in the winter, tidal waters, as well as the need to keep the river available for ships. Experts doubted at the time whether it is possible to build any bridge over the capricious river. The decision to entrust its construction to Kierbedź was taken by Tsar Nicholas I directly. Construction took 8 years and St. Petersburg gained a bridge 342 meters long, 20 meters wide, made of cast-iron with seven fixed spans and one drawbridge. It was named the Blagoveshchensky Bridge (later renamed Nikolaevsky Bridge after Tsar Nicolas's death). On the opening day of the bridge, on 6 (18) November 1850, Kierbedź was awarded a specially stamped medal and promoted General-Mayor (Major-General).
  In 1852 he became deputy chief of construction of the Saint Petersburg–Warsaw Railway and went abroad in order to familiarize himself with new technologies and ways of building iron bridges, to help build the new railway. He visited England, Germany, Austria and Belgium. He soon made use of this knowledge, building his first truss bridge with a span length of 55 meters over the Luga River from 1853-1857.
  Kierbedź was chief of construction in 1856-57 of the St. Petersburg-Peterhof Railway, which was opened for service on 15 (21) July 1857. He was awarded the Order of St. Stanislav, 1st Class, in 1855 and the order of the Red Eagle, 2nd Class, in December 1857.
  From 1858 Kierbedź was a member of the Head Council of Railways and Public Buildings Direction. On 17 (29) December 1858 he was made an honorary member of the Imperial St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences.
  In 1859 he started the construction of a permanent iron bridge (the first) over the Vistula River in Warsaw. Stanislaw Kierbedź was deputy head of technical matters on the Bridge Construction Board along with General-Adjutant Count Paul Demetrius Kotzebue. The bridge was completed in 1864 and officially given the name "Alexander Bridge" (after the reigning Tsar), but was commonly known as the Kierbedzia Bridge. Caissons were used to build the pillars for the bridge which was an unusual construction technique at the time. In recognition of his achievement, he was decorated with the Order of St. Vladimir, 2nd Class, on 18 (30) December 1864.
caption: The construction of the Kierbedź Bridge in Warsaw in 1862
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