Why is the planetarium in Penza the only one in the world?
In Belinsky Park, behind the Lenin monument, there is low building With two faceted turrets, it is the only wooden planetarium in Russia and the world.
In May 1927, the Presidium of the Penza Provincial Executive Committee decided to build a city observatory, and its grand opening took place in June of the following year. It was constructed of wood, as this building material was the cheapest, most readily available, and easiest to work with—important given the tight construction schedule. The observatory was named after Ilya Ulyanov (Lenin's father) for his contribution to the development of meteorology in Penza. Initially, the observatory served the needs of agriculture: it housed a meteorological bureau, a laboratory melioration and other services. During the war years, the observatory housed the hydrometeorological service.
In 1954, the building underwent major renovations and a planetarium was installed—a device that projects images of celestial bodies onto a domed screen, allowing for the simulation of their movements. Later, a "Small Zeiss" camera was purchased from the GDR, allowing for observation of the starry sky at any time of day, regardless of weather or season. A Great Hall with a new dome was built to accommodate the equipment, allowing for a hundred people instead of the original fifty. In the late 1980s, the planetarium was designated a cultural monument of regional significance. It has become one of the symbols of Penza and significant object in the life of every resident: here they accepted people into the Pioneers, arranged dates.
Planetarium was popular: one could see stone and iron meteorites, an astrolabe, a Foucault pendulum, models of celestial bodies, displays on the evolution of the Earth, and the Salyut and Mir orbital stations. By the early 2010s, the total number of visitors had exceeded half a million. But by that time, the wooden building had fallen into disrepair, and since the early 2000s, it had been supported by props and ties. It closed in 2011.
In 2016, schoolboy Ivan Udalov told the president during a direct line about the closed planetarium, which was continuing to fall apart. Penza authorities were forced to take action and promised to restore the building. The project was developed, reviewed, and approved, but it wasn't needed. In 2021, the planetarium was simply bulldozed. caused outrage local residents, local historians, and preservationists from all over Russia. They argued that reconstruction could have been carried out by dismantling the building by hand, replacing the rotted parts, and reassembling it. The authorities, however, statedthat the logs were 80% worn out and it was impossible to save them.
The newly rebuilt planetarium have opened September 2, 2023. Its highlight was the "Star Hall" with a high-tech optical-mechanical projector, which accurately projects a picture of the starry sky on a 300-square-meter dome. Its appearance remained the same, the walls are made of wood. The Penza Planetarium once again became the only wooden planetarium in the world.
