The city district of Penza is the center of the region of the same name, located in the Volga Federal District. In terms of population, according to 2013 data, at 519, 9 thousand people, the city is 34 in Russia and 86 among all European countries.
Geographic location of Penza
The Penza region is located in the central part of the Russian Federation on the Volga Upland. The city was founded in 1663, and in 1939 Penza (not Perm, with the name of which the city is often confused) became the center of the region of the same name.
Penza is spread on both banks of the Sura River, which is also the main waterway of the city. The river gave its name to the most popular urban area - the so-called river Staraya Sura. The city is located in the southeast direction from the capital of Russia at a distance of 630 kilometers from Moscow.
Penza stretches 19 kilometers from north to south and 25 kilometers from west to east. The highest point of the capital of the Penza region is the famous Battle Mountain, located at an altitude of 280 meters above sea level.
In the south and southwest, the city, in the center of which is home to almost 520 thousand people, borders on the more densely populated Saratov region (the population of Saratov is about 839, 7 thousand people); in the north-west - with the Tambov region, where about 281, 8 thousand people live; in the north - with the Ryazan region (527, 9 thousand people in the central city); from the eastern and northeastern sides it borders on the Republic of Mordovia (the number of inhabitants of Saransk is 326, 8 thousand people) and with the Ulyanovsk region in the southeast.
The M5 federal highway also passes through the Penza region, connecting the capital of Russia with many regions of the Volga region and the Urals.
The time in Penza is the same as in Moscow, in the so-called Moscow Time Zone (MSK).
How to get to Penza from Moscow or St. Petersburg
The capital with the administrative center of the Penza region is connected by many railway routes leaving the Kazansky railway station in Moscow: direct trains No. 114, No. 256 and No. 094, as well as passing routes to Samara, Orsk and other Russian cities.
Almost daily flights of many Russian airlines also run between Moscow, the northern capital and the airport of Penza.
You can get from the Russian capital to Penza by covering the road distance of 640 kilometers, along two types of highways - the already mentioned M5, as well as the M6.
You can get from St. Petersburg to Penza by the passing train # 107. And the distance between the two cities, which must be covered in a car trip along the M10 highway, which turns into the M5 highway, is about 1350 kilometers.
