The appearance of Saint Petersburg includes long, straight boulevards, vast spaces, gardens and parks, decorative wrought-iron fences, monuments and decorative sculptures. The Neva River itself, together with its many canals and their granite embankments and bridges help to give the city its particular ambience.
Saint Petersburg's position below the Arctic Circle, on the same latitude as nearby Helsinki, Stockholm, Aberdeen and Oslo (60° N), causes twilight to last all night in May, June and July. This phenomenon is known as the "white nights". The white nights are closely linked to another attraction — the eight drawbridges spanning the Neva. The bridges are drawn from May to late October according to a special schedule, between approximately 2 a.m. and 4:30 a.m. to allow shipping to pass up and down the river. Every night during the navigation period from April to November, 22 bridges across Neva and main canals are drawn to let ships pass in and out of the Baltic Sea.[1]
The historical center of Saint Petersburg was the first Russian patrimony inscribed on the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites.
- ^ Schedule for main drawbridges across the Neva river (Official Russian schedule): [1] Archived 2007-06-29 at archive.today