станція 4 – Одесса
Station 4 – Odessa

The most important city in the southern Ukraine, a major tourism center, seaport and transport hub. The city is also the administrative center of the Odessa Raion and Odessa Oblast, as well a multiethnic cultural center. There used to be an ancient Greek settlement there and later some Tatar activity, but the real history of the city starts in the Tsarist era. It was founded in 1794 by the a decree of the Russian empress Catherine the Great, as a new harbour in the newly conquered coastline. During the 19th century, Odessa was the fourth largest city of Imperial Russia, after Moscow, Saint Petersburg and Warsaw. As a part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, the city preserved and somewhat reinforced its unique cosmopolitan mix of Russian/Ukrainian/Jewish culture. The city saw violence in the 2014 pro-Russian conflict in Ukraine during the 2014 Odessa clashes. The 2 May 2014 Odessa clashes between pro-Ukrainian and pro-Russian protestors killed 42 people – the nationality that is mostly declared there is Ukrainian (68% vs. 25% Russian), but the most popular language in the city is indeed Russian (78% vs. 6% Ukrainian and 15% the combination of both). The city even has its own, quite distinctive dialect of Russian.

City historical architecture has a style more Mediterranean than Russian, having been heavily influenced by French and Italian styles. The city might not look like it, but it has over 1 mln citizens and it really is a major maritime-transport hub. The Port of Odessa also became a provisional headquarters for the Ukrainian Navy, following the Russian occupation of Crimea in 2014. Before the fall of the Soviet Union, the Port of Odessa harbored the major Soviet cruise line Black Sea Shipping Company. Passenger ships and ferries connect Odessa with Istanbul, Haifa and Varna.

The city's public transit system is made up of trams, trolleybuses, buses and, of course, marshrutkas. There is also a funicular next to the Potemkin Stairs (that connects the city and the port), if you are lazy and don't want to climb them.

Arrival: 053 П, 19:10 Dnipro-Holovny, 06:36 Odesa-Holovna

Departure: 012 Ш, Odesa-Holovna 21:36 – Lviv 08:04