Our history

History of Saint Petersburg port is inseparably connected with the history of the city. In 1703 our Tsar, Peter the Great, gave orders to construct the first port facilities on the Zayachiy Island. Up to 1733 the port’s berths were located in the center of the city not far from Troitskaya square. Later the facilities were moved to the spit of the Vasilievskii Island. In XVIII-XIX centuries the Neva Harbour was the center of business activities. Russian merchants and foreign suppliers who delivered goods to Saint Petersburg were settling their bargains here.

The next pivot point in the history of the port was the opening of Seaway Channel in 1885, which allowed the vessels with bigger draft to call the port. Start of navigation on the Channel resulted in the onset of operations of Saint Petersburg Sea Port at the Gutuevskii Island.

Together with the city, the port lived through the toughest hardships of the Great Patriotic War. Located 3-4 km away from the front line, the port received military cargoes and people evacuated from the Baltic countries. Over 70% of the port infrastructure was destroyed because of continuous hostile bombardments.

After the war the works on modernization and reconstruction of port infrastructure started along with handling operations. New berths were constructed, specialized handling facilities and warehouses were built, equipment was renewed, railway tracks were laid etc.

Step by step, the Port was not only being restored, but it was developing. Thus, due to its capabilities to handle wide range of cargoes with various characteristics of cargo units the port gained its title as a multipurpose.

Establishing of JSC “Sea Port of Saint Petersburg”

On December 8, 1992 open joint-stock company “Sea Port of Saint Petersburg” (SPSPb) was founded on the basis of Leningrad Sea Commercial Port. As a result of the privatization the port became a private company.

The management of OJSC “Sea Port of Saint Petersburg” faced many challenges: with transition to the market economy the Ministry of Sea Fleet and the government stopped paying attention to the issues related to the technical equipment of the port – and. The company had to renew the equipment on its own and provide the port with the high-end machinery. Since state planning became a thing of the past, the port had to seek its own cargo flows for handling. Therefore, the port’s turnover structure changed and new cargoes emerged.

In the 90-ies the competitive struggle for export and import cargo traffic became especially acute. It was when the improvement of the operational process flows and replenishment of the fleet of the port machinery became the top-priority task.

In execution of the Federal Law No. 99-FZ dd. 05.05.2014 “On amendments of the chapter 4 of the part 1 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation and on declaring certain provisions of the Russian Federation laws as null and void” the official name of the company was changed to Joint Stock Company “Sea Port of Saint Petersburg” (formerly Open Joint Stock Company “Sea Port of St.Petersburg”).

In 2019 Sea Port of Saint Petersburg joined Port One — a Group of leading Russian stevedoring and freight forwarding companies.