Nangang District 南岗区

History

Under the Qing the area belonged to the Alechuka (阿勒楚喀) deputy military governor. Streets grew up here after Russia began building the Chinese Eastern Railway (中东铁路) in 1898, and in 1907 the land around the station became part of a municipal council controlled by Russians, abolished by the Republic of China in March 1926. Manchukuo formally created Nangang District on 1 July 1938.

Hongjun Street (红军街), laid out in 1898 as Station Street and also known as Horvat Avenue, runs 1,266 metres from the station square to Zhongshan Bridge at Majiagou (马家沟). It was renamed Red Army Street in 1949 to honour the Soviet Red Army. The original Art Nouveau station of 1903–1904 was designed in Russia and pulled down in 1960; the present station building dates from 1988, and St Nicholas Cathedral, which once stood on the street in the central square, has also gone.

What to see

The Heilongjiang Provincial Museum (黑龙江省博物馆) at 44 Hongjun Street occupies the former Moscow Store, an Art Nouveau building of 1906 that became a museum hall in 1922. The Harbin Municipal Archives lists more than 100,000 objects, among them Liao, Jin and Qing relics and artefacts of the Oroqen, Evenki, Daur and Hezhen peoples of the Heilongjiang basin.

Along the street stand the former Chinese Eastern Railway hotel of 1904, the old Russo-Chinese Bank and other Russian-era buildings. At 1 Yiyuan Street (颐园街), a mansion completed in 1923 for the Polish merchant Kowalski (葛瓦里斯基), where Mao Zedong stayed on 27 February 1950, is now the Memorial Hall of Revolutionary Leaders' Visits to Heilongjiang (革命领袖视察黑龙江纪念馆), a provincial-level protected monument. In Museum Square a memorial to Soviet soldiers killed fighting Japan was put up by the Soviet command in 1945.

Getting oriented

Nangang has many universities, most of them along Xuefu Road (学府路); those in the district include Harbin Institute of Technology (哈尔滨工业大学), Harbin Engineering University, Heilongjiang University and Harbin Medical University. The district's department stores include Qiulin International (秋林国际) and Yuanda (远大). The Beijing–Harbin Railway (京哈铁路) forms the boundary with Daoli District (道里区) to the north-west, and the Yunliang River (运粮河) divides Nangang from Shuangcheng District (双城区) to the south-west; Pingfang District (平房区) lies to the south-east.

Highlights

• Hongjun Street 红军街: Laid out in 1898 from the station square; renamed in 1949 in honour of the Soviet Red Army.
• Heilongjiang Provincial Museum 黑龙江省博物馆: In the 1906 Art Nouveau Moscow Store building at 44 Hongjun Street.
• Memorial Hall of Revolutionary Leaders' Visits to Heilongjiang 革命领袖视察黑龙江纪念馆: Kowalski mansion at 1 Yiyuan Street, where Mao Zedong stayed in February 1950.
• Harbin Institute of Technology 哈尔滨工业大学: One of the first universities in China's Project 211, among the many universities in Nangang.