Novosibirsk

Novosibirsk (Russian Новосиби́рск, pop. 1,425,600), after Moscow and Saint Petersburg Russia's third largest city, is located in the southwest of Siberian Federal District. It was founded in 1893 as the future site of the Trans-Siberian railway bridge crossing the great Siberian river Ob. From 1893 until 1925, Novosibirsk was called Novonikolayevsk, after the Tsar Nicholas II of Russia.

It is the administrative center of Novosibirsk Oblast.

The city lies along the Ob River in the West Siberian Plain. The climate is sharply continental, with very severe, cold and snowy winters and hot and dry summers. Temperatures in summer range from 20 to 22°C, in winter -18 to -20°C, but can reach -35°C in winter and 35°C in summer . The difference between the highest and the lowest temperature is 88°C. Most of the time the weather is sunny. The spell of sunny weather is 2880 hours per year.

Industries include machine manufacturing and metallurgy. It is the home of one of Russia's best universities (situated in a nearby Akademgorodok, a number of institutes and a scientific research center. Novosibirsk boasts opera and ballet companies, several theaters, museums, and art galleries, and numerous sports facilities. Novosibirsk is the third city in Russia (after Moscow and Saint Petersburg) in which a metro system was established (The Novosibirsk Metro, opened in 1985).

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The Novosibirsk Agreement is the informal name for the promise made at a meeting in Novosibirsk by Tony Blair to Paddy Ashdown that he would share government with the Liberal Democrats and institute Proportional Representation in UK elections on coming to power. The promise was not kept.