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Introduction. At present, the understanding that the solution of economic problems facing Russia cannot be based on standard economic approaches and models. It is gradually becoming obvious that attention to the spatial and historical features of the development of the Russian economy has not only academic interest, but also quite obvious practical significance. This can be proved on historical, or more precisely, historical and economic material. In fact, the theory of logic, taken broadly, is based on this. The development of transport and versatile tool to reduce the adverse impacts of space on the eco-economy, physical space turns into economic. The lack of transport connectivity of territories devalues the space of the economy (economic space) to a physical or geographical space. The purpose of the article is to show the role of the city of Saint Petersburg in the economic space of the North-West (understood as Saint Petersburg, Saint Petersburg, Novgorod, Pskov provinces) and Russia as a whole, through the development of railway transport in a concrete historical way. Materials and Methods. The historical method is used as the main method. In Russia, the spatial analysis method is almost mandatory, and it is also applied in this article. This method has been widely used in economic history, particularly in the study of transport. At the same time, we recognize the existence of research methods and techniques that are not suitable for this work, for example, the practice of economic and demographic analysis, especially in the neo-Malthusian version. The authors involve in the analysis the works of Russian and foreign scientists on the topic of the article. Results. The article shows the role of the city of Saint Petersburg as an economic and transport center taken in historical dynamics. The role of an important but single transport center in the economic development of Russia is revealed. The thesis is proved that the optimal choice of reference points for economic development has a positive impact on the development of the economic space of the entire country. Discussion and Conclusion. The article proves that the spatial scale of Russia contributes to the fact that the financial results of economic activity can be localized at a significant distance from the place of economic activity.