1,206-CITY ATLASSOURCE-BACKED CITY REFERENCE
Russia
Compare this sourced profile of Penza, Russia before planning. Stable fields identify the place; confirm current transport, access and opening details with official sources.
01What the data says — and does not say
This page separates the checked GeoNames row for Penza—523,553, Europe/Moscow, and source coordinates—from live travel claims. Those fields identify and compare the record; they do not prove current transport, accessibility, census totals, or a City Atlas Club visit.
Wikidata's localized description: city in central Russia.
02This city's dataset fingerprint
The source row behind Penza is GeoNames ID 511565. Its recorded administrative path is Penza Oblast → Russia, and GeoNames classifies the place as a first-order administrative seat. Penza occurs once as a primary city label in this atlas sample; the numeric ID remains the durable source key if names change. The city row itself was updated 2026-04-14; that date belongs to the source record, not to every transport or visitor detail in the real destination.
Within the fixed 1,206-record atlas, Penza ranks 1,081 by recorded population. Inside the 39 selected Russia entries it ranks 34; inside the 125 entries in its broad region it ranks 103. Its 523,553 population value is 0.81 times the 648,213 median for the country cohort and 0.79 times the 664,046 regional median. Penza sits in the lower half of this atlas's selected Russia entries. Penza's recorded value stays within one quarter of the country-cohort median used here. These comparisons describe this selected dataset only; they are not current census rankings or official urban-area boundaries.
Penza's three nearest other atlas coordinates are Saratov at 195.688 km with 844,858 recorded people; Ulyanovsk at 255.106 km with 626,540 recorded people; Tolyatti at 290.021 km with 702,879 recorded people. The closest-to-farthest distance spread is 94.333 km. Compared with Saratov, Penza's recorded population is 0.62 times as large. Against Penza, Saratov follows Saratovskiy Rayon → Saratov Oblast → Russia in the source. Its point has lower latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the same selected Russia cohort, uses Europe/Saratov instead of Europe/Moscow, and carries the same first-order administrative seat class. Its recorded population is above Penza's. Against Penza, Ulyanovsk follows Ulyanovskiy Rayon → Ulyanovsk → Russia in the source. Its point has higher latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the same selected Russia cohort, uses Europe/Ulyanovsk instead of Europe/Moscow, and carries the same first-order administrative seat class. Its recorded population is above Penza's. Against Penza, Tolyatti follows Samara Oblast → Russia in the source. Its point has higher latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the same selected Russia cohort, uses Europe/Samara instead of Europe/Moscow, and carries populated place rather than first-order administrative seat. Its recorded population is above Penza's. Its nearest-neighbor distance ranks 983 of 1,206 from shortest to longest in the same snapshot. Penza's nearest-coordinate gap belongs to the wider half of atlas distances. This pattern can reveal whether other catalog references are geographically close, but it cannot establish whether a border crossing is possible or practical, or whether rail, road, fare, or journey-time connections exist. Read as one record signature, GeoNames 511565, the coordinate pair 53.1957 / 45.0108, country rank 34 of 39, and neighbor GeoNames 498677 at 195.688 km bind Penza to a reproducible comparison. That combined key distinguishes the row; it is not a recommendation or evidence of a physical connection.
Penza's reference point is 53.1957° north and 45.0108° east. The IANA identifier Europe/Moscow is shared by 15 city rows in this catalog, while the GeoNames class PPLA is shared by 429 rows. Penza's row carries a first-order administrative label but no second-order label. Penza's point falls in the higher-latitude coordinate band used by this atlas's row checks. Penza's time-zone field defines the narrower catalog cohort; its place class is shared more broadly. GeoNames supplies no elevation for Penza, so the profile preserves that missing value instead of guessing terrain. Together these fields form a reproducible identity check for this page, not a claim about walkability, climate or accessibility.
03Nearby atlas references
Penza's closest other entries in this atlas are Saratov (195.688 km), Ulyanovsk (255.106 km), Tolyatti (290.021 km).
04Verify before you book
Before visiting Penza, confirm changing decisions with current first-party sources:
Read how City Atlas Club verifies changing travel facts →05Sources and freshness
GeoNames updated the row 2026-04-14; the atlas checked the dataset 2026-08-04. Available Wikidata fields were verified in the same run.
GeoNames data: CC BY 4.0. Wikidata labels and descriptions: CC0 1.0.