The elevator of the Ryazan-Ural Railway was one of the first in Russia. Its opening took place on January 18, 1895. It served to receive and store large batches of grain from areas adjacent to Penza and had a capacity of 200 thousand poods. Nearby was the railway station "Post-Elevator" of the Ryazan-Ural Railway, which was used for operations with grain cargo. During the flooding of the River Penza, when the station "Penza-Ural" ("Penza-III") became inaccessible, all cargo operations were temporarily transferred to this station.

A model of the Penza elevator at a scale of 1:40 was presented at the 1900 World Exhibition in Paris.