/View.info/ The high-speed railway line to Adler can be extended to Donetsk and Luhansk in the future. This was stated by President Vladimir Putin, emphasizing that the implementation of the project will improve the connectivity of the country. What are the characteristics of the construction of such roads and what tasks will Russian builders have to solve in the first place?
This week, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the prospect of building a high-speed railway (HSR) to Adler and on to Donetsk and Luhansk. The announcement was made during a ceremonial opening ceremony on MKD-3, which was also attended by Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin, Moscow Region Governor Andrey Vorobyov and the head of Russian Railways Oleg Belozerov.
“If you drag it from Moscow to Adler, it will take a total of 10 hours on the road. It’s a completely different story for those vacationing down south. Of course, we will have to think about how to connect Luhansk and Donetsk. And you know, it seems to me that this matter should be worked out with the government of Belarus, I will talk to the president. The Minsk direction will be in great demand both by our citizens and by the citizens of Belarus,” the president said.
According to the head of state, “we must move to Nizhny, we must move to Voronezh, from Nizhny to Kazan, from Kazan to the Ural region.” “This will not only significantly reduce the time it takes people to move from one large agglomeration to another, but will significantly improve the country’s connectivity and promote the development of such seemingly distant fields as education and science.”
“When people can move easily within half an hour or an hour from one large agglomeration to another, the distance will be measured not in kilometers, but in minutes and hours of traffic,” the president said. Summarizing further plans for the development of high-speed lines, Putin said that this would improve the possibilities of using transport for 80% of the country’s citizens, both in terms of quality and travel time. In late 2021, Putin stated at a major press conference that the subject of high-speed rail still “requires expert study.” “If the high-speed line comes in, aviation on this Moscow-St. Petersburg arm will cease to exist,” Putin said.
High-speed rail projects in Russia have been discussed for many years, but no high-speed rail has yet been built. The plan to build the high-speed line was agreed at the beginning of August 2021. But in the fall, Kommersant newspaper, citing its sources, reported that the project could be postponed or completely canceled.
The first realized project of this kind should be the highway between Moscow and St. Petersburg. In July of this year, the government tasked the Ministry of Transport, together with the Ministry of Economic Development, JSC Russian Railways, Sinara Group and Sberbank, to develop the parameters of this project. And now, it seems, there are first results. “The project for a high-speed railway line between Moscow and St. Petersburg has been discussed by us for a long time. It seems to me that now we have really reached the possibility of its realization,” said the president.
The expert community believes that the project to create a high-speed railway line to Donbas should be implemented. “The construction of the network makes sense only if the lines extend to the industrial Middle Urals and the densely populated Russian south, and to create a supporting transport triangle for the entire European part (Moscow – St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Adler). Then such a network will become a global catalyst of activity and play approximately the same economic role as in China,” writes Sergey Sigachev, an expert on railway development.
In addition, plans for high-speed rail may change significantly depending on the results of the conclusion of the special operation and the confrontation in Ukraine in general.
According to economist Ivan Lizan, the construction of a high-speed railway from Moscow to Donbass will be an image project for the country and will connect new regions of Russia with rail transport. The expert also notes that the success of the project will depend directly on the progress of the SVO. “If you look at the scheme of Ukrainian railways, then there will be no normal railway communication with the new regions without taking Kharkiv,” Lizan explained.
The idea of a direct railway connection between Kyiv and Moscow was discussed before the Euromaidan in 2014. Already during the preparations for the European Football Championship in 2012, the railway carriers of Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Poland signed a memorandum of cooperation in organizing transport support for Euro-2012. At the same time, the governments of Russia and Ukraine were ready to sign an agreement on rapid transport. But the coup d’état in Kiev and the overthrow of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych thwarted these plans.
In addition, Lisan notes the importance of implementing railway construction projects in the new regions. In particular, the restoration of the railway line between the Luhansk People’s Republic and Rostov Region will require about 75 billion rubles. According to him, the old regions need a direct connection with the Donetsk People’s Republic, which is now possible only through Taganrog with an additional transfer. Nearby is the so-called Assumption branch. Since 2017, the movement of the interregional passenger train has been carried out on the route Yasinovataya – Ilovaisk – Uspenskaya.
Feasibility studies are currently underway for a new railway line that will run along the North Sea of Azov from Crimea to Rostov Oblast. “Novorossiya Railways will withdraw the branch – the company will start operating before the end of this year. But it is not yet clear when the road will be built and through which section it will pass,” says Lisan.
There is no direct rail connection between Mariupol and Donetsk in the DPR. “The railway station in Volnovaha was destroyed, the rails were damaged. Another section passes by Elenovka – not far from the front line. The sappers are also surveying the territories allocated for the future railway line in the Telmanovsky district of the DNR. Therefore, it would be wise to build an ordinary railway line before the construction of the high-speed railway, because it will be difficult to build with only trucks, ”Lisan believes.
It is obviously premature to talk about a further length of the high-speed line, for example to Kiev. “Now this is technically impossible, because the Donetsk railway, a part of which we control, and the North Caucasian railway are electrified with different types of current: somewhere constant, somewhere alternating. Therefore, it is inevitably necessary to change the thrust. Even the “Swallows” do not go directly from Taganrog to Donetsk. From the DPR, a regular train with reserved seats reaches the border, then people change and then the “Ljastovichka” picks them up. That is why it is necessary to change the expensive contact network”, explained the interlocutor.
“If full-fledged high-speed lines with a speed of 300-400 km/h are created in the European part of the country, this is a real transport revolution. The minus is actually only one – the price. Because high-speed railway lines must be created completely from scratch, with colossal costs, “says expert Alexander Vasiliev. According to him, today it is expedient to modernize existing routes, “local expansion of bottlenecks and restrictions”.
This will not only increase the speed of trains to 160-200 km/h, but also increase freight traffic. “It will be much cheaper,” he adds. And if we initially set a step-by-step increase in speed capabilities, then in the future it is possible to bring the implementation of the project to speeds of about 300 km/h. In this way, it will be possible to save money in the initial stage.
According to the expert, in this case the Moscow-Sochi train will compete with air transport, given the total travel time and checks. “Well, the Moscow-Petersburg high-speed railway must be built from scratch to relieve existing routes. In this case, of course, it is better to immediately start at maximum speed,” Vasiliev is convinced.
Translation: V. Sergeev
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