The rails will endure everything

It will soon be impossible to get to the ports of Vyborg, Vysotsk and Primorsk

The construction of a new freight railway line across the Karelian Isthmus, which will relieve congestion on the St. Petersburg-Helsinki mainline, which is literally smoking from an oversupply of trains, is being postponed again. JSC Russian Railways, it seems, has not yet been able to find a common language with investors who are interested in increasing cargo flow to the ports of Vyborg, Vysotsk and Primorsk. At the same time, the terminals of this port area are growing by leaps and bounds, and every year they begin to design more and more transshipment complexes. And no one knows the timing of modernization of the railway, on which the future of the ports depends, the region’s vice-governor Grigory Dvas admitted yesterday.

In the Vyborg-Vysotsk area, all cargo is now delivered along the only double-track line St. Petersburg-Zelenogorsk-Vyborg-Helsinki, which carries heavy traffic of electric trains, as well as trains connecting the Russian and Finnish capitals. A few years ago, Russian Railways came up with a plan to reduce the travel time of passenger express trains between St. Petersburg and Helsinki by several hours, and transfer all cargo to an alternative line. The main ones are oil products, which LUKOIL transports to the Vysotsk terminal, and coal, transshipped at another terminal of the same port by ROSA-Holding. If just a few years ago this direction was not characterized by intense cargo traffic - several million tons of cargo were delivered to the ports of Vyborg and Vysotsk per year, now the situation has changed dramatically.

LUKOIL will deliver up to 11 million tons of petroleum products to Vysotsk in 2006, ROSA-Holding wants to export up to 5 million tons of coal. And this is far from the limit: LUKOIL wants to expand the capacity of Vysotsk to 15 million tons. Transneft has plans to ship petroleum products from Primorsk, where a specialized overpass is already being built. And Rosmorport, as Grigory Dvas announced yesterday, is starting a large-scale reconstruction of the port area, which will increase the length of the berth walls by 60% and triple the area for new terminals for transshipment of general cargo. Vessels with a deadweight of up to 70 thousand tons will be able to enter the part of the port of Vysotsk where bulk cargo is processed. As a result, the port will be able to handle at least several million more tons of metals and coal.

But the existing line can barely cope with the existing freight traffic, so Russian Railways wants to build a backup highway in the northeastern part of the Karelian Isthmus, which will increase freight traffic to 40 million tons per year. But the cost of the line is high even for a transport monopoly - it is estimated at 43 billion rubles, not to mention the fact that about 24 billion more are required to modernize the existing line and transfer it to high-speed passenger traffic. That is why Russian Railways would like to receive this money from those who make money by exporting their cargo through the Baltic ports. This is exactly what the regional vice-governor Grigory Dvas admitted yesterday. He complained that although everyone knows what needs to be done, no one is in a hurry to build a new highway. And it is unknown when its construction will begin.

“The project has been completed, there is an understanding of the technical aspects and volumes of financing,” Mr. Dvas said yesterday. According to him, there are “certain agreements between LUKOIL and Russian Railways on financing the project.” However, as follows from his words, the two giants taken together do not have the required amount to lay 64 km of railway track. Therefore, railway workers, apparently, continue to ask coal miners and other exporters to chip in for the line. For example, the Baltic Initiative - Vyborg company, owned by local entrepreneurs, wants to start building a methanol transshipment terminal in Primorsk - why not get some of the money from it? “The search for interested partners continues, the negotiation process is underway,” Dvas said. A source at LUKOIL claims that the new road will sooner or later be built, but when and at whose expense is still completely unclear, since the oil concern’s plans probably do not yet include large-scale investments in this project. In June, LUKOIL already signed an agreement with Russian Railways to invest 141.5 million rubles. to modernize the approach roads to Vysotsk and, it seems, is going to stop there for now.

Dmitry ANDREEV, St. Petersburg