Oktyabrskaya Railway (OZD) plans to invest RUR 23.5 bln into the arrangement of a high-speed service between St. Petersburg and Helsinki by 2009, the company informs. In 2008, OZD plans to invest RUR 9 bln, in 2009 – RUR 14.5 bln. The project is based on the agreement reached by the Presidents of Russia and Finland in 2001 and is supported by the government. The project’s specific feature is in its double target:
- to arrange high-speed service between St. Petersburg and Helsinki (3 hours and a half).
- to deliver cargo to the seaport of Vysotsk (transshipment complex of LUKOIL) and to a promising seaport of Primorsk handling oil cargo delivered by pipeline.
As of today, the volume of cargo delivered there by railway makes some 16 million tonnes though it may be raised to 40 – 44 million tonnes in the nearest future. The first target is to be achieved through reconstruction of a 160-kilometer sector of Petersburg – Vyborg – Buslovskaya run. The works started there in 2007. RUR 4.0 bln were spent from that time.
High-speed line is to be serviced by Pendolino trains to be manufactured by French company Alstom. Joint Russian-Finnish company Oy Karelian Trains Ltd was set up to arrange the service.
Implementation of the second task (delivery of cargo to port facilities of the Northern side of the Gulf of Finland and arrangement of export-import transportation via border stations Buslovskaya and Svetogorsk) implies transition of cargo flow to Priozersk direction. This part of the project envisages the following:
- reconstruction of the existing sector Ruchji – Sosnovo – Losevo;
- construction of new double-track electrified line from Losevo to Kamennogorsk (68 лшдщьуеукы);
- construction of the second electrified track from Kamennogorsk to Vyborg (40 kilometers);