JSC Russian Railways Kaliningrad Railway. Kaliningrad railway. Brief description, main indicators

Brief description, main indicators

The Kaliningrad Railway is a railway network of main roads and the largest transport and logistics complex in the territory Kaliningrad region. Convenient geographical location, developed track infrastructure on the approaches to ice-free seaports determine its strategic significance and uniqueness.

The road management is located in the city of Kaliningrad near the South Station. There are two locomotive depots: TChE-1 Kaliningrad and TChR-2 Chernyakhovsk, as well as KMDPM Chernyakhovsk and DMV Kaliningrad (MVPS).

By 1941, the extensive railway network of East Prussia was significantly longer than the modern one. On the land of the Third Reich, in addition to the main sections of the broad gauge, a network of narrow gauge tracks was built.

The restoration of railway tracks and stations was carried out by the Department engineering troops 3rd Belorussian Front, and then the Special Military District and railway troops, still during the fighting.

Railroad communication was of utmost importance for the Red Army, but the narrow-gauge railways of East Prussia created problems in their operation due to the lack of suitable traction stock and wagons. We had to hastily “change” the European gauge (1435 mm) to a width of 1524 mm and ensure the passage of our trains with cargo for the needs of the front.

This work was difficult and time-consuming, and was carried out using electric welding, since the rail-sleeper grid was all metal. Our soldiers called the metal sleepers “troughs.” But restoration work progressed at an accelerated pace. Already on the third day after the liberation of Königsberg from the Nazis, on April 12, 1945, the first echelons arrived in the city. Under shelling in winter, about 200 km of track, bridges and overpasses were restored.

The Kaliningrad railway is an important part of transport links throughout the Kaliningrad region. IN this moment it exists as a branch of Russian Railways OJSC. It was formed as a separate unit in 1992, after the collapse of the Baltic Railway. The corresponding resolution was issued Federal Council of Ministers. The road management is located in Kaliningrad, at the address: Kyiv street, building 1.

Story

The history of the Kaliningrad Railway goes back to 1939. It was then that this section of railway communication appeared on the territory of East Prussia.

After the Great Patriotic War part of East Prussia, in particular the territories where the Kaliningrad region is now located, passed to the USSR.

Integration with the Soviets began in 1946. Almost all local railway lines, especially those going to neighboring Poland, were dismantled. In all other sections of the railway, the lines were changed to the Russian gauge, which, as is known, differs from the European one since tsarist times.

Before the Kaliningrad railway became a branch of JSC Russian Railways, there was a Kaliningrad branch of the road. Periodically, it was part of the Lithuanian Railways (during two periods - from 1946 to 1953 and from 1956 to 1963). Between these two periods, the Kaliningrad road was part of the Baltic. And from 1963 until the collapse Soviet Union was part of the Baltic Railways.

Peculiarities

At the same time, all sections of the Kaliningrad railway, without exception, were not changed. The exception was the areas that provided transport connection region with neighboring states.

Moreover, one such site has survived to this day. Until recently, the Kaliningrad-Gdynia-Berlin train ran on a railway track with a width of 1435 millimeters, like in Europe. The train did not change tracks. IN Lately this route has been cancelled.

Railway boundaries

Since the Kaliningrad region is the only one in Russia that does not border with any other domestic region, the railway connection here is special.

Kaliningrad Railway, whose borders coincide with state borders neighboring countries, adjoins two border railway sections.

They are on the routes from Sovetsk to Pagegiai and from Chernyshevsky to Kibartai. And also the Polish State Railways - on the section from Mamonovo to Braniewo. There is one track on it, the tracks on which are different.

Passenger service

Only two lines are electrified throughout the entire Kaliningrad region. The railroad equipped them for commuter traffic near regional center. Moreover, there are two in the region. One of them is in Kaliningrad, and the other is in the east of the region, in Chernyakhovsk.

The Kaliningrad railway, whose length is more than 1,800 kilometers, provides a rich suburban connection.

Thus, six pairs of trains depart daily to the main Baltic resort of the Amber Region - the city of Svetlogorsk. The same number of buses run daily between Zelenogradsk and Kaliningrad. There is another railway line in the direction of the Baltic Sea - this is Zelenograd - Pionersky. Two or three pairs of electric trains operate on it every day.

In other directions, suburban connections are provided much less frequently. So, one train goes to Baltiysk per day, and then only on weekdays. The situation is the same with trains to Strelnya and Chernyakhovsk.

One train a day, regardless of the red days of the calendar, goes to Sovetsk. Another one - to Mamonov. But on weekends his route is shortened to Ladushkin.

Stations of the Kaliningrad road

The Kaliningrad Railway has an extensive network throughout the region. There are stations in all directions. In total, including railway platforms, there are several dozen of them. The largest are located in Kaliningrad, Svetlogorsk, Zelenogradsky, Pionersky, Sovetsk and Baltiysk.

But there are also quite large stations in smaller ones. populated areas. These are Bagrationovsk, Gvardeysk, Guryevsk-Novy, Gusev, Zheleznodorozhny, Znamensk, Ladushkin, Mamonovo, Nesterov, Polessk, Chernyakhovsk and Yantarny.

True, not all of these stations are currently operational. For example, in Yantarny the railway tracks have not been used for several years due to low profitability. Which, of course, affects economic development urban district, its tourism potential.

Branded train "Yantar"

The calling card of the Kaliningrad Railways is the Yantar, which follows the route Kaliningrad - Moscow. It appeared back in 1964.

Currently, on his way he passes through Belarus. On its way there are cities such as Vilnius, Minsk, Vitebsk, Smolensk and Vyazma, with a final stop in the capital of Russia.

The train consists of seven compartment cars, one of which is intended for persons with disabilities. disabilities. It also includes seven reserved seat cars, one SV (superior comfort) car and one restaurant car.

IN Soviet time By the way, the length of the train was no less than 18-20 cars. IN last years Due to the drop in passenger traffic, the number of carriages decreased.

The appearance of the train has changed several times over the years. Only yellow and blue colors in its design, which symbolize amber and the Baltic Sea respectively.

To purchase a ticket for this train, you must have a foreign passport. At the same time, it is not at all necessary to have a visa, despite the fact that the train passes through the territory of Lithuania, which is part of the European Union. There are agreements between Lithuania and Russia to issue passengers a simplified transit railway visa, which is issued by the consul directly in the carriage. It is valid for three months for round trip travel.

Due to the requirements for a foreign passport, you cannot buy a ticket online to Kaliningrad.

Kaliningrad Railway educated in 1992 within the boundaries of the former Kaliningrad branch of the Baltic Railway.

Due to its enclave position, the road does not have common borders with Russian railways and in the transportation system is connected with the railways of Russia and the CIS countries through the railways of Lithuania and Belarus. Transportation is carried out through neighboring states: Lithuania - through two land border crossings (Nesterov-Kybartai, Sovetsk-Pagegiai) and Poland - through three border crossings (Mamonovo-Branewo, Bagrationovsk-Bartoszyce, Zheleznodorozhny-Skandava). By its specifics, the road is unloading - the volume of processing of export-import cargo from the total cargo turnover is 85%.

A unique feature of the highway, located in the zone of trans-European international transport corridors No. 1 “Riga-Kaliningrad-Gdansk” and No. 9 “Kiev-Minsk-Vilnius-Kaliningrad” and which distinguishes it favorably from other transport hubs of the country is the presence of a double gauge: narrow European and standard Russian. And the extensive network of access roads to sea ports and terminals determines the universality of transit along the Kaliningrad railway, both through sea and land border crossings.

The main volume of transportation of foreign trade goods is carried out through sea border crossings along stations: Kaliningrad, Baltiysk and Baltic Les. The main range of goods transported by road are oil and petroleum products, specific gravity of which is 50%, ferrous metals 16%, chemical and mineral fertilizers 6%, timber 5%), coke, construction, coal 4%.

The highway closely interacts with ports, serving 2 seaports (commercial and fishing) and 1 river port, 6 terminals for transshipment of petroleum products and 2 terminals for transshipment of grain cargo.

Kaliningrad territorial center of corporate transport services, structural subdivision TCFTO - a branch of JSC Russian Railways. Today, the services of this structure are used by about 800 shippers and consignees and 40 forwarding companies, including companies engaged in international transportation.

In order to support enterprises of all industries focused on the transportation of goods by rail, JSC Russian Railways has developed a set of anti-crisis measures aimed at maximizing the simplification of planning the volume of cargo transportation. The time frame for approving shippers' requests has been reduced to 1 day for direct railway traffic, and to 3 days for direct international traffic with the CIS and Baltic countries, up to 5 days - in international traffic with third countries, a mechanism has been introduced to permit the loading of goods with a deferment of freight payments under appropriate bank guarantees. Opportunities are expanding electronic system ETRAN in the segment of remote interaction between the shipper and the railway, including the ability to generate applications for the transportation of goods, invoices signed with an electronic digital signature.

Key indicators of the Kaliningrad Railway in 2016:

Operating length - 668 km
- Number of employees – 3,777 people.
- Cargo transported – 10.7 million tons

Passengers transported:

· in long-distance communication – 0.5 million people.

· in suburban traffic – 3 million people.

By the decision of the Board of JSC Russian Railways, based on the results of work in 2014, the Kaliningrad Infrastructure Directorate was recognized as the best on the Russian railway network. Also, the winners of the industry competition in the fourth quarter of 2014 were determined by the company’s Board of Directors to identify four more enterprises operating at the Kaliningrad Railway testing site.

In particular, the first place based on the results of work in the fourth quarter of 2014 among specialized enterprises was awarded to the Kaliningrad Directorate for the Management of the Terminal and Warehouse Complex and the Kaliningrad Operational Carriage Depot, second place to the team of the Kaliningrad Traffic Control Directorate, third place to the Kaliningrad Directorate of Passenger Facilities.

Thus, almost all key enterprises of the production block have achieved high performance in operational work.

The Kaliningrad Railway is the smallest of the Russian Railways divisions, both in terms of kilometers (only 618 km) and in terms of quality indicators of passenger and cargo transportation.
The fate of the railways in these places largely repeats the fate of this region - the once northern part of German East Prussia.
By the 1940s, the length of railways here exceeded 1,500 km, which was quite consistent with the population density, economic development and dense urban network. The main line then was Tilsit (Sovetsk) - Insterburg (Chernyakhovsk) - Gerdauen (Zheleznodorozhny), which connected East Prussia with St. Petersburg by the shortest route.
After the war, many railways were not restored, nor was the previous standard of living and economic development.
On the surviving lines, the volume of passenger and freight traffic has decreased significantly.
Railways of East Prussia before and after the Second World War:

Only major dismantled lines are shown.
In Soviet times, the railway in the region developed much more slowly in comparison with other branches of the Baltic Railway. This was due to both the deterioration geographical location roads, and with the availability large quantity military facilities and closed cities (which especially affected the state of passenger infrastructure), and with the general lack of investment in railway transport in the Kaliningrad region in comparison with railway transport in the rest of the Soviet Baltic states.
In fact, the only significant innovation after the war was the conversion of railway lines from European to Russian gauge.
Electrification was insignificant, as in the neighboring Baltic republics (about 10% of the total length of the network), and was carried out according to a similar type - for the movement of electric trains in the suburban area.
After 1991, a slow stagnation began, which was initially expressed in a decrease in the number of train pairs, deterioration technical condition railway infrastructure. There were almost no line closures, unlike the previous period, the only exception being the “mothballed” line along the coast of the Sambian Peninsula (Svetlogorsk - Yantarny - Primorsk). In general, during the 1990s and almost all of the 2000s, the railway in the region operated without any significant changes.
As in the rest of the Russian Railways area, more significant deterioration began after 2009. Over the subsequent years, almost a third of the region’s lines were left without commuter passenger service, and traffic volumes on the rest decreased by one and a half to two times.
The current situation on the Kaliningrad Railway:

This time my acquaintance with the railways of the region began with resort town Svetlogorsk
Dead-end station Svetlogorsk II:

Svetlogorsk I station:

There are still quite a lot of electric trains left on the “resort” lines (in summer more than 10 pairs daily, in winter - about 6). However, train occupancy is low, which is due both to the huge number of used German buses traveling on the same routes and to the low speed of trains.
The main competitive advantage of suburban railway transport in the Kaliningrad region remains its relatively low tariff.

The situation is similar at Zelenogradsk station, the final point of another electrified line from Kaliningrad:

The “mothballed” line Svetlogorsk - Primorsk in the area of ​​the village of Yantarny:

The main railway junction is Kaliningrad. Seven railway lines still converge there - according to this indicator, Kaliningrad is among the top five leaders in the country (after Moscow, St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg, along with Bataysk).
Suburban service is still maintained on all lines from the regional center - although not everywhere daily. Long-distance trains run only on one line towards Moscow.
Königsberg once had several train stations for different directions, but by 1929 it was built main station(now Kaliningrad-Yuzhny):

In addition to the Southern Station, there is also the Northern Station, a hub for lines in the northern and northeastern directions - to the resorts of Svetlogorsk and Zelenogradsk, as well as to Sovetsk. It once served as a terminal station for some commuter trains; the station building was not much inferior to the South Station building:

However, now everything commuter trains- transit, and the Northern Station, in fact, has become a simple stopping point in the historical center of the city:

The only train for which the Northern Station is the final station is the recently launched city rail bus Northern Station - Kyiv.

In my opinion, this is almost the only positive change on the Kaliningrad railway in recent decades. Thus, Kaliningrad became one of the few cities in Russia with internal railway transport; The city train connects the city center and the outlying southern residential areas, allowing passengers to bypass the traffic-clogged narrow streets of the South Station area. There are six flights per day in each direction - three in the morning and evening rush hours. Despite some special status, incomes above the national average and claims to German heritage, Kaliningrad in terms of urban governance remains a typical Russian province, as a result - traffic jams here are comparable to those in Moscow, with the difference that you cannot get around them by metro.
The occupancy of the Kaliningrad es-bann carriage is not bad for a route of two stations:

Southern terminus - Kyiv:

After Kaliningrad I went to the northeast, then to the east and south of the region.
Polessk station on the Kaliningrad (Kutuzovo-Novoe) - Sovetsk line:

A typical stopping point for the Kaliningrad region in rural areas- Rzhevskoye:

Sovetsk was once a large station, a junction of four railway lines - to Kaliningrad, to Neman and Nesterov, to Chernyakhovsk and towards Siauliai and Klaipeda. The railway connection here suffered greatly back in Soviet times, when they did not restore the line to Nesterov, and by now the station has actually become a dead end. Suburban service exists only in the direction of Kaliningrad (once a day), long-distance trains no, there are only a few freight trains along the once main line Daugavpils - Sovetsk - Chernyakhovsk.
The station is borderline, all blocked off by fences, so only a photo of the station area ( Train Station- on right):

View of the border Neman from the Queen Louise Bridge, on the left - Sovetsk, in the background - the railway bridge:

Chernyakhovsk station is the second railway junction in the region after the regional center:

However, in Chernyakhovsk, suburban traffic remains only in the direction of Kaliningrad, PDSs go only along the main line now Nesterov - Chernyakhovsk - Kaliningrad.
Here the feeling of provincialism of the Kaliningrad region found another confirmation - a local Russian Railways security guard forbade me to film; When I said that unprofessional filming was allowed, he replied that he would find a reason to detain me.

Like the village, the war bypassed the station - however, the years of Soviet management did not bypass it.
But a lot has survived.

Since 2009, passenger trains have also bypassed the station.

As he told me local, working on the railway, the only traffic here is a few cars with components and spare parts for the Avtotor car assembly plant in Kaliningrad.
A striking feature of the Kaliningrad Railway is that on average the occupancy rate of diesel trains is higher than the occupancy rate of electric trains, especially diesel trains southern directions. This may be due to both unusual high speed diesel trains, and with a more significant reduction in pairs of trains on non-electrified lines.
And - for a snack - another border station Mamonovo: