Russian Railways increases transportation of export freight along BAM and Trans-Sib by more than 6% in January-July
During January to July 2020, Russian Railways transported 85.6 million tons of export cargo in the direction of Eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East along the Baikal-Amur and Trans-Siberian mainlines, which is 6.4% more than in the same period last year. It is also 41% more compared to January - July 2012, before the first stage of modernisation work on the railways in Eastern Russia began.
With 61.9 million tons, coal and ores accounted for most of the export traffic in this direction, 7.4% more than in the same period last year and twice as much as during the same seven months in 2012.
In addition, BAM and the Trans-Siberian transported 339,500 Twenty-Foot Equivalent Unit (TEUs) containers with export cargo in January-July 2020, 35% more than in the same period last year and 3.5 times more than during the equivalent seven months of 2012.
The increase in traffic volumes was due to large-scale infrastructure development, as well as technical and technological measures, including the renewal of the locomotive fleet, an increase in the mass and length of trains, the optimisation of the timetable and more frequent services.