On June 26th Russia and Abkhazia resumed passenger train services between Adler, Sochi and Gagra, Abkhazia. The train travels twice a day – at 7:05 AM from Adler’s train station, and back at 17:57 (5:57 PM) back the same day. The over two hours trip includes two ten minutes stops for passport control on both Russian and Abkhazian sides. Passengers do not leave the train for this procedure. More trains are expected to operate on this route in the near future.

The passenger train service between Sochi and Abkhazia was active in years 2003-2004, back then around 400 people traveled during each ride. It is hoped that resuming of the Sochi-Abkhazia train service will help to unload automotive Russia-Abkhazia border crossings, which increased in the recent years, and reaching 35000 people per day.

After a recent comment to a year old post about plans of a high-speed train from Moscow to Sochi, I decided to collect bits and pieces of what I know on a subject into a post.

“Sapsan”

• Russian Railways already sign a contract to buy 8 highspeed trains (“Sapsan” / Velaro RUS platform) from Siemens. They are to be used to connect Moscow with Sant-Petersburg, Nizhniy Novgorod, and possibly Sochi.
• First commercial use of this train is schedilered for December 18th this year, between St.-Pete and Moscow.
• The trains will use existing tracks, but the infrastructure will have to be modernized, and schedulers re-worked. This work for Msk-SPb trains is completed.
• 10 carts, carrying around 600 passengers
• Technical possibility of 250-330 km/hr, but for now will operate ~200 km/h, and even slower close to the cities.
• Planned 3 hrs 30 min – 3 hrs 45 min one way ride to SPb, 4 hrs to N. Novgorod, 17 hrs to Sochi
• Ticket price is still unknown at this point, even for Msk-SPb rides. But they’ll have to compete with 1500-2000 rub regular train tickets, and ~2000+ rub airplane tickets.

What are Sochi’s chances

According to an article on rbc.ru, it sound like a solid plans.

• September 22, 2009 – just yesterday – Russian Railways presented “Sapsan” in Rostov. Why in Rostov? Probably because it’s largest city on Russia’s south, and maybe train will make a stop there(?)
• The test rides in Russia’s south will begin on September 24 – thats tomorrow – on RZDs’ testing track Belorechenskaya – Maykop. And Moscow – Sochi high speed train should start running after the tests are completed.

“Sapsan” train. Photo source ru_railway

You can find more photos of this train, exterior and interior, here: community.livejournal.com/ru_railway/

Tender will be announced for the constructtion of the high speed railway between Sochi and Moscow in the near future. «Russian Railways» in partnership with Canadian Bombardier and Italian Finnmechanica announced that will compete for this project. Their $19.6 bln plan is to modernize existing infrastructure, and have trains going with max speeds of 200 km/h (125 m/h) and reaching final destination in just 15.5 hours. Night time rides will be setup, so passengers could get on the train in the evening, and arrive to Sochi next morning.