Caucuses Railway to Restart

St. Petersburg Times, Russia
Nov 9 2004

MOSCOW – Transportation ministries of Russia, Georgia, Armenia
and Azerbaijan are entertaining plans to revive traffic on the
Trans-Caucasus Railway, which was severed by a war outbreak in Abkhazia
and Nagorny Karabakh.

“The countries’ presidents, transportation authorities and business
representatives have expressed support for this project, which will
revitalize transport links between our countries,” Transportation
Minister Igor Levitin told reporters last week after an earlier visit
to Georgia. Levitin said that a company would be set up to restore
and operate the Trans-Caucasus Railway, which crosses the territory
of Georgia and Armenia and has access to Turkey’s railway network.

Russian Railways, or RZD, will participate in the company from the
Russian side, Levitin said.

The railway, stretching 2,300 kilometers in Soviet times, connected
Black Sea ports with central Russia, operated passenger services to
vacation resorts and handled more than 15 million tons of transit
cargo per year. Levitin said that Georgia has promised to provide
information on the condition of the railway later this month.