OREANDA-NEWS. July 22, 2013. Russian Railways continues to implement the project "Integrated Reconstruction of the Railway Stretch Mga - Gatchina - Vaimarn - Ivangorod and the Railway Approaches to Ports on the Southern Shore of the Gulf of Finland," which aims to increase trade turnover between Russia and the European Union through the port of Ust-Luga.

In the first six months of 2013, Russian Railways invested a total of 7.3 billion roubles in the stretch between Mga - Gatchina - Vaimarn - Ivangorod and the railway approaches to the ports on the southern coast of the Gulf of Finland.

In accordance with the established parameters of the investment budget for 2013-2015 at Russian Railways, capital investment for continuing to implement the project "Integrated Reconstruction of the Railway Stretch Mga - Gatchina - Vaimarn - Ivangorod and Railway Approaches to Ports on the Southern Shore of the Gulf of Finland" in 2013 is capped at 10.7 billion roubles.

This year, the main effort of the project and contracting organisations is focused on the work on the Luga railway hub, including train approaches. Thus, in particular, the 7th phase of reconstructing Mga station will begin, which provides for the full-scale launch of electric switching points and traffic lights.

In addition, the railway overpass near Vladimir station is due to be opened and this year, the construction of Phase 1 of an outbound yard with 10 tracks at the Luga-Sorting station will be underway and work performed on a sorting yard and a recentering yard.

Also due to be commissioned this year are Phase 1 at Luga-General station (3 tracks) and the new terminals and connecting tracks (2.25 km) at Luga-North station, as well as an additional main line on the stretch between Luga-Sorting – Luga-North – Luga-Oil, a distance of 11.5 km.

The project to reconstruct the stretch between Mga - Gatchina - Vaimarn - Ivangorod and the railway approaches to ports on the southern coast of the Gulf of Finland began in 2005.

The reconstruction includes strengthening the electrification between Mga - Gatchina (44 km) due to the increased weight norm for trains, lengthening the receiving and departure tracks at 19 stations to 1050 m, laying continuous second main line tracks totalling 159.1 km, constructing a 4.7 km railway bypass around Kotly station, electrifying the stretches between Gatchina - Ivangorod, Vaimarn - Kotly, Kotly - Ust-Luga and Kotly - Kalishche, a total length of 180.1 km and constructing the new station Luga-Sorting so it can receive transit trains and 5 approach stations at the port of Ust-Luga (Luga-North, Luga-South, Luga-Oil, Luga-General, Luga-East), as well as the connecting tracks between them.

Since construction began on the project, capital investment has amounted to 64.4 billion roubles, including 22.2 billion roubles for the Ust-Luga railway hub. At the same time, facilities costing 37.7 billion roubles have been commissioned, including 7.9 billion roubles for the Ust-Luga railway.

Continuous track totalling 156 km has been installed on the second tracks between Mga - Gatchina - Vaimarn - Luga-Sorting and, with the exception of Mga station, the full reconstruction of the port approach stations Luga-Oil, Luga-North, South-Luga and Luga-Sorting (Phase 1 - 3 tracks) has been completed.