OREANDA-NEWS. February 10, 2014. During a conference call, Vladimir Yakunin, President of Russian Railways, summed up the railway network's operational performance in January 2014.

Yakunin said that in the previous month, tariff freight turnover had increased by 7.1% compared to January 2013 and by 9.1% taking into account empty wagon runs. Average daily loading in January amounted to 3,105,400 tons, 0.2 % above the target and 1.2% more than in January last year.

"We see that the growth rate in turnover significantly exceeds the growth rate in loading. This is contributing to a significant increase in export shipments through Russian ports, even though domestic traffic is stagnant," said Vladimir Yakunin.

Yakunin also noted an improvement in the quality of organising and managing operational work on the railway network. Targets had been met with regard to most basic quality indicators of operational performance and were better than last year's level. Thus, the average weight of freight trains had increased by 0.5% compared to the figure in January 2013.

The average through speed of laden trains increased by 118 km per day to 656 km per day (excluding losses beyond the responsibility of Russian Railways).