“Important for Crimea, the south of Russia and our entire country”: Putin opened railway traffic on the Crimean bridge

Russian President Vladimir Putin traveled by train along the Crimean bridge, thereby opening passenger rail links between the peninsula and the continent. The head of state proceeded from Kerch to Taman.

“It is much softer than the car,” Putin said, comparing the two parts of the bridge across the Kerch Strait.

As explained to the president, this feeling is due to the fact that the railway tracks are laid along a more direct trajectory than a highway that has elevation differences.

The President talked in the cabin with the head of the Ministry of Transport, Eugene Dietrich, who noted that the estimated speed of the bridge reaches 120 km / h. Then the Russian leader moved to the restaurant car. Here the railway workers and builders told him about the progress of the construction of the facility. They also noted that the speed of freight trains, which will begin to move across the bridge in the summer of 2020, will be up to 80 km / h. In addition, it was noted that the construction of the bridge allowed young cadres to gain invaluable experience, which they can apply when implementing other projects.

Having reached Taman, Putin turned to the builders who had gathered there, thanking them for their high-quality and quick work.

“Today we have a pleasant and very important event. It is important for the Crimea, Sevastopol, the entire South of Russia, and for our entire country, because, of course, infrastructure facilities such as the grandiose bridge that you built will affect the entire economy, ”the head of state said.

“You have shown that we can carry out such large-scale projects on the basis of our own technological base. Without any exaggeration, this inspires confidence in almost every one of us that we and other similar projects can and will definitely do in the future, ”the president added.

He also recalled that passenger traffic between St. Petersburg and Sevastopol began 145 years ago.

“We do not start it from the beginning, but restore this movement,” he emphasized.

“Gift for the New Year”

On the same day at 14:00 from St. Petersburg to Sevastopol sent the train number 7/8 "Tavria". The train will cross the Kerch Strait on December 25 at approximately 2:10 - 2:40 Moscow time. He must arrive in Sevastopol 09:25, the travel time will be 43 and a half hours. The train will cover 2471 km, making stops at 20 stations in 9 regions and three cities of federal significance, and will also cross 118 rivers.

The departure of the train from the Moscow railway station of St. Petersburg in the form of a telebridge was observed by the president of the Russian Federation, as well as representatives of the bridge detachments on the Taman Peninsula.

“Good luck!” Putin said before sending the train.

On December 24, the first train from Moscow will leave for Crimea, the travel time of which should be 33 hours. He will leave the capital at 23:44 and will arrive in Simferopol on December 26 at 08:50.

• The first registered staff of Tavria, which went from St. Petersburg to Sevastopol on December 23
• RIA News
• © Alexey Danichev

Kairat Tursunbekov, the head of the PKU Uprdor “Taman”, the construction customer, called the launch of the Crimean Bridge railway in late December “a New Year's gift.”

Ticket sales for trains following the new route started in November. According to the press service of the carrier company "Grand Service Express", more than 50 thousand tickets were sold in the first month. In the first day, the sales rate was approximately three tickets per minute. The minimum fare from Moscow was 2966 rubles, from St. Petersburg - 3500 rubles.

The head of the regional Ministry of Transport, Sergey Karpov, said that by June 1, 2020, rail links with other cities of mainland Russia would be open. Final destinations, in addition to Simferopol and Sevastopol, will be Evpatoria and Theodosius. In the holiday season of 2020, about 3 million passengers can take rail links with Crimea, Kryminform reports with reference to Karpov.

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Unique building

The Crimean bridge has become the longest in Russia and Europe. Its length is 19 km. On it are roads and railways. A team of 15 thousand engineers from all over Russia managed to finish construction in a record four years. The work lasted from February 2016 to December 2019.

According to the Kryminform Center, the construction was carried out round-the-clock in two shifts and did not stop even for a minute, even in difficult weather conditions. As noted, during the construction of the weather station recorded in the Kerch Strait 10 thousand hours of storm.

General Director of SGM-Most Alexander Ostrovsky said that strong wind at the very beginning did not allow even basic structures to be assembled.

“We had to assemble the formwork three times. The first time we assembled the formwork and reinforcement cage. But the meteorological conditions, a raging storm bombed to smithereens. No matter how we defended ourselves, the wind turned out to be stronger than us, ”he explained.

According to him, the offshore operation to install the main arches has become one of the unique construction processes. Workers needed to assemble metal structures on the shore, and then prepare special piers that could withstand the weight of arches - more than five thousand tons.

The Deputy General Director for Infrastructure Projects at Stroygazmontazh Leonid Ryzhenkin, for his part, noted that the construction of the Krymsky Bridge has become a valuable experience for several generations of engineers.

“The team that has developed here is an alloy of experience and skill, youth and gray hair. This is really a team with a certain continuity of generations, and those aksakals, as we call them, they, we believe, have done their job perfectly. They taught a lot to those young people who will continue their work, ”Leonid Ryzhenkin emphasized.

The task of building a road and rail bridge across the Kerch Strait was set by President Vladimir Putin immediately after the reunification of the Crimean Peninsula with Russia as a result of the 2014 referendum. The active phase of the construction of the bridge and approaches to it from the Crimean and Krasnodar sides began in February 2016.

In December 2017, the online voting ended, during which the name of the structure was chosen. As a result, 64% of those who voted chose the Krymsky Bridge option.