Ukrainian standard gauge railway plan 27/05/22

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Source: Ukrainian standard gauge railway plan | News | Railway Gazette International

 

Ukraine: a desire to gradually switch to uic 1.435mm gauge

A desire to gradually switch to UIC 1.435mm gauge?– Ukraine, a country at war as we know, seems to absolutely want to turn its back on everything that represents Russia. One of the symbols that brings us back to a nation now considered hostile is the gauge of the railways: Ukraine has about 21,600 km of lines with the Russian gauge of 1,520mm, a legacy of the former Soviet Union and its successors. . A gauge also adopted by Finland, the Baltic states, Belarus and even Moldova. Announcing a series of infrastructural and regulatory measures aimed at integrating Ukraine more closely into European Union transport networks, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said his country will begin the gradual construction of railways that meet European standards. In question : agricultural exports that are normally shipped by sea through Black Sea ports, but are currently being blockaded by Russia as part of its invasion of southern and eastern Ukraine. The idea would be to do without ports and turn to Europe to export wheat in particular. The gauge differences between the 1,520mm Ukrainian and the 1,435mm UIC in Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania require transshipment from one train to another or the use of special rolling stock for the change of gauge rather than of standard wagons widely available. Upgrading the Ukrainian network to UIC standards could avoid these transhipments. However, a full-scale conversion program to UIC gauge would be a major undertaking and would take years.


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