The Night Express high-speed train No. 149 will begin its first journey on the Kyiv - Ivano-Frankivsk route at 22:27 on 17 January 2017. The journey will take nine hours, but its main feature is that the train will be composed of transformer railcars.
The CFTS reported this, citing Wojciech Balczun, the board chairman of the Ukrainian Railways public joint-stock company (Ukrzaliznytsia).
"The main feature of the train is the new transformer railcars that make up the train. These new railcars are equipped with furniture that transform. We received them in late December last year. They allow transportation of passengers with both sitting and sleeping railcars. This will greatly increase transport comfort and the efficiency of the rolling stock. For example, this rolling stock can be used to perform three trips per day on routes of up to 500 kilometers and two per day on routes of up to 800 kilometers. On this particular trip, passengers will also save time: a trip to Ivano-Frankivsk will take less than nine hours instead of the current 11 hours," Balczun wrote on his Facebook page.
Ukrzaliznytsia recently announced that the route of this train could be extended to the resort cities of Vorokhta and Yaremche in the Carpathian Mountains during peak demand.
Ukrzaliznytsia bought 13 transformer railcars from the Kryukov Railcar Building Works. Overall, contracts for supply of 21 passenger cars were concluded with the Kryukov Railcar Building Works in 2016.
According to the timetable published on the website of Ukrzaliznytsia, the train’s travel time will be 9 hours 03 minutes. It will arrive in Ivano-Frankivsk at 07:30 and pass through the Lviv train station (arrival at 04:58 and departure at 05:18).
