The Latvian Railways is ready to lease some of its unused locomotives to Ukraine. Taiwans Gunars, the production director at the LDZ rolling stock service, announced this at the international conference "Carriage Construction and Repair of Rolling Stock" in Kyiv on Tuesday, October 24, the Interfax Ukraine news agency reports.
"We have free locomotives because our carriers are looking at locomotives with the capacity of 6,000 horsepower. Since we – the rolling stock service – are the owners of this fleet of rolling stock, I think we could lease to Ukraine until you solve your traction problems. We are ready," he said.
As reported earlier, the Latvian Railways will extend the service lives of its old diesel locomotives by 30 years. As a result of modernization of its 2M62UM locomotives, their efficiency will increase by 50%.
The issue of shortage of rolling stock and its critical depreciation has been raised repeatedly. The acting board chairman of the Ukrainian Railways public joint-stock company (Ukrzaliznytsia), Yevhen Kravtsov, said in August that the company was considering leasing locomotives from the Baltic States as one of the options for replenishing its fleet of rolling stock during peak periods of cargo transportation.
Earlier, the Ministry of Infrastructure announced that Georgia could provide up to 40 locomotives to Ukraine during peak transportation periods in autumn.
The Lithuanian Railways transferred upgraded 2M62K-1163 diesel locomotives to Ukraine in 2015.
