One of the largest forwarding companies in Ukraine, Transgarant Ukraine (a subsidiary of the Russian-based Transgarant, which is part of the FESCO group), imported more than 60 railcars manufactured in 1991 into Ukraine in September this year.
The company delivered Azerbaijani railcars manufactured in the period of 1975-1990 to the country before that, the Business Capital publication reports.
"Before the end of the year, Russian officials are promising to draft a new, stricter provision on extending the service lives of railcars. Therefore, there is little doubt that Russian operators will gradually ‘pour’ their old railcar fleet into Ukraine,” the publication wrote.
The publication believes that the crisis among Ukrainian railcar manufacturers, which have already lost several billion hryvnia in revenues this year because of a reduction in orders for their products from Russia, will continue as a result.
"The consequences of operating old railcars can be disastrous: accidents will increase and speeds will reduce (to prevent worn trains from crumbling on the road). This could offset the effect of the upgrade of Ukrzaliznytsia’s fleet of freight cars (Ukrzaliznytsia intends to buy about 6,000 gondola cars before the end of the year)," the publication wrote.
