Loss-making at Railway Passenger Traffic Reaches 30%

The cost of passenger transportation by railway transport exceeds the annual income from ticket sales by 20-30%. However, CJSC Azerbaijani Railways (AR) has no plans to increase ticket prices, the head of the AR passenger traffic department Elyar Muradov told Turan.

Losses formed on passenger transport are covered by other revenues of AR.

Since last year, the authority to determine the rates for rail transportation within the country has been handed over by the Head of State to the management of AR CJSC. Last time the fare for travel on railway wagons was revised in January 2011.

Passenger traffic on the railway from Baku to the west and along the route Baku-Tbilisi grows during public holidays. For example, according to the press service of AR, from 28 December to 4 January 37.4 thousand people were transported to these areas. At the same time, it is necessary to consider that in the opposite direction the trains come back half empty. If the trains normally transport about 2,000 passengers a day, on holidays this figure exceeds 4.6 thousand people. Therefore, for 8 days trains hitch a total of 104 cars additionally.

According to the committee, the use of passenger railway transport in Azerbaijan continues to decline. During 11 months of 2015, 1.7 million people used AR services, which is 25.6% less than in the comparable period in 2014. This is despite the fact that since September 2015 the line Baku-Sumgayit-Baku received three comfortable double-decker train brand KISS produced by Stadler Rail Group. These trains operate 20 routes a day in both directions. This year, the number of trains will reach 5. -08B