New rail route connects the northern Chinese city of Shenyang and the Russian city of Samara. The first freight train will leave on March 23. Cargo in Shenyang will be collected from Ningbo, Guangzhou, Tianjin, Qingdao and Dalian by road and rail.

From Shenyang, the train will depart via Manzhouli-Zabaikalsk and travel via the Trans-Siberian railway to the Bezymyanka terminal in Samara, Russia. From here, the cargo will be distributed to other areas of Russia. Due to the fact that the goods go to Samara, which the Volga River flows through, the new route was called “Volga Express”.

It is understood that the new route will mainly serve the consumer goods sector. The transport and delivery times are yet to be announced.

infrastructure bottlenecks

Due to the increased demand for Russian and Chinese freight, transport times and efficiency have been somewhat limited. At present, however, the slow pace of cargo transport from China to Russia is not due to a lack of new routes, but rather to existing infrastructure bottlenecks that cannot be bypassed.