RAIL SHUTTLE TO LINK AIRPORTS AND CITY CENTRE

Comfortable trains travel non-stop to Moscow’s three main (Domodedovo, Vnukovo, Sheremetyevo) from the city centre every hour or every 30 minutes during the rush hour.

Aeroexpress cars are equipped with everything you need for a comfortable journey. Each car has soft individual seats, air conditioning, several televisions which show short films, clips and a creeping line with current information.

Aeroexpress terminals are located at Paveletsky, Kievsky, Belorussky railway stations, where you can register for your flight and check-in your luggage. Having arrived at the airport you can use a trolley for any luggage that you have decided to bring on a plane and go to the registration desk.

Our Aeroexpress rail-air links save you significant amounts of time. All the terminals are in the city centre and close to underground stations. Travel time is between 30-40 minutes. Passengers have no problems with baggage since they can check it in at the station and get it again at their destination airport.

Train timetables are synchronized with the departures schedule and security officers from the airports accompany the trains.

rush hour – час пик

creeping line – бегущая строка

trolley – тележка

MOSCOW-ST. PETERSBURG TRAIN SETS NEW RECORD

The ER-200 express, departing from Moscow for St. Petersburg, arrived at its destination half and hour earlier than scheduled. By covering the distance between Russia's northern and southern capitals in 3 hours and 54 minutes, it set an absolute record for this route,

«There is no one to meet us», people in the driver's cabin noted with deep satisfaction. «No wonder: neither the passengers nor their friends in St. Petersburg  who expected them to arrive 26 minutes later had an inkling that was a special train that had set out to break the four-hour barrier. Throughout the trip the drivers fought hard for every minute, every second even. And though a power black out near the city of Tver set us back a whole six minutes, and we had to work like mad to make up for lost time, the barrier was broken».

The result that has been achieved thus far is not going to affect train schedules noticeably, although we will work to cut the travel time. We have done this just to see what we can do. Making this kind of speed a standard, however, will take a good deal of improvement, above all in the quality of railroad tracks.

As a matter of fact, to make this speed journey possible, the Oktyabrskaya main line that links Moscow and St. Petersburg had to undergo large scale modernization. Even so, the ER-200 cannot go at 200 kph throughout the route. Its average speed is just 140 kph.

Still, passengers got a chance to choose between travelling by plane or by train. Railroad operators are making no secret of their intention to compete with airlines. Counting the time it takes to go to and from the airport, travel time is now the same. Meanwhile, Russia has joined the ranks of countries with a high-speed railway network, of which, until recently, there have been just three: France, Germany, and Japan. True, the Moscow-St. Petersburg route is just the first element of ours. Designed for the 2000-2015 period, a federal high-speed railway transport development program envisages a speed of 160 kph to 200 kph not only for trips to Europe (Helsinki or Berlin) but also to Nizhny Novgorod and Rostov-on-Don.

neither...nor... —ни...ни...

black-out — отключение

make up — наверстывать

as a matter of fact — на самом деле

large-scale — широкомасштабный

compete — конкурировать

envisage – рассматривать

ACROSS THE KERCH STRAIT BRIDGE BUILDING

The Kerch Strait Bridge is a road-rail bridge under construction by the Russian Federation, to span the Strait of Kerch between the Kerch Peninsula of Crimea and the Taman Peninsula of Krasnodarsky Kray. The current connection is by the Kerch Strait ferry between Port Kavkaz and Port Krym.

In May 2015, the construction of the bridge commenced; the road bridge is projected to be opened on December 2018 with completion of the rail link delayed until the end of 2019.

The Russian government's draft resolution of 1 September 2014 requires the bridge to have four lanes of vehicle traffic and two railway lines. It would probably need to be 4.5 kilometres long, and 60 metres high. The final design has not been selected, however it may be a steel lattice truss bridge: either a 2-deck bridge with vehicles on the upper deck and trains running beneath, or, parallel trusses with trains on one side, vehicles on the other side. A truss bridge will require dozens of pilings, which will impact the current flowing underneath, and the deep water channel would present a challenge to shipping. A suspension bridge with a high would be better for shipping, but would present a major construction challenge.

Peninsula - полуостров

four lanes - четырехрядный

lattice bridge решётчатый мост

truss bridge - мост со сквозными фермами (балками)

piling - свайное основание

clearance - пролёт моста

METRO BUILDERS IN SIBERIA

More than a hundred Muscovites helped to build Siberia's first underground rail line (nine kilometres and five stations) in Novosibirsk. Muscovites took part in designing and putting together the tunnel shields and the building of the tunnels and the stations. The weather is freezing here, and since the granite and marble finishing slabs for the stations were frozen, we've got to warm them before they can be used. Before our work crew came to Siberia, we had worked at Metro projects all over the country, and nowhere else did we meet so many difficulties as we met here. The average annual temperature in Novosibirsk is below the freezing point, but we didn't realize how many problems that would pose. For example before starting the finishing work for the stations' surface entrances we had to build heated shelters for them. Generally speaking, much of the work we did here during the winter is usually done in summer at other Metro projects. The summer here is very short and if we followed the usual practice, we would have dragged out the construction for another five years.

Builders from different place also worked on the project, since it is usual for Metro builders to pool efforts when a city undertakes such a major project. When we're through with our work here we'll go back to Moscow. And we'll return to Siberia because there are blueprints for the construction of Metro also in Omsk, Krasnoyarsk and Irkutsk.

shield — проходческий щит

finishing — отделочный

drag out — затягивать

pool efforts — объединять усилия

to be through with — закончить

blueprint — проект