Estonia, Good for Business, Railways, Transport

The Estonian state-owned Elron, formerly called Elektriraudtee, operates starting 2014 both electric commuter trains in Tallinn and its vicinity and intercity diesel trains that were formerly operated by Edelaraudtee.

Elron's Sales and Development Manager Ronnie Kongo also pointed out that last year's record passenger number results from the new services. "We believe that an increasing number of people are discovering the advantages of train traffic and the number of passengers will grow in the future too, but certainly at a slower pace than before," said Kongo.

This year, Elron has set a goal to serve 6.2 million passengers.

Kongo said that last year the most actively used line was Tallinn-Paldiski where 1.13 million trips were made. In terms of ticket revenue, however, the Tallinn-Tartu line leads as over a third of Elron's ticket revenue comes from there.

Elron earned an income of EUR 10.082 million from ticket sales, or 58% more than the comparable figure in 2013. "This year we have set a target of ticket revenues of 11.5 million euros," said Ronnie Kongo.